Nashville union and American. [volume] (Nashville, Tenn.) 1868-1875, 1874-03-12
NINTH CENSUS OF THE UNITED
STATES.

VI uOuSsl1.
NINTH CENSUS OF THE UNITED
STATES.
Under the above heading, the Edin-
burgh Quarterly Rerieao for January, |
contains an article which discusses at |
length the depreciation and loss of
property by the late war between the |
States, and the carpet-bag and Radical
rule that have followed. The writer |
makes some mistakes and some good |
points, and it is tue latter we presume |
will most interest our readers:
.'Thecensus officers have been happily |
inspired to accompany their reports |
with colored maps showing the distri-
button of immigrants over the Union.
But on these maps the whole Confede- |
racy is blank with the exception of
three or four faint and minute distances
from one another. The increase then,
it is evident, is mainly a natural one.
1t would be difficult to adduce stronger
proof of the abiding vitality of the white
race of the South. With such people
it is safe to predict the North will again
have to count, at no great distance OF
time, unless it manages, while there IS
yet opportunity, to allay its dlscon-
tent"
There is too much reason to fear that
foreign and friendly suggestions of the
abovepurport viii have small considera-
ton in the Northern mind. 1t enter
tains the same mistaken ideas now that
prompted the deliberate sacrifice of
capital estimated by the author of the
paper in the ReUie,r, as follows: ''These
several losses added together would
amount to a sum exceeding the national
debt Of Great Britain by considerably
more than half. Such a sum, if now
realized, would pay off the national
debts of both the United Kingdom and
the United States" The reader will
bear in mind that these losses of nearly
seven Thousand million dollars, as esti-
mated by foreign pubhcist, belong TO
the South alone, and they are still in
fiicted with perfect heartlessness by the
demonism that commenced. them. To
place the census estimates beyond cavil,
we cite. further: 1T would recoup
France for all her losses in the disas-
trous war against Germany ex-
elusive Of lives, but inclusive
of the indemnity, and of general
damages; and it would yet leave a sur
plus nearly sufficient to buy up all the
railways Of England, Ireland and Scot
land. And this incredible loss was
suffered in the brief span of ten years
by a population no larger than the
present population of Ireland. Truly,
it is no wonder that there should be
distress in the South" These facts
speak for themselves; no words of COM
ment can add to their force. But the
great practical questions are, in what
way and after how long a time, are
these losses to cease! So far as we
have seen, no writer or statesman at
home or abroad, has attempted to
answer the above simple and weighty
questions. The whole difficulty lies in
the moral and intellectual error which
assumed that half million slave-hold-
ers had the power and ambition to
force negro slave holding on twenty
million free white people in the North
EN- States, against the will and inter-
ests of the latter, unless the slaves of
the South were both emancipated and
enfranchised to govern at once
the persons and plantations
of their old masters. All
know that these fundamental mis-
takes and wrongs are still in force and
bearing bitter fruit. As statedby this
essayist. there is wonderful vitality in
the white race of the South" but it is
wholly in the iron grip of demoniacal
fanatics who have shed too much inno-
cent blood to see and confess their
error. They have politicaluse for SOO,
900 negro voters, and these must be
supported as wards of the nation,
though the entire white race IN the
South perish. The policy is to make
white people poor, and keep them so
poor that resistance to robbery Will be
impractIcable. In time, this constant
outside pressure viii make all the eau
casian blood of the South unit in self
defence; and give more strength than
divided Ireland has ever shown, or the
States in favor of State rights and local
ideas to rule in all local governments.
Foreign notions are sure to misgovern
from a lack of critical local knowledge.
Hence no Massachusetts, Sumner can
properly adjust civil rights and duties
to the wants and interests of Tennes-
see. The assumption is alike gratui-
L tvul