The Opelousas courier., 1868-01-25
MISCELLANEOUS.
Alarming Condition of the Country.


The present condition OF the country
in its financial political and moral as
poets, is truly alarming. The grand car
niyal of the war, with its disbursements
of six or seven hundred millions year, is
ended, and as the bills come In tor settle
ment we begin to realize the tremendous
pressure which is upon us of heavy taxa
fions. widespread cOrruptlons, general
depression in trade aud universal dis
trust. . p
The Southern States, wrested from the
rebellion, are rapidly going down to ruin.
The failures in their crops since the war
from droughts and floods, the worms and
frosts, have left the Southern planters
with their money and credit exhausted
and uncertain as to the needful bread for
their families during the winter. The
Southern negroes at the same time, shift
less and wasteful, have, as the rule, con-
sumed their scanty earnings, and with
starvation staring them in the face there
is prevailing sense of danger that they
may, here, there and everywhere, with
out moments warning, in their bloody
reprisals, inaugurate reign of terror and
a war of races. General Gillem's report
Mississippi viii apply more or less to all
the rebel States from Virginia to Texas.
They are all driving on from bad to
worse, and unless some speedy and COM
prehensive measures of relief and reform
are interposed, the civilized world, with
in few short months, may be shocked
with the revival, in the great republic"
of those horrible scenes of st. Domingo
which marked the African movements
there for negro equality and negro SUI
premacy. .Hs 7g~E z
We have no doubt that with the reas-
sembling of the two houses of Congress
after New Years, they will, by official
facts and vouchers, be fully convinced
that between the impoverished whites
and the swarms of idle and destitute
blacks in the unreconstructed rebel
States, there liz serious danger of reign
of robbery, violence and blood. Politi-
cally divided, as the Inhabitants of those
States already are. into the white mans
party and the black mans party. it will
require the most skillful handling to pre-
vent general rising between the two
races for mutual war OF determination.
There may, perhaps, be some scenes of
this character among the holiday diver
sions of the South, while our national
lawmakers are enjoying their Christmas
festivities in the North, and deIudiDg
themselves with the fallacy that they
have brought or are bringing about che
reign of peace on earth and good will
to men," @ gsseEaE ~
And what is the state of things in the
North! Our merchants are doing little
or nothing, though selling at less than
cost; our manufactures, to a ruinous
extent, are suspended or cut down in
their operations; our mechanics, in still
increasing numbers, are thrown out of
employment; the unemployed and the
destitute in all our great cities are more
numerous now than they have been In
any month of December for thirty years.
Hard tinlesiis heigeneral cry, and before
they can be better there is a general ap-
prehension that they will be worse.
There is no confidence in the present
head of the national Treasury, and there
isno confidence of any substantial or
seasonable relief from this radical Com
gress. Why should there be, when all
the legislation Of these radical reformers
since the collapse of the rebellion has
been devoted to the negrO--to negro phi
lanthropy, freedmen7s bureau, negro
equality, universal negro suffrage and
Southern negro supremacy EI8 .sst84
These reckless radical fanatics, in all
these schemes looking to political negro
balance of power for mere party purposes,
have been sowing the wind, and they will
reap the WhirlWind. General destitution
and threatened disorders Of violence and
blood In the South; general stagnation
depression and distrust i'm the North
oppressive taxation, resulting In still
decreasing receipts to the Treasury from
still increasing revenue frauds and cor
rnptions, are firing up the public mina
to the white heat of great politiea
revolution. It is coming, and In the face
of the overwhelming issues at stake til,
mere name and fame OF this man, tina
man or the other will be utterly eclipsef
in the Presidential agitation. Grant
Hancock, Chase, Seymour, Pendleton
Vallandigham, Fernando Weed, and al
other Presidential candidates, viii b,
subordinated to the great issues Whicl
are destined in 1865, as inEI640, to sweel
over the country like tornado. Thi
radical Congress has been and il hurry
ing the country headlong down the roat
to destruction. IL ID leading US rapid,
towards bankruptcy revulsion, pepudia
tian and chaos: but there ID still the las
resort of the people, From the ,deplor
able state ofthe country and from all th'
signs of the times we expect from tht
people nothing short DC d sweeping poll
tical revolution In our national election
of 1868, from Maine to California.
81 77ats Near FORK Herald.
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