The evening telegraph. [volume] (Philadelphia [Pa.]) 1864-1918, 1867-12-26
SPIRIT OF THE PRESS.
gprfoRIAL OPINIONS OF THR LEADING JOURNALS
UPoN CURRENT ToPIos-ooMPILKD EVERY
DAT FOR THE EVENING TELEGRAPH.
Povertr and NIlserv az ths south.

Poverty and Misery at the South
From The So Louis Republican.
Numerous accounts from the Southern States
1onour in representing the destitution among
Jhs people as already, thus early in the season.
having reached degree of suffering and want
that is something terrible. A well-informed
correspondent of this paper, who travelled
through large portions of Tennessee, Alabama,
and Mississippi, describes the condition there
as. in many places, very deplerable. The
planters, IL may be said Of all of them, are
bankrupt. Not one Of them has made his ex-
penses the last year. In Northern Mississippi
many of them, being unable to meet their OBJ
legations, have been sold out by the Sheriff.
and are utterly impoverished. In Alabama
the case is much the same. In some sections
1he crops have been unremunerative, and the
planters have been unable to pay their hands;
nothing was done in the cotton fields, many
freedmen were unemployed-many of them
from necessity, saying nothing Of the many
who preferred idleness to industry. From
Arkansas and Louisiana there comes up great
cry of want and suffering.
Affairs in that stricken country are comph-
Gated and made more critical by reason of its
negro population. The negroes suffer as well
as the whites, and it is something which, now
they are free, they cannot comprehend.
the necessaries of life and expecting that
emancipation would feed and clothe them
even more abundantly, they wonder and
shake their heads that everything should be
reversed-and that, instead of being better,
they are vastly worse off than they were
before. What it means they cannot under
stand; and many of them can easily be made
to believe the worst. Driven by want, partly
the effect of their own idleness, but chiefly,
perhaps, owing to circumstances which
neither white nor black can control, they
resort to theft and robbing to supply their
wants. 1t is, therefore, not surprising that
we have reports of their "robbing and plum
dering throughout the country" killing sheep
to feed upon and entering houses to rob them
of food and clothing. In Arkansas, grand
jury of one of the largest counties has made
presentation of these Outrages, and called on
the military authorities for protection. Fears
are entertained of a negro insurrection. Proba-
bly, general rising of the negroes, intent
upon universal robbery, burning and mas
sacre, aimed at the property and lives of the
whites, is the only calamity which would be
really much worse than the distressing state
of things which exists at the South already.
And now what will be done with a view to
relieve this di stress and prevent the calamities
which are so imminenti If we could make
this appeal to the President, we should have
no doubt of his answer. Immediately mea-
negroes, and especially the white desperadoes
who are misleading them, that they cannot
proceed in the line apparently marked out for
them with impunity. The military would be
used, not to countenance the lawlessness and
violence which are so rampant at the South,
but to repress outrage and wrong-doing. AT
the same time measures would be taken to
provide, in judicious way, for the wants of
both black and white, But we should in
vain appeal to Congress. That body is
frightfuly insensible and reckless as to the
condition of things at the South. Some of its
members may well be accused of desire to
revive the horrors of San Domingo at the
South. Such men nourish only deadly pas
sions of hatred and revenge; and would be
glad to see the South desert. Stevens, But
Ter, Ashley, Logan, and others Of their stamp,
are urging policies against the South which
lay them open to this charge. Unless the
people of the North speak in such thunder
tones of rebuke as shall frighten this Congress
from its present designs against the South,
that section of the country is in danger of be-
coming veritable "howling Wilderness, or
relapsing into the original jungle and den of
wild beasts from which it sprung.