The weekly clarion. [volume] (Jackson, Miss.) 1863-1882, 1874-06-18
THE CIVIL RIGHTS BILL.
GROUNDS OF SENATOR BROWN
LOWS OPPOSITION 10 IT.
He Thinks that the Negro is Now
Amply Protected and that the
Southern White People Have
Been Whipped Enough

Been Nv htppeO Enough
From the N Y. Times Grants Organ
A recent address in Mary lille, Tenn.
~ the principal of a mixed school, hal
brought out from Senator Brownlow an
dher vigorous letter, in which he show.
age of the Civil Rights bill will make
mixed schools popular, at least in Ten
lessee, or serve to break down social preju-
does. These, he says, are and always
will be beyond the reach oflegal enact
nents. He quotes, approvingly, from
recent editorials in the Times, and pro-
eeds:
81 am opposed to this Civil Rights bill
| because it is a usurpatiOn of the rights
AID an oppression upon all classes of
white people in my State and section.
But no feature of it is, to me, more obi
DIS than that it is especially burdensome
to the poor white people, and in utter
Contempt OF their rights and interests.
| am the friend of the poor white people,
as | have always been. Because | want
the children educated in. the public
schools at the expense of those more for
tuna.e than they, who are able to send
their children TO private schools, l oppose
this oppressive and abominable usurpa-
ton. The passage of this Civil Rights
bill will destroy the free schools of the
State, as it ought to do, for it is better
to have no schools at all than such as
are arbitrarily dictated under this bill
The mere threat to pass it is the greatest
insult and outrage which has ever been
attempted upon the honest, Woodworking
people of small property, or no property
The negro now has the equal protection
of the laws In other words, he has
equal political rights with the whites.
Besides this, in all the Southern States
he has equal facilities for education at
public expense, though he does not pay
one-tenth of one per cent. on the dollar
of the taxes which are collected to
support the schools. No invidious
distinctions are made against him. Ed
ucation in these Southern States is out
of the sphere Of politics. The negro is
amply protected, and the National Leg
islature should cease legislating on the
educational question, and creating tur-
MOL andbad blood where progress and
good feeling are being secured. For
several years the greater portion Of the
time of our legislators has been occupied
in legislating for the negro race. AlAend-
ment after amendment to the Constitu-
ton has been adopted, and law after law
for the further protection of the negro has
been adopted, until he is now the political
equal of the white man. Now that this
has been achieved the negro business ought
to stop. The country at large is becom-
ing disguised with the efforts now being
made to Cypress the whites in the passage
of bill which is not essential to the pro-
lection of the blacks. What the people and
States of the South need is to be let alone
by Congress, and give little opportunity
for recovering from the desolation and
waste of war. The Southern people
have been whipped i'll the battle between
me sections, and except small class of
fossIlIzed politicians and lot of weak
minded young men who part their hair
in the middle, they acknowledge and feel
lit. In no State is the negro deprived of
full and equal protection before the law.
But in several Southern States, like South
Carolina, the white man has no rights
which the negro is bound to respect,
The Southern people have been sufficient
ly punished for participation in the rebel
lion, and instead of harrassing and fur
Their humiliating them Congress ought to
extend to them helping hand In say
ing this do not retract one iota of nv
previously-eXpressed opinions of the follT
of the Southern people and the crime OF
their rebellious leaders. l never sup
posed that in being loyal to the Govern
ment l ceased to be Iennessean and a
Southern man, and to have a right to
regard the interests of my people as a
New Englander or Western man regards
| the interests OF his. No member of either
Houses of Congress has suffered more in
his person at the hands Of the rebels than
myself, and if | can afford to do simple
Justice to those who have been in error.
do not see why others should not do so
who have less cause than L for reveneful
feelings Instead of expressing, the ma
ton should lift them up from the slough OF
fe9pair, and encourage them. 1t is alike
its duty and policy to do so. The mi
quitous bill under consideration does not
affect Davis, Toombs, and the leaders
Of the South. 1t is, in reality, war
upon the hundreds of thousands of des-
titute widows and orphans of the South
With the termination of the war the
Southern people, as class, were poor,
out little property Of any description be-
! ng left them. Since the war ended, in
several of the Southern States the igno-
rant colored officials and white adven-
turers, particularly the latter, have stoLel,
everything that ,cas portable, everything thai
could be carried off. The public buildings
of charity, the orphan, blind, and insane
asylums are left, but the means for Their
support are wanting. The buildings
would have been stolen, but thieves could
not put them in a bank vault or carry
them in their pockets. The land could
not be carried away, but has been rem
dered worthless By tardtion, a0hich Is s.
high as to amount to con tscation It i.
with the greatest difficulty that large
classes of people, in affluent circum
stances, are enabled to provide the ne
cessaries of life in the Southern States
Nearly all the hope of the rising genera
ton is in their common school system
Under this the colored people have equd
educational facilities nth the Uhites, hOuqI
they don't pay one mill on the dollar of tn
tares which are collected for the supper
of the schools The thousands of womeI
in every Southern State who, though tn
widows of rebels, are in no wise response
bic for the war, are told, "Y our children
shall not go to school unless you are sub
jected to the humiliation of seeing then
educated in classes with the children O
your former slaves" The manhood O
the country ought to rise up against tn
, petty persecution. And the undoubte,
courage and generosity of Presiden
Grant leads me to believe he will vet
the villainous measure if it is passed
, The result of its passage will be that III