Daily Kennebec journal. [microfilm reel] (Augusta, Me.) 1870-1975, 1893-06-08

there viu be nothing iefI to discnss. M.
Chamberlain Gays things vifA considerable
abilify and uneomm0a smoothness. The
PRUDENT uan. however, viii, af1e1 be gets
through saying them, take them mp by the
four corners snd shake them gently 70 give
them fresh air.
The sneessoss Of Mr. Frederick Douglass
came-no, they didn't come. they we're
brought-from Africa. They were stolen
BY persons Who preferred idleness 70 work,
and they we're compelled, without their con-
senf and sgainss their will. to serve the idle
pon-pFoducsfs who had stolen and sub
juga;ed them. This is generally seckoned
hardship. In the condition Of this people
there vas one still worse. The women Of
this race belonged so absolutely to the men
!! whose title deeds fested on the most unnaf-
ufai theft and seizure in the catalogue Of
/ crimes that virtue was impossible and chas-
tity jest. For more than tso hundred years
this people, kept in brutal ignoRznee by
cold-blooded design and deliberate process
Of law, were permitted to form no concep-
ton Of female virtue ~ q defence against
the lust Of the men Who owned and bought
and sold them. The very instinct of chas-
tity vas almost rooted out from among them.
The brutal passions which in themselves
were held In check by force and fear they
saw their masters indulge without restraint
or pity. In South Carolina there we're about
SO. 300 Of these people doing work that
i0o, 900 might live in idleness. The 300,-
go liked IL; wanted the system extended,
and made war for the extension. They
failed, AMI the system went down.
Then suddenly the owners of the bodies
and souls Of men and women found them
selves di-possessed, and the men they hal
ow ned not only free, but citizens, and By
their votes in control Of the state. They
were unfit for it. II would have been a
miracle If they had not been II must be
said for them that they were not violent
and revengefui. They did the best they
knew, and that was bad enough. Conscious
of their own lack of experience ard capaci-
~ they accepted the leadership of white men
~ho protested friendship for them and vol
unteered their services. An opportunity TO
instruct these new voters in the duties and
responsibilities of citizens, to teach them the
obligations of morality and the force of law,
to make them worthy their new endowment,
was Offered these leaders. They did not
embrace it. Instead, the' used the brute
force of the numerical majority at their
bijling TO carry out schemes of self-ag-
grandizement and personal ambition. The
new regime became notorious for corrup-
ton. and South Carolina as THE PROSTATE
State e&t0rted the pity of the country. The
smoOthest Of the adyenturers became Gov
ernor. Under hi, administration thes car
dial was so great that his party would not
insist on his being reinstalled in 1876,
though upon fair count of the negro vote
he had majority. Indeed, he made no
contest, but calmly turned his back on the
black men who had voted for him and left
the state. His name was Daniel II. Cham
berisin.
Many things have happened in South
Carolina since then. The negroes are not
all model citiz+ ms many of them are dis
honest and la~less. In several instances
during the last year in various parts of the
state negroes have assaulted white girls
1t is revolving crime and is punishable by
statute. But in no case do the white people
wait for the process of law, nor are they
in any case content with the penalty the
law provides. What they do is to organize
a mob, and without judge, jury or the form
of trial take the accused negro and kill him,
often torturing him with fend-
ish malignity in the process. In
some cases they have killed innocent
men because they were ''of the same
color and somebody had got
to die" The blind. haphazard way in which
the white people of South Carolina were
killing negroes for a crime which when COM
mitted by white men waited mider punish
ment by legal process seemed proof to Mr..
Frederick Douglass that it involved the race
question, and disclosed a peculiar social
condition. Dwelling more, perhaps, upon
the wrongs of his race for two hundred
years than upon the atrocity whice reused
the passions of the mob, he protested with
great earnestness against the lawless and
violent demonstrations which seem aimed
at the determination of his people.
Then enters trippingiy smooth-spoken
person with rebuke for Mr.. Douglass be-
cause, instead of denouncing the lawless-
ness and brutality of the organized MODS
who have tortured and slain negroes charged
with revolving crime, he has not warned
the people of his race against the commits
sion of the crime which e1cites such angry
passions. And this smooth spoken person
is Daniel II. Chamberlain. Truly, he is
what they call on the frontier "a slick citl-
Zen.