The West Virginia journal. [volume] (Charleston, W. Va.) 1864-1877, 1865-07-05

Dem ocracy :(aristOcracy) Of the North.
It.was a convenient. way of&dispensing
with all'the obligations Of duty and jus
ticc to their couutry.. But if this is
true doctrine, what3becomes Of the nat
uralized foreigner? He cannot be o
citizen at all till he Eis first naturalized
as a citizen of tho United States: ! :
Looking to the above: definition Of
voters; in the Constitution Of Ohio we
| find that man may be as ignorant as a
Hotteuto,, as blind as. q bat, t,sana us vii
lainous as Jefferson Davis, and yet be o
voter iu Ohio. 1T is only necessary that
the voter should not be q negro or q
woman. But when we come to vote
with these estimable persons who cannot
1jail, or who have been to schooli that
excellent seminary of morals taught by
Rcverdy johnson; and Edward Bates,
(see their recent letters on oath. taking }
we confess not to see wherein We shall
be greatly injured by, the vote of wo.
man or negro. We, shonld..bo sorry
to believe that any woman or negro. had
descended so low in the scale Of being
as to lie on prmcplcl Yet we see the
majority Of voters in the rebel States are
taught to do this BY eminent lawyers,
aud, US consequence, the majority*of
voters in those States will be rebels,
rccking with the blood Of the slain, and
black with the iniquity Of crime. We
don't believe that this result is to be
much better than negro voting. But
We make no argument for universal suf'
rrugc. On the contrary, We want to
hear an argument from those enlightcn.
cd friends Of universal suffrage, who
have undertaken to ride the Democratic
party over this country,&by. the cxten-
Sion of the ballot. II itsdoes not en-
tighten, it will assurcdly amuse US.
What is the ftncss Of a voter? We
see in Ohio he may be q Laplander, or a
Cossack, but there IS no need that he
should read or write. lie cannot be a
negro, but he may be thief and for
ger. \ woman may not vote, but q
| Turk or Chinese may. If the Ameri'
can voter has either moral or iutellectu-
al qualifications for tho exercise Of suf.
fragc, it is not due to laws and Consti'
tu,ions it is due only to tho church
and the school. But women and nc.
groes can be as highly qualified in the
church and the school as white men,
Laws and Constitutions are no more
than the regulations which direct The
form and mode Of procedure. They are
neither tho power nor the spirit Of our
Government. The power and the spirit
are both in:tbo people. What tho. peo.
pie are, that the Government will be-
We see this in the late war. 1t was car
red on literally by tho people. No
Government on earth could have done
what our Government did because no
other Government rests on the popular
will. IF, fivc years ago, the politicians
had been told that the habeas corpus
would havc been suspended without in.
uuiry; that the President would send
hundreds to prison by arbitrary arrests
that slavery would be destroyed by an
edict of the Government, and forbidden
BY an amendment Of the Constitution,
they would no moro have believed it
than that the skies would fall, or the
earth give up its dead. Yet all this is
done and done simply by the common
sense of the people, who intended to &C.
complish a great end, and usod the
means necessary for that purpose. And
when it is accomplished, every spring
and wheel of political machinery comes
to its old place, and works as quietly and
smoothly as if no shock had ever been
felt. Now, in the future solution Of the
suffrage question, the politician may be
assured that it will not be determined
by what laws and constitutions are, but
by ,chat they ought to be. This is simp'
ly because it is only necessary for the
public will to determine it, und laws and
constitutions will be changed. In the
United States ull fundamental questions
oush. to be discussed ab origine. The
public mind Of the, American people
has advanced immensely in the last thir.
ty years, by means Of the school and
the press. No party juntos and caucuses
will hereafter govern this people,
There is mind enough to discriminate
between truth and fAsehood, the cxpe.
dien, and the inexpedicut. It is in this
new era Of our political being that the
fate of republican institutions is to be
determined. While We we're compare.
tively.a small people, few intelligent
leaders could arrange affairs. There
was vencratiou for great names, a re.
spect for old usages,. an obedience to
party DEGREES but iu great people, on
great continent, all these disappenr.-
OF course, the machinery Of State Gov
erumen,s being already at hand, States
first begin to show the want of cohesion
Secession appears, and we have war to
suppress it. We have surmuunted this
triumphantly. Blu. we are now on the
open sea. What next? We do no,
!. know; but there is happy nusury in
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