Yorkville enquirer. [volume] (Yorkville, S.C.) 1855-2006, 1880-09-16

the text of the American people "Eat, drink
and be merry, for tomorrow we die?" No
wa look to the future, and we say that this
great domain shall be preserved for future
generations, that they may reap the fruit Of
our good guardianship and trusteeship. That
is the doctrine of the Democratic party. But
the doctrine of the Republican party is tc
feed fat those who do not need fattening
to make the strong stronger at the expense Of
the weak, and to make the rich richer at the
expense of the poor, and in proof of this as
sertion I point to these land gifts by Act Of
Congress from 1863 until Democratic ma
jority in the House put a stop to them: Eel
low.citizens, this is not subject to be dis
cussed lightly. 1t is subject upon which a
man might spend more than day to show
the terribly reckless course of this party that
has made these grants for all time without
regard to succeeding generations. | can re,
member when l first entered Congress, some
twelve years ago, how the lobby Haunted
itself in the face of the public; how men
wonld sit there and put conditions in the
passage of laws, and they did it by money
and that money was the money of the people
of the United States. Subsidies and grants Of
all sorts were distributed with lavish hand.
No wonder that the wine flowed freely and
that Washington was gay place and that
the Republican party was popular with a
class. They were
FATTENING ON THE CORRUPTION.
When the Democrats came in power in 1875,
in the lower House, it put an end to all their
grand dinners and their receptions and their
influence, and their power was gone. Let
any man who was acquainted with the cor.
ruption of those days look at Congress to-day
and tell you the difference. Was it the Re:
publican party that caused this reform? {? No.,
it was the will of the Democratic party that
placed an honest majority inathe House of
Representatives. Another thing would like
to call your attention to is the attitude OF the
Republican party towards
THE CoLoRED PEOPLE
of this country. There has been contemp.
tible meanness by that party and its leaders
towards the negroes that meets my most
hearty contempt. They knew that they were
ignorant. They knew that they we're weak,
and not able to protect themselves, and what
have they done? They have professed to be
their warm friends and admirers. They.have
told them that they were fit to occupy any
station in the Government They told them
they were the equal of any man in every re-
spect. What has it all come to, when the
opportunity is given them to give substantial
proof of their love and admiration ?~s1 chal.
lenge any man of any color or party to name
a single colored man who holds an Office un-
der the United States government by the
vote of the National Republican party. |
have seen so much of this thing that it is
very familiar. I have been in Washington
for twelve years and have been householder,
and being taxpayer and residing in Wash
ington great portion Of the time, and being
a member of one Of the houses of Congress,
know whereof I speak. In 1870 they be-
gan to apply to the Republican Congress and
to make the District Of COLUMBIA what they
said was
BLACK MANS PARADISE,
a place where he would have to work very
little or not at all, and could support himself
by voting the Republican ticket. Well, it
brought great many there, but things went
on so that, they confessed themselves, they
began to recoil from the work they had be-
gun. They commenced by destroying the
house of delegates in which colored men sat,
and then they destroyed the governorship,
and the board of public works, and they had
spent not less than thirty million dollars on
the streets of that town and it was done by
the action of the Republican Congress, under
a law signed by a Republican President,
being no less man than Gen. Grant himself +;
and to-day and for the last six or seven years
no colored man has been allowed to cast a
vote in the District of Columbia, and no
white man either. Here this guardian of the
public liberty, this party that sets itself up as
a great example and apostle Of all that is cor
rect and light in Republican government
has stricken down the right which lies at
the very basis of our institutions-I mean
the right of suffrage. No man, for FIVE or
six years past, white or black, could 60 to the
polls and express his opinion in the District
of Columbia as to whether he is we'll or i'll
governed. [Applause] went
DOWN TO MISSISSIPPI
in June, 1876, as the minority member of a
committee of investigation. The majority of
that committee was composed of Mr.. Bout
we'll of Massachusetts, Mr.. Cameron of Wis.
consin, and Mr.. Mcmillan of Minnesota
They called up the colored people to ask
them whether they had been deprived of the
right to hold office, and what had been done
to them in elections and about their rights,
and had some conversation with those peo-
pie, and wish to call your attention to the
fact that there is not to day in the State of
Massachusetts single eolored man hold
ing any Office, nor in Wisconsin nor in Min
nesota, and therefore when they are down
here, expressing solicitude that the black
man should have office, they are deceitful be-
cause in their own homes they take care that
nothing of the kind shall happen. Cheers
So that 1 think we have right on the score
of common sense and justice to arraign this
party for its gross insincerity in those very
things Of which they proclaim themselves the
especial champions. said just now that
this party was insincere about money, about
public credit. To-day the sec; etary of the
treasury is making speeches through the North
declaring that the Democratic party is not
to be trusted by people Of property, by the
men of substance Of the land. Now, to put
this question of public credit in a short form
Public credit is nothing but an aggregate of
individual credit. The public credit of South
Carolina is the private credit of every indi-
vidual in South Carolina, and if he does not
see the immediate and instant result of stab
against
THE CREDIT OF THE STATE
he will find it in his individual fortune short
ly. In Virginia there has been much distress
and trouble. Frankly, 1 do not think their