The Indianapolis journal. [volume] (Indianapolis [Ind.]) 1867-1904, 1886-11-22
MISSISSIPPI SOLID,
exact value

MISSISSIPPI SULlU.
Amid the gloominess that followed the great
election three weeks ago, when State after
State wheeled into the old Republican column,
there was one ray of ideal sunshine that
cheered and comforted the otherwise despond-
ing Democratic heart Mississippi went solid.
True, that State is and has been for years
Republican by 10000 majority. Notwith-
standing it has received unusual attention
from the Democratic party; Notwithstanding
for ten years the Democracy have impartially
used the shotgun and burned innumerable
negro cabins over the family of loyal voters;
Notwithstanding the fact that the tissue bal
lot was worked for all that was out and the
art of counting in and counting out reduced
to the certainty of fine art, impudent he
publicans, like Judges Chisolm and Prentice;
would occasionally openly defy the settled or
der of things, and Copiah county murder
became necessary to teach the negro voter
that Mississippi was thoroughly Democratic
State, where no one but white man was al
lowed to exercise constitutional rights. The
mented in Mississippi by gerrymander that
was the envy and despair of the Democratic
Legislature of Indiana in 1885. A district
was manufactured that for attenuation shamed
a shoestring. Even this gerrymander did not
keep the rascally Republican majority of Mis-
sissippi from occasionally electing Congress
man. This menace to free institutions and
the integrity of democratic principles, in
this glorious year 1885, has disappeared, and
this banner Democratic State is fully re-
deemed at last Mark the successive steps
adopted by the Democratic partyto suppress
the 10000 Republican majority of Mississippi:
|. Murder and arson. (Ten years of it.)
9. Fraud (Anything is good enough for
nigger)
3. A thorough gerrymander.
A question occurs right here. The Consti-
tuition of the United States guarantees to the
people of every State republican form Of
government Is Mississippi republic, or has
she any longer republican government Is
it republican government when a majority
Of 20, 900 voters are robbed of their votes for
political purposes9 "The forms of law are
often the gravelothes Of liberty" In Indi-
ana the Democratic party uses the forms of
law to disfranchise the Republican majority.
But in ten States the Democratic party do not
even take the precaution of using the forms of
law to rob Republican majorities of their
rights. There are just two forces that keep
Cleveland and his party in power at Washing
ton-whisky and political robbery. If the
Democratic party respected fundamental con.
stitutional rights, it would leave Washington
in forty eight hours The United States is
Republican by 1000, 900 majority, and nothing
can defeat that majority except robbery The
Democratic party does not hesitate to count
the negro for representation purposes, and
then, after using him, to rob him of his
ballot. 1t thus degrades the value Of every
vote cast in each of the other States. It robs
every citizen Of Indiana Of his rights as an
American and makes him pay tribute to his
Southern master. Thus the right that the
South failed to gain by the wager of battle
she is slowly but surely accomplishing through
the subserviency of the Democratic party and
at the expense Of the honest voter of the
North.
Will the American people submit to thisP
The Journal now and here warns the Democrat
ic party that its days are numbered. This gov
eminent can never exist unless every one of
its propretors have equal rights at the ballot
box. The Democratic party in 1883 will go
to the wall upon this question. No party can
succeed for more than four years by con-
spiracy, no matter how -Tsll organized, against
the fundamental rights of free American citi-
zens. And that is the way the Democrats got
into power in 1884.
/. POOR HARVARD COLLEGE.