The daily phoenix. [volume] (Columbia, S.C.) 1865-1878, 1867-05-21
COLUMBIA.
Tuesday Morning, May 81, 1887
Gerrit Smith on the stump.

The SOutn Is hlSnly AVoreu tt IHlS
time with political teachers from the
North. Wilson and Kelly have been
trying to enlighten the nations
wards" who, it seems, will not be
enlightened, for whercverthey speak,
the effect has sheen negro; riots, out
RACES and bloodshed. We have, how
ever, O notable exception among these
mouthy missionaries of freedom and
equal rights, in no less parsonage
than Gerrit Smith, one of tho old
time abolitionists.. The Richmond
Dispatch, of Friday, publishes q
speech which he delivered in that
city, last week, to mixed assembly
of white and colored people, i'll which
he enunciated broader and moro
sensible views than any other North
ern emissary now in the South.
While he did not spare the South
for bringing on tho war, or for at
tempting, in some cases, to run away
from the restoration terms of Con-
grcss, he blamed the North for its
share in bringing on tho trouble, and
for its want of magnanimity now.
Though, under the Constitution,
those who took part i'll fighting
against the Government are traitors
to-day, he said he was s'avcrsc to
having his countrymen (the South
erners) so down to postcrity stigma
tized as traitors. When this strife
had advanced to great civil war,
with n de facto Government, and car
rying on war as an independent
power, they tce''e no longer traitors. s"
He wanted thus to lift them from
their supposed degradation. The
North, he said, was under common
responsibility with the South for the
late war.
After speaking Of slavery as the
cause of the war, and the North being
equally guilty with tho South for es-
tablishing and maintaining that in
stitution, he added, eve of the North
reaped far more gain from slavery
than you did. You but held the
cow-we millied it, He said he was
not an advocate of confscation, and
advised the freedmen not to ask for
it, but to seek homes by their honest
earnings. One point he suggested,
which reflects great credit on his
benevolencc and generosity, and that
was that he would relieve the South
for half q dozen years from direct
Federal taxes, to enable the people
to recover something Of their former
prosperity. Congress, lie said, should
have appropriated S1O,O0O,OO0 or
$50, ,000, 900 to that suffering land.
The New York Herald, in publish
ing a report. OF the speech, snys:
fHow can such broad and liberal
views compare with tho narrow
and illiberal policy in taxing the pro-
ductions Of the South, at time when
they most need assistancc?" The
Herald also very truthfully says, how
different is this speech to those threat
ening and mere partisan speeches of
Wilson, Kelly, and some other North
ern orators at the South. Tue Herald
thinks that Gcrrit Smith would do O.
great deal Of good were he to follow
those other speakers throughout the
South, and recommends him to do so.
A newspaper published at the
North, and entertaining radical
views, suggests, rs the Southern ne
:groes are generally disposed to de-
fer to the opinions of the Christian
ministry, being naturally inclined
to feel n reverence for religion and
its promoters and preachers that the
negro ministers of the Gospel should
be engaged to canvas the South in
the interest of the Republican party.
Here Is direct proposition to sub
sidizo a class of men who are held
in high esteem by their race, to pros
titute their Offices as ministers of
Gods word for the advancement of