The weekly clarion. [volume] (Jackson, Miss.) 1863-1882, 1875-06-09
THE SOUTH TRUE TO HER PROBES
SI0NS.
Hon. III. HI. ChnImers' Reply "a
Speaker Blaine.

: Haven by ex-Speaker Blaine, durin
u the recent Connecticut campaign, wa
much admired, and was declared by tn
Tribune TO embody and present forcibl
, the views upon which, if at all, the Re
publican party would regain power. Ii
g., leading idea Is contained in the followin
extract from the synopsis of the speech
as reported in your columns:
For the Republicans to abandon thes
issues, which involve the questions of eli
izenship, of free suffrage, and the supre
macy Of the Constitution with its amend
: ments, would be to surrender and disban,
their organization before the Legitimate
: ends of the great struggle had been fulr
attained. If he was pointed to expires
sions of Democratic acquiescence in thes,
results, he must receive them with eau
ton, because the condition of the Soutl
did not correspond to these assurance.
of acquiescence. In this remark h,
was not specially referring to personal
outrages termed by the Dem
ocracy the 'bloody shirt issue"-but tc
that general condition Of inequality and
oppression under the law which prevailed
in so many of the Southern States.
The views thus expressed are undoubt-
eddy entertained in good faith by very
large portion of the Northern people.
and Mr.. Blaine is doubtless sincere in the
belief that there are still pending at the
South tissues which involve the questions
OF citizenship, of free suffrage and of the
supremacy of the Constitution" with its
amendments. While | concede his sin
cerity | must be pardoned for saying
that it can only be done by making a
large allowance for the effects Of preiu-
dice.
He says that expressions of Democratic
acquescense In these measures must be
received with caution. No personal as
surances, therefore, of my own or of any
Southern man will avail anything.
/ Would it be worth while to call his at
tention to great public facts of incontro-
vertible notoriety which are wholly
inconsistent with the views expressed bv
! him? Would it be useless to point him
to the fact that it would be difficult for
/ him to find Democratic State or county
convention held in the South during the
last three years which has failed explic-
lily to recognize the binding validity of
/ the constitutional amendments and the
perfect legal and political equality of the
/ negro? This remark may not be true of
Kentucky, which however, was not Il
rebel State. May | call his attention to
the further fact that of all the Confeder-
ate soldiers now in the American Congress,
whose presence there has given timid
Northern men such fright, there is not
one who has not over and over again, in
every manner possible, pledged his faith
10 - l..
oted men may believe that these are only
parts of gigantic scheme of deception
by which the South is trying to deceive
the nation, Mr.. Blaine is too old politi-
clan and too much of a philosopher not
to know that such a game of hypocrisy,
embracing millions of people and thou
sands of miles of territory, is preposterous
e e. RHFd M9uba it be Of any mo@eat
the South are always composed of both
races, and to state that [ have rarely
heard a Democratic orator address a
meeting without assuring the colored men
present that he recognized their political
equality? A moments reflection should
have taught Mr.. Blaine that in every
Southern State the negroes comprise a
very large element of the voting popula-
party will ever dare to make war upon
their legal or political status. The ballot
is its own protection, and the history of
politics gives no instance of its ever
having been wrested from numerous
class of voters to whom it had once been
conhded. Mr. Disraeli and the British
Conservatives doubtless think that Mr..
Gladstone's Ministry conferred most
dangerous privileges upon the English
| tenantry, but they are not mad enough
to think of recalling them. Whatever
/ opinions Southern white men may enter
tain of the wisdom Of giving political
power to the negroes, they readily admit
/ that nothing short of bloody revolution
can ever deprive them of it.
/ Has Mr.. Blaine reflected that all of the
/ Southern States save three have now been
| for several years ruled by the Democratic
rarity, and that in no one of them has
| there been the slightest demonstration
/ toward introducing the reactlonary meas
ures so dreaded by him? Would it be
of any force to call his attention to the
| fact that there is no constitutional or
| Congressional requirements that white
men shall educate colored children, and
that vet in every Democratic Southern
State free schools are kept open for the
blacks, the cost of which is almost
wholly paid by the whites? If the con-
current testimony of public speakers and
party platforms and of facts like these
make no impression, nothing remains
but to express the hope that Mr.. Blaine
will find time to visit this summer our
poverty-stricken and aforementioned
section and investigate for himself lie
may discover occasional disturbances be.
tween the races, local in their character,
unavoidable in the sudden change which
has been wrought among US, but wholly
disconnected with any idea of deprivation
of political privileges. He will find d
widespread conviction that reconstruc
ton was failure if the lawmakers in
tended by it to build up wisely-devised
system of government. lie will find 6
general concurrence in a remark recently
attributed to Vice-President Wilson Il
the effect that the building up of negro
Governments at the South by the suddeI
and wholesale political enfranchisemen
of the blacks was a stupendous blunder
but he will find no party nor any consld
cradle fragment of any party which con
. templates for moment the undOlng 0
that which is universally recognized as ir
reversible. He will also find an earnes
desire to make the best of the circunl
stances and to fit the black man as speed
} ily as possible for proper discharge O
: those important duties which have bee
: prematurely thrust upon him.
a Mr.. Blaine thinks that there will n
longer be any necessity for appealing t
the LOYALTY of the North when Logan an
Wendell Phillips can speak as freely q