The Hawaiian gazette., 1903-03-03
JUSTICE At LAST.


in the Federal Senate for the payment
Of a fixed amount Of money and pen
sion to each Of the surviving ex-slayes
who were made free by the Civil war
of 1915.
II is forty years since the nation
struck the shackles from the limbs OF
six millions of negro slaves. or these
more than one-third were aged, Grip
pled. diseased. and incapable OF earn
ing bread. Half a million more were
tottering children. Before the Act OF
Emancipation the slave owner was
strictly required by law to support
these disabled and helpless persons, and
public opinion enforced the law. But
the Act Of Emancipation absolved the
owner from his legal obligation.
With freedom came physical misery
and restitution to the blacks. They
persisted with neglect, lack or 1000,
and restitution over the vast area OF
the South. They owned not an acre OF
land, not an implement Of agriculture,
not an animal of burden. They were
without capital, or the knowledge of
business Whowas responsible for this
condition of universal misery? Not the
South, but the great American Nation.
The founders of the constitution,
the greatest political instrument made
in the history Of the world" had firmly
fixed in il the right Of property in slaves.
New England was anxious to establish
a strong nation. She abandoned her
conscience and voted to establish prop
erty in men. Pennsylvania, New York
and New Jersey preferred con-
stitution with slavery to ose-jointed
confederacy without slavery. So in
1887 the founders of the great republic
stamped across the face of the Star
Spangled Banner the words, slavery
is right and must be protected" Lloyd
Garrison, fifty years later. called 1t "a
league with hell" To secure a perfect
union the people swallowed their con-
sciences in 1887 and decreed that bond
age should exist forever. Stronger,
however, than a short-sighted people
was the evolution Of history, and this
sagacious political scheme was utterly
destroyed by the Civil War seventy
years later God smiled at the efforts
of hi. little manikins on earth while
they tried to force his hand of justice
for almost a century. Their con
btltHCtS "tIt III httplhS, anu H.
finally kept them.
Freedom came, but the blacks, after
two hundred years of general serv'tude.
with seventy years Of servitude under
the constitution, became the creditors
of the nation for the loss of their earn
ings from the cradle to the grave; for
the accumulation of a hundred years of
wages. They had their verdict for this
in the courts of eternal Justice, and
its amount ran into the billions OF
dollars. No payment was made except
in some trifling consideration giver by
the Freedmen's Bureau, and the scanty
pittances of a few philanthropists.
Every white man who fought for tho
preservation of the Union, including
deserters and even traitors has been
pensioned till the amounts paic reach
thousands OF millions. We sing in the
Battle Hymn:
I'm the beauty of the lilies, Christ was
born across the sea,
With glory in his bosom that trans
figures you and me:
AS he died to make men holy, let us
die to make men free"
In our holy rapture of dying we for
got the obligations OF debt, and the
nation has forgotten II until now. We
Rave coldly stood by while million of
these suffering eX-slaves have shivei ed
in novels and rotted in the swamps for
lack of care and food, while in their
palsied hands they held the warrants
of eternal justice for the payment of
robberies committed by the nation ex-
tending over nearly a hundred years.
At last the conscience OF the nation
seems to be vitalized. After the great
majority OF these eX-slaves were IN
their graves by premature suffering
caused by the splendid ratification OF
a glorious constitution in 1887, sense
OF right slowly works in the nations
soul To have assumed the payment OF
these just claims after the war would
have been severe burden. The nation
vas weary OF war and expense To
pay them now is only n trining addl-
tion to the nations obligations. What
ever the moral duties OF the Southern
States We're and are in this regard, the
moral obligations OF the nation were
and are clear and distinct. II is bound
by the consequences Of Its own acts.
whatever they are. II merrily danced
the stately reel Of slavery for seventy
years, and now II must pay the BLACK
piper.
II Is paralyzing 10 think that. with
only sixty daVg IA work IN ana NTH