The Bedford gazette. [volume] (Bedford, Pa.) 1805-current, 1869-03-12

lHulNluudl merits. II hel INDUSTRIOUS,
sober and honest, he is respected and
patronized. have many friends a.
mong them, and cherishing only the
kindest feelings for them, / am in
capable of doing anything in my rep
resentative capacity to their prejudice
But, sir, the ballot will be no boon
to them. The assertion that it is
necessary to the protection of their
civil rights Is false, and, so far as
Pennsylvania is concerned, is SANDER
Gus. The negro no more needs the
ballot in Pennsylvania for his security
than the women do for theirs. The
whole history OF that grand old Com
monwealth shows that the weak, the
ignorant, the poor, the dependent have
been cared for by her with maternal
solicitude. Look at her common
schools, her colleges, her asylums for
the blind, the deaf and dumb, the in
sane; her hospitals for the sick, houses
OF correction for the erring, her prisons
for the guilty, her laws for the poor,
for married women, her system of in
testacy. What can Christianity or
civilization do for the lowly, the poor,
and distressed that Pennsylvania has
not done? Who dares to stand up and
accuse her Of robbing the negro of his
rights? Who has the audacity to as
sert that the ballot is essential to the
negro's safety and welfare? Founded
by deeds of peace, Pennsylvania has
been just to all men, whether red or
black or white, and he wrongs her
grievOusly who would undermine her
institutions upon the poor and false
pretense that her citizens of African
descent are oppressed. 1t is not so.
But though this amendment if I'M
called for even by the negroes Of Penn
sylvania, and is subversive of our fun
damental law, it is supposed it will be
Il step toward universal suffrage which
gentlemen speak of as great and
thinking, sir, that such opinions are
founded in misrepresentation of the
nature of suffrage. Having on a form
er occasion stated my views somewhat
at length on this head, / will not en-
/ ter again into the subject, but will con-
tent myself with saying that suffrage
is not natural right any more than
any other municipal regulation which
experience has shown to be expedient.
1t does not belong to manhood in the
sense in which the rights of life and
/ liberty do; but it is a political trust
/ which the majority may bestow where
/ it will best subserve the general wei
/ fare. 1t is a conventional as contra
/ distinguished from natural right
/ Its bestowal, limitations, and exercise
/ are regulated by the law of conve-
nience or expendiency. The question
always ought to be, will a proposed
/ extension of suffrage promote the peace
and welfare of the body-politic p
When Louis Napoleon, in the coup d'
etut that made him despot, decreed
universally of suffrage, he dem0nstra-
( ted how this beneficent reform of
which we hear so much could be made
/ the instrument of an inexorable tyran-
ny; and the same refOrmer who eX-
tended the basis of suffrage at Athens
brought in with it the odious o6tracism
by which the greatest and best men of
the city were banished. These and
many other examples that might be
cited ought to teach US that when suf-
frage is hastened or extended by force
or fraud, instead of growing up out of
the experience Of the people, it is a
cure and not a blessing.
Our written constitutions are the out
groupings of our national life. Until
lately they were formed, not on the wild
dreams Of Theorists, but to record the
conclusions of experience. What the
common mass have found to be good for
themselves they have secured in their
constitutions, State and Federal, Suf-
frage has been left to each State to be-
stow or Withhold according to its discre-
/ ton. Nowhere has it been extended TO
women or minors or unnaturaliZed for
eigners. Why? fla natural right, a
/ God given inheritancetO manhood, as it
is sometimes called, why should it be
Withheld from these classes? 1t is with
| held from them on the same reason it Is
in Pennsylvania withheld fromncgrocs
-expediency. Human experience has
proved that the trust could he best
| executed by excluding these classes,
/ and, as in all other trusts, the selec-
ton of trustee on the ground of eX-
| pedfency is no affront to those who
are not selected. Everybody except
those strong minded women who, not
Just representatives Of their sex and
"most ignorant Of what they are most
assured, +" clamOrfor WOman's rights" !"
would probably agree that it would be a
degredation tothe female sex toinvoive
them in the responsibilities of the bal
i lot. Universal experience attests that
they are not suitable trustees; and
therefore, by an almost universal con-
sent, they are set aside. The reasons
for setting aside the negro are stronger
and better than those which apply to
females, Between him and the white
man there is an ineradicable distinc-
ton that must forever prevent that free,
social intercourse on which alone pop
ular suffrage can be based.
This distinction if it be not enfamed
into hostility by bad legislation, does
not prevent the two races from dwell
ling together harmoniously in the same
/ -. -. --;o+fncr 90 -, CFy,ar -, ~, o