The Indianapolis journal. [volume] (Indianapolis [Ind.]) 1867-1904, 1883-11-19
Is the Present Condition of Virginia
a State of InsurrectfOn?
A Significant Article from q Washington
Paper-The Killing of Matthews-Judge
Harlan Civil Rights.
THE READJUSTERS.

Senator MahOne Reviews the virginia cam
paign-The Condition of the Negroes.
Special to the Indianapolis journal
WASHINGTON, Nov. Ex-senator Malone,
chairman of the Virginia Readjuster State
Committee, has issued an address to the
voters of his party. The address begins with
a statement of the principles of the Read
juster party and the bitter opposition en-
countered from the Bourbons. The Senator
then reviews the work of the Readjusters dur
ing the ten years they have been in power,
claiming that they have faithfully lived up
to all promises made. The cost of the State
government has been reduced more than
$250,000 annually, and great reforms have
been made in the provisions for care of the
insane; the suffrage has been liberated from
and the whipping-post has been abolished.
The public schools have been greatly inn
proved, and the establishment of the first
normal school in the United States for col
ored teachers is cited as proof of progress.
Since the accession to power of the Read
justers 726 miles of railway have been built,
and the taxable value of personal property
address continues:
II our public servants have been honest and
faithful, as the record shows they have been,
then large portion OF our people have either
abandoned their principles and willingly voted
all these good works into the hands of those
who would fan destroy them, or else the recent
election is not fair and unresrrained express
sion of the popular will. That the latter is the
true explanation of the result will not be
doubted by the candid people of the country
when they are brought face to face with some
of the means employed by the Bourbon faction.
1t is not pleasant TO hold up crime and law
lessness to the worlds gaze, but when the fruits
of these are made to seem the honest will and
opinion of our people IL ls patriotic duty to let
the truth be known.
Virginia, so'loug exempt from the bloodshed
and violence which has LEFT such foul traces
upon the political records of some of her sisters,
has, under Bourbon instigatiOn, been dragged.
even at this late day when the whole country
hoped for peace, into scenes and methods no
whit less bloody nor less brutal than those
which fiourished in the palmiest days of ku-klux
and white leagues,
When the Bourbon faction assembled in
Lynchburg in July last to formulate u platform,
a large element of its membership avowedly and
openly favored the adoption of the "cOlOr line.'
Bourbon journals proclaimed that the true is
sue of the canvass the race issue, and that
the contest should be forced into struggle be-
tween the whites and the blacks. That such a
plank would be incorporated into the platform
adopted seemed highly probable, until the final
action taken developed the fact that, for reas-
Ons best known to themselves, the Bonrbons
tiOn of their purpose to draw the color line.
Even the most moderate Bourbon did not pre-
tend that this failure to draw the color line in
the platform sprung from lack of purpose so to
do, but it was admitted on all hands that it had
not been formally adopted from motives of poll
cy. The temporary chairman of the convention
addressed himself TO "the white people of Vir-
ginia;" leading Bourbon organs recommended
the platform adopted "a white mans plat
FORM" and while Bourbon coadjut0rs, under the
name of straightout Republicans were sent into
the black districts to dsaffect cOlored voters,
the whole burden OF the Bourbon leaders in the
white districts was TO excite the race prejudices
ana passions of the whites against the blacks.
The debt question was not the issue on which
rBourhonism hoped to win, for their attitude to-
ward it was one of ahjeet abandonment OF all
pfetense of principle and acceptance of every
measure they had denounced.
Their attitude upon the questions of suffrage,
education, economy and taxation was equally
abject ana cringing. They, therefore, sought to
find other issues upon which they might appeal
to the voters of Virginia.
In their written platform they sought to sound
a keynote against Republicanism, but their own
support OF heretofore pronounced Republicans
answered this clAmor and paralyzed the power
of this appeal. On the tariff they assumed p6-
sition SO incOmprehen sible thatthe people FecOg-
nlzed them as impoStors ON tine subject OF re-
peal of the Internal revenue system, which they
sought TO make an issue, they found no opposi-
tion In the weak and Cabling clamor of oppo-
sitiOn to bossism, they found IL impossible to
produce facts or sustain public interest. In
studied array of offenses of omission and CON-
mission against our party, with which they
our canvassers met them, that there was not q
good count in the Indictment.
And 80, the Bourbon faction, finding naught
in their platform, naught in the record of the
Readjusters where with to break the solid front
of oun.paruy, deliberately abandoned all other
issues and threw the whole OVER of its speak
ers, its press, and its organization into the
cry with the energy of despair.
As late as July 20, when their convention ad-
journed, in the faith tnat other issues might
prove available, the race issue had not only been
made prominent by the BourbOhs, but had been
ignored. so long as it was not agitated, and,
indeed, up to the last week of the can vass, when
murder became rampant, our party was intact,
and every report from every section brought
confident assurances OF victory.
BOURBON DESPERATION AT FEAR OF DEFEAT
But as the election drew near the Bourbon
faction, realizing that on every other Issue it
was hopelessy defeated, infuriated by knOwl-
edge of impending disaster seized upon the race
issue, chanted, chorused, ami intoned 1t until,
wrought up to fever heat, it became their sole,
ONLY, and absorbing theme-screamed in threat
ening frenzy, fierce and bewildering as the
dance and song of the Carmagnoe in the days Of
the Sans -CulOtte.
AS early as September leading Bourbon edi-
tor announced to a member of our party in a
public place that the Bourbon plan of campaign
was "tO buy all they could and bully the re-
mainder." How faithfully this programme was
carried out the sequel will show. What was at
the time regarded IS a.sententious piece of band.
image has now been realized rs a dim fore
shadOwing of q bloody truth.
The progress of the canvass developed or
ganized system of duplicty, practioed by our op-
ponents, whereby in black districts they ap-
pealed TO the blacks for support on the ground
that our party gave them no recognition and
used them mere tools and cats paws, while,
at the same time, in white districts, their ap-
peals were made to every prejudice Of to
save the whites from an alleged purpose our
part to elevate the blacks above them.
The same speaker, who wOnld be found to-day
IN II lan ntlfr nf Mas OFF, ion and
gard for the negro and purpose the part of
himself and party to do more for them than the