The semi-weekly messenger. [volume] (Wilmington, N.C.) 1897-1908, 1898-08-26
TERMS OF SUBSCRIPTION.
WILMINGTON. n. C.
FRIDAY, AUGUST 26, 1898.


The black radical party III NolIA
Carolina have been weighed IN the
balance of public judgment and found
wanting. 1t has had two trials at a long
interval, and has proved barren and
unfaithful to great public trusts. At
ter the war it got control in North
Carolina and what a dreadful condition
of peculation and ruin and outrage
came out of it. The democratic Hand
Book graphically, tersely states the
case in 1867-70 well and as follows:
"It found a people poor and strug-
Cling amid the ruins of a desOlating
war. They needed good laws, the
party gave them bad. They needed
peace and rest, the party gave them
violence and disorder. They needed
low taxes, the party made them high.
They needed a reduction Of the state
debt, the party increased it three-fold.
They needed encouragement, the party
gave them the bitter dregs of disap-
pointment. They needed protection,
the party gave them a reign of law
lessness. They needed economy, the
party gave them reckless extrava-
gance. They needed honesty in gov
eminent, the party gave them an era
of corruption. They needed patriots
for legislators, the party gave them
knaves. They needed additional
school houses for their children, the
party closed most of those in exist
ence. They needed teachers for their
children, the party misused the school
fund. Under the guise of building
railroads, the party issued millions OF
state bonds and then stole the bonds.
Under the guise of suppressing disOr-
der, the party declared war and under
took in a time of peace, to suspend
the writ of habeas corpus and try men
by military court-martial. The credit
of the state had hitherto been good;
this party destroyed it,"
That looks black, but it is because
the party under the brush is black. 1t
is full of dismay and disgust but it is
because of the very bad deeds perpe-
trated by the niger party in those
years. The great Vance said in 1876,
that they effectually destroyed the
4 edit of North Carolina that it could
! OF buy a mint julip on Wall street
HIithOut the cash down. In every
county the script went down, and in
many 20 or 25 cents on the dollar was
all it would fetch. The whole atmos-
phere was impure. The state capitol
was converted into a whiskey den and
purchase of legislators and wide
spread corruption were as common as
filth. 1t was indeed a wreaking time
Of prOfiigacy and venality. A lot of
eight or ten leaders of the black rad
ica1s went to New York to trade in
North Carolina bonds. After remain
ing there for some time, they returned.
Soon after 800, 900 of state bonds in
the possession of a bawdy house were
sent to Raleigh for collection.
In 1870 came deliverance in part,
but it was not until Vance's splendid,
magnetic campaign in 1876 that com
plete redemption of the people from
the spoilers came. Then there were
hope and joy, and then began an era
of prosperity and honor and content
ment and public economy and good.
wise government, and this lasted for
twenty years.
Four years ago a foul combination
was made between two factions op-
posing each other professedly in prin-
ciples. They united for public plumb
er and lot for public economy. They
buried all of their pretended principles
in a common cesspool of wickedness
*'to peat the democrats" They sue
ceeded and since then gave outrag-
ed all decency, all promises, all pre-
tence of right doing, and have brought
great distress upon the state, and
sown the dragons teeth of lawlessness,
disorder, discontentment and crime
They are the very deadest of failures.
-nvrD DnUK