The New Orleans crescent. [volume] (New Orleans, La.) 1866-1869, 1868-02-01
BUTLER ON A WAR OF RACES.

| quoting, as "agood hit, the following passage
of speech lately delivered by Gen. Butler at
Richmond, Va:
II was said there would be a war OF races The
| story came round to him every Christmas while he
| was IN the army, aud they used each time to ask
| INN II he intended TO double the guard. Why
| should there be war of racesg He saw In the
| crowd before him some half white, some half
black. On what side are they going to light. Ii
| any war Of races had ever been intended it would
| certainly have come when the blacks, and the
| hall blacks, and the half whites were enslaved
| when their masters were away from home battling
| for the rebellion. Then, if ever it should have
| come. But. on the contrary, the negro took care
OF the helpless ones leftin bis charge. The negro
was neither blood thirsty nor cruel and with all
the cslumny and SANDER that have been heaped on
the black race, he had yet TO hear the Confederate
soldier state single act of indignity unknd
! ness on the part of the negro volunteer toward
| him when captured, or a single act of brutality
| Ierpeuaed In the hour OF victory.
The argumentative cleverness possessed by
men of Buffers stamp is ever apt, like vault
ing ambition, to o'erleap ITSELF What he says
in illustration of the naturally peaceful and
tractable character of the Southern negroes
rebuts nothing which his opponents have adj
vanced. On the contrary, the facts which he
| adduces with an air of triumph, only serve to
Tefute vital propositions of his own party with
| regard to the position which the Southern
negroes spontaneously occupied during the
| late war, in their relations to the white peo-
pie of the South and to the Union people of
| the North, to the Confederate States aud to
| the federal government. logical dissection
! Of the good hit" ascribed to him by his rad
zeal admirers will show it to be mere echo
of Southern testimony anda confirmation Of a
Southern argument. The only decent grounds
on which the radical politicians have de-
manded universal negro suffrage and a par
tial disfranchisement Of whites reside in these
two assertions (: that the Southern negroes
were universally on the side of the North in
the late sectional contest, and therefore, de-
served full admission to political rights as a
reward from the victorious section which they
aided TO the extent of thsir ability; and that
the effects of slavery and of the war combined
were such as to render the friendly co-exis-
tence of the whites with the freed blacks i'm
possible, and to make it necessary to the
security Of the latter in person and property
that they should be armed with tine ballot for
their own protection. But here is the admis-
sion of Gen. Butler that the Southern negroes.
instead of joining the North in the late strug-
gle, although mostingenioUs devices were en-
ployed to incite them to rise in mass against
their Confederate masters and rulers, re-
manned contentedly at home, and virtually re-
inforced the armies of the South by perform
ing duties for which, otherwise, large
number of white men, equal to a third of the
Confederate forces, would have been detained
from military service. There were some ex-
captions to this fact to be sure But they
occurred, for the most part, only when the
quiet Of the black population was disturbed
by federal invasion, or when black men were
made federal soldiers under the pressure of a |
formal or an informal CONSUMPTION. That
the blacks had ample opportunity to liberate
themselves from the oppression and crueities |
of slavery, is broadly conceded by General |
Butler. Why did they not seize the opportu-
nifty? There is but one answer. They did |
not realize in their own experience the oppres-
sions and cruelties which the Abolitionists al |
legged to be inseparable from their state Of |
seryitude. To suppose that they did realize |
these things and that nevertheless they were |
content and passive when they had in their
power both escape and revenge, is to suppose
a moralimpossibility. If, then, in the period
referred to, they were thus satisfied to live
peacefully under conditions of servitude es-
tablished and regulated by the whites when
the latter were the only voters in the South
and controlled the legislation of the Southern
States, it is absurd for General Butler and his
radical associates to assume that they could
not hive satisfied in a state of freedom IN
der Constitutions and civil laws adopted
by the representatives of the same class
of voters; a class whose influence over Iegis-
lation would naturally be qualified by grateful
recollections of kind and faithful services
which Gen. Butler alleges that they received
from the freed people during the war. The
truth is, that nothing at this moment but in
reference from without presents the whites
and the blacks of the South from sponta-
neously settling down in relations of cordial
friendship and mutual advantage 1t is the
radicals who have heaped on the black race
the calumny Of which Gen. Butler complains
They have foully slandered both the whites
and the blacks of the South. Their whole
reconstruction policy is q hideous monstrositv
ounded in an internal Islander. 1t is no
vision Of a war Of races spontaneously break
ng out, nor blood thirstiness and brutality
IN the part Of the negro in any form, that
Ills us with anxiety with reference to the DO
itical and the social sitution. 1t is the saw
lge incendiarism which marks every incident
If radical policy towards the South. We are
eaful Of the negro simply as we would be
eartul Of combustible material accessible to
desperate incendiary. We fear for him as
veil as for ourselves. IF the radicals kindle a
ire with him, our house may be burned down
perhaps, but he viii be consumed beyond i
5
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