The commercial. (Union City, Tenn.) 190?-193?, 1903-08-14

is Se[L!eG. Cur new constitutional
provisions as to suffrage give the
negroes who can read and write OF
who own three hundred dollars
worth OF property the right tC
vote. The amendment prevent,
some whites, a few, from voting.
Time was afforded to all to pre-
pare themselves for the suffrage
and since January the perman0n
voting list has gone into operation
1t was considered necessary tC
have constitutional check on suf
frage because we had tried Other
checks and found them, for one
reason or another, inefficient il
the long run. Cit would not do tc
use violence on people any more
than to submit to the dominance
of vicious elements and the paraly.
sis of industry. 1t also would not
do to make false returns in elec.
tions. The decentralization caused,
no matter what the provocation
and incentive, would have proven
as bad as submission to the rule of
vice and ignorance. So the law of
suffrage was put on a permanent
basis and defended by the whites
on the grounds of the preservation
of society and the efficiency of
local government. 1t will work
as we'll in the future as it is work
ing now. The Southerner thinks
that political leads to social equal
ity, and that he will never submit
to. As for the attitude of the ne
groes this remark is true. All the
blacks born in slavery times are
quiet, peaceful and Industrious.
Some of them are helpless pen
sioners on the bounty of their
former masters. On nv place
there is an old couple who do not
work because they are not able.
They get food and clothing from
the big house," and are invited
when they 60 there from their
cabins to sit down and make them
selves comfortable. These old
people were fully grown at the
close of the civil war and did not
go away. They said they could do
better for themselves by staying
with people who knew them and
would treat them kindly and
fairly. They have never left the
premises during all the long years
since, and now, in their extreme
old age and decrepitude, they look
to me and my family to smooth the
pathway of life for them clear to
the end. The old mans name is
Pete and the old woman's Sal.
They have some nephews who be-
long to the stock born and grown
up since the civil war, and are as
different from them as chalk diff
fers from cheese. Worthless and
unruly, whenever they pass by or
through the yard they are re-
quired by my sons to lift their
hats and move quickly. The newer
darkies are insolent in manner and
entirely untrustworthy except in
some instances where the older
ones have trained them. There
will be no trouble on a large scale
so long as the older whites and the
negroes bred under slavery, and
those brought up by them, live,
bnt when the generation, white and
black, which knew that slavery is
under the sod and only those who
have grown up after the war, and
who have become strangers and
enemies, | apprehend there will be
serious difficulty. Nevertheless,
the white is the stronger race and
must prevail. The white people
of Alabama have nothing but kind
feelings for the negroes and do all
they can to aid their personal ad
vancement, making proper dis
tinctlons between the mental and
social status of the two races.
Pep-Vito, Coca-Cola aud DR.. Pep
per's fine-favored syrup, from