Dodgeville chronicle. [volume] (Dodgeville, Wis.) 1862-current, 1867-12-20

like; and when the eX.Tebels, coming TO.
gether In Legislatures, enacted that no
negro should own land or hire house,
thus practically breaking UP his home, and
compelling him to work as q menial;
when they required him to hire out for q
year during the first weeks of January,
and Ia default allowed him to be sold for
term. of years; when they adopted sss--
TENS Of apprenticeship for blacks which
were not applied to whites; when they
provided the lash and whipping-post for
blacks but not for whites; when they ex.
cluded colored witnesses from courts OF
justice; when they organized rebel regt-
ments, which surrendered under Lee,
en- masss, into State militia, who
disarmsd the black troops that con-
Hquered under Grant; when they re-
vived the fugitive slave law for blacks
who did not work out their con-
tracts, but no punishment for whites who
did not pay the wages due on the same
contracts; when they reluctantly, and
only under impudeut protests, assented to
the repeal of the ordinances OF secession;
when they drove out Northern emigrants,
assailed the Freedmen's Bureau, organized
bands of negro killers, and finally culml.
mated these outrages in the massacres OF
Republicans and negroes, at Memphis and
New Orleans, and evinced a general readl::
ness to perpetrate the same outrages all
over the South; when the President I'M
periously demanded that the Freedmens
Bureau, the only protection the negro had,
should be abolished when he denied the
power of Congress to enact laws for re-
construction, and enforced his denials by
scurrilous exhibitions which excited con.
tempt and removed all fear; when South
ern courts were deciding the Civil Rights
bill to be unconstitutional, and Southern
State officers were trampling upon its
provisions, and defying the Congress that
enacted it; then, finally, the Republican
Congress began to move towards recon
struction, on the basis Of universal suf-
frage But they moved slowly. Their
first step geemed even step backward.
1t merely provided that unless the South
should grant suffrage to the blacks, their
number Of representatives in Congress
should be diminished in proportion to the
number of blacks DISTINGUISHED. The In
ference was, that by accepting that hmita.
ton, the Southern States might return to
the Union with the blacks still unenfran.
chised. 1t was dangerous offer to make,
and would have been fatal to our future
peace, had 1t been accepted. But, fortu.
nately, there was allied with this indifer-
cence to Justice, in Congress as a people,
q sentiment of hostility to rebels, which
was useful, not for its own sake, but for
what it accomplished for the cause of the
blacks The clause Of the offer ex.
Guiding leading rebels from Federal Office,
caused It to be rejected with scorn. Not a
Southern State acted upon it, though sev.
eral Northern States passed 1t as consti.
tutional amendment. g.
The rejection OF this proposition, with
the other cooperating causes alluded to,
at length brought Congress up.to the great
work of enacting that reconstructio should
| take place ON the basis of universal suf-
| frage, excluding only few leading rebels.
| The first workings of this plan, which is
now on trial, have been all that could be
expected. The moment the right of the
| ballot was conferred. and even before 1t
was exercised, the South was at peace
The Freedmen's Bureau, backed by the ma
tional bayonets, was far less adequate
protection to the negro than the simple
| promise of the ballot. In the Gulf States,
| the whites have held aloof from the regis
tration and the polls, knowing that the
| blacks would outvote them, and hoping
against hope that the reconstruction poll
cy of Congress would in some way, by
| Democratic victories in the North, be re-
yersed. The effect of this conservative
policy would be to throw the government
of those States almost wholly into the
hands of the white and black Republicans.
This would fulfill the prediction of De
| Tocqueville, made thirty years ago, that
the cotton States would one day form
State governments administered mainly
by the black race. In Virginia the whites
| voted, and were beaten by small MAORI
ty..y AS the whites vote for the disfran
chisement OF the blacks, of course, the
latter have no choice but to vote in solid
phalanx for the continuation of their right
of suffrage. No violence has character
| lied these elections, but slch result or
j future occasions is not improbable. As {
question of craftsmanship, however, the
l problem of reconstruction is solved. VIVA
4 remains is mere detail. When the ballo
4 was given to tho negro, the races were as
sured the same harmony which exists be
i tween them in Brazil and Mexico, where
whatever causes Of dissension may exist, tn,
races have ever remained at peace will
each other. They were saved from thu
4 wretched social struggles, between white
and blacks, which have impoverished sever
al of the West India Islands. Themajoritie
b of the Republican party in the Northern
States have been shaken slightly by the sui
/ fragequestion, but to nothing like the extern
suffered Immediately after emancipation
!, The votes against granting suffrage to col
ored men In Northern States indicate nc
dissatisfaction with the Congressional pol
II icy, because none claim that any great ent
4 of political craftsmanship could be sub
served by the extension Of the ballot to
few scattering negroes at the North.
II will eventually done, not from necessity
but for consistency ~
Il The Republican party, which has thu
, ovcrthrown slavery, and In whose hand
, | is the restoration of the Union, Is In tn
ascendant In every Northern State, not
II wjthstanding the apathy of portion Q
| the Republican party In the recent cleo
tions-an apathy which viii vanish unde
f the visibly safe and beneficial working
:. of universal suffrage at the South, an
, | will be electrified into enthusiasm long be
! , fore their reinforced maiorities will be re
quired for tho next Presidential campaign
l | BY the reconstruction of the ten Southern
! States, on the basis of the equality Of al
r loyal men, most Of those States will speed
|, | lily range themselves under Its banners
! Under these circumstances, the Republics
party which Is now emphatically the Dem
/ ocratic party Of the country, not onl
RI in its principles, but in prestige an
: power, Is liable to the dangers whic
f / always attend power, viz, corruption an
: venalitY. But under whatever influence
1t may hereafter rise or fall, its future de:
b TIMES cannot erase from the page of hi
# tory its brilliant achievements for huna
d freedom. Nothing but its own recreancy