The daily phoenix. [volume] (Columbia, S.C.) 1865-1878, 1866-09-01
Report or Cen. Gordon Granger.

IaE SOUTH.
To his Erce1ency AmdreW Johnson,
President Of The United States.
Sm: In obedience to instructions,
dated May 8, 1866, directing me,
while carrying out a specific mission,
'sto examine carefully into the dispo-
sition of the people of the Southern
States through which I might pass,
toward the Government of the
United States" have the honor to
report:
That in all the States Visited I
found no sign or symptom of organ
lied disloyalty to the General Go
vernment. I found the people taking
our currency and glad to get it,
anxious for Northern capital and
Northern labor to develop the re-
sources of their wasted country, and
we'll disposed toward every Northern
man who came among them with
that object in view
In some !. calities I heard rumors
OF secret org nizations pointing to a
renewal o. the rebellion. On inves-
tigating these secret societies, I
could discover in them nothing more
than charitable institutions, having
for their principal object relief Of
the widows and orphans of Confede-
rate soldiers who had fallen in the
war.
During the whole of my travels L
found it to be as safe and rs conve-
nient to mingle with the people of the
South, freely discussing any and every
topic that came up, as in any other
section Of the United States. 1 was
often among them unknown, and the
tenor of their acts and conversation
was then the same as when my name
and official position was thoroughly
understood.
The people of the South may be
divided into two classes. There is
the industrious class, laboring earn
estly to build up what has been
broken down, striving to restore
prosperity to the country, and inter
ested mainly in the great question of
providing food and clothin e for them
selves and families. These form the
great majority of the people Then,
there IS another class, an utterly ire
sponsible class, composed moinly of
young men who were the ''bucks" of
Southern society before the war, and
| chiefly spent their time in lounging
round the court-rooms and bars, in
chicken fighting and gambling. These
have been greatly broken up by the
war; many of them have been killed;
but those who remain are still dis
turbing elements in the community,
and are doing much mischief. It is
this class of men, and n number of
the poor whites, who have formed
gangs for horse stealing It is they
who, in some instances, have made
attacks on officers of the Freedmen's
Bureau, and have ill-Sreated the
freedmen. It is they who afford the
main pretext for saying that there is
among the people OF the South
feeling of hostility toward the United
States Government. But they are
not the representative OF the South
ern people. They form but an insig-
nifcant minority in the community,
and even they are actuated not so
much by feeling Of opposition to
the Government rs by a reluctance to
earn their own livelihood by honest
labor and individual exertion.
| That cases of authentic outrage
have occurred in the South, is patent
to every one familiar with the current
news OF the day. But these cases
are few and far between, and it is
both unjustand ungenerous to charge
the responsibility for such acts of
lawlessness upon the whole Southern
people. For some malicious purpose
accounts of these isolated disorders
have been collected and grouped to-
gether and sown broadcast over the
North, so rs to give to the public
mind an utterly erroneous impress
sion as to the condition of Southern
society The fact is, that wherever
disailection and turbulence have
manifested themselves outside the
class to whom have above alluded.
there has been some local or specific
cause to account for it. Lawlessness,
like an epidemic, has extended over
particular belts of the country, and,
like an epidemic, is equally traceable
to some init;atory cause. Chief
among these causes, must be named
bad government, pillage and oppres-
sion.
For five years, the Southern people
have been the subjects of gross mis-
rule. During the war, their Govern
ment was Il military despotism, de-
pendent solely on the dictum Of an
individual. Since the wax, they have
been left more or less in chaotic
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