The Columbia herald. [volume] (Columbia, Tenn.) 1850-1873, 1872-03-08
The Reconstructed states.
From the Washington Patriot.


Perhaps no people were ever more
doomed 10 drink the waters of per-
cnnial bitterness than the people of
the reconstructed states of the South
during the last ten years. They have
gone through that which would have
utterly cast down and left forever
hopeless a people less brave, less
strong, less intrinsically great. TO
have shown themselves, as they have
done, superior TO every vicissitude of
fortune; in war, superior to defeat
and humiliation in peacc-Or what
is called peace, though it is peace
not in deed but in name-superiOr to
insult, injury. oppression, wrong
and the slaudcrs Ofevery evil tongue,
stamps them, while shedding a glory
upon the country of which they are
part, as being one of the highest type
of manhood known among men.
Did they belong to some other ma
ton than this ; did we know them,
not as brethren with whom we have
been at strife, but as strangers, and
marked how they have borne them
selves through Unreasonable calam-
tiles, they would have won the univer-
sal praise of the American people,
including those now clouded by IA
naticism, OF warped by unreasona-
bic, and it would seem indispensable
hatred. We should have been proud
of our own unconquerable blood
that runs in their veins quick TO
claim them as our kindred; and
ready with an out-stretched hand, to
lift them out of the ruins of their
fortunes with which they are now
surrounded.
We are accustomed to overflow
with sympathy for what it pleases
us to call the oppressed of other
lands, strangely forgetting that we
have something msrvellously like
oppression in our own. Indeed, for
such, and for any, it seems, not of
our own household, we are very ten
der-heartod, ready to make any sac
rifices in their behalf, and take great
credit to ourselves for the exercise
of our enlarged Christian charity
abroad, though destitute, in a sig
niiicant direction and singular man
ner, of that excellent virtue at home.
| We have cars that are acute to hear
and eyes that arc quick to see bonds
afar oil, and as self constituted apOs-
tics of emancipation, we arc ready
to fly OH the wings Ofthe wind to the
uttcrmost parts of the earth to break
them. We have bOundlcsS vision,
so iDtractably bOundlcss thai We
cannot contract il to a recognition Of
what is demanded of us at our OWL
doors. In the plenitude Of our be-
ncvOlcncc towards the inhabitants of
other nations, if not, indeed, of other
planets, and in the unquenChableness
of our enthusiasm for remote enter
priscs of succOr, VIC go tracing the
rim of the horizon for something to
relieve, carefully overlooking the
claims of those whom we need not
traverse the globe, or get beyond
our borders, TO find, TO whom is due
first Justice and then iratcrnal kind
ness. Hungary, Ireland, Cuba, have
we as steady source OF sorrow,
whose griufs We volunteer to carry
| in our bosoms, but for Onc-third Of
our own land, our own kindred, the
people of the South, bowed down in
dust and ashes, VIC have nothing but
contumcly, an inverted face, insult,
dcnunciarion and heavy hand.
The bearing of the Southern pcO-
pie, as a whole, under all that they
have been forced, at the point of the
bayonct, and in other ways hardly less
tyrannous, 10 undergo, has been such
rs to command the respect and adj
mirstiOn of all candid and unpreju-
diced men. Theirs has been no
common lot their suflerings no COM
mon suflerings, nor is what they have
lost to be measured by any common
standard. Amid it all they have
been brave, stout-hearted, courage
Gus, not ullen nor despairing, though
greatly tempted to despair; but look
ing forward through the present dark
ness, and over present calamities, to
the dawn of a better day. Their pa
iiencc, their strength, their good
cheer have not been in vain. The
day is breaking, and this is due
in a great measure to their temp
cratcncss, wisdom, forbearancc UNI
der trying circumstances. 1t cannot
but be believed and hoped that the
exercise of these will continue to the
emil. The recent past to the South
ern people is dreary waste. The
opening future is full of promise to
them as an integral part ofthe Amer
lean people. And the time is not
far distant when, relieved of the
present cmbarrassmcnts that impede
their progress and bear them down,
they will illustrate, for the cncOur-
agcment of ether nations and other
times, how true it is
That men may rise On stepping stones
OF their dead selves 10 higher things.