The Charleston daily news. [volume] (Charleston, S.C.) 1865-1873, 1869-10-11
THE GEoRGEToWN ELECTIONS
A NEW SCHEME OF PLUMBER.
Meeting of the Radical Convention
Whisl<ey Flows like Water-A Sketch
OF the Candidates and the Nominee.

The Georgetown Times give this spicy sketch
of the proceedings of the Radical Nominating
Convention which met on Saturday, the I'd
instant:
AS we predicted two weeks ago, the small
Radical ring in Georgetown had matters all
their own way in the County Nominatin g
Convention, held here last Saturday. The
delegates were said 10 have had "a gay and
liyeIy old time of it, and the scenes enacted be-
fore. at and after the ballotting, are represent
ed to have been decidedly jolly and lively.
Whiskey flowed freer than water, and the
building dedicated to the intellectual develop
ment Of the colored youth of the district is re-
ported to have assumed, ID many respects, the
appearance of an ill-conducted and disorderly
dOggery carrying on business without Ii
cense. The prize 20 be run for was the uneX-
pired term OF Mr.. Webb in the Legislature
and for it four compettors-all men Of color,
varying from almost white to pure black, and
all residents of the town. They were Thomas
D. Mcdowell, Edward l.. Rainey,. Alexander
G. Baxter and j. H. Bowley, all Of whom, eX-
cent Rajney, already hold paying offices. No
freedman's name, either from town or county,
was mentioned in connection with the nomi-
nation. On Saturday morning Mcdowell
seemed to have the call against the field, but
by the time the delegates had assembled 1t
was apparent that BOwley had the inside
|
counter-movement was made. But If such
movement was made, it was too late and inef-
fectual tor on the first ballot Bowley was
first and the rest nowhere, for he received
seventy-seven votes, and all the rest thirty
votes, which, being more than two-thirds of
the votes cast, made him the nominee Of the
party.
Our information leads us to believe that j.
H. Bowley the nominee of Saturday last, is
from one of the Northern or Eastern States,
and that he came to these parts some time in
1866 In the capacity of a teacher. Under the
new order of things, he was elected or ap-
pointed County School Commissioner, and has
succeeded in establishing school In George
town, of which he is the teacher. The emolu-
mefits of his office, as School Commissioner,
amount to four dollars q day when on duty,
but what is his income from keeping the only
school in operation for the education Of the
colored youth in the district, we are not suffi-
cently advised to say. These, with the threat
of visiting just and merited chastisement on q
low white man, whom he detected In an act of
treachery to him, about the time the baloting
was to commence, are, SO far as we have
heard, the only claims he has on the county
for the honor Of being one of Its lawmakers.
In this, as In every other action OF the few
in Georgetown who assume to be the Repub-
can party of the district, the freedmen in toton
and country hdUe been insultingly ignored,
ouerslaughed, and pronounced incompetent and
un,oorthy TO hold office, or to occupy any posi-
ton of honor, profit or trust, and are to be
bulled into the belief that q stranger who
comes without dollar In his carpet-bag into
their midst has more interestin their welfare,
and more love for them than men like Edward
L. Rainey and John Lucas, who were born and
reared with them, and know them, and under
stand their wants. With cool efrontery and
complaisance that one cannot but hefp to ad
mire, these foreign friends ofthe freedmen tell
them that they are now entirely too ignorant
to know their wants, and, consequently, un-
able to represent them; and that possibly, IN
der their teachings, in some future day the
claims of the present benighted freedmen may
be considered by those who now assume to be
their sqperierss te ...lullns @,s.s,s.1;;. - -
...i.isH is felt and nponly expressed by the IN
telIigent freedmen of the district, at the man
ner of their treatment, the harp OF" Forty
Acres has been strung to new tune-the
sounds of which are calculated by their deceiv-
ers to lull the freedmen into pleasant dreams,
out of which they are to wake possessors, oc-
cupants and proprietors of landed estates. Re-
living on the supposed Ignorance OF the freed
men from the country, these fellows, who take
care to monopolize all the offices for them
selves, tell them that if they will but for this
time support and elect the candidate OF tne
League, The tares auiU be raised so high that the
lands OF the ,ohite men ,oiN be sold, and the
land agent ,oin be ready to buy them up, and
viii at once distribute them among the freed
men. They are assured that the plan Is Inn"
nitely better than the "forty acre and q
mule" plan; for, by this process they aooud
not only haue the land 6at ,oou!d get clear
of the 1ohite men loho might disturb them
in their agricultural operations. Having
had "the promise to the ear so IN
variably 'broken to the hope, from March,
1865, to the present time, by every adventur-
er whose business it was to impose upon them,
il is not strange that the freedmen, particular
ly those from the county, should have some
misgivings of the fair promises held out to
them, and place no faith in the words Of those
who have heretofore systematically deceived
them. Experience has taught the freedmen
these are the cunning devices of adventures,
who have all along succeeded In monopolizing
all the offices, and thus excluding them from all
participation and enjoyment of them, and that
as long as they listen to them, they will con-
tinue to be ..hewers of wood and drawers OF
water" to q set who, without office, would be
as destitute of head as they are Of principle
Having been plundered and kept down by the
plausible but deceptive pretexts and promises
of the Georgetown clique, 1t would not sur
prise us If our friends, the county freedmen,
did not give Mr. Bowley a hard and rough
road to travel before he gotto Columbia. We
shall see.