Middletown transcript., 1870-02-05
SATURDAY MORNING, FEBRUARY s, 1870.
Deststution among tho Black People In
Washington.

Washington City, ever since the late
war, has been crowded with freedmen,
among whom are many aged and infrm
persons, and many women and children
who are not able to support themselves.
But there are many more, who are able,
who throng the purlieus of that city and
will not seek employment but prefer to
remain there in filth, beggary and rags,
dragging out wretched and miserable |
existence. Washington has become the |
great lazar-housc of the nation, for this
class Of our population, and public and
private charity have been invoked for their
maintenance. Only few days since, Mr..
Thomas Garrett appealed to the people of
Wilmington, in their behalf, asking for
cast-off garments, bed clothing, or any
thing else suitable for shielding them from
the cold And now an appropriation is
asked for them from the national treasury.
A cotcmporary says;
The sum of thirty thousand dollars is at
once needed to relieve the destitute miscr-
ables Of the District of Columbia. The
Congressional Utopia is in melancholy
condition. Senator Bayard, Of Delaware,
out of sheer humanity, felt himself COM
PEELED to vote for the appropr[ [ation. In
announcing his intention he thus spoke of
the state of things at the National Capital.
''But while, sir, have ann punced my
intention to vote for this measure, and for
these plain reasons, | cannot forbcar to
call the attention of the Senate and the
country to the fact that the city of Wash
ington, the District of Colum bia, which
has been under the benefcent care of that
party which is par excellence the friend of
the black man, offers to-day the spectacle
Of being the very worst and most unhappy
home that he has on the face Of the earth
We have had here the evidence of philan-
thropic ladies who have travelled over
Europe and have travelled through all
parts of the United States, and who tell
you that nowhere within the range of civil
lization, to their knowledge, iB there SO
much of human wrotchedness as exists to-
day among the colored people Of this Dis
trict, should be disposed 10 add my
own testimony much to the So me effect
less in degree, but similar in kind Al
my own dwelling in this District the ap
peals for charity are constant tenfot
more numerous than ever knew in tha
community which was my home, ant
which in part represent upon this floor
Passing through the streets, through th
thoroughfares of this town, there are larg
er bodies of wretched colorcd people thai
ever saw in my whole life before. wa
brought up in community where thos
people abound, where they formed one
fourth of the entire population, and I d
say that never saw in all my previou
life as much unhappiness, as much degra
datiou and vice apparent in that class {
people as have in the few short month
which have passed in the city of Wash
ington."
The Baltimore Gazette says ALI til;
Mr.. Bayard has said is strictly tru'
The colored people, as brother and cit
zens, have proven themselves to be SO
failures in Washington. Left to themse
ves,they will do in the main no bett
elsewhere, and where they are made rule
over many things, they will re ender ST
worse account. The longer they are le
to the guidance of the Radical faction Il
more rapidly and the more surely W
they draw near to that war ofrace viii
will result in their annihilation.