The morning news. [volume] (Savannah, Ga.) 1887-1900, 1897-02-02

Editor Morning News: Your article on
"A Word About the Election" was en-
inently correct. to the point and true.
A halt must be called. or vote buying
will be the open rule and not an excep-
ton. You ask, and it must be answered
AS a community, are we content to let
that evil pass without protest or an
effort to remedy it? Has the public con-
science become so deadened by the long
continuance of this evil that it cannot be
awakened by the dangers which the evil
threatens?" Your writer would ask, has
the public conscience taken on the dry
rot and decay and death sure but only
a question of time? A great principle is
involved in this matter. EXpediency looks
TO the beginning of thing; policy to the
middle, but principle to the end. Men
of little conscience or loose morals never
look beyond eXpediency for success with
them is everything, and any and all ends
are legitimate with them. Your writer
has no fault to find with the ticket elected,
for as to mentality, it is as good as
the ticket defeated. 1t is the means that
were used on both sides to corrupt the
negro and by the purchasable vote that is
the gravamen of complaint.
Corruption is a stream that takes in
everything and widens rapidly. AS you
say again: 1--WE must have a public sem
timent which will not tolerate vote-buy-
public sentiment? is the question. Not
among so-caled leaders, both white and
negro; for no one would go to a decaying
carcass with the expectation to find whole
some meat, nor to a house of prostitu-
ton to find virtue. 1t must be found
with right-thinking, right-acting, right
doing men, regardless OF all party or fac
tional associations. If the twelve apos-
ties had been candidates and had been
elected by corrupting voters, we would
protest as to the means used. / am
not discussing men, but the means and
it is time to call a peremptory halt. Of
fice-seeking has become a chronic dis
ease with some, and a whole community
must be stirred up. corruption legitima-
tized that the outs may get in, and vice
versa.
As the Morning News said on the day of
the election, the negro was king. How
true it was, ana how sad that il was
truel How does that sound abroad? Who
got the greatest number of negro votes?
Who made the negro king?
Are we to have i'm Savannah in the fu-
ture as i'm the past, that all elections
must turn on the negro vote? Must the
negro be the balance of power and each
faction seek success through corrupting
him2 Are our election to be the synon-
YIN for unblushing corruption, bribery
and vote-buying? Must the negro be
taught to look to elections as his satur-
MALTA for political or fractional import
ance and his vote all important to he
had? Must IL be the unbridled and unre-
strained source of corruption? Those are
pertinent questions, and viii have to be
answered by those who have good govern
ment at heart and pure elections as the
voice of those interested in our city's well |
fare.
But who is to blame is also a question |
of great Importance? II those who depre- |
cate the unblushing buying of votes, let |
them see TO Ii that they do not contribute |
one dollar towards a corruption fund. Two |
wrongs never yet made a right nor two |
lies an honest truth. Because the oiher |
party does It, Il does not follow that cor |
ruption should be met with corruption. |
That the negro should be the all impor-
tant and the sine qua non, an indisp ensi- |
BILE condition, be sought, courted, fiatter- |
ed, bribed and bought
God knows there are enough OF corrup- |
tion among the white voters, without |
swelling the list by Juggling in negro cor
ruption. Some decided steps should be
taken in this matter. Your writer does |
not iiatter himself that he VIII be among
the living two years hence, but that does |
not deter him from entering his protest |
against such unholy and infamous cor
ruption as Is now winked at through the |
eye Of indifference, but really an invite,
that success covers multitude OF sans.
and that nothing succeeds like success,
and the end justifles the means.
The present mode. manner and meas
ures should be stopped. And the first
step should be to sit down on negro lead
ers. Tell them they are not wanted, their