Los Angeles daily herald., 1888-09-10
r. C. O. Benjamin Has Some.
thing to Say.
THE REPUBLICAN ECORD.
This Negro Scores the G.. 0. 2. in
Round Set Terms for
Its Faults.

way:
ED1roRs HERALD Over two months
ago began the publication Of the Oh
serper, not as an experiment, but be-
cause l thought the publication OF lib
eral, progressive independent news
paper-having for its object the
enlightenment and the advancement OF
of my people (the Negro race)-was
downright necessity. The Negro has the
ballot, he should be taught how to use
it. He is clothed with citizenship, he
should know it's responsibilities. An in
dependent, wide-awake newspaper,
which bravely tells the truth, is thou
sand times more helpful and beneficial
to the race than the subsidized partisan
sheet, which can see but one light, one
party, one church and one side. The
Negro is narrow and intolerant because
of the one-sidedness of his training, but
he will grow in the esteem and conf
dence of the American people in proper
ton as he grows in liberality and toler-
ance. With view to liberalizing the
race in matters Of politics, business,
church and society the Observer
was established, and its circu-
lation has run up from a
few hundreds into the thousands. The
intelligent Of my race have expressed an
admiration for the independent spirit and
the clean and lucid matter which it con.
tains. The illiterate of my race and the
office-seeking Republicans have con-
demned my course, the former because
they knew no better, and the latter be-
cause it numbers their political days.
My honest endeavor is to show the Negro
that it is bad policy to trade with man
who holds an old debt against him. The
Negro has worked twenty-four years to
pay tie debt of gratitude, and still the Re-
publican party hold mortgage on him.
When will the debt be paid? When will
the Negro be released from political
bondage? The fact of the matter is, the
Negro is in debt to no political party for
his emancipation. The Liberation of the
slaves was a war necessity, and the
soldiers who took part in the war, black
and white, Democrats and Republicans,
are drawing pay to-day for their services.
Then why should the poor Negro be
asked to pay debt which the Govern
ment is already paying? This talk about
the original purpose of the Republi-
can party being to abolish slavery is the
merest bosh. When Douglass, Gerritt
Smith, William Lloyd Garrison, Lucretia
Mott, Wendell Phillips, Sojourner Truth,
and host of others were standing up
manfully battling for negro manhood,
there was not yet any Republican party :.
Indeed the anti-slavery issue had not
then reached the importance of engaging
the active support OF politicians. On the
contrary, Henry Clay and Daniel Web
ster were splitting hairs in Congress to
appease by cowardly compromises the
rampant spirit of slavery, to prevent the
extension, not to abolish the infamy.
Charles Sumner was getting bis head
crushed by Preston Brooks in the Senate
OF the United States, and John Brown
was getting hung at Harpers Ferry, for
protesting against the iniquity OF slavery,
and Abraham Lincoln was sparring with
Stephen A. Douglass in Illinois without
once placing himself squarely on record
as in favor of the abolition of slavery.
No, there was no Republican party
when the army of noble men and
women were being rotten legged for Gre
ating the issues which eliminated in the
birth of the Republican party and the
precipitation of the civil war. There was
nothing in the Republican platform upon
which Abraham Lincoln was elected
President, which aimed at any more
radical measure than confning slavery
within the territory then covered by it.
When the South opened the war by firing
upon Fort Sumpter the Democrats of the
North like Benjamin F. Butler rushed in
to defend the Union, and without SEEM
ing to do 80, became members of the
Republican party. Indeed as manv men
went into the war for the Union who had
been lifelong Democrats, as men who
belonged to the Republican and other
parties. These Democrats-fully one at
the end-came out Of the war as good
democrats as when as they went in.
They did as much to make possible the
emancipation as their Republican breth-
rem in arms. The men who controlled
the Republican party and the advocates
OF abolition were distinct from the begin.
ming. Had the white men been able to
subdue the South without the assistance
OF colored men; had the Southern Con-
federacy listened to the repeated over
lures OF President Lincoln, it is verv
doubtful If should be writing this arti-
Gle to-day. The anti-Slavery men had to
plead for every concession to freedom
from the politicians of the war period.
And in these days when black men are
being shot down in cold blood and swung
up to the limbs of trees throughout ali
the South by irresponsible tramps, no
Republican Congress ever did more than
resolve and investigate the matter. When
terror reigned in Florida, South Caro-
lima, Louisiana and Mississippi, no Re-
publican President, from Grant to Ar
thur, ever declared those States in rebel
lion, and put such down with the strong
arm OF the Federal authority. Then came
the cowardly treachery OF 1876, when the
Electoral Commission com posed of seven
Democrats and eight Republicans, de-
clared that Hayes and Wheeler lad been
elected President and Vice. President of
the United States by the electoral votes
OF Florida, South Carolina and Louisiana.
but that the Republican candidates for
Governor and Legislators had not been
elected, and that, too, when it was
clearly demonstrated that the vote on the
State ticket was larger, or as great, as
that on the electoral tickets. Then
came the decision of Supreme Court
overwhelmingly Republican that the
Ku-klux law was null and void and un-
constitutional. We had hardly recovered
from the shock of this tremendous and
monstrous construction of the Constitu-
ton when the Supreme Court declared
null and void and unconstitutional the
Civil Rights bill. I have drawn a
picture Of the condition of my race and
the Republican party. am interested
f.