Staunton spectator. [volume] (Staunton, Va.) 1849-1896, 1892-06-22
A Southern Mans Northern Views.

In the first issue of a new magazine
styled the Republican there is an anus
ing contribution by John S. Wise, re-
publican candidate for Governor of
Virginia in 1885, on ''Republicanism in
the South" the gist of which is that
there isn't and can't be a white repub-
lican party in the South. The fates-
that is to say, the policy and exigencies
of republicanism in the North-are
against it. Mr.. Wise takes facts as he
finds them. A good republican himself,
and now citizen of New York, he is in
a position to play the role of candid
friend and does it. In the outset Mr..
Wise attempts to clear the minds of his
party associates of the mist of error and
prejudice through which they view the
Southern situation. There is no ami
mostly toward the Union at present,
he tells them, among Southern people.
Not one democrat in ten thousand in
the South harbors," he says, ''any re-
sentiment against the United States.
issues why Southern whites should be
solidly democrats" There is every rea-
son-apart from republican policy sine,
1865-why they should be divided into
republicans and democrats. As late as
1860 Virginia and Tennessee cast their
electoral votes against the democratic
candidate. Wings, federalists, &C., up
to reconstruction times, Wed with
democrats in these and other Southern
States for political control. What, then,
fused the discOrdant elements into such
a mass of democracy that it seems use
less to attempt to break it up?
Mr.. Wise answers the question. 1t
was, he says, "a course of idiotic legis-
lation," now known as ''reconstruc-
tion," which began by withholding
the suffrage from all the whites and
threatening to give it to all the blacks
Thus all white citizens of the South
were driven into opposition through
resentment and fear" Had the repub-
ican leaders been wise they would,
Mr.. Wise says, have reserved the ques-
ton of negro suffrage" and permitted
1.-THE old wing and democratic ele-
ments,n whO-he tells Historically
hated each other" to renew their war
upon each other. In that case, when
would have been divided between the
two parties, and ''there would have
been a substantial element of whites
in both parties"
But nothing like this happened. The
whites were DISTINGUISHED. The State
governments were turned over to tut
terly irresponsible whites and negroes"
The result was the union of federalists,
States-rights men, wings, know-noth-
ings and democrats into a party which
''prOfesSed no tenet save the purpose
to assert and maintain white suprem-
acy.n This nondescript combination
afterward assumed the name democracy
and fonnd friend and protector in the
democracy of the North.
s.. The fear of renewal of negro SUI
premacy is, Mr. Wise AYERS, the sole tie
of the solid South. That fear compels
all who identify themselves with South
ern interests to vote the democratic
ticket. Now and then there is bolt,
like the readjuster movement in Vir-
ginia or the alliance movement in
South Carolina, but the memory of re-
construction, fortified by race preju-
dice, steadily works, like the law of
gravitation, to bring everything back
to the starting point. Even good re-
publicans from the North who go South
to live, in a few years, says Mr.. Wise,
desert their party and vote the demo
cratic ticket on national as well as State |
chance" he tells US, "for republican |
success in any Southern State"
The force bill is the party's plan for |
carrying the South, but Mr.. Wise has
no faith in it. Force bills" he says,
cannot reBch it. To carry out force
bill would require the presence of
enough honest republicans from other
places to imperil the republican major
tiles there" As for the Harrison ad-
Mr.. Wise says it has in
dicted deadly stabs" upon republican
ism in the South. 1.-The present ad-
ministration," he says, sis beyond COM
parison the most sectional administra-
ton that has ever been in power. The
South is no more part of it than
Hayti." The party and its President,
It seems, are wholly wrong in their at
titnde to the Sonth. The wonder is
now Mr.. Wise, with a full knowledge
Of the facts, manages to continue re-
blican.-BGlt SlIn