The home journal. (Winchester, Tenn.) 1858-188?, 1868-03-19
NEGRO SUFFRAGE.

| NGNlAsO Nv = - AS@SSSASs
The Radical Status Of the Tennes
sec Conservatives.
From the McMinnville New Era.
The following letter, addressed t.
General Ben Hill, explains itself. l
presents tho relation oil the Tennessee
Conservatives to the question Of negro
suffrage in new and more acceptable
light than that usually considered by
the country at large. 1t has thus
general as we'll as local interest and
value.
NASHVILLE, February 20, 1868.
Mn Dear General :-You tell me
that many of our friends at home arc
disposed to look back at the campaign
of last summer with regret, and to at
tribute our present anomalous position
before the country to the stand we took
upon the question of negro suffrage
You say that the responsibility for that
action is somehow set down to my &C.
count, and are good enough to add
that, considering all the attendant cir
cumstances, you do not share the opin
ion that the policy was ill-adviscd OF
inproper. / ought surely to be obli-
ged to you for the kind friendship which
suggested your letter, as we'll as forthe
occasion it gives me OF making, in my
own person, a few points that seem to
have escaped the public attention.
shall write with the freedom and famil-
iarity with which I should talk if we
were casually met under the old roof
tree.
To the extent Of having introduced
the resolution which, after thorough
discussion; was finally adopted and in
corporated in the Conservative plat
form, 1 am certainly answerable to the
charge of rcsponsibility--which how
ever, should read "complicity"-and I
have no inclination to deny the pater-
nifty, or to conceal, now that the meas
ure is less popular than it was, the ear
nest and watchful care which / gave it
from its inception to its passage. /
was convinced of its correctness and
its expediency. 1t might be a matter
for debate, thought, whether we
should make any fight at all; but, ifthe
fight was to be made, our line of battle
was clear enough. Not only the ext
gencics Of the period, but fixed princi-
Piles of political. nay, domestic econo-
my, pointed to the complete and unre-
strained recognition of existing facts as
our nearest stronghold of defense for
the present, and the surest base for fu-
ture operations. Such recognition
can never bring hurt upon a party, OF
all individual in the long run. 1t af-
tords a refuge for doubt in perplexity
ard though oftimes temporary. is by no
means unworthy Of the most elevated
uses, or cut off from results beneficent
and just. You will bear in mind that
those who make most showing of what
they call consistency" are not always
most consistent, or most honest. When
a man has fallen among thieves you
don't call an offer Of ransom a piece of
Inconsistency, do you?
The mass Of the people were, as they
are still, completely hand-cuffed. BY
pleas, spec Gus indeed, but powerful as
they were specious, those who held
possession of the making authority
had withdrawn the old standard OF suf-
frage and substituted a new one. The
negro was foot-loose. From slave
he had become, without any change il
his condition or any effort on his part,
a master. The freaks of legislation,
like those of magic, had done this al,
most in night. Created citizen by
the civil rights bill, and voter by the
franchise law, this passive subject OF
transformation was about to exercise
for the first time the new prerogatives
which had been conferred upon him.
The whole thing was an experiment
untried, untested; and there existed las
why should there noS?) many doubts
as to the direction !: was likely to take
Quite u body of intelligent persons, led
by Mr. Colyar and Judge Whitworth
calculated with assurance that the ne,
gro vote might be divided if it could
not be controlled; while others, among
whom remember our old friend Gov
ernor Campbell, were of a different
opinion. in the far South, where the
question had not yet assumed a tangi
bic shape, our people were generally o.
one mind, as expressed through Gen
Wade Hampton and the Governor o.
South Carolina. Clearly it was an oper
issue, and on Tennessee, being far II
advance of the other Southern States
its decision rested. Tennessee was the
vidette, so to say, Of the new campaign
Don't you recollect at Dalton, in '64
when General johnson sent You up te
Tunnel Hill with squad of picked
men to develop the enemy2 Well, yor
did the business handsomely. You de
veloped the enemy sure enough, an
had half your command captured ant
was nearly picked off yourself. Blu
nobody thought of charging you will
inconsistency. On the contrary, yol
followed the varying, but Legitimate
laws of cavalry warfare, as Forrest o.
Morgan would have done, and received
the thanks of the Commander-in- Chief
You got the thanks of the troops too
They were glad enough to know wher'
the enemy was and that there would bt
no attack just yet. In every campaigl
the enemy has to be de, eloped by som
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