Wilmington journal. [volume] (Wilmington, N.C.) 1844-1895, 1867-10-25
The Election.

The near approach of the time when the
people Of North Carolina will be called up
on to vote under the Reconstruction Acts
of Congress, makes it necessary that a
thorough organization Of the Conservatives
should be effected. With a majority of
gregate vote, and with majorities in seven
ty-two of the eighty-nine counties, with
unity Of action, the whites can control the
State in elections upon general ticket, or
by counties, for delegates to Convention.
North Carolina and Arkansas are probably
the only one of the ten excluded States
which can be saved from the control of the
late slaves and their political masters. Ten
nessee, also, may be placed among those
which have been legislated under the thral-
dom of the negroes. The two States which
form the exceptions may be lost to the
white race by apathy and want of organiza-
ton.
We hardly suppose any respectable num-
Der of those Conservatives who favor the
call of Convention desire that body to
incorporate into the Constitution of the
State negro suffrage and white disfranchise
ment us is required by the act of Congress,
but only to give to the colored people the
same political privileges which the Consti-
tuition of Ohio bestows upon them, and
which the people of that State have SO re-
Gently and SO emphatically declared shall
not be extended, OF at farthest, to grant
them limited suffrage similar to that pos
sessed by their race in New York, the en-
largement of which, the Cons titutional
Convention, under the control of extreme
Radicals, lately in session in that State,
either opposed Or was afraid to favor.
If, then, our assumption be true, we see
no good reason for the call of the Conven-
ton by the people of North Carolina, for
unless the requirements of the Acts of Con-
gross be fully complied with, in regard to
universal negro suffrage and the partial
Acknowledgement of the whites, as effected
by the Howard Amendment, the Convention
and the Constitution which it may adopt are
alike useless and expensive undertakings.
To vote Tor Convention ard in favor of
candidates who will comply with the re-
quirements of Congress, is to endorse uni
yersal negro suffrage and aid in fastening
upon the State all the ruin which it entails.
To vote for a Convention and for delegates
who will not comply with the Act of Con-
gress is blowing hot and cold with the
same breath.
We have said that the people of Ohio did
not turn out with so much unanimity and
strength to defeat the desires of the few
negroes in that State to be possessed of the
right to vote, but they declared against the
exercise of that privilege by the negroes of
North Carolina. In this assertion we have
the qualified but real endorsement of Gen
eral SCHoFIELD, who says "The people of
Ohio are not voting against suffrage in the
South. They are only declaring by their
votes that Congress has no right to impose
it upon them" Of course no one doubts
the right of a State to regulate her own
suffrage laws, and at least the Radicals of
Ohio will be we'll satisfied if North Caro-
lima will voluntarily saddle herself with
negro voters, but refuses to set her the eK-
ample. And we may say to General SoHo-
FIELD and to those who desire the call of q
Convention, that before the State decides
upon it, Congress has illegally referred the
question for decision to the entire negro