The Wheeling daily register. [volume] (Wheeling, W. Va.) 1864-1878, 1868-09-28
SPEECH OF
J. N. CAMDEN, ESQ,
Democratic Candidate for
Governor Of West Virginia,
at n Mass Meeting in
Mason City w. Va,
on Thursday,
Sept. o, 1865.

canuiuate fOr GOVERNOR, anu III an
earnest manner urged the people to
support the Conservative ticket.
Mr.. CAMDEN, on taking the stand,
was loudly cheered, and said:
FELLOW CITIZENS: / thank you fol
this kind reception. 1t is gratifying to
see SO much interest taken in the polit-
ical condition of our country. There
has been no period within our recollec-
tion when the issues presented to the
people for their consideration attracted
more attention than at the present
time. For the past seven or eight years
the people have been stimulated and
excited by the events through which
we have been passing; the passions and
prediudices engcndered by the times
have been fed and fostered by those in
power in order to hold men to what
they supposed to be party allegiance,
and to prevent investigation into the
acts of those who had been placed in
office. Bnt, my friends, these prejudices
and passions are dying out. The peo-
pie are thinking for themselves, aid
are no longer in mood to be carried OFT
by inhammatory appeals, or be made
the instruments to echo blindly the
proscriptive denunciations of party
leaders for party purposes alone, III
which the people and the taxpayers
have neither lot nor part.
ISSUES.
1t has not been the policy of the party
in power to restore peace, harmony and
fraternal feeling to osr State or to the
country, because their own purposes
would not be promoted by it. But, on
the contrary, it has been and still is
their policy, by false issues and in
flammatory speeches, to keep up an ex-
citement that will prevent fair inves-
tigation of the issues before you.
Ia order to divert your attention and
obscure Judgment, they seek to play up
on your passions by calling us rebels"
TRAITORS" "revolutionists" and other
"pet Names" But, my friends, the Con-
servative party means PEACE. 1t means
the restoration OF our Union under one
GevernmeR Rt- mot two Governments
one for the North and another for the
South; nor two currencies, one for the
bondholder and capitalist, and another
for the laboring man, but it means the
Government of our fathers, honestly
and economically administered for the
good of the people.
propose in my own imperfect way
for you know have not been much
given to political speaking-to discuss
fairly and frankly, the issues which di-
vide the two parties asking your votes
in West Virginia. The issues between
the two parties are embraced, either
directly or indirectly in the resolutions
contained in their platforms:
First. In regard to reconstruction, and
negro suffrage, ard
Second. In regard to the question of
finance and taxation.
Aud here | wish to remark that these
are new issues-questiOns upon which
the people have not before been called
upon to act. AT no general election
has the question of negro suffrage been
involved as it now is, and never before
has the question of paying of the pub
lie debt been submitted to your votes.
These questions are for the first time
before you, to be decided without re-
regard to former party associations,
and by your votes at the next election
they will be decided for all time. Fer,
if negro suffrage is once established
over any portion of the country, it will
never be changed peaceably; and if the
tive-twenty bonds are not now decided
by your votes to be payable in lawful
money, they will be funded into new
bonds running forty years, leaving us
no escape but to be taxed To pay year
ly gold interest of Que hundred million
dollars while we live, and then leave
as an Inheritance 10 Our children the
same debt to pay which we now owe.
RECONSTRUCTION AND NEGRO SUFFRAGE.
shall not be able to give more than
a passing notice to the Congressional
policy OF reconstruction in the South,
involving negro suffrage and negro
equality, not only in those States, but,
as | shall show you, in West Virginia
and the other States of the Union. l
know you have been told that we have
nething to do with negro suffrage here;
that we are not affected by It, or inter
ested ia it. But, my friends, let us ex-
anime the facts.
By the Reconstruction laws, which
the first and second resolutions Of the
Republican platform bind the party to
maintain, Negro suffrage is fixed upon
ten Southern States of the Union. These
ten States are entitled TO twenty Sena-
tors, while New York, Pennsylvania,
Ohio, Indiana and West Virginia, with
fourteen millions of people, are only en-
titled to ten Senators. The votes of
these States, together with five others
of the largest States of the Union, are
overcome and neutralized by the negro
votes of these ten States, and the votes
of our own Senators and congressman
may even be killed by negro represen-
tatives from some of these States. You
may say there is no danger of such a re-
suit. But there is danger. Leok at the
condition of South Carolina. Her Leg
islature is composed of nearly two me-
groes to one white man. The negroes,
having the majority, can elect. And is
it not reasonable to suppose they will
soon exercise their pewer, especially
when they are urged to do so, as they
have been by Senator Sumner and other
leaders of the Radical party
But that is not all. The constitutions
formed by nearly all the Southern
States require every one, before exer-
cising the right of suffrage and citizen
ship, to take and subscribe an oath, in
substance, that he believes all men are
equal before the law, and that he will
never attempt to deprive the negro of
the right of suffrage, or from doing any
thing which the white man may do.
Then, if you or your children remove
to any of those States you cannot eX-
ercise the rights of suffrage or citizen.
ship, without first swearing that you
are in favor of thing which you have
been all your lives opposed to. And
yet they tell you you are not interested
in negro suffrage.
But the encroachments of negro suf-
frage upon our rights do not even stop
here. BY the fourteenth article of the
constitutional amendment, which Con-
gress has declared to be adopted, the
second section not only offers premium
to the negroes of the South, for giving
to themselves the right of suffrage, but
inflicts a penalty on the Northern
States for refusing it; for it declares
Ia H. r-a1 nfa