The daily dispatch. [volume] (Richmond [Va.]) 1850-1884, 1884-02-22
the Danv,lle-R,ot investigation.

The Danvilie-Riot Investigation.
II Is already settled, we arc inclined 70
think, that the committee appointed by The
United States Senate to investigate the riot
in Danyille will be unable 10 damage the
Democratic party by any report that IL can
make. The testimony OF the white men
carries with 70 weight OF which 1t viii be
impossibie for the most malignant Radical
70 diycst 1t. The contrast between the
witnesses on the one side and those on the
other cannot but have It's effect even upon
the cold, calculating, "mean" JOHN SHEER
MAN.
The negroes have proved to be swift
witnesses. They, or some OF them at least,
have seemed to be ready and willing to
swear 10 whatever might be deemed ne
cesssry TO make out a case for the Republic
cans. But they have oyer-reached them
selves. When one negro swears that he IS
afraid to testify fully because he wants to
30 back TO Danyille 10 live, and dozen
negroes testify not simply to all that oe-
CURED but 10 great many things that did
not occur at all, even the blindest and stu
pidest OF the Republicans must be con-
WINGED that the first negro lied. So when
a negro testifies that he heard the firing OF
pistols and guns two hundred yards OIL,
and that he afterwards got to the scene OF
the riot In time 10 see personal collision
that took place before the firing occurred,
IL cannot but be evident to the whole COM
mttee tina. he, too. is lying.
VIOLET KEELING was so swift witness
that the Republican managers must be
credited when they claim that they had
not coached her before she went upon the
stand. She compelled the coHmittee to
infer the real facts Of the case when she
told how she hated, or rather despised,
any and every negro that dared to vote
the Democratic ticket. This, too, is fact
that the northern people ought 10 ponder.
They have learned II from VIOLET KEEL
mo, and are estopped from discrediting
their own witness. We mean the fact that
the negroes are banded together solidly in
the interest OF the Republican party, and
that they exercise a tyrannical influence
over all the voters of their race. Let Mr..
VANCE ask every negro witness how many
negroes he knows who vote the Demo-
cratic ticket, and the committee will learn
that In the South hundreds OF thousands
OF ignorant negroes are massed in solid
phalanx against the intelligent white
voters, voting as their leaders tell them,
totally incapable Of approaching their
duties as freemon, and reckless as to the
consequences Of their abuse OF the cleo
tive franchise.
General MALONE can furnish valuable
testimony on this point. He knows well,
and II asked will testify before the COM
mittee as he has said in an interview with
a newspaper reporter, that in his party in
some counties in.Virginia there are hardly
whites enough to "officer the negroes"
That Is to say, the negroes are solid on his
side--the whites solid on the other side.
The Petersburg Inder- appeal says that
General MALONE ought to be made to tes-
tify as to the statements he has made in pa
pers published to the world by him. This,
too, Ia a good suggestion. Such wholesale
libels. IL they are libels, ought to be known
rs such. If the statements are true, let
him say so under the solemnities Of an
oath. Especially should he be made to tell
where IL was that the Bourbon knife
sank deep" and how he learned that the
DanvilIe riot was part OF a premeditated
scheme TO intimidate negro voters. Also,
how 1t happened that these intimidated !"
negroes east this year vote larger by
twenty thousand or more than they ever
cast before.