Port Tobacco times, and Charles County advertiser. (Port Tobacco, Md.) 1845-1898, 1873-01-31

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that our people are imbued with an Intense
prejudice against freemen of color; that
they are opposed to their being taught to
read and write; that if not all our white
people, Mr.. Suits neighbors are ignorant,
and non-enterprising; and that Mr.. Suit is
the only white man in the State who favors
and encourages the education of the blacks.
Now the journalist who conveys such i'm
pEessiODs, either designedly deceives, or is
ignorant upon matters in regard to which
he writes. It is true that in times of sla
very, the free negroes, as class, from their
anomalous condition perhaps, were pro-
verbally worthless; but the fact that near
ly half the colored population in our State
were already free, when emancipation took
place, by the generosity of their former
owners, shows that no such intense preju-
dice existed in Maryland. We do not know
the peculiar opinions of Mr.. Suits white
neighbors upon the subject of their educa-
ton, but we do know that opposition to
the education of colored children does not
exist in cur county, nor in the State gen.
orally. Schools for them have been in op-
Grafton here without opposition or him
drance since their freedom. Baltimore
city, since it has been under Democratic
rule, under the general powers conferred
by the school law of the State, has estab-
lished, and still sustains schools for her
colored population at her own expense
The last Legislature of Maryland, elected
against the almost unanimous vote of the
negro voters of tin State, made an annual
appropriation for the education of colored
children. Under that law we believe schools
in every district of our county have been
established; and suppose it is SO in other
counties. Near this place is one of the
schools, most fourishing one, too, on
lot donated, long before the act in ques-
ton, by one of the largest former slave
holders of our county. All these things
show the fallacy of the differences strang-
er to the facts would draw from the article
in question. So far as the ignorance Of
Mr.. Suits white neighbors are concerned,
it seems very strange, in face of the fact
that since 1885 free schools have been
maintained throughout the State. They,
in common with the people of the South,
may well be non enterprising in view ofthe
want of means to be enterprising, as ne
cessary consequence of the war, and the
burdens imposed upon them since by
those in control of the Government.
We think it is about time this sort of
thing had stopped-this Misrepresentation
of Southern people, and pretended sympa-
thy for their former slaves. The day is ap-
preaching, we trust, when other people at
the South, besides negroes, will be consid-
cred as having rights, and when the SEN
timentalism on the subject, at the North,
viii cease. Our people are willing to cheer
fully accord to them all the privileges al
lowed them by the Constitution and laws,
and such others as their intelligence and
good conduct may deserve. They ought
to be sufficiently enlightened now, by ex-
perience. to know this; and that those who
claim special and superior privileges in
their behal-in matters never attempted
to be regulated by legislation as between
white people-are pretended friends, using
them for their own selfish ends. They will
eventually cause them trouble, instead of
rendering them service.