Belmont chronicle. [volume] (St. Clairsville, Ohio) 1855-1973, 1872-09-12
What Horace Knows about Ku-
Klux, tsfa


Klux. tstg
On the 18th of March, 1871, Mr.
Greeley said, through the columns ol
the Tribune: .t.a-i ll,2 e.i
'That men are daily killed throughou
most of the Southern States because
they are Republicans, is Just as sure rs
the fact that those States were lately
the arena OF a great civil war. There
has. been not less than five Thousand
negroes kiIledbecause of their cOIos and
their politics in theseStates since Grant:
election; and not one white SouthroL
has been punished for such murder
Nay, the brutal murderer Of "a white
military officer at Vieksburgh, Miss.
walks the streets of that city as freely
and proudly as though he were the hero
of some great Confederate victory. ~
Gentlemen opposite! we respectful
ly warn you that you are making a re-
cord that will expose you to fearful
judgement in the next Presidential
election. The. people of the United
States do not believe in wholesale as
sassination as a political maneuver, and
will uphold no party that resorts to it.
You may carry most of the interveA-
ing elections, when the issue is not dis
tinetly and vigorously pressed home
upon the masses but when we come
to 1872 you will assuredly be beaten BY
the votes of men who are not poIitie-
ians, and are not now voting at all.
We shall only have to drive home the
the facts which prove your completely
in the crimes now convulsing the South
and you Will inevitably go under. IF
you succeed in defeating legislation to
protect the loyal men of the South
from the crimes to which they are now
exposed and subjected, your fourth
successive discontinue in Presiden-
tial struggle will be signal and e0nelu-
sive.n l s.
As late as January 10, 1872, after Mr..
Greeley had thoroughly studied the
whole matter, had ample time to exam
inc into the facts presented, after both
sides of the story had gone before the
people, and tne Kuklux act had been
enforced, he used the following lang
uage in the Tribune, aa ~.
ssThe Kuklux trials which have
Just been concluded at Columbia. S. c.,
reveal social condition in that
State which shows how low down are
still the poor whites whose poverty and
ignorance were part of the slave system.
These trials showed, too, how the vim
dictive hatred of freedom still clings to
the higher classes Of the South, and
how easy it is for the ex-slayeholder to
turn his oppression of the black man
against the low class which befrfended
him or hesitates to join in organized
society to drive him out. Nobody can
say that these trials have not been
fairly conducted. The prisoners were
defended by such eminent legal counsel
as the Hon. Henry Stanbery, ex-At-
torney General of the United States,
and the Hon. Reverdy Johnson. But
the testimony brought out overwhelm-
ed all ar gument, and forty-seven of
these wretches confessed their crimes in
open court, six others were convicted,
and seventy two indictments, embrac-
ing over five hundred persons, were
found. The. story of brutality, crime,
and moral degradation made
,sp from the revelations of the tcit5sesses Is
too TeUotting for recital; 1t is O. dark
chapter IN The history of eieiyizatioR; Ii
is a burning dssgrace to the party l1ibich
the conspiracy, aided and
a6etteds its agents, and did its best To-
suppress the evidence noID published to
NE tcortd." ~ IlS
And yet Horace Greeley is at the
head of this same party which he warn
ed as making up a reeord which would
expose them to fearful Judgment in this
contest. He caps the col
umn upon which brutality, crime, VII
olenee and moral degradation" are in
and now asks the honest yeo-t
manry of the country to support that
column
Friends will you do it?