Staunton spectator. [volume] (Staunton, Va.) 1849-1896, 1867-06-04
From the Baltimore Gazette. |
Duty of the South.

Very many journals in the North and not a
few, we are sorry to say, in the South are per-
sistently urging the people of the latter to give
prompt and willing assent to the lawless and
ruinous demands of the late Congress- They
are told that as they can get no better terms it
is folly to refuse those now offered that they
ought not to sacrifice an attainable right for an
unattainable one that as Congress intends to
force negro suffrage upon them they had better
adopt it themselves, and that, having been con-
quered, it becomes them to submit An i'm
mense deal Of loose, wild talk like this is utter
ed daily, but those who indulge in it rarely con-
descend to apply it to the facts of the case
Congress, having no shadow of right to med
die with the elective franchise in any State, has
insisted that the negro population in each of
them shall be clothed with the right of suffrage,
and threatens if this is not done to make them
voters itself in defiance of laws and constitutions
When it has executed its purpose it proposes
to admit delegations of Radical politicians to
represent the South in the Federal Capitol
Now it passes our comprehension, we confess,
to understand why the Southern people should
cooperate with Congress in running themselves,
either because the latter will not moderate its
demands, or because, if the South does not as
sist, that body will do the work of destruction
by itself. If ten States are to be destroyed or
degraded, on what principle can they suppose
1T to be their duty to accelerate their doom 2
And what right do they sacrifice by rejecting
the Congressional mandate? The privilege Of
sending delegations to Congress is surely not
worth contending for when the negroes and the
Hunnieutts and the Underwoods elect them,
and 1t IS certainly not worth purchasing under
any circumstances with the sacrifice of every
other right. If it is the fear of confscation
that makes some men willing to consent to the
terrible terms now imposed upon the South,
they may as well dismiss that subject forever
from their minds, for the Federal Congress has
already done it's worst. When it's late measures
shall have been put into practical operation aud
the last barrier which separates two naturally
antagonistic races shall have been removed,
conhscation will come to be regarded as a minor
evil. Wherever the negro element will nearly
equal or will preponderate over the white, the
latter will have other and greater cause for dis
quletude than the fear of losing lands, which
will be then Of little value. What is to be, un-
der those circumstances the precise condition of
society it Is not easy to foresee, but it is very
certain that, unless controlled by military des-
potism, neither life nor property will be safe
throughout large districts of the South, and the
material prosperity Of the latter will be destroy
ed. Some future generation from the North
may one day spread over the land and, after
having established evangelical and philanthropy
~ cOO4CtlCS ssAU lllo UldChS uldy
make it to bloom again. But to its present
possessors it will be SO sad and so desolate an
abiding place when its better men are disfran-
chised and it is ruled by negroes and their white
partlsans, that oonfscation will have no terrors
for those who dread it now
As to the continued call upon the South to
submit, it is but an idle waste of empty
words. The South has submitted, is submit
ting, and has no thought of doing otherwise.
If the reyolutionist persists in calling negroes
to the polls, and in registering the validity Of
such elections with the bayonet, the South will
perforce submit even then. But no one, save
natural-born poltroon, imagines that acts of
submission involve or must be accompanied by
establishment. The Southern people know
full well that the measures of Congress will be
as destructive as they are despotic, and were in
tended for their enslavement and humiliation.
They have nothing, to gain, by co operation with
that body, and nothing to lose by refusing to
make voluntary surrender of all their remain
ing rights, liberties honor and possessions.