The Opelousas journal. [volume] (Opelousas, La.) 1868-1878, 1874-11-27
Compromise
From the New Orleans P1eayune.l

lEIoA II Anew SIlChuS L lEdS uUe.I
The Terrebonne system of compromise
was well received hy many Northern
papers, and regarded lis a plan whereby
the whites and blacks might unite in
favor of good government without either
race relinquishing its ideas, politics, or
even it's %prejndices.
1t was IL strange system, entirely OPP
posed to all the ideas of politicians, but
accomplishing the same result in Louis
lana that the minority law has accom-
pliShed in Illinois and other Western
States. BY gerrymandering, Radical
conventions and legislatures had 20 cut
up the State that thirty-six out of fifty
five parishes and fifteen ont of twenty
four Senatorial districts had negro ma
i~nrities. If, then, the negIm's had voted
solidly the Radical ticket, As was hoped
and expected, the State ut Louisiana
was forever doomed to il Radical Legis-
lature.
The only two ways to rescue the State
were to persuade the negroes t. join
with the whites in voting for honest
men, and the Terrehnnne compromise
or minority representation system. Both
these plans have been utilized. We
know how many of the best negroes
Joined with lis, but we do not know how
much the negroes helped i'll the Terre-
bonnie system.
In T]errebonne, where the system was
inaugnrated, it worked %splendidly. Mr..
McCullunI, Conservative. was elected
representative, although the parish went
strongly for the Radical State ticket. In
East Feliciana Mr.. Pipes, Conservative,
was also sent to the Legislature in the
face of 800 Radical majority. These two
were the only parishes in which the
compromise was formally drawn up and
agreed to.
In other parts of the State the conf
promise plan was tacitly adopted. 1t
was this that elected Mr.. J%Ourdain, Rad
ical, in the Seventh Ward, although the
ward vent Conservative.
ln North Louisiana, in strongly Rad
ical parishes, this gained Mr.. Spencer
several thousand votes.
In Caldwell, Richland, st. Tammany
and several other parishes, the whites
ana blacks united on their parish ticket
with great success in almost every in
stance.
Altogether there are probably over a
dozen parishes in the State about equally
divided between white and negro par
istes, wherein there has been union be-
tween the two races in >evtry case di
lNNAt" dSt'IiiSb IlIlC Ctl pCL-D dSSc lIIN
scaIIawagS; and, although it has failed
IN several Instances, as in Jefferson and
st. Mary, it has nevertheless convinced
the negroes that they can work without
their White politicians.
Negroes who have been elected on the
am ticket with Conservatives, can not
possibly have any reason to diStrust the
latter, and must naturally feel them
selves independent of parry ties, when
in almost every instance, the Radical
party, as represented by Packard, had
arlayed itself agains! them.
While, therefore, this plan does not
present the same advantages as IL more
perfect union of both races in favor ot
tue anne candidates, it yet will unite
them in some banner and teach them
more fully the weakness of the Radical
Government that 0vtrshadOwsthis State
1t certainly has given the negro voters
of Tensas, Terrebonne, Madison, Rich
land and Il number of other parishes an
independence and Il sense of their own
power. This independence from the
Radical ring rule must nlwayst tend to an
improvement OF Our government.