Orangeburg times. [volume] (Orangeburg, S.C.) 1872-1875, 1874-03-12

SfShtS stutL nave lHauo HcI IcilOWhuu,
and Massachusetts took up the refrain
and sounded her own praises, too. They
had q right to do so. But surely if it is
consistent with national sentiment for
some States to boast of their renown, it
cannot be wrong for other States to de-
fend themselves against njustreproaches.
1t was not slavery, sir. which kept the
South back; it was the presence there of
four millions of men who came to us aC
first utterly untraine1 savages; and these
we had to govern, train, and improve, rs
best we might. Herein it was our mis-
sicn to expand our moral and material
forces, and it entailed upon us great bur
dens; for these men were awkward and
unskillful laborers, whereby our efforts
were of fneccssity confined to the coarser
and more primitive kinds Of human in-
dustry; and thus we suffered infinite
material loss. The North, with her skilled
and educated laborcrs aud artisans, was
at liberty to devote herself to the more
complex and refined industrial pursuits,
| with consequently higher profits and
more rapid growth in influence To have
freed our slave laborcrs. and set about.
directly educating them in schools, was.
for many reasons, q practical impossibili-,
| ty. If we had freed them much earlier
than they we're set free, and thrown them
OH their own resources, they would have
perished in thsr helplcssness. When
they were freed, immensely advanced as
they then were in practical knowledge of
the arts of civilized lie beyond their orig
nal conditions, consider what immense
cost and labor it has required onthc part
Of this great Government, through the.
machinery of the Freelnan's Bureau andt
other agencies, to kold that race up till;
it got able to stand alone
While the North. therefore, can point
to her great cities, her wide conlmerce,s
and her abounding wealth. as the results,
of her efforts, may not tie South tru'h-9
fully say that the grand work, ofciyilias.
ing and clevating whole race has beGTfi
mainly hers? do not claim, nobody
prctcnds, that the great and bcneiicicnt
results which, under Providence we have
thus wrought out were directly and con-
sciously aimed mt by lis with deliberate
purpose. In cur dealings with the Airi-
cans we were, OF course, mainly prompted
by those ordinary motives of self.intcrcst
which move human natre everywhere;
Just as were the Yankee slnvers who de-
ported the negro from his native land
and sold him to us. He owes none of us,
North or South, many thanks But |
do maintain that his removal from Africa
and temporary subjcction in this country.
have been The divinely appointed means
of his civilization and Christianiza,ion.
These things seem 50 Obvious to me that
| content my yse!l' with simply stating them
ard leaving them for the reelection of al
candid minds.
Neither ought the negro, or is solids
ant friends. to indulge perpetual bitter
ness, as if i'll all those events auy wrong
or any strange thing has happened to
him. We may speculate upon the abso
lutte right of every human being, under
all circumstances, to liberty and sclfcon
troll. These are fine abstactions. But
the order Of nature and Of Providence,
which is practical, seems to be that every
man, every nation, and every people shall
pass through stage Of subjection and
pupiIagc under some superior authority
| before arriving at maturity and cnfran-
chisemelt. Each individual man passes
through this stage ofyouth and subordi-
nation to his parents before he becomes
of age. The leading of Israel into Egypt
and into bondage was MS wonderful and
ms necessary at their exodus thcretrom.
And rs for nations, Spain, France, Eng
land, and the United States and all others
/ believe, first went through period of
dependence on some superior power or
mother country before they reached i'll
dependence and autonomy, The negro
| ropr tl,nrnfnrn in hoino, rnnuirob Gret "a,