Clarksville weekly chronicle. (Clarksville, Tenn.) 1873-1890, 1877-10-20
THE COLORED VOTER CONSID-
ERTNGs.


Our attention has been called to
New Orleans paper entitled the
Weekly Critic, edited by color
ed man evidently of considera-
BILE shrewdness. He sees plainly
enough that the time has come when
the relations of parties to one anoth-
er are so far changed that it becomes
a serious question with which them
terests of the cOlored race can best
be identified.
He says:
The Republican party has been and per-
haps is the party of our choice. Taught to
believe by its leaders that Southern whites
were our natural enemies, we chung to it
with a devotion OF spirit that was truly God
like 1t cost many sacrifices to espouse its
cause and battle for its principles. Our
Northern friends admired our courage, ep-
plauded our actions, and said We We're not
ungrateful. That palaver carried them
through three campaigns, when the negro
was left to fight for himself, among people
whose natural pre- udices Were intensified by
the tenacity with which we chung TO Its
tenetS.
He evidently considers himself
deserted by his white leaders and
announces that it is time to look for
for others. Betrayed and deserted by
those who profered their friendship
as bait for Office, and, when office
was no longer attainable, lost their
interest in their cOlored friend, he
seems to think that in his own race
alone are to be found the men to
give shape and counsel to his pOliti-
cal action. Thus
/ Now that the thirst for office has been
| quenched, our former colored leaders in this
| State, can do much by showing our people
| the path To pursue. We do not class all who
occupied official place as leaders. Nine
| tenths of them were followers. We must
/ single out the most resolute, the most deter
| mined aud the most intelligent, and even
; that must be accompanied by a clean record
/ We do not want the advice of men, who are
| under cloud for malfeaSance in office; but
men whosa political records are above suS-
picion and reprOach. Men like the former
| bring reprOach us as people. Their acts of
omission and commission are charged to a
race and it behoOves us to see to it in the flu
| ture that no political honors are conferred
| on those whose sense of shame has been
! dwarfed by an etching PALM and an in
| Sufferable amount of egotiSm.
! 1t is time now for the negro to ask himself
! whether that 'debt of gratitude" has not
| been paid. 1t is time for us to ask ourselves
/ whether that enthusiasm and good will
manifested for President Hayes in the South
! cannot be and should not be directed in an
! other channel. In other words, whether our
! relations, our condition and our peace and
| happiness cannot best be observed by re-
nouncing our allegiance, now the veil of Gu
| pidity and hypocrisy has been lifted from
the face of our former Syren.
We are not going to obtrude our
cOunsel-it would hardly be accept
ed as disinterested- will only
suggest to our contemporary tostudy
the one subject of public education
as worked by the two parties,
by the Republican party so long
as it held rule, by the Demo-
cratic when it succeeded to it; let
him compare the abundant talk
and stealage of school funds on the
one side, the practical effort on the
other, and he will find matter for
sober reflection.
We must yet make room for one
more extract which cOnVinces us
that the freedman is getting his eyes
very wide open indeed:
| Much, very much depends on our young
| men. They assume the duties ofcitiZenship
in the beginning of an era, where brain,
muscle, character and resolution, have taken
! the place of tricl<ery, discrimination and dis
| honesty. They may be derided and discOur-
/ aged, but il is their solemn duty to make
] name for our people that none need be
| ashamed of, and one that can stand the test
/ of Time. 1t must be done by earnest, pa
/ tient endeaVOr, by close application to study:
Nv no VII pf or IN md hN-