The Vancouver independent. (Vancouver, W.T. [Wash.]) 1875-1910, 1880-11-11
Teaching the Gospel of Hate.

IL Is q SAD ana Omn1OuS spectacle,
full of gloomy pOrtent for the future
of the Republic, to see the substantial
unanimity with which the people of
the South are Systematically striving
to educate the rising gen neration
throughout that section in n spirit of
contempt, aversion and hatred of the
North.
The most popular and generally rec
commended school book in the South
to-day is a volume entitled, "a New
School History of the United States
of America; by J. 5. Blackburn, Prin-
cipal of Potomac Academy, AleXan-
dria, Va, and w. Mcdonald, A. NJ,
Principal of the Male High School of
Louisville, Kentucky" This book
has gone through eleven editions, the
latest of which is dated 1880. The be-
lief, expressed by the authors in the
preface, that it is the only school his
| the demands of the OCCASION" seems
as the Southern demand is concerned,
by its enormous circulation and gem
eral use in the schools throughout the
States embraced in the late Confed-
eYacy. But nothing can be palmer
|
sion," if this book does indeed meet
! them, are that the children of the
South shall be trained and educated
in the doctrine that nothing was
really settled by the war; that seces-
sion was not settled by it; that even
slavery was not settled by it; that the
overthrow of the Confederacy was
simply brutal triumph of might over
right; that the principles for which
the South contended were eternally
just and righteous, and should never
be renounced or abandoned.
On the subject of slavery the doe
trine is plainly inculcated that it is
"the natural condition of the Afri-
can" and a Divine institution wisely
ordained as the means of spreading
the blessings of Christianity.' On
the subject of secession the authors
lose no opportunity, direct or indirect,
of impressing upon the minds of the
Southern youth that, though tempo
rarily Il lost cause, it is nevertheless a
sacred right. jefferson Davis is de-
scribed as ''no extremist, though res
olute in the defense of the rights Of his
secfiOn.n Such is the teaching which
these two leading Southern educators
of youth "believe meets the demands
of the occasion.' During the last ses-
sion of Congress Southern statesmen
in both houses gave frequent almost
fearful expression to their 'yearnings
forfraternity and cancellation" yearn-
ings which they solcmnly averred
were shared by the great majority of
the people they represented. How
does this popular book, which is in
all the Southern schools, feed such
longngs? BY teaching the children
to believe that "ther country'-that
is, the late Confederacy-is now
crushed by superior force, under vile
and cruel despotism: that the North
ern hatred of slavery was based in
part upon Il malignant fanaticism and
in part upon "a sentimental preiu-
dice" that the South was mainly set
tied by 'gcntlemen,n and the North
by "the lower classes that ever since
the rise of the anti-slavery agitation
the North has been constantly making
aggressions upon the constitutional
and equitable rights of the South;
that the rebellion was justitiable, be-
cause "the property, lives, and liberty
of the citizens were threatened by the
aggressive aspect of the incoming Adj
ministration'-th is. the Admins
tration of Lincoln; that the southern
Representative and Senators who left
their seats in Congress to take part in
the rebellion 'were driven to this last
resort of honor by their political enc
mies.n Such are the teachings with
which those who profess to be ''yearn-
ing for fraternity and conciliation"
are systematically imbuing the minds
of their youth while denouncing the
people of the North for excepting alive
the animositics of the war"-Sdn
Francisco Chronicle.