The herald and mail. [volume] (Columbia, Tenn.) 1873-188?, 1874-10-09


borough speech of our candidate for
Governor, James d. Porter, on the
financial question and the civil rights bill,
is SO well put that we present it to our
readers:
The Democratic party is pledged to
economy in the administration of the
State government, and against an in
crease of taxation. Great drought and
our present poverty made it necessary to
oppose an increase of taxation, the prac-
uce of economy, always wise and proper,
is now our escape from isolvency, and in
the enforcement of this idea there is an
absolute necessity that all useless and
unnecessary offices must be abolished,
excessive salaries reduced, and men who
control and collect the public revenue
held to the strictest accountability. The
credit and good name of the State must
be maintained, and all just debts and OBJ
legations paid. The Democratic party
can not afford to be dishonest. 1t can
not afford to imperil its good name by
the adoption of any policy that looks TO
Repatriation. In four years of Democratic
rule IN Tennessee the bonded debt of the
State has been reduced from $43 052, 62S
Sc to SIC, 9S0,S5l %. The old issues of
the Bank of Tennessee, amounting to
81, l79,375 10, have been received into the
Treasury and cancelled. The floating
debt, consisting in part of outstanding
treasury warrants, amounting in October
l, 1871, to $752,4l7 81, has been reduced,
up to July l, 1874, to 1921, 066 OIL. The
loan account has been reduced since
January /, 1873 from 100000 to SI2I,
OOO and the country demands that this
good work shall be continued until this
great incubus is taken from our shout
ders."
On the Civil Rights question he says:
The position occupied by the Democrat
&c party of Tennessee on this grave ques-
ton is well defined, and can not be mis-
understood, and has my unqualified in
dOrsement; but l am not opposed to the
bill now pending in the Congress of the
United States, because of any opposition
| have to doing full justice to the colored
people. When a member of the Legisla-
ture of Tennessee, l voted against bill
to expel free negroes from the State,
when such Union men as Senter and
Trewhitt and others of East Tennessee
were earnest advocates of the measure.
Free negroes had no voice in public af-
fairs then, and my action was simply the
them justice. In Tennessee colored men
have all the civil rights that are secured
to white man, and no party seeks to
interfere with their enjoyment. 1t is
true that the temporary Chairman of the
Convention that nominated my competitor
stated, and thrice repeated the statement,
that if the Democratic party was restored
to power it would remand the colored
man back to slavery, and refer to it to
say that it was made through ignorance
or partisan malice, and, whether intended
or not, 1t is a gross SANDER upon a party
composed of men more loyal III every
sense of the word than their detractors,
and my competitor was present when this
Islander was published, and it is for him
to say whether he consented to it. The
purpose of this address was to arouse a
feeling of enmity on the part of the
blacks towards the whites, in order to en-
force party discipline and impose upon
the credulity of the black man, and to
| blind him, if possible to his true interests
and the disposition of his real friends.
What more than this do colored people
want? If they are wise and thoughtful
they must know that it is an impossibility,
! while they are now full participants in the
| benefits of our common school system.
| The action of the Superintendent of Pub
| lie Instruction, during the last summer,
in suspending the entire system, when 1t
was believed that the pending bill would
become Law, must have taught the col
ored people that, while the taxpayers of
| the State generously admitted them to a
full participation of the benefits of the
common schools, they would destroy the
whole system before they will be made
& ,,l &c
Bill. | repeat that | do not oppose this
| bill because Ofmy unwillingness to see
| Justice done to this people, but the re-
| verse. | do not want to see this gross act
| of Injustice put upon them. l believe
that the two races, if let alone, can and
will live tremendously, for | can not for
get that through four years Of war no
! hand of revolt or sedition OF mutiny was
| lifted up by them. They thus demon
| sirated to the world that eight millions of
| masters were not merciless despots, and
| that, contrary to all outside views, kind
| ly feeling did exist between the two races,
| and | believe that whenever the cOlOTed
people learn to appreciate the political
prostitutes and carpet-baggers by whom
| they are now influenced and controlled,
| the whites and the blacks will live along
side of each other with mutual good will
and good Offices The people of Tennes-
see will resist the passage of this bill, and
| It's execution, if it becomes law, in every
legal way possible, for they are slow to
/ ne. eve that it is competent for Congress
to regulate our schools, or to determine
how our hotel-keepers shall bestow their
guests, or by whose side we sleep after deatL'
| But unless our own people are united,
and sentiment of opposition created
that will be felt at Washington, this
odiOus bill will be passed in DeceIa Der
and approved by the President. He has
already recommended the enactment OF
law to better secure the civil rights
| which freedom should secure, but has not
effectually secured to the enfranchised
slave; and Senator Morton, of Indiana,
the Republican leader of the Senate, de-
nounces the mischievous impression that
| had been made in the South, that the
President would veto the bill, as being
without foundation, and the Republican
party everywhere is fully committed to
| IT,