Shenandoah herald. [volume] (Woodstock, Va.) 1865-1974, 1873-10-09
OUR nominees:
GEN. KEEPERS SPEECH.

SO large as we would like to have seen
it, owing to the fact that the farmers
were busily engaged in seeding and cut
ting up their corn. Mr. P. w. Magru-
der introduced Gen. Kemper to the au
dience.
General Kemper said he was solemn
ly impressed in view Of the crisis now
impending. The future of Virginia
the fortunes of her people and the pros
perity Of the State for all time to come
is involved in the present struggle.
Sooner or later, in the history of every
community, crisis came which settled
its fate, and he believed that we were
now OH the eve of a conflict as decisive
of our fate as the battle of Waterloo.
Of himself he had not one word to
gay. Born and reared under the very
shadow of the beautiful home of that
plain and honest Virginia statesman
James Madison-he had it almost from
the dying lips ofthe venerable sage that
the Governorship Of Virginia was a
place that should neither be sought nor
declined. He had always cbeyed the
call ot-his country, whether in the time
ofpeace or in the stern councils Of war.
and he would do so now. He had ney-
er been for war. The county on the 9th
erside ofthe mountain from which he
hailed, had been called little South
Carolina, yet solitary and alone he
stood before his people and proclaimed
that secession was not necessary and
that the election of Abraham Lincoln
was no cause for war.
He proposed now to calmly investi-
gate the truth, the justice and the phi
losophy Of the great questions before the
people.
They did not relate to Federal affairs,
but to the internal, domestic and munic
lpal welfare of VIII ginia. And she calls
to day upon all within her broad limits
whether native OF foreign born, Demo.
crat OF Wing, Secessionist or Unionist,
Grant1or Greeley, either or neither, to
come to her'rescue.
The charge now made by the Radi-
cal party that the Conservative party of
Virginia had arrayed the whites against
the negroes was false as he could show
from their own testimony. He then
referred to Gen. Grants report on the
condition of the South, the Union
Leagues, the Underwood Constitution
which DISTINGUISHED the white people of
the State, and finally of Robt. w.
Hughes, Lynchburg speech, which he
declared was an arrow dipped in poison
AN African arrow shot out of a re.
creant white mans bow. He, Kemper,
was neither partisan of the white man
or the negro, he knew no race, class or
sect-he was for Virginia as whole.
The people of the North cannot under
stand how we are situated in the matter
of the negro. We have in Virginia
$50, 900 negroes-more than in all the
northern States and territories put to
gether. Troublesome as is- this ele
ment, the Conservatives had dispensed
justice fairly and wisely to both races
tor the past four years. While he
would accord to the negro equal and
exact justice he would oppose to the
bitter end social equality bill such as
New York has passed. He then read
from the laws of Louisiana, where there
are mixed schools, and the penalties
prescribed for persons refusing to send
their children to them-$25 for every
days absence from school unless caused
by sickness.
Gen. Kemper then sketched the his
tory of the Southern States since the
war, showing the unexa,npled and un-
paralleled fraud, corruption and oppres-
sion in those States wherever the Radi
cal party had succeeded in getting into
power. lie compared VIRGINIA with
the other Southern States. One third
Of Louisiana is now wilderness. and
the hiding place Of the fox, the owl and
the bat In Florida under Radical rule
the debt had been increased 70 times
and It all the property real and per-
sonal was put up and sold it would not
pay the debt. He made touching
review of South Carolina and SO on
through the list Virginia, lie said,
paid but so cents on the hundred
dollars, 10 cents Of which went to the
support OF free schools, deduct this as
it should be and we are paying less
taxes than we did before the war
Virginia stands the Ararat of the
Southern States from which we look
1ewn upon the raging storm, and the