Perrysburg journal. (Perrysburg, Wood Co., O. [Ohio]) 186?-1965, 1879-02-28
Southern Political Methods.

WHATEVER light the evidence before
the Potter Committee may throw upon
the outrages and frauds practiced in
several of the Southern States during
the campaign and at the election last
fall, the testimony taken thus far makes
it certain that the irreconciliable Sec
tionalism of the native Southern whites
will be brought out with startling dis
tinctness. Two of the witnesses exam
ined on Wednesday were native South
erners and residents of Mississippi.
One, Gen. Reuben E. Davis, was
Greenback candidate for Congress last
fall against Colonel Muldrow, in the
First District General Davis had been
lifelong Democrat, fought in the Con-
federate army, and had evinced all the
attributes of Fire-Eater as early as
1859, when, as member of Congress, he
had publicly warned such Republicans
as William H. Seward that they would
be hanged if they dared show them
selves in the South. Yet the very fact that
he ran against the regular Democratic
nominee at the last election, and as a
Greenback candidate secured such negro
votes as were not intimidated or pre-
vented by fraud or violence, was enough
to bring obloquy upon him. He was
suspected of organizing the blacks in
opposition to the Democrats, and that
suspicion alone secured his being
hanged in effigy, burned in effigy, and
| threatened with assassination. He
swore that no white man in the South
could vote against the Democracy with
out being ostracised, and that he him
self dreaded the assassin's knife more
than ostracism. His life had been
threatened if he dared to testify before
the Teller Committee, and it is not
much wonder that he taunted the Gov
ernment with imbecility while it was
in position to compel him to testify,
but could not protect him in telling the
truth.
The testimony of William Vassar, a
native of Virginia, but now residing in
Mississippi, was of much the same pur-
port. He had been suspected of max
ing Radical speech, and that sub
jeeted him to bull-dozing. Everything,
he said, is called Radical in Missis-
sippi that is not Democratic, and every
man who gives utterance to Radical
ISM is regarded as a pest, and every
such person is visited with bust
ness and social punishment. Hetestihed
that the politics of Mississippi were
controlled largely by boisterous and
reckless young men, that immigration
of Northern people is looked upon as
an intrusion, and that there are no con-
victions for political murders and out
RACES. What was said about Missis-
sippi politics by native Southerners
might be said with equal truth of the
Democratic methods in nearly every
Southern State.
Such testimony as this can scarcely
fail to place in strong contrast the pre-
vailing freedom of personal opinion
and action in the North and the sec
| tional intolerance of the Southern
whites. A Southern man may come to
Chicago to enter business or practice
! his profession, or settle down on a farm
in Illinois; he may have been an origi-
nal Secessionist and active in the war
of the Rebellion; he may still be fierce
Democrat and vote and act with that
party. With all this, he will be able to
express his opinions freely; he may
make political speeches and vote any
ticket he likes without a suspicion of
| luueTIeTSuCe, ue may run IOT OllCo dS u
Democrat, be elected, and enjoy the
possession thereof in peace; he will
always have equal social, business, or
professional chances according to his
personal ability and conduct. In the
south it is the very reverse. Northern
birth or Republican antecedents sub
ject man to social ostracism, business
discrimination, political bulldozing, and
even personal violence. This is the uni
versal rule. Ithas become so notorious
that Northerners who went into South
ern States TO live, taking their capital
and energy with them, are emigrating
from there as fast as they can, even al
great personal sacrifice. Northern men
no longer contemplate emigrating tC
the bulldozing Southern States, no mat
ter how much the attractions of climate
or Investment might otherwise influence
them. A recent article in the st. Louis
Globe Democrat demonstrated that even
the border State of Missouri, which
ought to belong to the West rather
than the South in character and senti
ment as it does in geographical location
is repelling immigration from the East
ern and the Middle States by its utter
Bourbonism, including an opposition
to common schools, a preponderanc'
. of Confederate element, and a DISPOSE