The New Orleans daily Democrat. [volume] (New Orleans, La.) 1877-1880, 1877-06-29
OUR WASHINGTON LETTER.
A GOVERNMENT OF PREFECTURE In
THE DISTRICT or COLUMBIA.
Discussion Concerning tlse Washington
Niger and Negro suffrage.
Especial Correspondenoe OF the Democrat ]

paigns of 1874 and 1876, the Investigations of
| the Forty-fourth Congress, the disturbed
condition of the South and many other
causes have conspired TO distract public at
tention for two years from q fact which ca1-
not much longer escape scrutiny That is
the fact that, under cover Of the smoke and
confusion of these grand contests. an expert
ment has been going on in the District OF
Columbia which must be described as nothing
| less than the system of
| GOVERNMENT by PREFECTURE.
This experiment has now progressed to q
point at which it is fair to pause and survey
| It's results: and the survey cannot fail to be
of national interest inasmuch as IL Is the first
experiment of governing ON American com
munity without even q pretense Of suffrage
or representation ever made. In order to
facilitate clear understanding of the situa-
tlon 1t Is necessary to briefly recaptulate the
history Of the system Of prefecture in Wash
| ington and the District.
| Up to 1878 this City and District had en-
ioyed or endured. as the case may be, com
bnation Of municipal and territorial govern
ment, In which both the principle Of suffrage
and that of representation were recognized.
The citizens of Washington elected their local
officials the same as in other cities and regu-
lated their own municipal affairs. heinhab-
itants Of the District enjoyed substantially
| A TERRITORIAL STATUS,
and altogether there was local sef-govern-
ment here the same as elsewhere, subject only
| to such notifications as were incident TO the
peculiar relations which the Federal govern
ment, as property holder and local tax
payer, held to the municipality. This system
at best was complex. But under it we seemed
to get along as well as the average of our
neighbors and there was no thought of ex-
changing it for any other system until the
monstrous Radical experiment of
NEGRO SUFFRAGE
was thrust upon us. To understand the Of
feet of negro suffrage in this District 1t Is ne
cessary to know the peculiarities of the Wash
ington nigger. You who have been wrestling
with negro suffrage for seven or eight years,
may think that nobody can give you any i'll
formation about the nigger as voter which
you do not already possess. But the Wash
ington darkey D. sui generis. The average
Southern nigger Is lazy enough and shiftless,
but his laziness and lack Of thrift are in the
nature Of disease whereas the Incidence Of
THE WASHINGTON BREED
Is normal and any development of industry
or thrift is looked upon as symptom Of un-
soundness. But the Washington nigger,
partly by reason Of the facilities afforded by |
the galleries of Congress, and partly by rea-
son of the fact that there is q sort Of political
inspiration i'm the atmosphere of the capital
which is nowhere else to be found, acquired
certain degree and quality Of knowledge
which was denied to his brother of the planta-
tions AS may well be imagined this knowl-
edge was simply
AN INSTRUMENT OF MISCHIEF.
| don't know what may have been your
cumulative experience with the effect of en-
lightenment upon the negro, but my obser-
vation has invariably been that, either be-
cause of the quality of the knowledge he
acquired, or by reason of his faulty pro-
cesses of assimilating it, the more a nigger
kew the less he was worth to society.
Well we had three years of negro
suffrage here in Washington under con-
conditions of exceptional intelligence on the
part of the negro and equally exceptional
toleration on the part of the whites The re- ,
suit was that at the end of that period the 1
property holders of the City and District :
prayed Congress to abolish suffrage alto :
yether as q means of suppressing the Wash {
ngton negro That Is to say. the $4,000 {
white voters in the District of Columbia vol ,
lntarly relinquished all the rights of self !
government and asked to be governed like q i
FRENCH ACCOMPLISHMENT r
II the empire, in preference to sharing their /
lights with less than 10000 negro voters! a
Let me briefly digress here, by way of per- l
onal explanation: The other day | read i'm q n
Western Radical organ of some prominence t
IN article under the heading of "The Old il
Rebel YELL, in which it was remarked that g
the Washington correspondent of the New n
)rleans DEMOCRAT, which is the leading n
rgan Of the White League throughout the II
outh, has begun to write o series of letters "
intended to fan into flames the O
)ng latent hostility of the Southern whites d
gainst negro suffrage" The article further Il
emarks that "thiS correspondent is noto-
iously an adroit manipulation of facts and
II expert juggler with logic, and there can be :"
o doubt that his efforts will meet with q "
earty response from the reading public, to l.
hose prHiudices and hatreds he caters by u
iring his own" u
hoops up his cs
BLOODY SHIRT READERS -
18th the startling announcement that "this 4,
Did crusade of the rebel Washington cor e,
,spondent Of the DEMOCRAT may be taken @,
a sure forerunner of general movement :,
the South, and is undoubtedly the product p
instructions from his chief. And we are E,
,und to say that as leader of such & cru
de the New Orleans DEMOCRAT cannot fail !.
be dangerous, because it is backed by g, %
.dent capital and conducted with ability VI VI
with the magnitude of its mis- - -
evous des!gns" ~
Now, the Iowa editor who wrote the above " ",
lows me personally, and has known me for ~ "
veral years. He knows that | was born VI
ID raised in New York; that 1 was "
AN ORIGINAL ABOLITIoNIsT in
d Republican from the time when became th