Daily globe. [volume] (St. Paul, Minn.) 1878-1884, 1880-07-26
THE POLL TAI.

mare's nest, and proceeds to give the public
the benefit of his discovery-an explanation
of how the Democrats expect to carry the
Southern States. Nearly ell those States
provide that every adult male stall pay a
poll tax of from one to three dollars year,
the penalty for neglect to do SO being dis
reimbursement. Shot~guns will not be used,
he says, but instead the formula will be,
"Not paid your poll tax, and you can't vote
here" The rights of the negro, as pre-
scribed in the fifteenth amendment to the
constitution, are spurned and ignored, and
in the South they are to-day in worse con-
dition than in the days of slavery.
1t is fortunate for the ''Yirginia Republi-
can" that there is no penalty attached for a
mans making frst-olass fool of
himself and advertising the fact
If he possessed even grain OF
common sense or intelligence he
would know that the rights of the negro are
not spurned and ignored. On the contrary
these people are placed on an absolute political
equality with the whites in every Southern
State. The payment of poll-tax is as oblig
atory upon the whites as upon the blacks,
and the penalty is precisely the same. This
political equality is what the friends of the
negro have long been clamoring for. Now
that they have succeeded they denounce it
as oppressive far worse than slavery, and de-
mand that the negro shall have greater
privileges than the white man possesses-
that he shall enjoy the privileges and protec-
ton of citizenship without performing any
of its duties or bearing any of its
burdens. If the poll-tax was levied
only upon the colored voters of the South,
or discrimination used in prescribing or en-
forcing the penalties of neglect to pay it,
there might be cause of complaint, but as
whites and blacks are treated precisely alike
both by the terms OF the law and the admin
istration of it, it is difficult to see where the
hardship Or INJUSTICE comes in.
If the imposition of poll-tax, with the
penalty of Acknowledgement in case of neg
lect to pay attached, is crime, then the New
England States, all of them under the con-
troll of the Republican party, are guilty Of q
like crime with their Southern brethren. In
Massachusetts Gen. Butler estimates that no
less than two hundred thousand voters are
disfranchised every year by the operations
of this law. In Rhode Island no foreigner
is allowed to vote until he has accumulated
certain amount of real property. In other
Eastern States there are obstacles placed in
the way of the exercise of the franchise, all
of them quite as oppressive as the poll-tax
levied in some of the Southern States. If
the charge of oppression will lie against the
Southern States it will also lie against the
Northern States. By condemning the Demo
Gratis of the South for such laws, the parti-
san press equally condemn the Republicans
of the North for similar enactments.
1t would, perhaps, be far better for the
interests of the country if every State in
the country should have such laws as are re
franchise of sufficient importance to
warrant him in paying dollar year to-
wards the maintenance of civil government,
he is very poor citizen, and does not de-
serve the privilege of voting. IF he is toe
indolent to earn such small sum he is not
capable of approaching the duties of citizen
ship, and ought not to be allowed to exer-
else its rights. None of the negroes Of the
South need fail to pay their poll-tax, and if
they do so they will be permitted to vote
just as white men vote under like circum.
stances. Their demand that they should have
greater rights than are accorded to their
white fellow citizens is, to say the least, an
impuaent one, and deserves, as it will receive,
no consideration whatever.