The New York herald. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1840-1920, 1867-12-20
Tho New Southern Reconstruction Bill


The Great Issue Before the Country.
In the new Southern Reconstruction bill
which has just passed the House of Repre-
sentatives, and In the close party division OF
the House-yeas l04, nays 37-upon the final
vote, the intelligent reader may readily per-
ceive what will be the great controlling issue
In our approaching Presidential contest. The
tinkering Of Congress upon bonds banks and
currency signifies nothing. The passage of
this new negro Reconstruction bill, on the
other hand, is equivalent TO formal procla-
nation Of the republican platform for the
Presidential campaign.
And what is this bills II is simply bill to
facilitate and expedite the reconstruction and
restoration In Congress Of the ten outside
Southern States on the basis of negro supre-
macy. Under the Reconstruction laws as they
now stand there must be in all these Southern
elections majority voting Cloth sides counted)
Of all the voters registered; otherwise the
election falls through. 1t has been demon
strated, however, that under this system there
is danger that the opposition party may con-
trive to keep . majority Of the registered
voters from the polls, and thus defeat the
object Of the election. To avoid this danger
this new bill provides that . majority
Of the votes cast in these elections
shall be decisive, though less than
one-haK or less than one-tenth Of the
registered voters Of the State como to the
polls In the next place, the new bill provides
that, instead OF waiting till after the adoption
Of . new State constitution, each Of the States
concerned may elect members to Congress in
the election on the constitution.
This bill will doubtless lover the veto) be-
come law; and under its provisions during
the present session Of Congress we may look
for the restoration Of the ten excluded rebel
States They will be entitled, altogether, to
fifty members Of tho House, twenty members
Of the Senate and seventy electoral votes in
the Presidential election. Their admission into
the House will admit them into the Presiden-
tial contest !; and this Is the special object Of
the bill-a Southern negro radical electoral
balance Of power for the Presidential success
sion against . possible Northern opposition
majority. We say that under this new bill we
expect these ten outside Southern States will
be reinstated in Congress during the present
session; but whether there will be any negroes
among their representatives, or not, II is diff
cult to conjecture. In any event the restora-
ton OF these.ten States on the basis Of negro
supremacy will inevitably become in the North
the controlling issue In the Presidential cam
paign.
Ia ~ fho a. Al gkxSn H. a..
programme can only be maintained by .
standing army; and with q standing army
over the people a. . dxsd institution In the
South, how long win Il be before we are blost
with the supreme authority Of an army over us
In the NORTH In these ton excluded States
there was in 1860 population Of some seven
million six hundred thousand whites and
blacks, Of which the whites held majority Of
nearly Q million over the blacks But under
the peculiar circumstances and antscedents Of
these two races in the South, II the blacks
were In majority Of million or two millions
their political supremacy over the white race
would be impossible without standing army.
Negro domination, II maintained In any one Of
those States means standing army and the
removal Of the white race born upon the coil I;
but negro domination even in South Carolina,
ses up through the devices OF universal negro
suffrage and White disfranch issmsnts, will not
be tolsratei BY the North.
Radical fanatics on popular rights, when in
power, always push their extreme theories TO
their own overthrow. The French Jscobins,
who opened the way for Napoleon and The
empire, and the English Roundheads, who
found, not Ass seFylps, bat their master in
Cromwell. and who n his dsasA had 70 submit