The Anderson intelligencer. [volume] (Anderson Court House, S.C.) 1860-1914, 1870-08-25
<HOYT & CO., Proprietors.
The Letter Of Judge Orr upon the Political
Situation.

-5G COLUMBIA, S. c., Aug. Is, 1870.
70 the Editor Of The Republican:
SIR: 1 have received from various sources
communications in reference to the questions
which are agitating the people of South Caro-.
lima to-day 1t is impracticable that should
answer them individually. / have prepared an
exnosition of, what believe should be the pol
icy of the white people in South Carolina in
the pending election between Carpenter and
Butler on the one hand, and Scott and Ransier
on the other. shall be under obligations to
you if you will give it publication.
Very respectfully,
In response to inquiries addressed to me by
friends in letters and otherwise, l shall proceed
very briefly to state my opinions ON the politi-
cal issues presented to the people in the can
vass now progressing in this State.
/. shall vote for Scott and Ransler, Repub-
lican nominees for Governor and Lieutenant
Governor.
2. cannot vote for the nominees of the
Union Reform party, because in my Judgment
the purpose which they propose to accomplish
is entirely impracticable, and the nomination
made by their Convention will not only accom-
plish, no good results but the consequences OF
the nomination and canvass must be pernicious.
The avowed purpose of the Convention was
to effect reforms in the Administration of the
State Government In some OF its depart
ments retrenchment and reform is doubtless
greatly needed. Some of its Offices are filled
by incompetent and corrupt men, who should
be driven from the places they occupy. More
economy in the appropriation and dlsburse-
ment Of public money should be .practiced.
How are these objects to be attained! Inc on
" reforms in the State Government that can be
successfully accomplished at least for many
years to come must be by and through the Re
publican party and its organization. They
have control of all the departments of the State
Governmept, and have a majority Of more than
thirty thousand voters to preserve and perpetu-
ate that control So long as an opposing party,
disaYowing Republicanism, is organized IN the
State to defeat and displace them so long will
party machinery and appeals to party appll-
ances preserve its unity and supremacy. Ii we
want an illustration of the strength and con-
stancy of party organization in securing self
perpetuation, look to the State of Vermont for
thirty years prior to the war, when it annually
rolled up its $4,000, or more, majority for the
Wing party, despite all the efforts Of the De-
mocracy, aided most of the time by Federal in
fuence and patronage.
When you attempt to reform party, by de-
stroying (which is the present mode of re-
form adopted-the first law of nature, self
preservation, appeals to each member of that
party to resist the new movement and avert its
destruction Such an antagonism has another
most baleful influence; the most active and
oftentimes the most unscrupulous partisans ex-
aggerate the Importance of maintaining party
usage and discipline, and the great mass of the
honest portion of the party are thus diverted
from careful examination into the fitness OF
those seeking to represent them, and from abu-
scs and corruptions existing in the party
An antagonistic party may be organized, and
organized with great effect, when there is re-
mote prospect of success in driving the party
in power, or its leaders who are guilty of mis-
rule, from their supremacy but is there such a
prospect in the present canvass?
The colored vote is, and has been from 1867,
nearly unit for the Republican party, and
have they acted unwisely or unpatriotically IN
their ardent devotion the Republican party :?
Suppose our conditions-of the white race
were reversed, that we and our ancestors had
been slaves for 200 years, that party had made
war to give US freedom, that it had succeeded,
that the same party had periled its own su-
premacy by guaranteeing to US our civil rights,
and that above all, the ballot-the efectual
weapon of preserving those rights-had been
secured to us by solemn constitutional enact
ment by the same party, and we were, in the face
of all this appealed to by those who had opposed
all these great boons, to join with them in over
throwing the party of our deliverance and re-
demption, would any white man for moment
tolerate with patience any such proposition :?
Would it not be most ungrateful for the colored
man to renounce such party, when its very
existence is now threatened? Some of his
leaders, white and colored, may be incompetent,
corrupt, treacherous, but he would exhibit
strange obliviousuess if he would consent to
ioin an antagonistic organization to destroy his
own party, even before he had attempted to re-
form it.
The relative population of whites and color
ed are as 3 to 4, and the vote may be assumed
to be the same. The colored majority is more
than twenty-five thousand.
Assuming that the great mass of the colored
voters will sustain the Republican party and
the foregoing views, confirmed by the expert.
ence of the last five years, does it not conclu-
sively show that if there is dishonesty and
peculation in departments of the State Govern
ment, that it cannot be reformed by a Reform"
party? Don't the figures show that the votes
are too numerous on the other side? This view
of 25.O0O majority is upon the assumption that
every white man in the State votes the Gre
form'' ticket, but when the ballots come to be
cast it will be found that there are many white
Republicans in South Carolina-many more
whites who will vote the Republican, than
blacks who will vote the Reform" ticket.
If I have shown that reform cannot be ac-
complished through the Reform party, it de-
wolves on me to show how not only reform is to
be accomplished, but how larger infusion of
the intelligence and virtue of the white race
can exercise its just and legitimate influence in
the cotnsels of the State.
1t must be done through the organization OF
the Republican party. The wise and expert
enced in good faith must go into the Republi-
can party, acquire fair and legitimate inf1u-
ence, aiding in selecting the most competent
and deserving men for official position in the
Republican ranks, and when confidence has
been attained by good faith and sincerity, then