The New Orleans bulletin. [volume] (New Orleans [La.]) 1874-1876, 1875-12-05
RADICAL STRATEGY.
Arguments Used by The Radicals to Control
the Northern Elections--The Policy of the
nifty of Interests Between the North
and Soutk..Let the South Alone.

the Northern ElectlOns-.Tho fOncy OF the
South.-Unity of Interests Between the Nor tn
and Soutk--Let the South Alone.
Editor N. O. Bulletin
MARKsvILLE, La, Nov. %, 1875.
I see by recent numbers of New York and
other papers limitations of the class of argu-
ments that are being used in the North to
control the elections there. The fears, not
the reason or intelligence of the people, are
appealed to. Herein lies the secret of the re-
cent Republican successes They are told If
the Democrats are successful the South will
be restored to its former prestige; the gov
eminent will be called on to pay off the
claims of the shareholders, for slaves lost
during the rebellion; Confederate soldiers will
be pensioned on its bounty, and widespread
imitation become the established policy Of the
party.
It is a sufficient answer to all such clap-trap,
to say that if we destroy the money of the gov
eminent, the latter will have nothing to pay
with. This element of difficulty is therefore
eliminated from the proposition, and the
only question which remains is as to the pay
for the slaves and bounty-and the solution
of this question is not among the most diff
cult to be found in political science. We have
already had some experience in the practical
working of the theory, and we know there is
a limit even to the faculty of imitation. This
limit, every sensible man knows, would be
practically reached and passed long before
the government could possibly hope to meet
such claims There is not a ten year old rebel
boy who can not rise to the height Of this
argument 1t is lesson we all know by the
saddest experience.
The danger to Northern capital is certainly
not In restoring the South to her rightful
place in the government but in combating
her efforts to obtain it. Ii the money power
is not blinded to its real interest, it will not
precipitately accept an issue when none is
sought to be made with it. The Southern
people have no idea of interfering with the
national faith, and will respect it as long
as they are permitted to do SO. But
Northern capital must not expectto forge new
letters for Southern limbs, or bind old
ones 1t will, on the contrary, best consult
its true safety, and remove all cause for future
apprehension, by dealing with US In spirit OF
generous trust and confidence. Even honor
is not unfrequently bought with confidence.
The South has very little to ask of the Gen.
eral Government and that of such character
as to require no concealment, or calculated to
create any great amount of alarm or appre-
tension. If she ever RECEIVERS her ancient
power and prestige in the Union, she will
probably insist, as an act OF simple justice,
that the government shall reconstruct the
levees along the Mississippi, and lend its as
sistance to the construction of a Southern
road to the Pacific. These are matters Of in
creasing and engrossing Importance to us,
and the consideration of them must sooner
or later, mingle in the public discussions of
the day. Properly considered. they are not
unreasonable claims, and certainly no harm
can come to the government from having
them pressed on its attention.
The Southern people have no views or ul-
terror policy beyond this, and certainly none
more harmful. What they now specially de-
sire and most strenuously insist upon, is to be
let alone. They would be willing to abandon
even these claims, as equitable as they are, to
obtain this one boon-the right of local self
government But this right they mean to in
sist upon. 1t is not to be disguised that they
see their only hope of security In the tri-
umph of Democratic policy They feel that
the party which carries that banner is the
only party willing and able to give them
stable peace and security. The defeat of that
party in the next campaign would remand
them back to state of uncertainty and de-
spair. The consequences to which such q
condition of things might and would nat
rally lead, it would be well just here for the
Northern mind to make a passing note Of
The policy OF the South under Northern
tuition has heretofore been one of extreme
passiveness and forbearance During ten
long years we were taught to believe that I'M
der this policy the day of ultimate deliverance
could not long be put off, and we nursed with
Jealous care the faith thus taught u.s. During
all this time we have been kicked, jeered and
scoffed at, and still, for aught that can be
discerned, the promised haven is as far off as
ever. Would it be strange then, if, in the
near future, seeing no other hope for her, the
South should abandon the passive for the ag-
gressive policy, and lead off in the agitation
Of the currency question? Old sores, we
know, are sometimes cured by counter-lrrl-
tsnts, and stranger things than this have hap
pened
1t is useless to conjecture what would be
the result of an aggressive policy on the part
of the South and the laboring and industrial
classes of the great West against the bond
holding class, united and welded together
firmly as the two former could undoubtedly
be in such contest 1t is enough to know
that the latter, and minority class, would have
about as much as they could well attend to
without intermeddling in the future with u.s.
And Just here there is one thing that this CO.
lossal moneyed power OF the North ought to
make note of, and that is, that there are two
ways of returning to specie, and one Is by re-
firing the national currency, and the other by |
wiping out the debt. And while from mo-
sives of interest and policy we are opposed to |
imitation, the same interest and policy would |
induce US to favor reputation, if the latter |
did not involve breach of the national faith. |
But this same national faith requires that
equal and exact justice should be done to the !
South, and so let the common faith be evenly !
observed by all the parties to it. Their deal
ing, at least, would seem to require that much.
JUSTICE.