Daily Ohio statesman. [volume] (Columbus, Ohio) 1855-1870, 1868-01-07
NORTH CAROLINA.
Reconssruction-Wh IL tho Point.
il..taf91I From the RaleiRh Sent, mil lga I'LL.

The Radical Convention will soon be
called to make Constitution for the
State of North Carolina---a State older
than the Constitution of the United
States -older than the old Confedera-
tion itself-older than many persons
now living in the Union. A State,
which has had a Constitution, and has
been acknowledged as sovereign State,
for more than 80 years, by an order of
Congress is called upon. not to amend
her Constitution (Which Constitution has
been recognized by all the State gov
ernments of the Union, by the old Con-
federation and by the Government Of the
) United States, in all her branches, for
ninety years. to be a Republican Com
stitution and Government,) but is re-
] quired to form q Constitution, as if she
. were not now, or never had been, a
State I! The idea is too sober a one, to
be set down as preposterous. a ridicu-
; lous one! It is a degrading, humilia-
: ting one. to be required of. or to be sub
: mitted to by, a great people,. q svrsi So
I, The people Of North Carolina, who
! made the State and who formed her
Constitution, do not desire new, Con-
stitution. Whatever was in her Con-
: stitution repugnant to the Constitution
of the United States, they have ex-
plunged. Her people acknowledge no
4 Constitution. but that which they had in
. 1860, with the simple addition of the
abolition of slavery. Left to free and
!. unbiased choice, they would have no
other. If another is forced upon her
people, it will be without her consent.
1t will not be the Constitution of free
State and a free people. a9ei 5sge. ~
Congress, in its plentitude of power,
orders the people of North Carolina not
to amend their Constitution, but to form
one. For what? Are we required to,
become new State Yes. That is
the meaning of it. The requisition is
made in order to our reconstruction
or reception into the Union. But
we are already in the Union.-
, W. have never been out Of the
Union. Congress has so declared-the
President has so declared, and the Su-
preme Court has so declared. The Union
has established its offices of custom, its
Offices of internal revenue, its Federal
courts in the State. The laws and Con-
stitution of the United States are as
fully enforced in this State as in any
other. We pay our taxes and render the
same obedience to the Government that
is rendered by any other State. All the
laws passed by Congress, either during
the war or since the war, in all particu-
@ lars Except in those extraordinary laws
pertaining to reconstruction) fully rec
ognize North Carolina to be State in
the Union, as much so as any other
g State. The simple difference is, Con-
gress has not received our Senators and
Il Representatives. And yet Congress re-
! quires a nes0 Constitution, meO State,
, and meao people for North Carolina be-
fore it will recognize us.
Suppose North Carolina assents to
the blotting out of its old Statehood-its
old history. and the neo people, which
Congress has made, form new State,
and a neao Constitution and government,
: with its old people denuded of their
rights and franchises-and suppose all
this should be sanctioned by the Gov
ernment in all its departments. Sup
pose the Supreme Court were to pro-
nounce the whole thing valid in law.
s soiu not this aoork, IN spite of ana subse-
quent acts Of the State or Of tie Con-
gress. a total annihilatiom of the entire
Indebtedness Of the people, and Of the
State 4? Will not this totally obliterate
the obligations of the old State and the
old people We ask our learned men
in the law to answer this. a 65sl
.o But what is the real point with the
Radical party in this matter of recon.
structionq Is it. really to restore the
Union? Not at all. Is it to secure
rights and immunities to Union men
Not at all; all these are already secured
. Is it to guarantee freedom to the former
slave population of the South 2 By no
means. This has already been done.
What, then, is the real object of the
Radical Congress-? 1t is simply to
secure tie South to the Radical party.
But, to do this. that party is utterly
oblivious of and apparently Indifferent to
the direful consequences which must re-
suit to the Southern States, We, as in
duty bound, warn the people of North
Carolina of these consequences. Radical
reconstruction. as proposed, will infal-
libby produce the following results:
!. It will destroy the culture of cot
ton. in the South, as leading and chief
i article of export and commerce. This is
legitimate consequence of negro equal
ity in the South. It will give to Europe
a monopoly of the cotton culture--thus
destroying this great means of exchange
and commerce between Europe and the
United States making American cotton
manufacturers dependent upon Europe
!, for cotton, and obliging Southern plant
ers to become competitors of the North
ern planter in wheat, pork, cattle, and
stock-raising, hay, etc.ol14 i1 -la .
2. 1t proposes to give the negro the
control of the ballot-box in the South,
by disfranchising the. white people
thus throwing entirely in the hands of
the negro race the control of the Offices
of the State. the control of the courts,
and of the jury box, as well as of our
financial, educational, and social inter
ests. # i5si
8. Such state of things must entail
upon our white people either perpetual
submission to its results, which will pro-
mote miscegenation on the one hand, or
perpetual conflict on the other, till one
or the other, or both, of the races are
extinct. .ct
Now, we ask, in all soberness, is there
a native white man in the State who
will dare to risk such consequences by
aiding to bring them about? Is there a
respectable, sensible colored man in the
State who desires such result, and who