Nashville union and American. [volume] (Nashville, Tenn.) 1868-1875, 1871-11-28
THE CARPET.BAGGERs AND THE

the great body Of them have voted the RAD
cal ticket in all the Southern states with q
blind persistence that has seemed to, leave
no hope that they could be convinced that
any other course would be best for them.
Indeed in some portions of the South il was
dangerous for negro to attempt to vote
the Democrats ticket. Ignorant, inexpe-
rienced, and excitable, their passions were
The mere organs on which the cunning and
INSCRIPTIONS adventures have played with
out ceasing for their own aggrandizement,
and thus they have been employed as facle
instruments for the injury not only of the
whites, but of their own race. Their
minds have been kept in a continual fer
mental one time elated by the hope of
some impossible good, at another tortured
by the fear of some remote evil-and thus
the poor creatures have been driven by their
earpet-bag oracles, like weaver's shuttle,
from one extremity 20 another. And what
have they been benefited by their alliance
with the Radicals Let us see how this is,
andl ct us take Virginia and South Car
-olina to show how they are affected
by Democratic and Radical rule. Three or
four years ago the Democrats got control
of Virginia, and their administration of the
affairs of that State has been such that quiet
prevails generally throughout the State; and
no threats have been made at Washington,
so far as is known to the public, to suspend
the writ of habeas corpus and send troops
there to execute the mandate of Radical car
pet-baggerS and scalawags. The Richmond
Enquirer presents the following contrast
between the negroes in Virginia and South
Carolina:
ave challenge a comparison between the
condition of the colored man in Virginia
and in those Southern States where the
carpet-baggers have obtained the control
Of the government. Are the colored peo-
pie of Virginia less contented than their
trothers in South Carolina? are they less
prosperous? Is justice more impartially
meted out to them in South Carolina than
in Virginia? Have we any Ku-Klux in
Virginia? Are the races arrayed against
each other in bitter hostility as in South
Carolina? Has Virginia been plundered
Has there been any breath of official cor
ruption here? Have not our Judges been.
just and impartial? Has the colored man a
better opportunity to get common school
educationin the mixed schools of South
Carolina than in the ''separate" common
schools established by the Conservative
officials in Virginia? Have they "three
thousand" common schools in South Caro-.
lima? The carpet-baggers have control in
South Carolina, in Mississippi, in Florida, in
Louisiana, in Texas; and is the condition of
the colored man in any one of these States
any better than it is in Virginia? Is it as good?
Bad government is bad for all; and the mis-
government which has prevailed in South
Carolina has fallen on the blacks as well as
the whites. The plumber Of that State may
have enriched few carpet-baseers, but it
has benefited nobody else; and while it
comes directly out of the whites, it Injuries
indirectly the colored population also. If
the planters ofsSouth Carolina are ruined,
and their estates are abandoned, what be-
comes of the. plantation hands? Society is
disorganized in the Southern States, and
the prOperty-holder and the non-property-
holder all suffer together. Every branch of
industry languishes in Turkey and in ia
maica because there is bad government;
and so in Louisiana, Mississippi and South
Carolina, there is a general prostration of
business because the laws are bad and are
badly administered
The Lynchburg Ne1US says that "one of
the most cheering features of the great
Conservative victory in Virginia is the in
creased colored Conservative vote" and
that this must be to the Radical carpet
pagers "one Of the most CALLING circum-
stances of their defeat" as ait indicates
clearly enough that the coiored men are
beginning to find them out. As time wears
on and the freedmen become better edH-
Gated and more intelligent, they will be apt
to assert their political independence, and,
like all other men, to vote on public
questions without regard to race.
As the carpet-bag influence gradu-
ally wanes they will begin TO realize
more and more that the native white peO-
pie Of Virginia are theiI best friends, and
that the two races are mutually dependent
on each other"
There is no State in the South so COM
pletely under Radical rule as South Caro-
ma. In that State the negroes have been
as much under the control of carpet-baggers,
50 far as their right to vote is concerned, as
they were under their masters before The
war. The carpet-baggers have monopolized
all the fat offices; and have grown rich
upon them, and what is the condition
of that State and the negro popula-
ton there to-day? We beg to in-
troduce here the testimony of an intelligent
negro on this point. The person to whom
we allude is named Cain, clergyman of
some note among his race, and the editor of
the Missionary Record, paper Published
in Charleston, which has steadily supported
the Radical party. In a recent issue, that
paper tells who the real South Carolina Ku.
Klux are. 1t says:
"The important developments in the af-
IdlTS OF TINS Stale NlIlllu the last lew months
prove cOnclusiyely that there is something
wong. The mdeniable facts that the Legis-
lature has made appropriations to meet the
current expenditures, and that the taxes have
been promptly paid by the people, and that
yet there is a want of funds to meet the
legitimate expenses Of the State, show
record which is not enviable. No man of
honesty can afford to shut his eyes to the
glaring misappicatiOn of the funds of this
State, as shown in the inability to meet the
current expenses. No State can hope to
succeed and retain credit While its finances
are so manipulated as to fail to pay its en-
ployees; in every department there is com
plant that there is~hO money in the treas
uries, either in State or county; in every
one the employees complain that their sala-
ries are not paid; the jails are crowded with
criminals, while the Sherifis are complain
ing that they cannot meet the current
expenses, because of the want of money
in the counties to pay them.
Yet the people have responded
well to the taxes demanded, and have paid
up. The State Treasurer does not give the
County Treasures any chance to speculate