The Portland daily press., 1879-08-15
Silence will Not Do"
The Yazoo Mobs-Manly and Indignant
Protest of Ex-Governor Brown Of Mis-
-sissippi-A Timely Appeal.
[Vicksburg, Miss. Herald
TERRY, HINDs COUNTY, Miss, Aug. 6, 1879.

-SlSS1ppl-A timely Appeal
[yicksburg, Miss. Herald.l
TERRY, HINDs COUNTY, MISS, Aug 6, 1879.
To the Editor of the Herald
Dear Sir In times of great public danger
it is the duty of every good citizen to speak
out plainly on the side of law and order. "Si-
lence will not do The man who fails to raise
his voice against mob violence is little less
guilty than he who takes sides with the mob.
That is just the point ON which Sou thern Con-
servatives and Democrats are accused at the
North 1t is in vain that we charge admitted
outrages on the turbulent element" The
ready answer is, "You do not interpose with
becoming energy to repress such element" II
"silence will not do" as in the Yazoo case, you
and and every other conservative citizen Will
have to admit that the answer is well made
You and 1, and those who think and act with
us, readily admit that we have no right to in
terfere in the purely local affairs Of Yazoo
county, and we do not propose to do so. But
if Yazoo proposes to get up confagration to
burn up her own vermin she must have prop
er regard for the safety of her neighbors.
The man Dixon may, for aught l know, be
chronicles may not have been correctly trans
mitted. But it seems to me / heard of this
same man in 1S65-6-7, and along there. He ap-
peared from the accounts to be very good man
then, and as the leopard does not change his
spots, nor the Ethiopian his skin, am at q loss
to understand why the same man has become
such terribly bad fellow in 1879. Is 1t not
the old story of the just (?) judge who did not
comprehend the case fully till he found out
whose OK it was that had been gored? Ii 1t
was only Yazoo case should say 10 you anu
all outsiders, Hands off" But it assumes
vastly larger proportions. Viewed in its prop
er light, it concerns the whole State, the whole
South, i'm fact, the whole United States. 1t
concerns, and deeply concerns, the freedom OF
elections everywhere. 1t is proposition to al
low a mob to say, "We tolerate no opposition;
we propose to carry the election anyhow, and
we will take no risk; opposition is dangerous,
and we will not tolerate it; no ticket shall
stand opposed to our will; vote as we tell you
or not vote at ALL" Strip the proposition of
verbiage and disreputable disguise, and that Is
what it means.
Have madcaps and do-nothings stopped to
inquire what is to be the end of all this? II
one party may drive another from the field in
Yazoo by force OF arms, may not the same par,
ty with equal justice, be driven from the field
in some other election? and thus elections be-
come matters of physical force and ballots be
emphatically, or what is worse, silently,-be-
cause that lacks the element Of courage which
always inspires degree of respect even In o
bad cause, and you insure Republican tri-
umph in the pending gubernatorial contest In
Ohio, and almost a certain triumph for that
party in the Presidential contest in 1880. Is
the defeat of an Independent candidate for
sheriff in Yazoo worth more to us than the
worth more than the election of Democratic
President in 1880? Is it not better to allow
Dixon to be sheriff of Yazoo than to swell the
"boom'' for Grant as the Radical candidate for
President next year? And yet, calmly consid-
cred, that is the issue which our indiscreet
friends in Yazoo seem willing to force upon US.
Can it be that any considerable portion of the
people of this country are willing to substitute
force and violence for the peaceful methods OF
our fathers in the choice OF officers? l hope
not think not. But, if 1 am mistaken, let
me say to all such, correct your error and do
it quickly. If there is any one point on which
the great American public has made up its
mind it is that the ballot shall be sacred, and
the ballot-box free from corruption or intimi-
dation. In this lies the only security for our
free institutions. That is the public Judgment
and it will have to be respected.
Indiscreet Democrats, in their mad efforts
to keep the Republicans out of power, are, in
fact, paving the way to let them in. Do they
not know that conservative, law-lCving,
law-abiding, peaceful citizens cannot, and
will not, follow them in their headlong ca
gard for consistency, to say nothing OF political
honesty? What has Congress been doing DUR
ing all the long and dismal days Of its late pro-
tracted session? What have our members been
elections should be carried at the point OF the
bayonet. Now what have we? Not elections
carried, but fields swept of candidates by shot
guns before the election. In our eagerness to
expose the wicked designs of the Radicals we
got up cartoons of ballot-boxes pierced by Fed
eral bayonets. Can we now complain II the
other side gets up cartoons showing ballot
boxes riddled with shot-guns, and independent
candidates fleeing for dear life before Demo
cratic mob?
Small as the Yazoo affair may seem in itself.
it has in it the elements of vast revolution.
What the people of that county may do for
themselves and within themselves, does not
tonch the heart of the question. Ii they had
taken Dixon out and hanged him, simply as a
bad man, history in its progress would scarcely
have paused long enough to make note OF It.
The vital, underlying principle is that candi-
dates are not to be driven from i.he field 6y
force on the one side or the other II one side
may do it as a matter of right they being the
Judges, then it cannot be denied that the other
side may do the same thing whenever they
have the power What then becomes OF our
boasted freedom of elections? Carry the idea
to its legitimate results, and it ends in, (which
party has the greatest amount Of physical
force?" 1t will matter little whether the bal
lot boxes are pierced by Federal bayonets or
have no further use for them on either side.
Messrs. Singleton, Barksdale, Wathall, you
are avowed candidates for the United States
Senate; where do you stand on this question?
Unbosom yourselves. Has one party, vi ct
arrmis, the right to whip the other from the
field? Is it to be assumed that nobody can be a
candidate except by the special grace of mob
falsely claiming to speak and act for the Demo
cratic party? If that is the idea let us know it,
and it is barely possible that there will be
found spirit enough among the independent
voters of this country to rebuke and utterly
overwhelm such insufferable insolence. Isl
lence will not do" Do you encourage mob
violence by saying nothing and doing nothing,
or do you speak out boldly on the side Of law
and order? A word to our Senators and Rep
resentatives in Congress (omitting, of course,
Senator Bruce. How do you propose to meet
this question next winter? When the "stal-
wart'' Republicans propose to meet Southern
shot guns with Northern bayonets, what are
you going to say about it?
My dear sir, sat down to express my ap-
proval of the course which, as an independent
journalist, am fully persuaded you have felt
it your duty to pursue. know you are right,
and in the end all thinking men will thank
you. My approval or disapproval may amount
to nothing but when a man throws himself
into the surging billows to save drowning
canse, 1 am boy enough yet to stand on the
bank and cry ''bully for you" Very truly,
Your obedient servant,
A. G. BROWN.
Iewiston Journal.1