The Manning times. [volume] (Manning, Clarendon County, S.C.) 1884-current, 1895-07-17
detriment Of the many Besides

ernlleIL. reSLriClSO 10 pefSOllS pOSSeSS-
ing certain amount of property or
education, what reasons are there for
not further restricting the governing
class to u few college professors Or
millionaires:
By making the officers Of the law,
who shall be the servants of all, the
dependent creatures of a class only.
YOU make them the willing or unwill-
ing tools of that class alone. and they
will be bound to construe and admin
lister the law to please members there
of only, in which system tits apparent
that the class shorn of power is with
out even as much protection as slaves
whose masters ballots protect them.
Such form of government we had
in a limited degree before the late war,
when the free negroes, the unprivi-
legged class. had to have guardians by
whom many were deprived Of freedom
and property. Any form ofgovernment
Gf we may dignity it by such term
which forces class ofpeople to con-
tribute to its existence without a voice,
whose contributions in the hands of
the privileged class are used as en-
gines of oppression is worse than that
among savages, where all men are at
least equal. By natures God and the
Constitution Of the United States we
have been made free men and guar
dians of our own rights, and our bal
lots given as peaceful weapons of de-
fense, and no honest and loyal citizen
is willing to deprive us Of them, anu
we shall fight the flesh, the devil and
all his imps through every court and
power in the nation before we shall
be robbed of our rights by anarchistic
nullifers.
\ privileged class government pro
duces on the one hand class Of
cringing suppliant towards, glad even
for the poor privilege Of life fora short
time, and on the other class OF AFRO
giant, cruel and h"artless murderers.
because conscious of wrongfully OBJ
tained power, whose members fear
nothing from their creatures, the otti-
GERS of the law who construe and ad-
minister it as suits the viii Of their
masters
Such a government We have in this
State today, and the ruling faction is
in favor of handing it down in all its
wickedneSs as a curse to generations
unborn, but we are unwlIilngto entail
such legacy to future generations.
Most Of our murders and all our
lvnchings are Immediately traceable to
such government, and under 1t our
State will continue to sink from bad to
worse, until it becomes such hell that
no one can live in it.
Man, naturally given to error, is
impelled to right action from only two
causes; the hope of reward or fear
of punishment; and the law ante dat
ing the Mosaic age, that he that taketh
mans life must forfeit his own as a
penalty, has been abrogated, and the
rule in this State is that a white
man taking the life of a colored man
does not pay the penalty with his own
which has spread to others, and is no
longer confined to the oppressed class.
Upon the slightest provocation mem
bers of the privileged class, without
fear of punishment, murder or play
the part of prowling savages or canni-
balls and dignity it by calling it a
lynching, as the conscience of the State
has been so scared that it is regarded
as virtue rather than a crime to
lynch fellow-being. Murders and
lynchinps are noXious plants flourish
ing only under privileged class gov
ernment, and will surely die when the
sheriff and court are made to depend
for future favcrs upon the suffrage of
every man.
We believe in universal suffrage,
because we believe in the right of all,
which, under our form of government,
cannot be secured without making the
political power of each man equal in
the creation of the administrators of
the law.
The most illiterate and humblest citi-
zen, possessing nothing but his life
and muscles, has as much right to the
means of protecting his porperty,
though invisible, as the millionaire.
When deprived of our ballot, our
influence with the administrators of
the law IS gone and we are absolutely
without protection.
While all members of the privileged
class do not take advantage of our
helpless condition, many do, and it is
cruel and hope-destroying to deprive
US of the power to aid humane and
liberal men in the election of such
honest men as will, in the dispensa-
ton of justice, hold the scales equally
balanced, whether the subject weighed
is black or white. The rule adopted
by the Democratic Executive Commit
tee, debarring all colored men, regard
less of past political affiliations, from
participation in the approaching pri.
maries of said party, and allowing all
white men, regardless of past political
utilization, to participate in the same,
with the declared purpose of counting
in in the general election the ones
named in the primaries, is violative OF
every principle of justice and honesty,
repugnant to the doctrines of civilized
government, and practical repudia-
ton of the Federal constitution.
We view with alarm the action OF
Conservatives, whom we are inclined
to regard as broad and liberal men
when they, to ourexclusion and in re-
pudiation of our rights, accept an
equal division with the administration
faction and submit that it is most un-
reasonable to expect our support when
failing to secure such concessions.
We submit that the only honorable
thing for them to do, if they mean JUS
tice, is to make fair fight from prin-
ciple in every county in the State for
the rights of all, in which they would
get the support of every honest man
in the State, regardless OF race or poll
tics.
We further submit that we stand
ready to join with any number of the
liberal white men of the State, and to
aid them in making a Constitution
broad enough to cover the rights OF
every man, however rich or poor, and