The weekly Floridian. [volume] (Tallahassee, Fla.) 1867-19??, 1884-11-25


number Of white peopl6 III the North.
To illustrate just how sit works to the
destruction of all fair elections, let me
federacy and FIVE loyei States of the
North, possessing in zach section the
same number of electoral votes. In the
South the States of Louisiana, Mississippi,
Alabama, Georgia and South Carolina
have an aggregate of ~ electoral votes
They have $500, 900 white people and
over 100000 colored people. In the
North the States of Wisconsin, Mime
sofa, Iowa, Kansas and California have
likewise in the aggregate 4s electoral
votes, and these have white population
of 100000, or just double the FIVE South
ern States which | have named. These
Northern States have practically no col
ored population. 1t is therefore evident
that the white men IN those Southern
States, by usurping and absorbing the
rights of colored men, are exerting just
double the political power of the white
men in the Northern ssssssess
I submit, my friends, that such con-
dition of affairs is extraordinary, unjust
and deteriorating to the manhood of the
North. Even those who are vindictively
opposed to negro suffrage will not deny
that if Presidential electors are assigned
to the South by reason of the negro pop
ulation, that population ought to be per-
mitted free suffrage in the election. To
deny that clear proposition is to affirm
that the Southern white man in the Gulf
States is entitled to double the political
power of a Northern white man in the
Lake States Il is to affirm that a Con-
tederate soldier shall WELD twice the in-
f1uence in the nation that Union soldier
can, and that the perpetual and constantly
increasing superiority shall be conceded
to the Southern white man in the govern
ment of the Union. If that be quietly
conceded in this generation it will harden
into a custom until the badge of inferi-
ority will attach to a Northern white
man, as odiously as ever Norman noble
stamped it upon a Saxon churl This
subject is of deep interest to the laboring
men of the North. With the Southern
Democracy triumphant in their States
and in the nation, the negro will be com
PEELED to work for Just such wages as the
whites may decree-wages which will
amount, as did the supplies of the slaves,
to bare subsistence, equal in cost, per-
haps, to 35 cents per day, if averaged over
the entire South. The white laborer in
the North will soon feel the distinctive
etfec: of this upon his own wages.
THE DEMOCRATIC INFLUENCE.
The Republicans have clearly seen from
the earliest days Of reconstruction that
wages in the South must be raised to
Justly recompense the laborer or the
wages in the North ruinously lowered,
and the party have steadily worked for
the former result A reverse influence
will now be set in motion and that coDdi-
tion of affairs produced against which
years ago Mr. Lincoln warned the free
laboring men of the North and it will
prove hostile to their independence and
will inevitably lead to ruinous reduction
of wages The mere difference in the
color of the skin will not suffice to main
tain an entirely different standard If
wages in contiguous and adjacent States
and the voluntary will be compelled to
yield to the involuntary. So completely
have the colored men in the South been
already deprived by the Democratic party
of their constitutional and legal rights as
citizens of the United States that they re-
gard the advent of that party to National
power as the signal of their re-enslave
ment, and are atfrighted because they
think all legal protection for them is gone
Few persons in the North realize how
completely the chiefs Of the rebellion
WELD the political power which has trl-
umphed in the late election.
1t is a portentou3 fact that the Demo
cratic Senators who came from the States
of the late Confederacy. all, and l mean
all without a single exception, personally
participated in the rebellion against the
National Government. 1t is a still more
significant fact that in those States no
man who was loyal TO the Union, no mat
ter how strong a Democrat he may be to-
day, has the slightest chance of political
promotion. One great avenue to honor
in that section is a record of Jealous SER
vice in the war against the government.
1t is certainly an astounding fact that the
section in which friendship for the Union
in the day of it's trial and agony is still
political disqualification should be called
now to rule over the Union. All this
takes place during the lifetime of gen.
Grafton that fought the war and elevates
into practical command of the American
Government the identical men who organ
lied for its destruction, and plunged us
into the bloodiest contest of modern times.
l have spoken of the South as placed by
the late election in the possession of the
Government, and 1 mean all that my
words imply. The South furnished
nearly three-fourths of the electoral votes
that defeated the Republican party, and
they will step to the command of the
Democrats as unchallenged and as unre-
strained, as they held the same position
for thirty years before the civil war.
No POLITICAL INEQUALITY.
Gentlemen, there cannot be political in-
equality among the citizens of free Re-
public; there cannot be minority of
white men in the South ruling majority
of white men in the North. Patriotism,
selfrespect, pride, protection for person
and safety for country, all cry out against
it. The very thought Oft stirs the blood
of the men who inherit equality from the
| Pilgrims who first stood on Plymouth
| Rock, and from the liberty-loving patriots
who came to Delaware with William
Penn. 1t becomes the primal question of
American manhood. 1t demands hearing
end settlement, and that settlement will
|