New-York daily tribune. [volume] (New-York [N.Y.]) 1842-1866, 1865-06-26
FURTHER sTHlHE-CAN 1T NOT
BE AVOIDEDe

The careful reader of the report herewith
printed of President Johnson's colloquy on
Saturday with certain prominent South Caro-
linians, having previously pondeTed the pro-
ceedings Of the late meeting in Boston and the
letter in our last of Robert Dale Owen TO
the President, will have gained there.rom
much light on the political situation and the
which still environ the pending "re.
construction" Our own hopes Of all early and
satisfactory solution of all our difficulties are
strengthened daily.
II we differ with Mr. Owen, and more point
eddy with the able and upright men who gave
tone 10 the Boston meeting, il is not with
respect to the end they contemplate, but TO- the
means whereby IL IS to be achieved. We feel
that reconstruction which should leave -Four
Millions of our people politically voiceless and
impotent, would not merely be unjust to the
freedmen and perilous to the Republic, but that
il would he especially baneful to that part of
our country wherein the Blacks ese mainly
found. The SOnth prominently needs that her
people be reconced to each other, and that they
cordially combine their best efforts TO rebuild
her waste places, and not merely restore her
past productveness ane thrift, but carry
each to point far beyond the highest
standard of the times forever past. The South
needs not only to revive, and ultimately TO
extend, her former production Of Cotton, Rice,
Sugar. Tobacco, DC, &C., but at the same time
to rebuild her railroads and bridges, place on
her rivers the steamboats, and other means Of
which have been almost entirely
also to open her innlmerable mines,
renew her supply Of draft animals and other
cattle, set wheels to turning and mills 20 run
ming on her water-courses yet double and ulti-
mately quadrrple her annual production Of Grain
and other elements Of Food. Ali her more in
tellgent clafses-ncarly al OF them impover-
isheI many actually famishiDg-lnust feel this
at least as keenly as We do.
If we differ somewhat with Mr.. Owen, still
more with the solid men OF Boston, il is on this
point: They assume that our only hope for justice
and acknowledgements 10 the Freedmen is based
ON Federal authority and interposition: we
trust, on the contrary, that the ruling caste at
the South may be prompted to do what is just
and necdful by their own enlightened convic-
tons of justice, security and wise policy. And,
if the end in view can be thus att.ined, all will
mite in dccming it preferable to any other II
the South shall voluntarily cnfranchise her own
Freedmen, or a large proportion of them, prof
fering like acknowledgements to the residue on
which they may, by industry and
Trugality, fulfill, this will certainly be much
better, more satisfactory, more enduring, than
if imposed at the bayonet's point by Presidential
ukase or Congressional act. And, if threats that
shall be imposed from without
tend to obscure prospect Of its being delibe-
rately accorded from within, then they surely
should be spariDgly INDUCED orutterly forborne.
Hitherto, it has been ground Of serieys COM
plant that Southern good intentions with re-
gard to Slavery and Negroes were constantly
or perverted by Northern imperti-
,ence, dictaton and uncharitable Judgment.
Thus the resistance at the North to legalizing
Slavery in Missouri was ably, forcibly resisted,
lot on the assumption that Slavery ought to 90
here, but on that Of the right Of the people
lirectly interested to determine TIE point for
themselves and the lack Of justification for
Northern interineddling herewith. May We
lot wisely labor 10 avoid, in the present case,
% secondary aR so damaging an Issue
Why should tho South insist on the per-
,ctuol serfdom or vasSalage Of her principal
,ody Of laborcrs'
Society in that region naturally resolves
tself into four classes: l. The considerable
landowners and planters; 2. The merchants,
artisans, lawyers. physicians, educators, &C.,
Co., or industrious Whites; B. The Poor
Whites; A. The Blacks, hitherto mainly slaves.
Of these, the planters have practically been
he governing class largely controlling tho
political action q the two next; while the slave
has had no political status or influence what
ever.
The War for the Union has wrought great
ohaDges in tho social qualification Of the South,