The Richmond palladium. [volume] (Richmond, Ind.) 1855-1875, 1865-08-10
Gen. Cox on Reconstruction.


Last week, we published few extracts
from the able and truly eloquent letter o
the Union candidate for Governor o
Ohio. in reply to committee" giving
his views regarding the disposal of the
colored race. We make further extract,
from the same document, believing thai
we could not publish anything on this
''vexed question" more practical or more
acceptable to our readers.
''Hiidreth. in his 'Despotism in Ameri-
ca declared slavery to be in itself a
state of war, and this character is in
delibly impressed upon both races in the
South. The captive learns duplicity
toward his captor, and in the slave il
has become marked characteristic 1t
| is a fair stratagem for which he feels no
guilt. l have seen a master boasting of
the fidelity of his servant, and discussing
the subject of slavery in his presence.
while the negro waited upon him with an
/ impassive humility which would make
/ you believe no intelligent idea of free
| dom had ever penetrated his brain. Yet
l have seen that same negro afterward
! in camp. transformed into a clear headed
ally of our troops, leading them to his
master 5 buried stores. or guiding them
to the fianks of the enemy's lines. with
an intelligence and steadiness of purpose
which left no doubt as To his understand
ing Of the conflict between himself and
his master.
The daily and hourly repetition of
proofs of this fact, many of them too
subtle for description. but none the less
convincing TO the observer, has fully
convinced me that never between Nor
man and Saxon nor between Gaul and
Frank, was there amore conscious hat
red. or antagonism more likely to prove
inveterate. than between black and white
on our Southern soil The negroes will
have no sense of security nor faith in
their former masters, even if they offer
them political rights; they will fear them
as Danoos dona ferentes.
What does history teach us in regard
to the pernanance and durability of
such prejndices and enmities of race?
Speaking on this subject, Angustin
Thierry, in his history of the Roman
Conquest, SAYS: Whatever degree of
territorial unity the great modern States
OF Europe may appear to have attained
whatever may be the community of
manners, language, and Public feeling
which the habit Of living under the same
government, and in the same stage Of
civilation, has introduced among the
inhabitants of each of those States there
Is scarcely one of them which does not
even now present living traces of the
diversity of the races of men, which in
course of time have come together in it.
This variety shows itself under different
aspects, with features more or less
marked Sometimes it is complete
separation of indioms, of local traditions,
of political sentiments, and a sort of
instructive enmity distinguishing from
the great national mass the population
of a few small districts and sometimes
mere difference of dialect or even of
accent, marks though more feebly, the
limit of the settlements of races OF men,
once thoroughly district and hostile to
each other.
If fifteen centuries of common govern
ment and political Union have not been
able to obliterate the distinctions and
even the ''instinctive enmity' of races
which were physiologically similar, what
encouragement have we that success viii
attend a forced political fusion of bitter
ly hostile races from the antipodes of
the human family?
The process by which even the com
parative unity of the English people was
achieved. is described by the same phil
osoph;c historian. whom have quoted
near the close of his great work, as a
complete amalgamation" of the Nor
man and Saxon@idioms, and ..mixture
of the two races which it took four
centuries OF sanguinary war to accom-
plish. -
/ hold that there is great philo.ophic
truth in the words of Guizot, in sum-
ming up the eight centuries of blood
shed out of which the French emerged
into nationality from the petty races and
tribes He SAYS. In the life of nations.
that union which is exterior and visible,
the unity of name and of government,
although important, is by no means the
first in Importance, the most real, or that
which NJ axes indeed one nation There
is unity which is deeper and more
powerful: it is that which results not
merely from identv of government and
of destiny, but from the homogenity
of social elements, from the. likeness of
institutions, of manners. OF ideas. of
tastes, of tongues: the unity which
resided in the men themselves whom So
ciety assemblies. and not in the forms of
th cir associations in short, that moral
unity fanae morale } which is far moro
important than political unity. and which |
is the only solid foundation for the
latter"
l have watched with deep interest the |
educational effect of the war upon our /
own army, and / assure you that whilst |
our white soldiers have uniformly and /
quickly learned to appreciate the fact
that the existence of our free Govern |
ment could only be preserved by the !