The daily phoenix. [volume] (Columbia, S.C.) 1865-1878, 1872-10-04
COLUMBIA. S. G..
Friday Morning, October q, 1872.
For President Of the United States.
HORACE GREELEY. OF New York.
For Vice- President
II. GRATZ BROWN, OF Missouri.
oan the Coiorcd People Afford To Support
Moses!

Moses!
For four years, now, ever since under
the operations of the Reconstruction
Acts tue right to vote was given them,
the coiored people have had absolute
control of the State Government. They
have not themselves administered the
government nor held all the Offices, but
men of their choice have. With them
has rested the actual power; the officials
are but their agents. Much has hereto
fore been conceded to the colored people
on account of their ignorance. It has
justly been said, in excuse for the mise
rable government under which the State
has and is now groaning, that the ne
groes, but suddenly awakened from
slavery, and vested with oil the powers,
privileges and duties of citizenship,
would naturally make mistakes and be
misled by the wiles of demagogues aud
unworthy solf-seeking politicians But,
is there to be &c end &c this thing?
Must the colored people continue, from
year to year, to impoverish the State,
and prevent her progress by supporting
repeatedly corrupt men in her public
Offices?
South Carolina ia the one State in til g
Union il which the black people have
unlimited sway. It is here that the ques-
tion will be most definitely settled, whe-
ther or not they are capable Of self
government. They have made no record
as yet upon which they can look except
with shame and humiliation. Duped by
adventurers and thieves. they have al.
lowed millions Of debt to be piled upon
themselves and their white fellow-citi-
zens, without the first dollar of consi-
deration being received therefor. In
four years, they have accumulated against
the State public debt more than twice
as large ae that which had been previ-
ously incurred during nearly century,
and there is nothing whatever to show
for it. More than this. the rate of taxn-
tion has been increased more than a
thousand per cent, and still there is
never any money in the Treasury for any
legitimate uses. There has not been
one dollar of this years appropriation to
the Lunatic Asylum paid; but little bet
ter can be said of the Penitentiary, the
public schools, or any other proper OBJ
ject of governmental expenditure. More
money was spent and debt incurred for
one session of the General Assembly,
last winter, than used to cost for the
support of the entire State Government
for two years. and thirty times rs much
as any session of the Legislature ever
cost up to 1868, when the colored people
took charge of public affairs.
Another election is now on hand, and
it remains to be seen whether or not the
colored people approve of the acts which
their public servants have done, and
whether they are willing to make their
acts their own. Many, yes, most of the
very men who have 30 ruthlessly be-
trayed their trusts. who have brought
the State to bankruptcy, degradation
and shame, are again offering for Office.
One of the chief of these is T. j. Moses,
Jr., who has the cheek to offer himself
as Governor of the State. He has pro-
badly perpetrated more separate acts
of dishonesty and peoulation than any
other of the corrupt men connected with
the State Government. The proof is
plain, and has been made public time
and again. There is no need to rehaah
it, for it is familiar to every one. No
decent, honest man will, or can, defend
him.
Will the colored people, with their
eyes open, sustain this man, and even
reward his past misconduct by giving
him the highest Office in their gift? II
they do, then woe to the State, for there
will be no hope for it's peaceable redemp.
tion. The colored people have it all
their own way, and with them the final
responsibility must rest. The white pco.
pie have put no candidates in the field,
for they desired to place no obsta Gle in
the way Of that reform in the RspubIi.
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