Memphis daily appeal. [volume] (Memphis, Tenn.) 1847-1886, 1882-08-16

power hereafter for self-protection. l. NJ.
Stewart, coIored, pastor of Bethel church,
New York, in letter to the New York GLOBE
says:
If our public men of character and respecta-
biliy viii be the race in the struggle which
they are making for rePTeseaa,93h ana ar
rectly or indirectly, shall be willing, inoeeo,
should feel Il to BE- my 9H5 u sP reach ON the
subject of politics, even as Beeeher and IaImage
DO ts %0g5a M.tb bs a agant the Re
publieans OF to remain at home. We discharged
our imaginary debt Of gratitude 70 me KePnon-
the Union, and made them citizens and Vote e1I
to save the party" We shall De a elpner IN poll Oh
tics so long as we vote ike slaves We snan De
driven from West Point and the Naval Academy
like dogs, so long as we may be counted as certain
shall ask for bread proper representation in the
public serviee) and be given stone contempt
and quiet Hdicule), SO long as we deserve H.
Whenever the colored people cease to
array themselves in solid phalanx against
the whites, parties will form on new issues.
So long as the blacks North and South are
solid for the Republican party, 30 long will
Republicans war upon the South with the
view of maintaining this solidity. But 90
soon az the solid colored vote is broken, the
Republican party will make new issues in
the South with the view of winning the sup
port of enough whites TO divide the Southern
States. In every presidential election all other
considerations are forgotten, and the Northern
vote is rallied solely upon the infaming
issue that no man shall be elected who, by
reason of Southern support, may be In any
degree subject to Southern influences. This
is nothing less than the political outlawry of
a section-the admission of it to psrticipa-
ton in the adm Illustration of the government
in form, but rigid denial OF it to such par
ticipatiou in fact; and no calm thinking Re-
publican fail to perceive that the natural
consequence must be that the people of the
outlawed section will also forget their indi-
vidual differences of political opinion, and
unite 10 make common cause in the sym
pathies born of a common prescription. If
the live political issues OF the day grew out Of
unsettled questions surviving the war, there |
might be justification for this sectional pro-
scription by the North. But this is not true /
in any sense. Even if the reconstruction |
measures and the last three amendments TO |
the constitution authorized such alignment |
by the Republican party, those issues are
now, and have been for years, settled beyond
the power OF disturbance. And yet the po-
liticaI alignment is still upon the passions
and prejudices OF the war, to the utter ignor-
ing of every practical question of legislative
or administrative policy. For illustration,
the Republican party is generally recognized
as being favorable TO high tariff, while the
Democratic party fsvers tariff for revenue
only. But, nevertheless, low tariff and free
trade men without number at the North
range themselves under the Republican BAN
ner, while at the South protective tariff men
Are equally earnest in support of the Demo-
cratic cause. And the same is true as TO
Every other political question which now
contains live, practical issue. A mans po-
ition on either or all Of them fails TO iden-
ify him as belonging to either one political
'arty or the other. He may be in fsyor of
rec trade or fat money, aud he may be OPP
'osed 10 internal improvements and to SUBJ
idies by the general government, and he
nay be most ardent Republican; on the
Their hand, he may be on the other extreme
n all of these questions, and still give his |
lost earnest support TO the Democratic party.
his is strange condition of affairs, and
due to the fact that while these are | {
moDg the real questions which now con-
srn the material interests of the country,
nd are those upon which political parties
ould naturally be divided, they are all ig-
pred and subordinated to the sentiment
the political prescription of the South. e
pom all of these live, practical questions t
e people of the South are as much divided 6
they are at the North; and whenever the j,
Northern power" shall case to insist that e
e South shall wear the badge OF political p
and shall present the opportu-
ty for political alignments upon these :
actical questions, the people of the South q
Ill divide upon them, and the "Solid South" b
i'll no longer exist as the spectral phantom G
American politics. But so long as these :
actical questions are ignored as the tests d
party fealty, and 80 long as the dominant p
rty mas for its sole shibboleth political q
ilawry and osiracism for the South, then ),
long will the great mass of our people Il
ng together in their prescription, even if p
be in the encouragement of continued 81
feat. e