The New York herald. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1840-1920, 1876-08-08

experiment the like OF which no civilized
nation ever made in the world. What was
meant by comforting the suffrage upon four
millions of persons just emancipated. with
out education, without property, without
training in the exercise of citizenship, with
| out IA correct moral sense and with no sense
of public responsibility at all-what this
meant Mr.. Lamar, in his singularly able and
| philosophical speech on Wednesday, brought
wildly before the senses of his hearers and
readers. To help him he had the foremost
friend of the negroes in all the land, Sena-
tor Morton himself for we must confess that
the language of Mr. Morton, cited by MIR.
Lamar, describes in even more vivid detail
than that of the Mississippian the perils,
the evil results and the inconvenience of
this gift of citizenship to the freedmen. The
two speeches-Mr Lamar's aud Mr.. Nor
toms deserve the careful attention of all
| thoughtful citizens, not rs arguments for
Withdrawing this gift from the Southern
blacks-that is out of the question-but in
order that the Northern voters may realize
the true nature of the Southern troubles,
in order that they may see that the questions
there involving the whole of society in tur-
MOL are not to be settled by military
order, few companies of cavalry or n Force
bill. Mr.. Lamar spoke truly time was
needed and in some of those States time is
still needed And besides time they need Wig
orous, courageous local governments, ready
to assert the laws, to punish evildoers and to
hold society together in peace until time
shall solve the still remaining difficulties.
One of the phrases oftenest used about
the Southern States is that they ''must be-
come like the North" eve want to make
Louisiana like the North" said very prom
inent republican of that State the other day
:'We want to make Mississippi like de Norf"
said colored Sheriff of that State not long
ago to Northern traveller, who replied
to him, gravely, "You are Sheriff of this
county, my friend you cannot write SEN
tence correctly you can barely read you
own less than five hundred dollars worth of
property in the world yet you are Sheriff
of great county, and you want to have
your State like the North. Believe me when
l tell You that there is not State nor
county in all the North where ten men could
be found to nominate you for Sheriff, or, in
fact, for any Office whatever. I do not speak
it to offend you, but to inform you. If you
lived anywhere in the North, even in Massa-
chusetts or the Western Reserve Of Ohio, no
soul would ever for moment think of nom
mating you even for constable, much less
Sheriff You would be patient and con-
tented day laborer or farmer, and your wild
est dreams would not lead you to think of
Office" Is not this true? And if SO, when
we echo the Southern republicans or
the Southern negro's cry that the South shall
be like the NORTH ought we not
to think what that means? Louisiana
has negro Lieutenant Governor
Mississippi had one until he was
impeached for bribery. Almost every South
ern State has colored State officers, colored
sheriffs colored tax collectors, colored
judges colored school officers. In this are
they not unlike, very unlike, 'the North?"
Frederick Douglass is cultivated man, an
eloquent speaker, o fcrcible writer, a man of
property, good citizen. What party in
New York has ever thought of nominating
him for Lieutenant Governor?
We too, would like to see the South like
the North" and like the best part of the
North. We should like to see, for instance,
the rude, unlettered colored men of the
South warned and guided by the republican
leaders to give up their greed for public of
fee, and taught to select their governors,
their sheriffs, their Legislators, their judges
and county supervisors from among the
educated and property-owning white resi-
dents. We should like to see them calling
upon these, and not upon the far off and to
a great extent powerless federal govern
ment, for justice and protection against
the lawless part of the community. We
should like to see society in the South
reorganized with che brains at the top and
that is what the republican rule down there
with its constant cry for federal interference
and its fatal habit Of teaching the ignorant
negro that Office is one Of his rights, no
matter how he abuses it, and that the federal
power is his only protector, has continually
INSTRUCTED. Among the documents sent in
by the President with his recent Southern
Message are some letters from the United
States District Attorney of Northern Missis-
sippi. He relates that the Grand Jury which
had just been discharged consisted of eleven
republicans and seven democrats that be-
fore this body was brought evidence of in
timidation at IN election ; that he-a native
Mississippan--in vain pressed upon them
the necessity of indicting the guilty parties
that they absolutely refused to do SO, and he
encloses their report to the Judge Now,
having just refused to find indictments on
which the guilty might have been brought
to justice, what do these republican Grand
Jurymen do? They unite in a wild general
indictment of the whole State rs revolu-
tionary and full of violence and demand the