The Portland daily press., 1867-11-26
The Constitutional Conventions in the
Southern States. '' f...4

S0utmerm StHtes. EI.
1t is just now the cue OF the Democratic
newspapers to affect an aristocratic scorn
OF what they call "the black-and-tan
conventions" In the Southern States. The
endeavor of the oppressed people of the South
to learn the first lesson OF selfgovernment is
watched by these mousing critics, not with
solicitude and hope, but with pitiless,
fault finding vigilance seeking only signs OF
failure. How the spectacle affects a true
democrat "a genuine believer in the American
system of government, let the following letter
from the Hon. George F. Talbot show. Tie
letter is addressed to James w. Hunnicutt'
one of the delegates to the Virginia Con;,titu-
tional Convention, and is printed in Mr..
Hunnicutt's paper, the Richmond "New Ma
tion," from which we copy: ua m
The deliberations OF your Constitutional
Convention will he watched with interest ev-
erywhere. 1t will be a sublime spectacle. The
fathers assembled to form the Constitution
and consolidate the Union of the Republic
several years after the monarchical authority
had been overthrown by arms, and all its Tory
adherents had been disabled by confiscation
or banished from the country, and with a
unanimous constituency waiting to applaud,
support, and maintain their perfected work
You will meet in the city where, two years
ago, treason eapitulated with the honors OF
war, instead of being conquered and punish
ed-in the stronghold where rebellion tor four
bloody years struggled to give its law OF slav-
ery to the whole American continent. The
great mass OF the educated, influential, prop
erty-holding classes in the city where you de-
liberate, and in the State whose fundamental
law you make, will be hostile 10 your persons
and to your political faith. The only lrela-
tionship the Richmond Enquirer and its large
school propose to realize towards one half OF
the Virginia-born population, is that ofa di-
vine, perpetual, fated superiority and mdster-
ship. The purpose, cherished with atanati-
cism more bigoted than Islamism in Its first
centuries of propagandism, to build the ine
quality of races into the constitution OF So
ciety and government, to embody the recog
milton of property in man in the paramount
law, and makes the policy of slaveholding the
controlling national policy, has been, in the
minds of most Virginia white men, checked
and thwarted, not foreworn or repenttd of
Slavery in name or fact is still their ideal OF a
perfect state. In the midst OF predjudices SO
inveterate, OF the passionate assseration of
principles so Numerically opposite to those
inculcated by tradition in every American
of your task OF making Republican Constitu-
tion for whatha been aptly called the "Old
Dominion" and might have been more ex-
plicitly called the "Old Dominion. nll
shall not be disappointed il your Conven-
ton makes a less imposing impression upon
the imagination then that which ratified the
National Constitution. j do not expect to find
In it the scholarly culture of Jefferson and Mad
ison, the weighty dignity of Mason. and Wv
Io fba Yaoisrhad ara nf patrsol.
In improvising citizens and law makers ont
of slaves, we must take them with the ,ude-
ness ofan intellect that has learned well only
the lesson of suffering. The blacks and their
friends are scarcely better equipped as leeisa-
tors and eonstitution-malSers than were the
apostles as retOrmers and teachers of a new
faith and philosophy. The high culture OF tIs
Old Virginia statesmen seems to nave res,'I,ou V
IN system which kept hIgh eultas eAI.,- .Iln.
sively the ornament OF an aristociacy, mn,e
It doomed to ignorance anu hast .,,h;,o 'e
mass of the people and bereit even Whlte
,no,, 81 a,orv badge and insignia OF their vann-
,ad s,nor;ority save a pride which was in lIl-
'Mu.o,,s lsu ilkeeping with filthy habits and
aarr,,nted speech. The statesmen of the NeiD
Wat;on may so far reverence the very educa-
tion they lack as to bless all the coming gen.
erations with free schools open TO every Vir-
ginia child. You and your colleagues may
not LldtCu tuc CtdooiC quotdtiOhS nun mUn-
tesquieu and Burke which delighted the ears
of the educated citizens who listened to the
debates of the old Convention. But to what
purpose were the old publicists and moralists
studied and learned by those who failed to
find the fundamental principles of justice, and
never saw the incongruity OF slavery in free
State? In the more accessible and familiar
Sermon ON the Mount you may be able to
find quotations quite as apt to the occasion.
and philosophy much more safe to build a
State upon. At any rate you may challenge