The state journal., 1873-10-31
[Communlcatcd.]
GODS LAW OF THE RACES.
Doesit Forbid Their Intcrmingling

delphia Sunday Repwblican. y
We are asked by Quaker gentleman
Of this city If, In our opinion, u woman be-
longing to the Anglo Saxon race is justi-
fable In marrying white man of African
descent This friend says that, young
girl with whom he Is acquainted is sought
In marriage by an in every way unoxccp-
tionablc young man, save that his mater
nal ancestors, several generations back.
were colored. We are told that his COM
plexion Is fair, his eyes gray, and hair a
light brown, and that he has inherited
from his octoroon mother and English IA
thcr, n handsome figure, fine manners, and
u good fortune.
Without the smallest particle Of ''color
prejudice" we reply that we should think
that such marriage would be productive
of unhappiness, not alone TO the parties
Immediately concerned. but to their off.
spring, for many generations. Unjust,
mean, and unchistian as is caste and
color prejudice, il will not do, because
some few liberal minds have ignored it, to
say II has no longer any existence in the
United States. 1t lives in full vitality in
the minds of the majority of our citizens,
and will continue to do so for a long Sc
rics of years, aud In view of this prejudice
it becomes us all TO discourage marriages
which must come under general odium.
a woman, however fondly she may love
and be beloved, can not live and be happy
under a social ban nor can n man be con-
tent whilst knowing that his wife and chill
dren are thus ignored.
We have known at various times scve-
raj couple who,, putting aside the fear of
man." have contracted marriages under
circumstances contemplated by the young
woman alluded to by our Quaker friend.
Without one exception these have all
turned out disastrously.
We remember very beautiful young
lady who married gentleman with an III
veins, without previous knowledge of the
fact. Although loving her husband, who
was an accomplished gentleman, she never
forgave him for his silence on this point.
The.s story somehow got out, and the sor-
row it caused her superinduced heart dis
ease, which eliminated fatally when her
children, although fair as lilies, were re-
quested to withdraw from school, u private
one, ON account of their supposed African
blood.
We know beautiful quadroon girl,
who being married to Il white gentleman
of education and means, was taken by him
to live in the interior of the State of New
York, far from old acquaintances and as
sociations. This unfortunate woman died
II few days after the birth of her first child
of the shock of overhearing her nurse say
to some of her gossips, that the baby was
q "nigger."
One peculiarly of African blood is, the
tenacity with which it retains its place in
the human system, and how, after ming
ling with the white races for generations,
it will, after scores of years, reassert itself
plainly and Enthusiastically. We once knew
Il gentleman who had two little daughters
almost of mulatto darkness, although their
octoroon mother, purchased and married
from Southern auction-block, was per-
feet blonde. These little girls. as they
grew up, blossomed into the most dazzling
womanhood. One of them loved gem
tleman, who was withheld from marrying
her on account of her origin, and she be-
came insane, and save for few short in
tervals, has never recovered her reason.
A brother of these young ladies, young
lawyer of much promise, also became de-
mented on account of horror of African
faint in his blood. A few months ago we
encountered the second sister, but would
not have recognized her had she not adj
dressed and made herself known to us.
The rich brunette complexion OF her
beautiful Young womanhood had changed
back again to the the diugy mulatto hue of
her'childhood. Her features had EXPAND
ed and ilattened till no one cOnld fail to
detect mt once the race from which she
sprang. Her little daughter, who accom-
panied her, was almost Il ncgress. We do
not know whether this lady was married
to Il white or colorcd man. We learn
from physicians, resident in the South,
that the Quadroons, octoroons, and mus
tees, are more frequent subjects of insani-
ty than people OF either pure white or
African blood. This, to us, would prove
the strongest of all arguments against
such unions. We hold that people have
no right to invite children into the world
to inherit diseased bodies. minds, appc-
tites, or II social ban. The world is hard
and pitilcss enough ut best; but its sor-
rows and burtlicns are infinitely multi
piled to those who come into it under Il
congenital curse. ''ro such come grieis,
which are never put into words fears,
which must not be spoken; gricfs, never
to be seen; fears, never to be outlived,
but destined to go down into the dust with
the frame which carried them about dur
ing long years of anguish, known only to
the sufferers and their Maker
The above article read with surprise
and sadness. It. cmanates from the pen Of
one who claims to be an earnest worker in
the cause of humanity, without regard to
race, sex or color; from one who, while
declaring sentiments tceming with IN evil
dent shrinking from the idea of g African
taint,' yet avowedly is ''without one par
ticle of color prejudice"
Granting the truth OF the assertion that
pure Anglo-SaXon or African blood be free
from II predisposition to insanity by what
process can the commingling of such pure
streams cause the impurity of insanitya
The idea is illogical and absurd!
There are very few persons Of pure AZ
rican blood upon this continent, and /
know of no African asylums for the insane,
nor are they, as race, though possessing
great imaginative powers, liable to those
morbid mental disturbances that produce
insanity; hence, il the assertion be true,
what multitude of insane persons, or
those liable to become so, must be wan
dering mt large in every community.