The Democratic press. [volume] (Ravenna, O. [Ohio]) 1868-1901, 1872-03-21
Social Equality.

Ii any one had predicted, few
wears ago, that there was, in sthe
United States, q white man so lost to
coRmon sense, enlightened patriotism
and pride of caste, as to propose the
political and social equality of the
African and Anglo-Saxon races, the
prophet would have been considered
mad But the degeneration which
follows unreasoDing fanaticism and
unbridled passion has developed many
such men, who mistaking sectional
hate for enlarged philanthropy, are
moving heaven and earth to bring
about the unnatural condition between
races. whom nature has declared dis
tinct,by marks too plain to be mistaken
even by the corrupt tyrants who are
striving to make the laws of nature
subserVient to their lawless will.
Ifall this damphooleJy is sanctioned
by the high-seunding but false as
sumption that " all men are by nature
free and equal" why have the Indians
and Chinese been excepted from the
provisions of the natural law? Why
is not the idiot equal to the sage; tho
thief to the honest man; the pauper
to the man of wealth and the pigmy
to the giant? Why is not the honest
laborer, stained with toll, welcome
visitor in the gilded halls of the efem-
mate millionaire Why are the real
ly useful-the wealth producers-cut
off from social intercourse with the
accidentally rich? 1t is because
fixed law of nature is changed and
and inequality, and because society
enacts lis own laws more binding and
irrepealable than those of the iegisla-
tor The grossest manifestation of
tyranny is the attempt to regulate
the social relations of a people and to
harmonize the multiform differences
which grow out of tue different pur-
suits and conditions of life. With
these things g God governments never
interfere, and the most despotlc have
failed to control.
A law of Congress may throw open
the theatres and bathrooms; the
steamboat state-rooms and sleeping
cars; the church pews, and parlors of
the rich, and invite the negro to enter
and make himself at home, but those
who vote for the law, know it will be
dead at its birth, and those very men
would be the first TO kick the intrud-
ing negro out of doors. Then why
enact such laws? There are three
important E0dSOuS iOI IL III tAO OotA-
nation of the Radical Congress-the
first is that it may secure the negro
vote for Grant, the second, that it is
an insult to the South, and the third,
that it muitiplies the chances OF col
lisions between the blacks and whites,
and thus invite the armed interven-
ton so eagerly desired at Washington
as pretext for controlling the elec-
tions in November.
AS before stated, a wise government
will not only leave the social relations
to adjust themselves, but will prohib-
it by the most stringent provisions,
any government interference. So
long as society exists, distinctions be-
tween wealth and poverty, learning
and ignorance, refinement and rude
ness, virtue and vice will continue to
divide society, and any attempt by
the government to break them down
and substitute perfect equality, can
result only in mischief. And the at
tempt now making by Congress, TO
elevate the most ignorant and debased
of all our population to an exact level
with the most cultivated and refined,
is species of tyranny too base to be
tolerated by any save the most de-
graded of mankind. 1t is strange
that those who make idols of the me-
groes with the hope that the negroes
will make gods of them, cannot SEQ
that the course they are pursuing i5
sure to end sooner or later in the de-
thronement of their idols and their
consignment to deeper degradation
than that from which abolitionists are
attempting to raise them. Nature
will assert her power, and the foolish
efforts of man to resist that power,
will recoil with terrible force, crush
ing alike the workers of the great I'm
iauity and the idols oftheir pretended
worship.-Ctaykscille (Tena.) ChrOn-
jf.Ie