The Jackson standard. [volume] (Jackson C.H., Ohio) 1847-1888, 1876-06-29

4
in the elements of morals. But in the
4 South the barbarous and terrible minor
/ ity rules over society. 1t planned the
4 rebellion; il drove the reluctant commu
nifty into a wild reign of bloodshed II
was nearly successful in its designs II
was crushed, for the moment, by the vic
/ tories of Grant Then once more il
planned a new subjugation of the South.
ern States by means Of secret associations
! pledged to drive the Republican voters
from the country and to terrify the col
ored population into submission. Soon
after the fall of Richmond the Democrat
ic leaders in New York boasted openly
that the Ku-klux would soon rule the
South, and Democracy find its chiei
strength in the regions of reconstruction.
They evidently relied upon the fierce
and brutal minority who had so long
governed in Georgia and Mississippi to
establish once more their reign of terror
No State, before 1860, had been more
plainly opposed to secession than Geor-
gia. Its working-men, mechanics, and
artisans had always contemned the agi.
tators of South Carolina, were ruled by
the instincts Of humanity and common
sense. Even in the summer of 1865, ac-
cording to the correspondence of the
New York Times, il was asserted al po-
Htical meetings in Georgia that ma
Jority of the citizens of the State were
strongly opposed to secession, but by
trickery and fraud and violence were be-
guiled or dispossessed of their rights +"
But the desperate minority had now once
more projected the subjugation of Geor-
gia and all the South, and with the APP
parent sanction of the corrupt Demo
cratic leaders of the North, formed what
is known as the Ku-Klux Association.
By this secret machinery they planned
the expulsion or death OF every Republi-
can, the complete reconquest of the ter
ritory from Maryland to Mexico. With
in ten years they have almost gained
their object The governing class in
nearly all the Southern States is the wild
and savage men, maddened with whisky
and frenzied with vice, who ride over the
country to shoot Republicans like par
tridges, and from whom the colored yo-
tiers hide as if from an evil spirit.
A private correspondent relates that as
he rode recently along the highways of
Mississippi, he was surprised to see the
negroes. whenever they caught sight Of
him, fall down on their faces in the grass
and creep away on their hands and knees
beyond the reach of a rihe-shot The
poor people, he thinks, supposed that he
was Democratic politician on an cleo
tioneering tour. They fancied every
mounted man political assassin. The
snecdote seems hardly credible, yet its
authenticity can not be doubted. In
Mississippi at the last election no voting
was allowed in many districts where the
colored Republicans possessed an enor-
nous majority. Georgia, Alabama, Tex
as, Kentucky, Tennessee. have long been
held in bondage in a similar way by saw
age troops of Democratic politicians. In
1865, &c. and '67 Republicanism had
made rapid progress in all the Southern
States; the small farmers, mechanics,
and even the laboriDg whites seemed
anxious to invite immigration. plant free
schools, and cultivate a land already half
desolated by slavery. The rebellion had
always been odious to this class of the
white population; they seem in 1865 to
have won the control OF their section
But the Ku-Klux began nov its silent
atrocitities. Hundreds of the colored
people, we are assured, were murdered
daily. These unfortunate creatures are
being hunted down like dogs" we are
told as early as August, 1865; and the
Raleigh Progress relates that even in
North Carolina negroes were killed with
out provocation and without punish
ment. At the close Of the war the
project OF exterminating the colored race
seems at once to have been disclosed by
a thousand barbarous deeds. Yet still
the Northern settlers advanced into the
country, allured by the prom
ises and the hopes Of the more rational
part of the population, bought planta-
tions in Georgia and Alabama, invested
money in Southern railroads, founded
free schools, projected vast improve
ments, and might have filed the South
ern States with a rapid and lasting prog
ress. Even Virginia might have been
reused from its lethargy, and Kentucky
cultivated into humanity and peace.
Republicanism ruled for few years at
the South, and its traces are seen in lines
Of railways that have opened up vast dis
tricts to agriculture and trade, and a
scheme of universal education that still
fingers amidst the barbarous reaction.
For almost at once the secret associa-
tion upon which the corrupt Democracy
Of the North had so confidently relied
began its war upon Republican progress,
and the nightly atrocities OF its masked
ruflians were heard of from Virginia to
the Rio Grande. Ii was no longer the
poor negroes, but the white settler. the
Republican voters, and every man OF
mark and note, upon whom these bands
of assassins inflicted horrible outrages.
The story OF the Ku-Klux in the South
ern States is one Of those passages in the
annals of men on which memory refuses
to ,,usA and of which the dark ontline
need only be recalled. But its political
effect was disastrous to the South beyond
State after State fell into
the hands of robbers aud assassins. The
railroads were stopped. their bonds re-
pudiated. tue foreign capitalists were
plundered. honesty was banished forever
Georgia was among the first to submit to
the rule of the Ku-Klux. 1t repudiated
its debt; it kept its railroads. 1t robbed
the capitalists who had trusted it; il
drove out Republicans who had invested
their money in its wasted soil; il closed
its common schools. Virginia soon fol
lowed in reputation and Democracy.
Alabama resisted for time the rule OF
bloodshed and dishonesty, and has at
last fallen amidst q disgraccful scene Of
robbery. Wherever the ku-Klux have
succeeded, their first aim has been to de-
fraud the English and American capital
lists who had trusted in the honor of
State and the wealth Of the nation. But
still more fatal TO the Southern section
has been that sudden check which was
given to industry, emigration, and trade.
The Democratic Ku.Klux, who terrified
peaceful citizens by midnight murder
and endless prosecutions, soon completed
the ruin OF a large part of the South.
Its credit was lost. its honor gone. No
capitalist would any more lend money to
repair it's railways or rebuild its cities.
Its lands were often almost valuelsss. A
general cry of distress arose and still
rises from all its people. Louisiana is a
scene of anarchy. In Texas every pro-
gressivs or reform movement for educa-
ton and peace is certain to be broken up
by deeds of bloodshed and by the savage
emissaries of the Democracy. The Ku-
Klux were nominally suppressed by the
legislation OF lS1O-I2. But the same