The Caucasian. (Clinton, N.C.) 188?-1913, 1900-01-04

whether it will declare that ali OF
the other sections will fall with
Section 5. Now. mas much as every
voter in the State must vote for or
against the Amendment as a whole,
therefore every one who believes
Section 5 is unconstitutional must
vote against the whole Amendment
or violate his oath to support the
of the United States
Besides, it is of the greatest inn
portance for every one Of us to con
slider what would be the result If
the Court should declare Section 5
unconstitutional (as 1t clearly isl,
and leave the remainder of the
Amendment to stand.
WHAT WILL BE THE REsULrf
No one will deny that the result
will be to disfranchise fifty or
sixty thousand white voters Of the
State. many of them old men and
Confederate soldiers who are now
too old to start to school and get az
education even il they had the time
and money to do so. These men,
who compose some of the very best
aud most substantial citizens of our
State, would be DISTINGUISHED, while
the town negro with his cooked bat
and eyeglasses would vote aud be
eligible to hold Office according to
the provisions Of the amendment. |
regret to say it, and would not ad-
vertise the fact if the threatened
danger of Acknowledgement of our
good honest voters did not demaud
it, that North Carolina has a larger
percentage of illiterate voters than
any other State in the Union. There
fore, the adoption of such a disfran-
ehising scheme would, if Section
is knocked out as unconstitutional,
result in DISTINGUISHING more good
substantial men in our State than 10
any other State. The very political
Machine that is now trying to dis
franchise these men is the political
Machine that is responsible for this
illlteracy and for these good men
beng forced to go through q life
handicapped by Ignorance. You
will remember that when you and
| were in the Alliance legislature OF
1891 that we not only called attention
to the alarming percentage of litter
acy in the State, but also to the fac,
that little had been done by the
Democratic politicians to remove
this blot upon the State-this crime
against our citizens. We succeeded
in getting that Legislature to make {
larger . appropriation for public
education than had ever before beer
made. We have since, in the legi
stature of 1895 and 1897, added
largely to this fund. The amount il
still insufficient to make it possible
for all of the boys who are nov
twelve years Of age or under to ge
an education before they are twenty
one; and it is too late, even if tn,
amount were sufficient, to educat,
| the older men who are also in DANCE
of being disfranchised by this scheme
Besides, the poll tax trick In tn
Amendment will rob the publ
school fund of thousands Of dollar
and make it still more difficult 70
poor boys to get an education
Now shall these fifty or sixty thous
and white men, to say nothing O
their sons, be disfranchised whe
their ignorance Is no fault of theirs
That this may happen is not onl
possible, but probable. Is there
voter in the State who will sa,
that he wants to do this7 Is there
voter in the State who will say tina
he is willing to vote for sometbin
that NAV result in thisf
WAS 1T THEIR PURPOsE7
AS ! have already said, thes
politicians did not intend to settl
the race issue, and they have care
!, fully prepared an Amendment ths
will not do it. But they have pr.
pared one that in my judgement wi
do something else-one that will {
, any of its sections survive the ties
of the Supreme Cour) surely di.
! fran chise about sky tholsand whit
voters. 1t is true that they den
this was their purpose, bnt in repl
| | ask that if this will be the resu
; is it no. fair to say that this wa
their purpose7 They claim the1
legislature was composed of til
brains of the Democratic party
Then surely they must have intepc
ed what is clear will be the result
, Besides, why should not the Sin
mons Machine desire to disfranchis
a sufficient number of good, poo
plain people of the State to max
their leadership and supremacy Gel
tain in the futuref Let US see for
moment who this Mr.. Simmons 1.
He was one Of Ransom s politics
lieutenants and Machine henchmer
Ransom always feared the gooc
plain people because he knew the
loved Vance, and that they an
Vance hated the methods of Rar
SONS political Machine which wa
organized to defeat the people
will in convention and at the ballo
box so that it could with impunit
betray their interests. In paymeu
for such machine work, Ransom ha
Cleveland to name Summons fo
Internal Revenue Collector. ,Vanc
knew Simmons, and he knew tha
this nomination was to nay him fo
dirty political work. Vance stoo
in the Senate and dsnouced til
nomination on the ground that TIL
man Simmons was unfit to hold
position of trust and honor, an
fought his nomination. If Vauc
had lived he never would have bee
confirmed. The persecution an
!, MISREPRESENTATION heaped upo
Vance's head during his last day
(and which no doubt fastened b
death), was inspired and institute
by this Ransom Summons Machin,
Now of course Vance's admirers Gan
!, he had no greater admirers than II
plain people who loved him) do n,
love Simmons. They came within
few votes of controlling the la
! Democratic State convention ar
+ overthrowing Mr.. Simmons and a
l Il \ n Il