The Cleveland leader. [volume] (Cleveland [Ohio]) 1865-1865, 1865-09-21
JOHN STUART MILL ON EQUAL
SUFFRAGE.
He Declares in Favor Of 1t.


and friend Of America, John Stuart Mill
whose recent triumphant election to Par
lament wAs 60 decided triumph for the
cause of progress in the old world. The
letter is addressed to Judge Dickson, OF
Cincinnati, and is written in response to 3
letter from that gentleman inclosing Gen.
/ Cox's Oberlin epistle, and requesting his
opinion on the general subject of negro
suffrage. We commend it to the candid
consideration of our readers.
1902 BLAcKHEATH PARK, KENT,
September l, 1865.
DEAR SRI am sincerely obliged to
you for giving me an opportunity of read
ing the letter of Gen. Cox, and your excel
lent paper in reply.
You ask me for an opinion. 1 should
hesitate very long before obtruding upon
any American, and still more upon the
American public, any mere opinion of
mine respecting their internal concerns.
But il is the concern of mankind, almost
as much as of the United States, that the
coDquests achieved by your great and ar
duous struggle should not be, in the very
hour of victory, carelessly flung away /;
and the opinion which youdo me the honor
70 ask, is one which 1 share with SO many
of the noblest and wiseet Americans, that
I need have the less scruple in express
ingi III
II is certainly some gain to the negroes,
and to the principle of freedom, that they
have been made even nom inAlly free. l do
not pretend that it is nothing that they can
no longer legally be bought and sold But
this isAbout the amount of all they will have
| gained, if the power of legislation over them
| is handed oyer nnn0 nn1-O - their Old znns-
ters, and to the mean whites by whom they
are despised as much, and probably more,
than even by their masters, and who have
been fighting four years to retain them
enslaved. If it were not for your State in
stitutions, the case would not be so pressing
for those who have made them free coulo
keep them so. But, ,once the War-power laid
down, and the regular course of State gov
eminent restored, what is to prevent 8
State Legislature, chosen by their enemies,
from making laws under which, unless
they resist by force, they will have as little
the control of their own actions, as little
protection for life, honor and property, will
in abort, be, except in few of the outward
| incidents of slavery, almost IS much slaves
as before To bring this about, it would
not even be necessary to enact new laws.
| It would suffice to leave the old ones un.
repealed, by which the testimony of q
negro cannot be received against white.
Nay, even were these laws abro-
gated, nothing more would be needed
than psrtislity and prejudice in the white
| of - Aa
sistent with ordinary human nature that
such partislity and prejudice should not
exist All this is so evident that even the
candidate, to whose letter you 30 ably re-
piled, is quite aware of il, and can suggest
no means of averting the evil, except what
agree with you in regarding as the
chimerical project of affecting local seps-
ration between the two races, excluding the
negroes from the Jurisdiction of the States,
and giving them territorial government
apart It is not to be believed that the
PresIdent or Congress will entertain such
scheme as this seriously. II, then, they
allow the Southern States to reorganize
themselves, and resume all their constitu-
tional rights, without negro suffrage, what
is 10 be done2 To abandon the negroes
to the tender mercies of those from whom,
at go terrible cost, you have so lately res.
cued themP No party or set of men IN the
treeStates are so shameless as to propose this
combined turpitude and imbecility. But the
freedom of ths negroes and the self-govern.
ment of the Southern States, IS at present
constituted, cannot Co exist; and If it is
determined that come what will, the for
mer shall be reality, it must be intended
that the latter should be q mere pretense
A censorship will have to be exercised
over all the acts, both legislative and sd-
FedersI kuTnofIties %ni,I py m1maffcdAe
eion, prevent or set aside all PROCEEDINGS
calculated to interfere with that equality Of
civilIrights to which they are bound by every
consideration both of duty and of interest.
TO secure 70 the freed race. And this mil.
itAry dictatorship will have to be continu-
ed for great length of time; for it is
speaking within bounds to say that two
generations must elspse before the habits
and feelings engendered by slavery give
place to new ones-before the stain which
the position of slsve-msster burns into the
very souls of the privileged population can
be expected to fade out
This is tie state of things which the
policy now apparently acted on by the
Federal Government leads to; but l have
too high an opinion of the intentions and
feelings Of the President and the practical
good sense and determination of the
American people, to believe thst such
policy will be persevered in. It would be
nothing less than electing to rule tyranni.
cally over the whole Southern population.
III order to avoid depriving the white half
of that population of the power of tyran-
nizing over the black half
Instead of restoring to the States lately
In rebellion q nominal self. government
which, unless you are willing 20 sacrifice
all that has been gained by four years of
civil war, cannot be suffered to be real.
would it not be better to be make the self.
government real but to grant it only to q
mixed community, in which the populs.
ton who have been corrupted by vicious
institutions will be neutslized by black |
citizens and white emigrants from the
North7
And what is the hindrance to this in
he minds of the President and his Cabl. |
net . Is il scruples about legslity2 To be |
about exceeding his lawful pow-
srs well becomes the first magistrate of a
ree people. But in this case the scruple
Ieems wholly out of place. We are told |
hat the rebel States must be assumed new
II to have been out of the Union, and
therefore, to be Internationally entitled to
III their original liberties and powers the
moment they condescend to accept them.
teAson would say, on the contrary, that by
themselves Independent of the
Union they could not, indeed, divest them
elves of Its obligations, but certainly for.
cited its.prlvileges A state of civil war
uspends sll legal rights and all social COM
acts between The combatants. Except un-
or the terms of cspitulation, defeated
ebels have no rights but the universal ones
t humanity. The Southern people. their
YES, bodies and estates, were, by the issue
the war, placed at the discretion of
heir conquerors; but of conquerors whom
9th the general law of right, and the spe.
ial principles of their own social and poll.
cal institutions, forbid to exercise per-
lament dominion over any human beings
subjects, or on any footing than that of
lual citizenship. It would, however, bs
a the part of the lee States q generosity {
artaking Of stiffness were they to give
Ack to their bitter enemies not only
over TO govern themselves, and the me-
'oes within their limits, but, Through '
representatives. in Congress,) to govern the {
ee States too, without first exscting such I
lAnges in the structure of Southern soci.
y as will render such relation between i
EN- and the free States rational and safe. Q