Daily Ohio statesman. [volume] (Columbus, Ohio) 1855-1870, 1867-03-06
VIII Not he Pacifed.

The Radical press on the Reserve are in.
consolable because of the refusal of the
Republicans in the Legislature to submii
i to vote of the people an amendment
striking from the Constitution the wort
White. They will not be paciied. The
Republican members who voted against
submitting the proposition are berated in
every form imaginable. They are called
"cowards, - "tender-toed," and all that sort
of thing, and vengeance dire is threatened
to be visited upon them. They are told
that Negro Suffrage is an issue in this con-
test; that the issue has been made and is
now fairly before the peoples" that it has
been made by the Republican members in
Congress, and the party everywhere is by
Is Endorsement of the doings of the Repub-
.licans in Congress committed to it ire
vocably; that there is no dodging or blink
ing it. They are furthermore told that the
mass of the Republican party, who are de-
nominated the people, are SO determined
that Negro voting shall be established in
this State, that they will not vote for any
Republican for any Office who is not in
favor of it. This sort Of talk has at least
the merit of plainness, if it has no other
merit.
The mass of the Republican voters may
with truthfulness claim that they have moi
indorsed the Republican members of Con-
gress in forcing Negro Suffrage upon the
District of Columbia, upon the Territories
and upon the South, because they have not
been called upon to vote since these things
were done. It must be remembered that
the Republicans in 1866 ran for Governor
in this State gentleman who wrote let
ter to the Oberlinites, wherein he gave to
the Reserve and to the Radicals all over
the country the greatest dissatisfaction,
and all manner of disparaging epithets
: were visited upon him by the Radical press.
That letter saved him and his party from
defeat. In consideration of having written
it he received the soldier vote and what
was then called the conservative vote in
the Republican party. There was falling
off in the Radical vote on the Reserve, it is
true; but while he might have received a
larger vote on the Reserve had he unequiv-
ocally espoused Negro Suffrage, unques-
tionably4 he would have lost in middle and
southern Ohio votes to such an extent as to
have produced his defeat. Last fall the
Radical candidates for Congress evaded the
question of Negro Suffrage in almost every
instance. If the Democrats charged
them with an intention of making
voters out of the Negroes, they repli-
ed by asking the question: "Will you
allow Rebels and their sympathizers
to rule this country ?'' They had
not the manliness to say: eyes, we are in
favor of making voters out of the Negroes !;
they are qualified; they are patriotic; they
served the country faithfully in the army,
and it is therefore right that they should be
permitted to vote" Had the Republican
party, through its candidates and its
presses, last fall taken this position and
carried the State with the majority it did,
the Reserve Radical press would be JUS
titled in claiming that the mass of the Re-
publican party is committed to Negro Suf-
trage, by the action of the Republicans in
Congress. A very good way to get at the
feelings of the voters of this State in re-
gard to Negro voting, so far as it relates to
Ohio, is to make a fair, square, open fight
on that issue at the April election. Let
each party nominate good men for the
respective offices to be voted for on the
first Monday in April, and then, without
blinking. equivocating or dodging, let the
question be tried. Thus can it be ascer-
tanned how far the Republican masses re-
gard themselves committed in favor of Ne
grovotfng by the Republicans in Congress
and by the Radical editors in this State.
If the Republicans shall sweep everything
with their usual majorities, it will be evil
dence of very positive character that they
are ready for and want Negro Suffrage in
Ohio, without any further delay. Give us
a trial of the question, then.