The Wichita daily eagle. [volume] (Wichita, Kan.) 1890-1906, 1891-04-18
REV .IOSEPA COOK

ST. LOUIS, April 17.-Rev. Joseph Cook,
who has been severely criticised for GER
tain statements he made regarding the
south in lately published interview in
the Globe Democrat, has replied to his
critics in long letter to the same paper.
Among other things. he says:
Il do not believe in pensions to ex-Con-
federate soldiers, such as Tennessee is
everywhere reported to have granted in
her legislature lately. It is amusing to
me that any southern politicians think
| that loyal immigrants are to be attracted
TO the south by the prospect of being taxed
there for pensions to men who. a little
while ago, were attempting to destroy
the best government on which the sun
ever shone.
y have made lately careful collection
of southern school histories of the United
States. and find them full of misleading
statements concerning the north and the
west. One of these books is by A. H.
Stephens, vice president of the socalled
Southern Confederacy, and teaches with
out qualification the constitutionality of
secession and the supremacy of state over
national rights, in cases like those Of
the commonwealthS which brought on
the war. Another, and intellectually the
best of these volumes, teaches in so many
words that, under chattel slavery the
interests of the master and of the slave
were Identical" 1t is a misfortune to
southern youth to be taught what enlarged
culture everywhere repudiates. Upon
some fair and safe plan national aid ought
to be given to education in all the states
l appreciate fully what the south is doing
for education, OF course | rejoice in the
growth of the New South, and in the in
f1ux of northern capital and enterprise into
many of the regions which the barbarism
and the abyssmal folly of secession desc
lated. believe In the gradual pSication
of the reading test for the suffrage of
both blacks and whites of the north and
south. Iexpect to see the colored vote
divided, especially on local issues, as it
advances in power and intelligence.
: "A large Afro-American population in
this republic is here TO stay. 1t numbered
more than 1900, 900 during the war; it is
now 5000, 600. and it will ultimately be
100000 and 100000 At or not long
after the centennial Of the emancipation
only seventy-two years distant, there are
likely to be. SO the scholars say. $4,000, 600
OF the colored population of the republic,
and 10000, 600 or more OF the white. II
will not be safe to deny the guaranteed
political rights of 81, 900, 900 or of 5000, 900
of our population. 1t is not safe now so
to suppress 8 portion of the legal vote of
the south and so to nullify great amend
ments to the constitution as to give the
south fraudulent control of national legis-
lation. Senator Edmunds says correctly
that In proportion to the number of
counted votes the south has three times
the power in the house of representatives
that the north has. This is not a local
matter. The north will not perma nently
submit to notification. Minority control
and rebel rule must go the way of slavery
1t Is both a legal and moral outrage TO
lax loyal populations for pensions to ex-
confederate soldiers. ] should be likely to
say all this on proper occasions anywhere,
in public or private, in the south. This
would make trouble among men of Bour-
bon sympathies."