The news & observer. [volume] (Raleigh, N.C.) 1894-current, 1900-06-24

pied with ana l0uSHb heSlo sullldS
and on account of his noble and man
| ly opposition to it. only lacked one
vote of being impeached. Grant and
Hayes had TO deal with ne
| gro suffrage and they saw
with prophetic vision that 1t
| would sooner or later have to be re-
stricted or our system of government
| would become a hiss and byword FOR
all civilized nations Of the earth.
| Therefore they have spoken out in
thunder tones Of warning to the Amer
lean people. the descendants of those
who fought to establish a free and in
dependent form of government. But
you will hear some day. all these men
are dead and gone to their long homes.
We would do wisely to take their
warnings and profit by them, if we
expect perpetuation of freedom and
liberty. You say times change. Yes,
they do change, and sometimes from
bad to worse. i am talk
ing to you who claim to
/ be true and genuine Republic
cans. How, if you are such, do you
endorse President Mckinley? OF
course you say you do. Well, let's
see If you do. Did he not say a few
months ago the Porto Ricans should
not be allowed to exercise the elective
franchise, except on property and ed
vocational qualifications? Do you en-
dorse that? If so. why do you want
| to hold on to the illiterate negro vot-
! ers in North Carolina?
DO you endorse the Republican
Congress, which few weeks ago
passed bill on the elective franchise
for the Hawaiian Islands and disfran-
chised all who could not read and
write, do you endorse Congress for
| being SO cruel to thosef ignorant fell
lows away out on these islands?
The authorities we have referred to
| perhaps, are not worthy of consdera-
ton. by some of these wise constitu-
tional lawyers, CT which North Caro-
! lima has today, more than al the
| United States combined. You can
| meet them on the street corners. You
! can meet them on the highway. You
! can meet them in the bypaths, and
| they will tell you that any man who
votes for the Amendment will per-
! iure himself. 1t is enough to make
a man quake and tremble to hear
some of them delineate and eXpound
| constitutional laws.
| Oh. you wise men, please inform
the public at what school or university
you got your law license.
The MeclSenburg Declaration Of
| independence was the stepping stone
to American independence, and the es-
! tablishing of the purest and best form
of government ever devised by man;
and it developed true manhood in its
! fullest greatness until the blight of
negro suffrage became a part of the
organic law, which only serves to de-
base rather than eieyate the American
i people. 1t has had its influence to
corrupt the body polite, and the day
is dawning when it must be restrict
ed to perpetuate q Republican form of
government. Controlled b. love of
! country, home and family, the time
/ has come when if any man starts out
! for an office, county, State or Con-
gressional, and does not fill his purse
| with paper money, gold and silver, he
| is left at home to mediate over the
signs of the times.
Republicans of North Carolina, let's
now get squarely down to business.
Pray tell me what have we as a party
ever accomplished in the South. Have
we not been denunciated and called
the negro party from the days of re-
construction to the present, and is 1t
not a fact, that all these years the
negroes have been voting with the
Democrats and bringing MS down to
defeat all these wears? Being repudia-
ted by the ignorant trading negro
vote. have we not tried the experiment.
long enough to pause and reason
together and resloye hereafter to cut
loose from the negro who has kept
us down as a party here in the South?
With but little respect at home and
much less north of the Mason and
Dixon line, we have been repudiated
! by the negroes themselves. The North
ern Republicans have looked upon the
white Republicans of the South as a
set OF mere place-hunters. And, you
white Republicans, fellow citizens, you
all know that every party has its ring
/ masters in every township, county
! Congressional district and State, and
we are sorry to say and confess that
our party all over the South has had
! its full share of the ring masters in
every presidential election since 1868;
who have done more to bring the
! party into disrepute than the masses
of the party could overcome or will
ever overcome if a check is not put
!. upon these ring masters?
At every Republican National con-
vention the delegation is largely ne
groes from the Southern States. The
way they vote SO goes the nomination.
and when a new Republican President
is to be inaugurated at Washington
(! the city is overrun by these ring mas
ters and the negroes who were at the
National convention, and among them
selves they divide up all the Federal
patronage of the South.
! My white Republican friends of
North Carolina, what encouragement
have you to send your sons to college
or to the State University to>prepare
them for any public office within the
gift OF the people, if in the end they
have to buy their way to prefer
ment. How long, Oh how long are
you going to quietly submit to such
a real state of facts as now exists all
over the Southern country and here
in North Carolina. where you will soon
have an opportunity to say You will
vote to develop manhood and instill
| n laudablp am hiti0n in your own