The Charleston daily news. [volume] (Charleston, S.C.) 1865-1873, 1868-08-12
KEooNsTRucT1oN.
IFrom the Round Table. ]

One Of the grand errors which the people Of
the North have committed since the close OF
The war lies at the basis Of the whole recon-
struction policy, and is Independent OF any
question Of the constitutional power to deal
With the Southern States as they have been
dealt with. It has consisted in the assumption
of necessity for protecting the negroes
against the whites. The general belief IN such
necessity has led the people OF the North to
acuuiesce in measures which they certainly
would otherwise have condemned, and Of
which they are now beginning to see the mis-
chievous fruits. The error has extended to
the means as well as to the end. We have as
sumed that the negroes needed protection at
our hands, and then have committed the blum
derof supposing that the ballot was to be the
great panacea. 1t has proved to be o Pando-
ra's box.
IP q supreme ruler, having unrestrained au-
thority and an ordinary share OF wisdom and
benevolence, had been called 70 consaer tne
problem presented by the sudden abolition OF
slavery as one of the consequences Of civil
war growing out Of political revolt against his
government, it is probable that one Of the last
projects that he would have adopted would have
been to reverse the political and social relations
Of the two races by comforting political power
upon the inferior race and taking it away from
the superior. But wise or unwise, constitution
al or unconstitutional, the action OF Congress
toward the Southern States has been founded
on monstrous assumption. The whole social
history Of the South fol period Of fifty years
preceding the rebellion shows that the relations
between the two races had in general been kindly
and harmonious There were evils enough al
tendant upon slavery, and it was certainly blot
upon the escutcheon OF such repqphc as
ours. We have all reason to be thankful for
it's removal, and this we believe is the opinion
of ninety-nine in every hundred of the former
masters. But whether it arose from the nature
of the negro, from the fact that for 80 many
generations he had been slave, or fiom the
virtues which such system engendered IN the
whites along with vices which it produced, it
is undeniable that protection and good treat
ment Of the blacks were the settled habits and
the firm disposition OF Southern society. II it
had been otherwise, We never should have wit
messed the extraordinary spectacle, which
was displayed all through the war, of SER
vile population remaining peaceably at work
in the absence of their masters, who were
carrying on war one OF the ayowed objects of
which was to continue them in their servile
condition. There was no such thing as Sc
rious slave insurrection in the whole South
while the war was going on. In cases almost
innumerabie the slaves on isolated plantations,
where white women and children were left
without any protectors of their own race except
ing single overseer, were faithful to the last,
carrying on the labor O. production which fur
nished the sinews of war as we'll as the meaus
of subsistence for all. The national govern
ment obtained no important military advantage
in the whole course Of the war which can be
said to have accrued from any Willingness Of
the blacks to rise en- n,aSse against the sup
posed oppressors. This spectacle has at no
time impressed the people OF the North as il
did the people of foreign countries, and we have
not drawn from it the important lesson it should
have conveyed to us.
IL should have taught us that when the peo-
ple Of the Southern States, after the war was