The semi-weekly messenger. [volume] (Wilmington, N.C.) 1897-1908, 1898-11-22
SITUATION IN THE CAROLINAs
HE Views OF a Native NOrtherner and
a Republican Who for the Last Ten
Years Has Lived at the south
Washington Post.)

SNoA%Nt
nave been contemplating for some
time, and do it at once-that is, write
an article Oh the situation in the Car
olinas from the standpoint OF a north
ern man. and one who for the past ten
years has been a resident Of the Caro-
linas, and is thoroughly acquainted
with prominent people Of both politi-
cal parties, and also thoroughly ac-
%Quainted with the status Of the negro
in politics. l was born a republican,
being introduced to the world in Mas
sachusetts il the first year of the re-
publican party's existence. l was a
strong republican as a boy, and reach
ed a republican manhood in the state
of Kansas, which at that time-1S15-
was an almost unanimously republi-
can state. I was for many years pub
Usher and editor of republican papers,
and would as soon have thought of
selling my birthright as of deserving
the republican party. This state of
mind continued until ten years ago, l
Travelled through the Atlantic coast
states and saw the condition of things
politically. Soon after that time-in
1881 settled at Florence, S. c., a Sec
ton of the state where the races were
very evenly divided, though the white
man ruled. I saw then, and / still see
no way in which a self-respecting, ed
ucated, or intelligent white man can
vote with the republican party in the
south, in local affairs. The few white
leaders among the republicans in the
"Black Districts are leaders simply
for office, with no higher aim; no high
er aspirations than the money they can
make; the notoriety they a attain,
and the petty power they can exer-
else.
For some weeks prior to the recent
| a1antinn I wa in tho cpyar9 COMMITTEES
of eastern North Carolina, and / can
honestly say, in my opinion, that any
man coming from the north or else
where, who could see what I saw, and
keep his republican proclivities in local
politics, is either a fool or a knave.
There are many good men who are
republicans in the western portion of
the Carolinas, but they have not been
thrown into contact with the results
as have those OF the eastern portion of
the state. This year, however, the con-
ditiOn had become so rotten that the
stencil from the eastern counties was
waited like a great miasmatic cloud
over the western counties, raising
from the borders of the ocean and as
cending even to the clouds which cap
the Blue Ridge, and a response came
which swept the state of much of it's
disease. The people of the eastern
INT did not desire trouble; they
ldu 1IolI1lIIS against tlC ICSlO- lh1y
give him employment; they feed him,
they educate him, paying about 50 per
cent. of the taxes; the whites build
school houses and tax themselves to
help him. What, then, is the cause of
the great feeling of the recent election?
The negro, in politics, is not a unit in
dividually, but a unit collectively. The
| negro does not vote for principle or
upon party issues, unless you call his
principle the talismanic word republi-
can. For this word he will sell his
best friend and benefactor; for this
word he will place in office a drunken
| SOt or a knaVe; for this word he Will
turn over to rotten officials the power
to destroy the property of his en-
plOyer and make it practically value
! less. The negro knows no such word
as gratitude when he is VOting-SOme
will say that it is in gratitude that he
votes the republican ticket, but it is
not so. 1t is because he is petted, pat
ted, and cajoled by office seekers, who
! are really his worst enemies.
There is another reason-he has had
| a taste of office holding. Negroes who
| could not read or write have held seats
| in the legislatures of both North and
| South Carolina in the past: they hold
offices now for which they have no fit
ness, mentally or morally. Hundreds Of
them hold positions as magistrates IL
| the eastern counties of North Carolina.
The negro has not, nor ever will have,
a judicial mind; it is not given him by
nature; it is one great fault OF his
physical makeup, and why should he,
because he is black, be put in a posi-
| ton for which nature never intended
him? There has been too much talk
through the press Of all the faults Of
the negro-of his faults against the
. white race, due to his sensual nature:
of the danger from him to be feared
by respectable people, et0, etc. | did
not begin this letter to discuss these
questions, but I will simply pause to
say that the negro of today is not the
negro of thirty years ago. The Old
time negro is hOnOred and respected
by his old time masters, and need new
err suffer if they have bread, but the
"new negro" the boy and the youth
who have grown up in the streets CT
the rapidly growing southern towns
are to be watched and suppressed. It
is the only hope of security, the only
hope of civilization. Give the ordinary
negro ar Inch and he will Il k an
ELL" He has been so cajOled tina he
honestly thinks, at least many of them
do, that they are superior to the white
race. They have gotten in North Car
DINA so that they dictate to the re-
publican bosses, and that is the rea-
son they have been given nearly all
the local offices in the eastern part
of the state, not because the leaders
desired Il, but because they were COM
PEELED to give it. The tool was rising
up against the artisan, and with power
to crush him.
The Press speaks of honest "elec-
ton laws The election laws of North
Carolina have been SO arranged that.
with the machinery in their "
hands,, the republican officers could
illegally register enough negro votes
to carry the state. and this without
the power of the white man to chal-
lenge. BY the present law all names
must be challenged before the day Of
election. on specific days set apart for
this purpose. The voter not being
present, how can any one know from
a name whether he is entitled TO vote
or not? There is no challenge allowed
on election day. Thousands of negroes
had been Illegally registered, and this
is why the white men-nOt alone
white democrats-gave it out, as they
did give it out, they would challenge
this Illegal vote with a rifle or shot
gun on the day of election.