The colored Tennessean., 1865-10-14

white man. =
It is very evident, from the acri
mony of the discussion now going
on in the Mississippi and other
Southern newspapers, that the ques-
tion Of allowing the negroes to testify
in the courts is to be an issue in the
local politics of those States, till the
matter is decided one way or the
other. We fail to discover in what
respect the rights and liberties of the
whites are to be restricted by admit
ting the negro to the witness stand.
In Ohio negro testimony is taken
upon the same conditions as that OF
the whites, and the jury is left to de
termine what degree of credibility is
| TO be given it. We have not heard
that anybody's liberty or rights have
been impaired by this simple act OF
justice. If it is the purpose of the
Mississippians to so arrange their
local laws as to put it in the power OF
eth master class to outrage and abuse
the freedmen, and if the license to
outrage and wrong this despised race
is regarded as a right and liberty
not to be restricted, we can under
stand the hostility which the News
manifests to Governor Sharkey's pro-
position. a a
1t is perhaps well to observe here,
that the blacks have been set free, and
as freedmen the Government of the
United States is bound to protect
them, and secure to them the rights
Of freedmen under republican form
Of Government. The Freedmen s
Bureau has been established to pro-
mote this object, to see that the treat
ment of these people is fair and just,
that the master-class do not over
power and cheat them out of the free
dom bestowed upon them; that it
shall be fact as well as name, and
that in all things they shall be sub
jected to no exceptional laws and
regulations oppressive and unjust in
their character. If the people of
Mississippi have the disposition with
which the News credits them, and the
Legislature embodies that spirit IN its
legislation, the Freedmen's Bureau,
which the News stigmatizes as San in
QUESTION and "an oppression" will
assume a more permanent character
than will be agreeable to the pro-
slavery editor of the News. a&.
1t is a little remarkable, with all
this general denunciation of a bureau
established for the purest of purposes
to protect the weak against the
strong, and the simple minded against
the cmning-the News fails to point
out a single instance in which it's ope-
rations have worked any oppression
to whites, or deprived them of any
just rights as against the freedmen -
We regard this opposition as the off
spring of prejudice, and of a policy
which is designed to cheat the freed
men of all the rights and privileges
growing out of the condition of free
dom; and we shall so regard it till
specifications establish the fact that
the Freedmen's Bureau, while secur-
ing justice to the black, works injus-
lice to the white, The people of the
free States are not disinterested spec
tators of the struggle now going on
in the late slave States. They desire
to see these States restored to all their
civil rights and enjnyments, hut NOT
at the expense of justice and fair deal
ing toward a race set free by the war
power of the Government in accord
ance with their sentiments and de-
sires and that freedom they are de-
termined shall be assured to them,
completely and beyond the contin- |
gencies of local legislation, though
5he restoration of the States them |
selves, to their full relations be i'm
oeded and delayed. The President |
stands pledged to this as much, as he
stands committed to suppress treason
ind rebellion. His word has been
given to the freedmen, and he is not
he man to shrink from it's redemp-
ion, though pro- slavery conservatism
lowl with indignation.-[ Cincinnati
Commercial. /
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