The Hocking sentinel. [volume] (Logan, Ohio) 1871-1906, 1889-06-20

these stories of blood come up to
The people of the north, that We
were lmpelled TO look upon the
south land as The realm of crime
where ghostly horsemen patroli-
ed the country side at night
where the life Of each citizen was
made miserable by the sense
that was continually harpins
about impending danger, a land
where the silence was most fire.
quently broken by the crack o.
shot guns and the tapping wing:
of the feathery scavengers tha,
hung along the trail of the regu
lator. Admitting now that this
is or has been true, for some very
good and reliable men in the
south told me that such state
of affairs had existed there. is il
not a strange fact and a matte,
worthy considerable thought. il
not comment, that the New
South, the latest star that ha'
been. fixed in the great industrial
crown of the nation, should have
| come up from the ashes of wal
wrecked states amidst the flash
ing shot guns of the Bull Dozer
If there was not left, let us think
in charity. by some hapless blum
der, as legacy of the war, one
problem that was to be worked
out in characters Of blood under
The banners of peace, might not
the civilized world very properly
ask by what rule of statesman
ship the American people have
allowed a class of citizens to be
disfranchised that had been freed
only after the expenditure OF a
vast amount of treasure and a
mighty waste of blood; and
again, to force the solution of
that problem upon the people of
the land wrecked in the winning
of freedom for this class of citi-
zens as the price of redemption
of their possessions from the
hands of those totally Incapable
Of fostering or caring for thema
l talked to many persons in
the south about the negro and
hereW ith give the substance of a
conversation with a gentleman
who was raised in the Black Belt,
that is along in the same line
with the talk Of others:
"You will hear very little in
the south about politics. except
ing at election times, and not
much then. The masses recog-
nize the fact that the war is over.
Their thoughts are not so much
of the past as Of the future. We
are not having any trouble with
the negro. He can vote if he
wants to, but we stuff the ballot
box ana make the result as we
want it. We do that as a matter
of protection 10 our interests
We find it easier to do that than
10 bulldoze. For six years we
lived under the rule of the negro
because we could not help it,
But we haue come back and have
come back to stay, with a clear
understanding that the negro's
reign is ended. In the Black
Belt there are places where you
could blow a horn and 500 ne
groes would come to ten while
men. You know what the re-
suit would be il there was a fair
election in that section. The Of
fees would come into the hands
Of men without education. men
Without one idea of how the af-
fairs of a county or state should
be managed. Is there a farmer,
is there an intelligent laborer, Is
there a capitalist. is there tax
payer III all the broad Northland
that would want to locate Or in
vest money in a state where they
would have to submit to such a
condition of affairss l think
not.
"When the war closed the sonth
was practically a desert. We
were without anything but our
fields. 1t should have been OBJ
vious to the world that our saliva
ton rested with the brightest and
most capable men of the south.
The negro as a voter would not
have interfered with with the
work of reclaiming our country,
but the negro as voter and Of |
fee holder, excluded the best and
put in power an element that was
utterly incapable of taking care
Of itself under the most favorable |
circumstances. There was not |
and there could not have been
any progress while affairs re.
NAMED in that shape. We knew
here was no limit to our resour-
;es If they could be developed,
Jut we also knew that the very
that kept US in poverty
would eilectually bar our capital
md We fDally took up the only
means at hand to better the stu.