American citizen. [volume] (Canton, Miss.) 1864-1890, 1872-08-24
A Talk With the COl0red VO-
tiers of Madison County.
NO, I.

Not as sycOphant or a politician,
but as a life long citizen and earn
est well-wisher of Madison county,
we intend to address few words of
and counsel to the col
Ored voters in our midst. These
words may be concluded in the
present editorial, or we may deem
them of sufficient importance to con-
tinue them in several issues of the
AMERICAN CITIZEN.
To preface: We trust we shall not
be accused of having any private
and personal interest to advance in
what we may have to say. We are
not a politician, and are quite sure
that we will never be one. We are
not a candidate for any Office, and
hope never to be. The best years
of our life have been passed in Mad
ison county and here we expect to
pass our remaining years, and be
buried. Anything, therefore, that
we may say to any class of our citi-
zens, will be prompted solely by a
regard for their welfare, and by the
desire to advance their interests.
We shall not speak as a partisan.
The day of the partisan has passed;
we confess that, in the past, there
was too much of partisanship; be-
fore, during and since the war, the
professional politician controlled too
much the thoughts and acts of the
people at large. That we may new
er have occasion to write the fore
going sentence of any period in our
future is our sincere wish. With
the present canvass, we trust the
era of good feeling has been inaugu-
rated, and that from this time hence
forth the honor and prosperity of
whole country shall be the one OBJ
.ject to prompt her patriotic citizens.
We have all been influenced, more
or less, by bitterness and prejudice !;
we have hated to lay down long
cherished feelings and preferences;
we have all chung tenaciously to ex-
plOded ideas, and have refused to
recognize the fact that they ..explod-
ed, or to entertain new ideas rem
dered necessary by the changed con
dition of affairs. With these intro
ductory remarks, we shall come at
once to speak to the cOlOred voters,
and of their duties in the present
Presidential canvass.
Our readers will do MS the justice
to say that we opposed, as long as
possible, the nomination of Horace
Greeley for the Presidency. We
will admit, too, that we opposed the
giving of the right suffrage to the
colored people, in the way it was
This last we did for three
reasons: LIST. We did not wish to
with Congress the power of
the question of suffrage
in the States. End. We did not
think that the colored man, just
from slavery, possessed
the intelligence to vote in such way
as to advance his own welfare, or
that of the country. 3rd. we knew
that the country was filed with I'M
Adventures, paid tools
Of the Government, whose duty it
was made to array the races in hos
tility, and to control the votes of the
people in the support of
measures designed to Cypress and
the white neighbors
whom they lived. Was it
then, that the white peo-
pie of the South, that, indeed, pa
triotic men in every section, opposed
a measure intended to accomplish
such wrong! But the work has
been done, and to-day the colored
man enjoys every civil right pos
sessed by the greatest, richest and
proudest white man in the county.
No human agency or power can de-
strOy the rights of the cOlored peo-
pie. This being so-and no person
will deny tit is proper for the
people of the South to join hands,
and march together as friends in
the advocacy of whatever cause will
most surely promote the happiness
and prosperity Of our section. To
bring about this result, the good
people of the South and of those of
our own county of Madison, we
write this article, and shall write in
the future. The colored people who
read what we write, are requested
to ponder our words as reasoning
men, and not reject them thought
lessly, as heated partisans.
We advocate the election of Gree
ley. This may seem strange
course to be pursued by a native
man. Greeley was, for
years, a bitter enemy OF the South
he was the founder of the old aboli-
ton party he did more than any
living human being to free the ne
groes, he devoted his energies to
striking the shackles off the limbs of
every slave that tOiled beneath the
folds of his nations flag. In accom-
this object, the Government
was thrown into the hands of men
who have controlled it in their per-
sOnal interests men who have over
ridden the Constitution. and, to
keep in power, have endeavOred to
excite riots, and cause the shedding
Of blood, between the two races in
the South. Leaving out of cOnsid-
Grafton the many fragrant and cor
rupt acts of the bad men i'll power,
the nepotism and personal govern
nent of President Grant, and the
of his administration,
tai