The weekly democratic statesman. [volume] (Austin, Tex.) 1871-1883, 1875-01-07
RRsTRECTION OF sUTPnAGE IN cor.
PORATIONR

Texas is peculiarly blest in the fact that
q great majority Of the voters Of the State
are directly, and in their own persons, in
terested in the States well-beiug. Two
thirds or more Of the. voters in Texas are
landowners. While this is true, there is
little danger that Texas viii ever be re-
duced 10 the Pltiable condition Of Louisi-
ana, whose whole wealth, sold at auction,
would not extinguish the incaleulabIe pub
lie debts Of the towns and parishes and Of
TIE State, and Of cities, created by stupid ne
groes, led by white adventures. But
there is danger in Texas, as has happened
in each Southern State, that the black rab-
bic will be aggregated in towns and cities,
and these may be as efTectually plum
dered, by the same agencies, on the
western as eastern side of the BIissis-
sipPi. Therefore, one correspondent
proposed, some days ago, to have
clause injected into the State Constitution
prohibiting voting in municipal elections
save by freehoIders. When this law shaped
the fortunes of once most prosperous
city, whose properly Is nov confscated by
taxgatherers, the city's annual expenditures
we're $40, 900; to-day, this same municipal
government, in the hands of black and
white mob, costs taxpayers annually more
than half q million dollars; while it is
stated that those who hold Office and the
electors of these oficeholders hardly pay
5000 per anhun into the city treasury.
Democracy may mean universal suffrage !;
but that was according to Webster" or
Jefferson, when negro voters had not raw
aged States and cities, and when ''all
men were born free and equal. 1t
was well, then, for all men to
vote; but times are changed and we
may possibly change with them. There
is no addendum to the Federal Consti-
tuition prohibiting this restriction of suf-
frage in corporations to freeholders, and
while it is not necessary to approve or con-
demn at this hour the policy proposed, in
this behalf, by our correspondent, there can
be no harm in presenting the subject for
the consideration of the lawgivers of
Texas. The Chicago Times wants an asso-
ciation Of taxpayers to protect their inter
ests against the usual political marauders
Of that city. The board of aldermen of that
city are about equally distributed between
Irish, Germans and ScandinsVians. The
citizens Of American descent are petition
ing for representation, but have little
chance of success. The debt Of New York
city is now twice greater than was that of
the Federal Union when the war began.
New York's representative thief was the
true representative of majority of the
voters Of that rabble-ruled and Tweed-ac-
cursed city. Memphis went to perditiOn,
following in the footsteps of Gotham, and
now that the Legislature sits and a State
convention is proposed to be created,
the blessed blacks of Memphis propose to
become allies of the whites, and vote here
after for honest men, and for known, fixed
citizens of the country. The New Orleans
Times thinks that "the American people are
being driven out of the country. annihilated
as thoroughly by over-taxation as were the
Indians in days gone by. The people of
Chicago may deem themselves unhappy, but
they have never felt the beauties of taxation
as developed by negro-carpet-bag Radical
government" such as forces these tears
from the sad, brimming eyes of the broken
hearted Times. In all Southern cities, in
the last two years, the people-the property
holders have been forced to organize
"tax payers associations" against the
black rabble, and the question presents
itself whether the simple remedy for the
greatest calamity of reconstruetion-the
bankruptcy of towns and cities and coun-
ties-shall not be guarded against, even in
the organic law Of the several States in
which the negro, gregarious animal,
gathers forces of incalculable evil