The evening telegraph. [volume] (Philadelphia [Pa.]) 1864-1918, 1868-11-14

bbhuCeHs ~ WOulu hOt nave Doou EiRuJ w iob
the negro alone'' Immediately after the war.
To make emancipation a blessing and not a
curse TO him special means had to be provided
for his protection and education, until he had
become familiarized with the machine y of free
society, and had learned to play his part in
working IT, until the ruling race had given
some satisfactory indication OF respect for his
rights, or he had been provided with the legal
means of asserting them, and the knowledge
necessary to use the means effectively.
The Freedmen's Bureau was one most
powerful and benefcent agent in making the
transition from slavery to freedom easy, aud
it has been maintained up to the point where
there was danger of its preventing the growth
CT self reliance and prudence among those for
whose benefit it was established, and danger
of its becoming prey to jobbers and profess
sional politicians. Its labors were admirably
supplemented by the American Freedmen's
Union Commission, which was established
four years ago, by the voluntary efforts of
private individuals, to do for Northern charity
towards the freedmen what the Sanitary Com
mission had done for Northern charity
towards the soldiers-that is, organize it,
conduct it through proper channels to the
quarters in which it was most needed,
prevent waste from want of concert and
concentrated responsibility, and prevent its
being cursed by the spirit of sectarianism or
localism. 1t has succeeded in doing all that
it set itself TO do in remarkable degree, its
main efforts being directed, since the first year
or two pending the assumption of the work by
the State governments, to the supply Of the
freedmen's greatest want, education. 1t has
established and kept going thousands of
schools all over the South, and has, during
the past year, devoted a large portien of its
funds to sowing the seeds of schools-if we
may use the expression-by training white
and colored teachers; and it is a remarkable
fact that Union majorties at the South are in
the ratio of freedmen's schools-that is the
more schools you have the more votes you
get for peace and quietness, for the mainte
nance OF the United States Government, and
for the payment of the United States debt,
and the equality of men before the law. In
short, the story of the influence of education
on politics at the North is the story of the
influence of education on politics at the
South.
The Commission now propose, after pro-
viding funds for the maintenance of their
schools one year longer, to dissolve aud leave
the work they have begun to be carried on
by the Southern people themselves, and they
do this because they have been made sensible
by many signs that they are just nearing the
point where persistence in treating the freed
man as an object of com niseration or as the
pupil or ward of the community would not
only bring into ridicule all that has been
done for him, and all the arguments
on which the claims made for his
political equality have been based, but
weuld seriously interfere with the growth
of his own character. In stopping their work
now, they stop it while it still retains the
public sympathy and respect, and thus render
valuable service to the general cause of
charity; for if charity have any formidable
enemies, it is they who keep philanthropic
movements" going after the intelligent por-
tion of the community has ceased to see the
necessity of them, and after they cease to have
any visible basis but rhetoric, sophistry, and
exaggeraton.
The action of the Freedmen's Commission
may, and we hope will, furnish useful les
son to Legislators and political agitators in the
stage OF reconstruction on which we are now
entering. II the negro is what so many of US
have been asserting that he is, man who has
only been kept by gross abuse of the power
of the majority from taking his full share in
the work Of progress both moral and mate
rial, he must be left to win his way to his
proper place by the use Of ordinary means.
The value of difficulties in strengthening and
elevating white character is now an old and
trite subject Of remark. The most energetic and
successful white communities are those for
whom Providence has apparently done least,
as far as outward circumstances are con-
cerned and the same proposition is true in a
vast majority of oages with regard to indivi-
duals. Wherever the industrial field is fairly
free, the "self- made man" is getting the better
of the man whose father supplies his capital;
and though education is an equipment which
always gives its owner an immense advantage,
the educated man who has nothing but his
own brains to look to for aid in the struggle OF
life almost always beats the educated man
who enters the arena with his material future
provided for by others. The thing which has
probably most contributed to make New
Rnglanders ''the bosses" in nearly every
undertaking in the country, and has placed
South Carolina conquered at the feet O
Massachusetts, is the fact that New England
hills are bleak and bare and the New England
soil stony and unproduotive. OF course,
everything must be done that can be done tC
make the difficulties with which the negro hs:
to contend no greater than those with which
poor white men have to contend. He ought
to have security, and he ought to have educa
ton, in SO far as it is in the power OF the
Government to supply them; but the grea
burden which weights the negroes in the race
is one which neither Government nor philau
thropists can remove, and that is the want o
all the ordinary claims to social respecta
bility. These claims, in the case of race
are based on a history rich either in grea
deeds or great men, and in the case
of individuals either on wealth or professional
or commercial success, or learning or genius
No white race, or white man, who wants thes'
things is thought much of. The negro race
must, in short, win good social position il
the way other races have won it; and when i
has it's roll of poets orators, scholars, soldiers
and statesmen to show, people wiz greatly re
speot it; but not till then, no matter hoV
many novels are composed in its honor o
how many sermons are preached against 18th
sin of CASTE"
So, also, as regards individual negroes,