The daily phoenix. [volume] (Columbia, S.C.) 1865-1878, 1867-05-02

Carolina, OF Georgia, OF Florida, or
Alabama. In Mississippi and Lou
isiana, there are few more; but do
you notperceive that, if you are extra
VACANT i'll demanding more than YOU
are really entitled to, and you succeed
in arraying the white race against the
black, and creating prejudices which,
happily, do not now exist-do you
not perceive that the same injustice
which you attempt to visit upon the
white man in South Carolina will be
visited upon the colored man in
North Carolina and elsewhere?
Another point: The large tracts of
land now owned by our planters will
probably be cut up into smaller tracts
and sold Mt comparatively cheap
rates. Suppose that, in South Caro-
lima, the price should be SO low as
fifty cents per acre; can your people,
with the scanty earnings Of the two
years during which you have been
free, buy and stock these farms, and
compete with the white men from
Pennsylvania OF New Hampshire,
who will soon be prepared to make
South Carolina their home, and who,
in few years, will swell the white
population of our State until it far
exceeds your own? There are some
four or five hundred thousand white
people who come to this country
every year. Consequently, there will
be this great addition to the natural
increase of the white population, and
there beingno emigration from Africa
to increase your own, the result, in a
few years, must be an overwhelming
majority of the white race within the
limits of the State. Under these
circumstances, am 1 not right in ad-
monishing you to practice modera-
ton and modesty in making demands
upon those who will represent you
and your interests?
Occasionally, I hear utterances of
distrust. eve are afraid we shall be
cheated" 1 have no doubt there
are bad white men MS there are bad
black men. But you have this lever
in your hand which secures protec-
ton. Suppose you adopt sensible,
rational platform, and with it, go be-
fore the Convention of South Carroll
M. Then suppose the men who rep
resent you in that convention,
forgetting the pledges they gave,
allow Constitution to be adopted
without inserting those provisions
which affect you and your privileges,
in the shape of free schools, home
stcads, &c. Where is your redress?
l will tell you. It is in the Act of
| Congress, which declares that after
the constitution has been adopted
by the convention, it shall be sub
mitted to the people. If they are not
satisfied, all they have to do is, by
their vote, to reject it, and demand
another. Why, my friends, if you
were not to raise your hands, and
constitution should be sent by q con-
vention to the people for their con-
sideration, and its provisions failed
to secure your Just rights, it is your
privilege, even then, to vote against
and demand q revision of tho instru-
ment. 1t is thus that protection is
thrown around every man-white and
colored-in the entire State, and the
power given to the people to be
themselves judges of the character
of the fundamental law by which they
are to be controlled,
Congress has seen fit to give you
universal suffrage. I think it was n
mistake. think if there had been a
limitation-for instance, such as. the
ability to read and write-it would
not only have thro WI safeguard
around the community. but stimu-
lated the ignorant of both races to
attain to that intellectual condition,
the reward Of which would have been
the right TO vote; and we should have
seen, as q result, that in ten years
from now, there would not be q free
man i'll the State unable to read and
write
Under existing circumstances, how
ever, taking things as they are, what
is to be the result with the vast pro-
portion of those who are both en-
tirely uneducatcd and ignorant OF the
duties of citizenship? How are their
votes to be controlled? Somebody is
going to control them, and they are
just as likely to be controlled by bad
men MS by good men. One may have
weakness for q drink of whiskey.
y glass of grog takes him off. An
other has Il weakness for plug Of
tobacco. That will carry him off.
Another has n weakness for pocket
handkerchief or clean shirt, laugh
ter, and that will carry him off,
Much, therefore, depends on the cor
rect influences with which these per-
sons are surrounded; and, in this