The evening telegraph. [volume] (Philadelphia [Pa.]) 1864-1918, 1867-10-18
7ENING FRIDAY OCTOBER l8 1857

he'dared to be industrious, his property was
burned. II he sought higher wages, he was
sent to Jail for idleness. II he got out of work,
he was sold as a slave. Fifteen hundred muir
ders of negroes, for which nobody was ar
rested, were reported in Texas. Daily, like
murders were perpetrated, and went un-
punished in every Johnsonized State. The
Freedmen's Bureau and our military officers
were powerless to stop this incipient war
against the black race. For want OF the
ballot every means adopted to protect them
was inadequate. Rebels and Democrats were
equally furious in denuncatiOn both OF the
Freedmen's Bureau and Of our military occu-
patton of the South, which were all that saved
the trembling blacks from an immediate re-
turn to slavery. The President, to stop the
'frritation' of the late Rebels, was too rapidly
withdrawing the troops and working to
abolish the Bureau. Before the freedmen
there were but three alternatives-the ballot,
determination, or slavery. ALL sensible men
saw that partial suffrage was perpetual war,
and that white suffrage meant war OF
races. President Lincoln on numerous occa-
sions, and President Johnson in his letter TO
Governor Sharkey, had recommended that the
suffrage be given to all blacks who could read
and write. The South received the proposition
with greater scOrn than it afterwards showed
towards universal suffrage. Evidently, 1T was in
vain to look to the white vote of the South
for the remedy. That was itself the disease.
There was no remedy save in Congress- That
body could not have proceeded with greater
deliberahon. 1t proposed to the white vote of
the South scheme by which it might still
rule the South absolutely, provided it would
consent that each Northern mans vote should
have the same weight in eecting Representa-
tives to Congress as that of each Southern
voter, and that certain'classes of Rebels should
not hold Federal offices. The South rejected
with scorn any proposition by which they
could not send Lee and Davis to the Senate or
vote for them for the Presidency. They de-
manded with equal hauteur that their old pre-
rogative of voting not only for themselves but
for the blacks should not be invaded-nay,
should be enlarged by emancipation, so that
the whites who formerly voted for three-ffths
of the blacks should now have added to their
aggregate vote the power of one full vote for
every colored man at the South, whether that
colored man should vote or not. They de-
manded that a white Rebel South Carolinian's s
vote should not only vote down two loyal dis
franohised black South Carolinians, but three
New Workers, making five in all.
Still Congress delibeTated for another year,
| until the unmistakable voice of the people in
| condemnation of the Presidents policy, and
the elimination Of the outrages of the white
| suffrage system in the negro massacres at New
| Orleans and Memphis compelled them to enact
restoring loyal governments to tho South, and
| the Southern States to Congress. For two
| years the white vote had been only renewing
| rebellion. restoring slavery, and organizing
hell" What the South needed was new
| constituency-in love with freedom aud loyal
| to the Union. Congress called it into exist
| ence by extending suffrage to the blacks. I'M
mediately the impending war of races was
changed to a wOndrous scene of billing and
| cooling, in which leading Rebels We'd with each
| other in accepting the situation, and in patron
zing and instructing the black vote As 10y
magic the negro-killers desisted from theiI
| blacks might have the lawful power to punish
them. Legislatures allowed blacks to testify
The stream of Justice began to lave the sweat
ing brow of oppressed labor. The thought Of
1 restoring slavery was no more. In all but the
mere formula OF electing State governments
and admitting representatives to Congress, the
South was at peace. The ballot was peacel
What if President is soured because the
peace did not come by his plan, and did come
by another2 What if some thousands of lag
gard Republicans fail to come to the polls anC
vote to sustain these results as they ought to
| Does that mean that the nation has decided TX
reverse impartial suffrage, the very promise o
which, discounted in advance by the whole
South, has brought peace ere yet ballot ha
been cast2 Does it mean that we are to con
sign the black race, and with it the white, o
the South again to slavery By no means
The Democratic party can as well repea
emancipation or the Declaration of Indepen
dence as impartial suffrage. Whatever MAJ
be the course of future elections, reconstruc
tion will, beyond peradventure, 60 on in the
manner enacted by Congress, and refusa
to cooperate therein by the Rebel vote of tn
South will only result in their self-exclusiol
from all offices and power in the State an(
National Governments. If they by their in
action voluntarily hand over the government
of their States to the blacks, theirs be tn
blame. We have reason to believe the black
alone would prove quite as good governors a
the whites alone have been. They certainl.
could do no worse, either for the South or 70
the Union.
How Is It Done!
NJ Ill