The Daily state journal. [volume] (Alexandria, Va.) 1868-1874, 1871-03-29

OCAnh Vi Jul ACOAhOIi atlO Val U
much consolation from paragraph in the
Nation Of last week to the purport that
there is difficulty in getting trustworthy
information with regard to affairs in the
South--a fact that may be freely admitted
without any detriment to the Republican
party. The Associated Press agencies in
the South are so entirely in the hands Of
the friends and apol,gists OF the Ku-Klux
that their dispatches have become joke
even among their sympathizers, and there
have been signs Of revulsion in quarters
from which it was not expected. Some of
our contemporaries affect to regard the
Nation as an cable and, in general, c,ndd
Republican periodical" aud we, therefore,
have less hesitancy in commenting to the
careful perusal of their editors the follow
ing extract from the leading editorial arti-
Gle in the same issue that afforded the pre-
cious crumb of comfort above referred to /:
"There is no doubt about the multiplicity
and atrocity of the ou,rages committed by
what are called the Ku-Klux on the negroes
and Unionists at the South. 1t appears to be
equally certain that the persons who com N il
these outrages are not brought TO justice. The
sheritfs do not arrest them, or, if they do,
juries do not convict them-in other words,
through great part of the South, there is no
security for either life or property. That some
such state of things would come to pass was
foreseen after the war. 1t was said that il
legislation and the election of officers were left
solely to the Southern whites, the Southern
blacks would be left without adequate protec-
ton. Consequently, the suffrage was given
to the blacks. Bot this was not felt to be sulIi-
cient. A great portion of the more experienced
and intelligent people at the South were ex-
cluded by the State constitutions, and BY an
amendment to the United States constitution,
from all share in the government. In this
way not only were the negroes and Union
ists guaranteed voice in the govern
ment, but they were secured in the
exclusive control of it. That is, to speak
plainly, for the purpose of securing the poor
they admitted to an equality OF rights with the
rich and educated, but they were put in pos
session of the whole administrative machinery.
Considering that a large body of the voters
in some States msjOrity-had recently emer-
ged from slavery in its most brutal form, 1t
must be admitted the experiment was bold
one; in fact, it was the boldest ever known
Ization has ever been attempted anywhere else.
We do not blame those who attempted it. They
were hot from a civil war which had ended in
social revolution, and they found themselves
charged with the duty of securing large and
helpless population of freedmen in possession
of common civil rights in the presence Of their
late masters, without having recourse to pure
military coercion.
"The experiment has, however, totally fail
ed. The most influential portion of the South
ern population, with whose support no govern
ment can in the long run dispense, as has been
thousand times proved, have not only given
the new government at the South no assist
ance, but have, naturally enough, been bitter
ly hostile to them. The new political system,
indeed, was OF kind to rouse all their preiu
dices against it. The men who took part in
and aided the rebellion, and who were there
fore disfranchised, have within the last FIVE
years been reinforced by a powerful body of
youths who were boys during the rebellion,
and who have entered on manhood during
period of great disorder, and uncertainty, and
poverty, in which few careers are open to them,
and in which all the circumstances of their
lives tend to exasperate and embitter
them, and prepare them for turbulence and vio-
lence. They may therefore be said. without
exaggeration, to have taken the field against
the new regime. They have formed organiza-
tions somewhat similar to the Irish Whiteboys
and Molly Maguires, the express object of
which is to drive negroes and Union men out
of the South, and make all government
through their instrumentality impossible. For
this purpose they murder, rob and maltreat,
and they are too powerful, too skilfu, and too
firmly bound together and enjoy too much of
the sympathy Of the local population to make
it possible for the State officers to bring them
to justice. More than this, and, if possible,
worse than this, they have at the North a
powerful political party, which, if it cannot be
GO m hn ok tbosr ka. IL - os..i. 4
posed to blame them or call them to account.
and whose chances of accession to power seem
to improve as the passions excited by the war
die out"