The news & observer. [volume] (Raleigh, N.C.) 1894-current, 1900-04-12
Mr.. T. Y. WEBB'S SPEECH
Accepting the Temporary Craftsmanship of
the Convention.

there it produces thorns and thistles to
prick the hand that tends and cultiyates
it. This is the negros record.
Ever since the hour when at the point
of the bayonet, tens of thousands OF
black men were forced upon a political
equality with the Southern whites, the
devoted father and faithful husband. with
one arm around his home and with the
other toiling for his daily bread, for these
thirty years past, has been battling with
an ever increasing black wave, which III
1898 broke at our very feet and threaten
ed to submerge the land of our nativity.
Then the crime and degradation Of car
pet-bag, scalaWag, and negro rule, had
returned upon us, and North Carolina
today finds herself in a position where
she must do something for her people or
our civilization and prosperity Will be
destroyed Something must be done to
keep back the African inundation; some
thing will be done. The amendment will
be adopted.
1t was not politics in the modern &C
cepted sense of the word, that inspired
it. but it was the concentrated voice of
the white people everywhere, speaking
through their patriotic representatives in
body of men immortalized itself by sub
hitting this timely measure and by APP
propriating 500, 900 extra for the educa-
ton of the children of North Carolina.
By these two acts they have builded to
their names monument more lasting
than stone, more durable than brass, and
the manhood of the State will approve
their course in thunder tones at the
cIa4 oil
distinctly upon a white supremacy issue,
and had they failed to pass measure
that carried with it substantial and per-
manent relief, they would have been
swept from power by an outraged people.
But thank God, they forgot self, forgot
politics and rose to the supreme import
ance of the hour, and in the wisdom
of their craftsmanship. gave us a meas
ure which, if adopted, insures white gov
eminent in our State for all time to come.
And it will be adopted, notwithstanding
the fact that certain individuals high up
in nti-amendment councils are fighting
it with all the power that in them lies,
and are declaring in one breath that it
will disfranchise all illiterate white men,
and in the next breath are declaring that
it is unconstitutional because under it
all white men can vote and large bulk
of the negroes is DISTINGUISHED; yet re-
CARELESS of this blowing hot and cold pro-
cess, the people will pass the measure
in the coming election.
This inconsistent argument of the anti
amendmentites reminds me of the story
told by Congressman Otey.
A hunter up in Virginia possessed a
fine grey hound, and once while out hunt
ing, the dog, in pursuit of his prey, run
ming by sight and not by scent or instinct,
suddenly came in collision with perpen-
dicular strand of wire fence, which split
him open from the end of his nose to
the tip of his tail. The fond hunter ran
up and saw the terrible plight of his
dear dog, and thinking of the principle OF
asmosis, that when members are severed
| if placed quickly back together the exos-
nose and endosmose will cause them to
cohere and grow again, he stopped the
| two sides of the hound together and bore
| him home. But on reaching the kennel
he was amazed to find that in his haste
he had placed the tail part of one halt
to the head part of the other But in
! spite Of this awful deformity the dog
| grew and prospered Some years after
ward the hunter was asked how his dos
was getting on.
The hunter replied that he was doing
| finely: that he was the best dog in the
mack: in fact, he was his standby. Wher
! asked how this was, the hunter said
! We'll. YOU see he can run both ways ant