The daily phoenix. [volume] (Columbia, S.C.) 1865-1878, 1866-03-14
TERMS-IN ADTAN NCE
An Honest Radical Witness.

An Honest Radical Witness.
A correspondent of the Cincinnati
Commercial, who is vouched for by
that paper as San old-fashioned Abo-
litionist who does not extenuate any
thing or set down aught in malice, -
writing from Southern Arkansas,
says:
During a months travel in this
country-conversing with ccG-os daily
i have heard less complaint and
less denunciation of the Government
than can be heard around the various
corners of Vine and Fourth streets,
IN your city, any thirty minutes, by
dayHght-particularly of Sunday
morning. That there is an anxiety
to know when, if ever, they are again
to take their places in the Union
as reconstructed States, is evident
enough, but there is modesty about
this which does not i'll become high
toned conquered enemy. * X
From all that I have been able to
discover, an satisfied that if the
State of Arkansas was admitted into
the Union to-day, with all the rights
and privileges she ever enjoyed in it,
except as to slavery, she would be
much better governed in the year to
come than she has been during the
year which is past. It matters not to
me now that her people have been in
rebellion against the Government;
they have been punished for that.
Whether that punishment has been
adequate to the crime committed,
cannot be a question with any noble
minded victor, for she has cried
"Enough!" IF we are 6, magnani-
nous victor, really as powerful as we
talk, we will not only let this fallen
enemy ''get up" but by brushing the
dust from her soiled garment, try and
make of her fast friend. Her peo-
pie, like all other human beings, can
and will appreciate words and acts of
kindness. AS proof of this, Henry
Ward Beecher's sayings upon the
subject of reconstruction have made
him decidedly popular here. There
is no living man who would be more
cordially received and listened to
with more respectful attention than
he. This may be charged to selfish,
interested motives; but such suspi-
clons, just now, when there are
wounds to be healed, are far more
dangerous to the future good of the
country than the helpless objects of
them.
This Is very different testimony
from that given by the pack of poll
tlcai hacks, who, for partisan ends,
are employed to SANDER the South
and everything connected with her
people. OF the condition of the freed
people he says:
If some Christian effort is not soon
put forth upon a gigantic scale, they
viii soon go the way of the North
American Indians. One of their most
ruinous vices is RIGHTEOUSNESS. Who.
that has been at all acquainted with
the negroes under the slave system,
does not know that it has been the
practice among shareholders to keep
up strong plantation police, for the
express purpose of preventing cor
rupt, indiscriminate mingling of the
sexes, that they might profit by the
increase. This barrier, created for
such an ignoble end, is now removed,
and the results are obvious. You
will hardly see negro infant in
days journey. There seems to be
little or no care by the mothers for
such offspring as they do have. At
one point passed on the Ouachita,
was told that three negro infants had
been found in the river within one
week. What an account will our phi
lanthropists be able to give, if they
fail to accomplish as much for the
sake of humanity as the STAKEHOLDER
did, with the same material, for the
sake Of dollars and cents?
But the most noteworthy part of
his letter is the followiDg-giving the
lie, as ii does, to the radical stories
of South ern lawlessness:
Beside, you are not shut out from
them now. You are as safe there as
here. You need not believe in the
bugbear stories of persecution and
danger in the South. Such things
are only true to those who hunt for
them. You can find bugbears here,
as there. if you are SO disposed.
Memphis Appeal