Nashville union and American. [volume] (Nashville, Tenn.) 1868-1875, 1870-01-29

CA4SS were Heu1TdDCulS6O, Dtte Ill Nt
under military Law. Second, A small POI
ton Of the white people entranehised an
all the rest of the population, both blac
! and white. DISTINGUISHED. Third, A sma
portion Of the white people, together wit
ali Of the black people, enfranchised, an
the great mass of the white people disfrar
chised. as We now stand, we are practi
cally in a fourth stage, in which ali mel
are free and equal before the law. As
Democrat want to give that state lou,
and patient trial before we go on to tn
fifth experiment, namely, that Of complete
ly enfranehising one race and disfranchisin,
the other.
Mr.. President, very gladly turn from
the consideration Of such a state of things
with the results anticipate from it, I,
the consideration of the arguments which
satisfy my mind that the condition of uni
versal equality before the law is best.
think the fears delegates have expressed o
disastrous consequences to follow, are al
most entirely imaginary. The negroes a
the last general election were all enfran
chised, whilst a great proportion of the
| white population were not so. know that
had no vote. They were under perfect
party discipline, ard as general thing
they all went to the polls; and yet, so fal
as know, they elected not one single can
| didate in the State. Other delegates may
| fear, but l do not, that the negro's political
friends who have heretofore loved him SO
much viii stick to him through good and
evil report, in adversely as in prosperity
that their love for him Is so great they viii
continue to party-drill him after he is IN
able to reward them with Office, and they
are unable to reward him with sops. Sir,
for one am willing for the negro to see
the extent of their eleemosynary love for
him. Sir, the scales will fall from his eyes
and he will be in one year completely and
forever disillusioned on that subiect-forty
acres, mule, and all
If the adoption of this provision shall
secure only temporary calm, as delegates
have said, that is enough. Give us genuine
peace for five years, or two years, and
the negro will hardly be anappreciable ele-
ment in the community. There is
no emigration from Africa, but a million
immigrants from Europe come to these
shores yearly; and if we can give as
surances to the immigrant, (more especial
" the intelligent immigrant from the
Northern States OF the Union our white
population will be doubled before two more
general elections shall come around-while
in the same time the number of negroes
lin my opinion not now 200, 000) will be
diminished one-half Delegates have
likened the peace which would follow the
adoption of this report of the majority of
the committee, to the calm which precedes
death. Often if a vigorous patient could
get such a calm he would recover; and
that, in my opinion, is our condition now.
/ must say, in passing, that have no fear
in any event of social equality. Socially,
the blood of the two races would not mix
if poured together in q bowl.
honestly believe that they will identify
themselves with the people of the State.
That is the question at last Delegates
have travelled back in history long way
to demonstrate that the negro is incapable
of a self-sustaining civilization. am not
afraid to let in the light of history on the
question. What they have said is true and
more also. It's said by travellers that on the
walls of the inner catacombs of Egypt are
pictures of negroes, so like our negroes,
that q Southern man laughs when he looks
at them. Those pictures are older than the
day of Moses, and yet the picture always
u
earliest recorded maratime people knew
and traded with Ethiopia; the Phenicians
knew them, the Tyrian, the Sidonian, but
the negro would accept the civilization of
none Of them. He was just the same
negro then, that he is now. l admit all
that, but the argument l draw from it is
that We should give the negro every poht-
ical right in Tennessee. We know him
better than any people in history ever
knew him; and our experience Of him per-
fectly TALES with the teachings of history.
His is the only race that is perfectly
SUI geaeris, and his most Distinguishing
characteristic is not his colour, but the
fact that he alone lives and fourishes in
immediate contract with any superior
race.
1t is, in my opinion, a mistake to say
this is only true, when he is kept in slave
~. He belongs now to the hardest mas
ter that ever owned him yet-''Lord of
himself. that heritage of woe" And |
believe that he is fast becoming q sadder
and wiser man under the dispensation.
Many Of them are working hard and doing
well. In my immediate neighborhOOd
that is true Of them all; l am security for
their rent. and seldom lose anything by it.
Those who do not work will die; and those
who do work will identify themselves with
the country, as all working men do. If
the history of the negro and the white
man, in their relation to one another,
teaches anything, it does seem to me to
assure us, that the negro as a citizen will
always go with his wealthy and intelligent
white neighbor.
Z. L - &c
that il would not be safe to leave the ne
gro unprotected, to the mercies Of the
white men of the South. Those who
| think so, we're not raised rs we were,
under the kindly humanising influences of
negro slavery. They were not nursed by
| black nurses as we were, nor we're raised
with black children as playmates, nor had,
as We had, our mother IN the house, and a
| black nanny in the kitchen. No sir, /
repeat that if ever in this world, there has
been a superior race in whose hands hui
mainly would gladly leave an inferior and
helpless race, that superior people Is this
! much illuminated, much mlsunder-
| stood, white race of the South.
| What African or what Indian did
| our ancestors ever reduce to slavery? II
was the people of New England who carried
| on the African slave-trade, and imported
| and sold the ancestors of these very ne
groes 70 our ancestors, not only against
| their will, but against the solemn protest
| of Virginia to the British Parliament
| Parliament refused to interfere for the rea
| son that New England, as well as England
| had too great an interest invested in thu
| African slaye-trade. 1t was the New
! England States who forced into the Consti
tuition the provision that the slave-trade
should not be stopped until the year 1903.
| think they had better propose 17tl
| Amendment, TO expunge that previous ties
timonial of Massachusetts, from the Consti
tuition
repeat, Mr. President, that in re
gard to this and every kindrec
subject touching humanity TO aliel
races, we may proudly challenge
comparison, by the light of history, will
any people that history makes record of
and least Of all do we fear such q cOmpari
son with the descendants of the Pilgrim
| Fathers. To say no more of their recon
on the negro question, allow me ask wher
is the King Philip whose blood cries on
from our soil a.? Where now are the nobl
tribes of savsges who Ito their destruction
gave such hospitabie welcome to the Pi
grim Fathers? Where now are the Nc
hawks. the Oneidas, the Senecas, and tn
, rest of the great Six Nations of the North
Exterminated or sold into slavery a
AGE ago. Where, on the Otht
, | hand. are the great tribes Of the South-th
| Cherokees, the Creeks, the Chickasaws an
| Choctaws, and the Seminoles? They al
a safely removed to the far West, half-civi