New national era. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1870-1874, 1872-05-09
The Fui ure of Cotton.

The Washington Daily Patriot-a negro
hating io,irnal--in one of its issues last week
gave its readers an editorial on the future OF
cotton. The article predicts falling OH III
the cotton crop this season for several rea-
sons. 1t charges upon the GRANT radicals
as a crime their efforts to instruct the colored
men of the cotton belt as to their political
welfare, thus diverting their attention from
their work of raising and picking cotton. The
Patriot also paints dismal picture OF the
wrong done the cotton interest by the enforce
ment of laws prohibiting the poor whites, at
the dictation of the rich whites, from murder
ing the blacks who are so necessary to the
raising of cotton. We assure the Patriot that
the one thing necessary to insure the supre-
macy of King Cotton in the Southern States is
PEACE. A peace through which the rights Of
every man are acknowledged and respected.
Slavery has been abolished, freedom must be
allowed to take its place. People in the
South must be assured that their love of
liberty, their regard for the rights of Humanity,
and the laudable desire of the ignorant to ac
quire knowledge are not to be sufficient causes
for their being murdered and outraged. Thus
assured the colored people of the South can
not be easily induced to leave work to attend
political meetings.
1t is with the colOred labOrer in the South
just as it would be with the white laborer in
the North under similar conditions. Sur
round the white laborers of the North with a
powerful set of men, and with strong polti-
cal organization determined to reduce them to
state bordering on slavery, to prevent them
from acquiring the commonest education, to
deter them from exercising the elective fran
chise, denying to them the rights Of travellers
the accommodation of hotels, the right to
testify in courts Of justice, a trial by jury
unprecedented by feelings of caste; place the
white laborers of the North under such tyr
amy and they too, as do the colOred people,
will resort to politics to find relief from their
hardships Not only would the Northern la
borers resort to politics for relief, but if relief
came not speedily they would take up the
sword and fight to the end though the whole
| industry of the entire nation became paralyzed
| by their efforts to secure manhood rights.
| The problem as to the future of cotton, and
the future of every other industry in the South
will be satisfactorily solved when the policy
of that region has become so changed as to
acknowledge the right of every man, without
regard to race, color, or previous condition of
servitude, to life, liberty, and the pursuit of
happiness. This is all that is necessary; the
negroes will work, but they want to work as
freemen, they want to think and act as free
men, they want to rise out of their degraded
condition. They do not want to interfere
with any mans right, they make no war on
any one, they simply want their own, and
thinking their ends and aims can best be at
tanned by the continuance in power of the
Republican party, the colored people of the
South will no doubt do their utmost to accom-
plish that result though King Cotton should
be dethroned. Those who make it necessary
for the black man to abandon his labor to
protect his life and liberty are alone to be
held responsible for the decaptation of King
Cotton.