National Republican. (Washington City (D.C.)) 1872-1888, 1884-02-01
Tho Now Irreprssslble Conflict.

the south, because its champions assume the
false to be true and then argue upon the
false premises thus laid down. Thus, it is
claimed by them that the southern democracy
accept in good faith tho amendments to the
constitution, as they claim to have accepted
in good faith the result of their appeal to
arms. They say that of course crimes arc
committed at the south as we'll as at tho
north, but that these arc not political nor to
he taken as evidence of resistance to the ac-
complished fact of the equal civil and political
rights Of all men. 1t is very difficult to argue
with people who publicly deny the truths
which privately they admit.
Then on tho republican side there ia q
dangerous element Of false men who pretend
to believe a lie in order that they may thereby
avoid the task of dealing with an ugly truth.
These men properly belong in the democratic
party. They not only do not stand by tho
great principle of equality before tho law,
but they betray 1t on all occasions They
snecr at tho truth and its advocates, and
change the subject when the rights of citi-
zens and the duty Of government are spoken
of.
The democratic party is at war with negro
suffrage. 1t will conceal and condone any
crimes committed against it. 1t has not
votes enough to cope with it. and it docs not
mean to be outnumbered by the aid of negro
votes. 1t dare not attempt to nullify it in
northern states, although in several of them
it often has the balance of power, but in the
than is the brute creation. All pretense that
the fifteenth amendment is respected by the
democratic party at the south is sham and
an imposture.
The states of South Carolina and
Mississippi have negro majorties
Senators Butler and Lamar, of those
states, arc able men, and as fair as it
is possible for men to be in their situation.
They knew that in 1867, when the johnson
governments at the south were legslated out
by congress, they could easily have been the
leaders of honest majorities in their respect
i've states. The negroes had then no carpet
bag leaders, and could have been nodded to
the will Of the natural governing classes of
the SOUTH But, infamed with the hope of re-
trieving the lost cause through the agency of
Andrew johnson and his presidential
power the southern leaders defied
tha &c
made the presidential campaign of 1868 on the
declaration in the national democratic plat
form that those acts were unconstitutional
revolutionary, and void, and rallied under
the war cry of their candidate for the vice
presidency that the president ought to dis
sperse at the point of the bayonet the state
governments recognized by congress as legiti-
mate.
The negroes were forced in the first in
stance by their old masters to follow the lead
of newcomers, some of whom were no doubt
unprincipled adventures. Sullenly the main
body of the southern whites refused to yield
an inch to the march of events.
The reconstruction acts would never have
been passed if the johnson provisional gov
ernments had not refused TO guarantee civil
rights by ratifying the fourteenth amend
ment. The fifteenth amendment would have
been indefinitely postponed or greatly modi-
fed but for the violence of southern hatred
of the government so badly manifested.
The fifteenth amendment was adopted by
tho acts Of state governments which the
democracy of the whole nation had voted
ought to be dispersed at the point of the bay
onet-as being illegitimate usurpations. 1t
by republican congress has any binding
force in law. All laws enacted by republic
cans are unconstitutional, and all amend
ments to the constitution have been inserted
irregularly and in violation of that instru-
ment itself. In short tho government was
suspended in 1861, and there has been an
interregnum during the entire period of re-
publican administration.
But the democratic party decided in 1871
not to insist upon this extreme doctrine
until it obtained possession of all the branches
of the government. Meanwhile it resolved
to profess acqueScencc in tho amendments
not to admit their adoption, but to suspend
open resistance to them. Upon the attitude
of the democracy toward these amendments
Roscoe Conkling gave this warning to the
people in 1885,
They never yet have said nor admitted that thu
amendments were legally adopted They did say
reopening the questions settled by the amend.
ments, and they did say, in 1876, that they woult
accept them; but that they were legally valid they
have never said. With a thorough
bred democratic president, whatever may happen
in form to tho amendments they will become
more a dead letter than quickening spirit
That the right of suffrage is a dead letter
so far as the million and quarter of blacl
voters in the south are concerned, is as much
matter of history as that the democratic party
has for years falsely pretended to the contrary
The democratic editors and speakers of Misss-
sipp and South Carolina freely admit tina
they terminated republican rule in thost
states, not by honest voting, but by revolu
ton. Senators Lamar and Butler Could not
and probably would not, deny that the con
fession is true Nor can they deny that tn
white democrats of those states have frml!