The evening telegraph. [volume] (Philadelphia [Pa.]) 1864-1918, 1867-12-09

tiUn, etc, come home TO the ireside aud the |
table of rich and poor alike; taxes-national,
state, local-swallow up fifth, il not fourth
Of the gains Of capital, the earnings Of labor;
end the naturally restive temper OF the
7 eople, thus heavily burdened, proiers rare
indictments to financial quackeTy and
villainy. The two thousand five hun
dred millions of national debt, supple
mepted by at least five hundred millions
of State and local debts, form an aggregate
ne arly equivalent to one-tenth of the property
of our whole people. In other words, he who
has property worth in all 500 600 may con-
slider it mortgaged to the extent of ten per
cent. by public debts; and including the cur
rent expenses of Governu ent, he must expect
to Jay twenty per cent. of his earnings in
taxes. This enormous percentage will be
gradually reduced if we shall be preserved
nom future rebellions and wars Property is
rapidly augmenting, while debts are being re-
duced and paid off, so that the burden of taxa
tion can hardly be half so great in 1877 as it
is in 1867; but 1t must for generation be
heavy, and its pressure is aggravated by our
past exemption. Paying taxes is never a de-
light, a luxury: but he who never felt them
till yesterday will stagger under them to-day
as he will not tomorrow or next day. And
the ignorant poor man. who is freshly met at
each turn by an excise or an impost, will be
| apt to lend an open ear to the demagogue
| who proposes to rid him of the load by means
with public faith and personal honor.
Those whom the national debt overthrow,
| of course, hate that debt. 1t represents the
men and means to which the Rebellion was
forced to succumb They cannot be expected
to kiss with affection the rod that smote them.
To "be hung and pay forty shillings" used to
! be proverbial for severity of punishment; to
be put down by the strong arm, and taxed to
defray the cost of the discipline, may be ever
so Just and wholesome, but its subjects will
naturally be among the last to see and con-
fess it.
So with reconstruction generally. That the
recognition and establishment of the right of
suffrage as justly and necessarily inhering in
| blacks as well as whites, is indispensable to
any tue and lasting restoration of the ma
| tional authority in the States lately in revolt,
! is as clear as any proposition in mathematics.
! Slavery was the core of the Rebellion, and
! whoever this day believes that blacks have no
rights which whites are bound to respect, is at
| heart a Rebel, whatever his flag or uniform.
The Rebellion had no meaning, no purpose, no
excuse, but just this. Men fought on each
side in our late struggle who pro-
perly belonged on the other (and this
is the case in all civil wars); but the
Rebellion meant exactly that slavery
is everywhere and always the rightful, benef-
cent relation of the black to the white race
and its maintenance legitimate, important
function of government. He who believed
this was at heart with the Rebellion, though
he lived In Vermont or was a general in the
Union army; he who held the contrary may
have served gallantly in the Confederate
forces, yet he thanks God to-day Gf capable OF
reasonng) that those forces were defeated,
And whoever is to-day struggling to keep
down the blacks, to deny their right of suf-
frage, and exclude them from all consideration
or power, must feel that the late Confederacy
was mainly intent on doing his work, and be
moved to drop tear to the memory of Stone
wall Jackson.
A great majority of the people desire
righteous and just government yet many
often vote as though they did not. They
virtually go to the polls blndfolded, and
vote away their own and their country s
well being, because they are badly in
formed. They mean to be good citizens,
ignorance is culpable in so far as the
means of dispelling it are provided and
accessible. There is not one voter in the
United States who ought not regularly
to take at least one newspaper for even
those who cannot read should qualify
themselves to vote by each having a wife,
child, or neighbor read aloud in his hear
ing. When a decent weekly can be had
through a year for the price of a summer
days work, no voter can be justified in doing
without one.
Through one of two channels-the news
paper or the grogshop-every voter obtains
some knowledge of public affairs. Some voters
are familiar with both; but the great majority
depend mainly on the one or the other And
nine-tenths of those who find the facts which
underlie their political convictions and impel
their political actions mainly in the journals
they take and pay for vote the Republican
ticket; while those who CLEAN what they know
OF politics mainly from bar-room discussions
vote against us. And, while good journals
are abundant and cheap, there are this day
hundreds of thousands of voters who take no
newspaper whatever.
The class who live by day-labor almost uni
formly vote against us. Two-thirds of them
work for Republicans whom they respect; but,
reading no paper regularly, they take their
politics, directly or indirectly, from the grog-
shops. If half million OF these could each be
induced to take and read good journal, there
would be at least one hundred thousand more
Republican votes in the balot-boxes next
November. And these votes would insure q
Republican President and Congress.
respectfully commend to the half million
readers Of the Independent their duty in the
premises. Each of them might induce three
to six voters to take some good Republican
paper, If he would try. do notinsist that he
shall so act in behalf of this or of any particu-
lar journal, but that he shall induce each
voter within the sphere of his influence to take
such Republican paper, whether it be classed
as political or religious, as shall prove most
acceptable. One will take a Baptist, MethO
DIST or temperance paper, who would not be
induced to take another. Persuade each Il
take that which he may prefer; but let us try
to begin the new year with half million
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