The Weekly Perrysburg journal. [volume] (Perrysburg, O. [Ohio]) 1861-1???, 1868-01-31
Selected selistelIany,
The Condition of the South, and
its CHnSeS

/ aus MUSES.
Under the above head the IN. W Eveninq
Post reviews the statement of its cores
pondent, in regard to the condition of the
Southern States, and the causes which
have led to that condition:
We publish elsewhere two southern
communications, one from our correspon.
dent Traveller" whose accuracy and mod.
GRAFTON of statement we have before com.
mended and the other from q" D." dis
tinguished physician of South Carolina.
They neither of them give us a very hope
ful view of things at the South, but they
do not concur precisely in their views of
the causes of this unhappy condition; nor
do they pretend to suggest the remedies
for it, if any such exist.
! That the representations of our South
Carolina friend are well founded, ia many
respects, we have 10 reason to doubt,
! Thet many of the freedmen are ignorant.
idle and vicious that industry is paralyzed
and the prospects of subsistence gloomy !;
! that the sudden admission of vast numbers
Of recent slaves to the franchise has pro-
duced certain bad effects, may be admitted
We deplore these mseries as much as he
does, and we believe that every intelligent
man ut the North, not swayed by partisan
preiudices, deplOres them. and would re-
move them if he could. But our cores
pondent should remember that consider
aIle part of the evils he describes is the
effect OF antCcedeEt causes that have been
long operating, and not altogether the re.
suit of any recent or immediate measures
or policy.
FIRST, as to the character of the negroes,
we may repeat what Macaulay said in an
essay of the Edia6urgh Repie0 of 1929,
in reference to the obstinate hostility of
the English public to the enfranchisement
OF the Jews "The English Jews" he re.
marked, "are, as far as we can see, precise
y what our government has made them.
They are precisely what any sect, treated
as they have been treated, would have
been.' What the American negroes are
to-day the dominant race, north as well as
south, have made them. SO pliable and
plastic nature as theirs was never before
permitted by Providence to pass through so
thorough tutelage. If they are treacher.
ous, white men made treachery their only
defence. If they are dishonest theft was
minor reprisal upon those who robbed
them Of all. II they are immortal, they are
the children of system which included all
conceivable immOrtalties. If they are un.
fitted to assume the duties of free citizens,
their training has been in the hands of
superior race, with absolute power of d.
.rectior. II they are ignorant, it is because
white men have made it the objectionable
offeEce to enlighten them. This we say not
as taunt. nor in any spirit of resentment,
but 10 recall to our southern friends the
great facts Of history, which has its retribn-
tions as well as it's rewards.
Secondly. if TIE material prosperity OF
the South is largely destroyed, it's labor
dsorganized its commerce in ruins, it's
homes desolate. the best classes Of its pop.
uhtion decimated by death, we have not
far to seek for the dreadful cause 7 -Four
years Of war-we do not here inquire as TO