The Emporia news. [volume] (Emporia, Kan.) 1859-1881, 1865-08-05
From the London Spectator.
RECONsTRUCTIoN FROM AN ENG
LISH LIBERAL POINT OF VIEW

Democracy ia America, 1t is becoming
evident, has to pass through one more trial
1t has come victorious out of war which
would have crushed any European m0nar.
chy except the British, and has overcome a
rebellion before which even Great Britain
might possibly have succumbed. 1t has
secured, BY four years of desperate effort
during whichft has had to discover the men
who can organize force as well az to develop
The force itself, the control Of a continent
and the emancipation Of 3 race, and now il
has to accomplish feat greater even than
these. Our American friends XII lisfs
with annoyed Incredibly when we describe
the task yet remaining te be performed; but
it is none the less one which. will test their
trusted system far more than the struggle
which they have won. That was ques-
ton of force, and even tories like Sir Arch.
ibald Alison have long since conceded that
a democracy, when it possesses force at all.
possesses il in a nearly irresistible degree.
Nothing can Withstand millions of free men,
when sill are willing to sacrifice all rather
than the republic should suffer a decline.
But democracy has now to develop quality
indefinitely higher than force, a quality
which democracies are apt to despise, which
the American democracy avowedly does des-
pise-the delieats and subtle craftsmanship
which can carry through a social rsvolu-
ton without destroying the bonds by which
society exists. The Federal government,
victorious in war, and not unsuccessful in
diplomacy, able to place million Of men
In the field aud to keep six hundred armed
vessels engaged in blockade,-that, the
strangest fact of the war, has almost escaped
attention,-has now, when resistance has
apparently ceased, to change eleven oligar
chical States into eleven democratic aud free
republics, and every mail which arrives
displays more clearly the difficulty of the
task.
In eleven States, all faithful OF submits
sivs to the Uniou-Virginia, Kentucky,
Tennessee, North Carolina, South Carolina,
Georgia, Alabama, Mississippi, Florida,
Louisiana and Texas-there is a silent strug-
gle going on, nomiuslly as to the position
OF the negro, really as to the question, old
as civilization, whether the basis of socie
ty is to be equality or privilege. Equality
OF legal rights is the strength of the North
yet 1t Is unwilling to establish it in the South
by force; privilege is the passion of the
South, and though defeated IN the great
struggle for its final recognition as the key
stone of society, it cannot bear to surrender
the long enjoyed possession. Privilege,
therefore, 10 some shape the "South"-by
which we in this instance mean all recently
slaVeholding States-is determined to re-
tain. In Virginia the masters, with the
fine instinct of capital for its immediate
interests, have combined to fix the rate OF
wages for coloIed men at FIVE dollars month,
just one third the hiring price of slaves,
and about one fourth the rate which the col
ored men, if free to work or be idle, would
be willing to accept. In Tennessee, which
has regained its restricted independence,
the Legislature has deprived the blacks of
the special right of freemen, that of bear
ing witness, and has imposed a special pen
atty on rape if committed by the inferior
color. In Louisiana the white is privileged to
do nothing, while the black, even if ne pre-
ters to starve, must work under somebody
orders; in North Carolina the free schools
are restricted to whites; in Arkansas and
some other States the free loeomotion of
blacks is forbidden, and in all, political
power IS confined not to property, or edu-
cation, or even ancient birth, but to men
whose skins are devoid of a shade of the
detested color. Many of these rules are in
themselves, as temporary rules, defensible,
and probably all deserve less opprobrium
than freemen will be disposed to believe.
We are not prepared to contend for negro
suffrage except upon the simple ground of
neeessity-though that ground is unassail-
ahle--or to condemn any community for
passing severe vsgrant laws. The masters
In the Stahordshire iron trade tried the other
Gay to insist on a rate Of wages, and the
olmcuity about the schools has shaken Bel
GUM and Ireland Even as to the Law
about evidence there is something to be said
in palliation. Apart altogether from NOR
ais, all races are not truthful alike, and only
one can as yet report facts without either
wilful distortion or prejudios, or an uncon-
scious color.
An English gentleman, or an English
workman of strong religious feelings, can,
when be tries very hard, report facts exact
ly As they occurred, aud he is, SO far as we
know. the only human being who can. Had
the negro's evidence been admitted only
qNantuna Ualeat, and the white entitled for
twenty years to q majority Of the Jury.
Justice might not have suffered, though
equality would. But all these laws and
general orders, and suggestions for laws.
and practices having the force of laws are
based on the same idea, namely. priyileoe
the right of the white man to a higbsr
legal position than the colored man by Tea-
son Of his whiteness, and if privileges is to
exist republican society must cease. Il
does not matter much whether the individ-
ual planter Is to control the individual ne,
gro, or the aggregate planter community is
TO rule the life OF aggregate negrodom, the
result IN either case is an oligarchical svs-
tenn, tolerable, it may be, in itself, though
In our eyes detsstable, but, tolerable or in