The news & observer. [volume] (Raleigh, N.C.) 1894-current, 1904-10-16

signed to help. The great mass o,
| the Southern negroes have submitted
quietly 10 the laws disfranchisins
| them. and have asked for no such
dangerous legislation as that proposed
i by the Republican party. Their bit
! terest enemy could ask for no worse
: calamity to befall them than a re-
J, newal of sectional and racial warfare
over the question Of negro suffrage
They will be placed i'm position
where they must suffer on account
of evil for which they are not re-
sponsble. That measure will. fur
! thermore. prove enormously injurious
to the business interests of the coun-
| try; will depopulate the cotton field
leave the Southern farms without la
| Dor, paralyZe the factories and bring
about condition of affairs worse
| than a panic. Nobody i'm the South
wants it. The Democratic party,
need not say. is ineXorably opposed
TO 1t. and will resist it's execution
ITO the bitter end The Republican
party in the South has nothing to
gain. and everything to lose by it.
A law of that kind will drive thou
SANDS of voters from their already
depleted ranks. If the Southern cleo
| toral vote is cut down. the Repub-
lean representation from the South
in the National convention will be
cut down also. and the Southern Re
publicans will become an insignificant
factor. shadow, a phantom. in his
party's deliberations. Yet SO COM
pletely overrdden were the Southern
Republican delegates by the members
of their party from other sections.
that not one of them arose in the Ma
tional convention of the Republican
party and protested against a plank
which every one of them knew would
bring his party into fresh and in
creased odum in the South If the
Republican convention should pros
pose a yoke of that kind for the
State of Massachusetts. l ask you if
the Republican party in that State
would live single hour. 1T is use
less to hug to our bOsoms the delu-
sion that the Republican party will
not do what it threatens. Let us
not forget that in the great states
of New York. Illinois. Ohio and In
diana. the negro voter hOiGs the
! destiny of the Republican party in
the hollow of his hand. Without the
negro vote. the Republican party in
any ordinary election could not carry
one of those states. The leaders of
the Northern negroes are loud
, mouthed blatent haters of the South.
AT their religious meetings. and other
public gatherings. it is no unusual
tEl1S IOf lneIn urge the oOutneTIl
negroes to put down ly-- hing by
shooting the white man from ambush
ana applying torch to the white
mans home. l have vet to learn that
any Of them ever suggested that IT
might prove q remedy for lynching.
if the members of their race would
cease committing those terrific crimes
which provoke an appeal to lynch
law Some of the most incendiary
Of who have OnpnlV
advocated arson and murder and free
ly denounced death by violence
against the Southern white man,
have been marked out for Mr..
Roosevelts approval. and are TODAY
his appointeeS to high positions OF
trust. These disturbers of the peace
have been taught that the Republican
party will nullify the DISTINGUISHING
laws of the South. and they will de-
mand that the pledge be carried cut.
it it was necessary TO promise the ab-
rogation of those laws in order to carry
the Northern negro vote in this cleo
ticn. why should it not be necessary
to execute the promise in order TO
hold the same vote in future cleo
tons? Those hundred and odd thou
sand negro voters in the doubtful
states of the North. those insolent.
unruly and revolutionary negroes
have wrung from Theodore Roosevelt
and the Republican party pledge
that they will sacrifice the peace OF
Southern homes, the prosperity OF
Southern enterprises and the rights
The whole South. with its twenty
five million inhabitants. its vast and
varied industries. it's thousands square
miles of territory, greater in extent
than the eastern portion of Europe.
weighs less with Roosevelt and ms
party than $50 thousand negro voters
in the doubtful states. To advance
his own selfish interest he is array-
ing one section of this commonwealth
against another. Instead of trying to
heal the wounds and adjust the differ
ences in the past; instead of teaching
the men of the North. the South. the
East and the West. that this is one
country and it's people one people,
who ought to dwell together in unity
and the bonds of peace, he is sowing
the seeds of distruSt, preaching the
gospel of hate. and at the behest OF
a handful of unworthy representatives
OF an alien and inferior race, proposes
to humiiiate and Cypress millions OF
his own fellow citizens, to whom he
is bound by the ties of blood. whose
fathers helped to lay the foundation
of this government by their courage
their sacrifices and the shedding OF
their blood. Every Southern voter,
who knowing the injury when Roose-
Welt has done to the South. marches
up to the polls and deposits Re-
publican ballot is saying in effect that
it was well done and that he approved
ii. The South since the day when
Lee sheathed his sword in defeat.
but not in dishonor, has been as true
to this Union as any section that
fought her through four years OF
bloody war. In the depths of poverty
her slaves freed without compensa-
ton. her fields desolated and grown
UP In briars and weeds. with nothina
but mounds of cold. gray. ashes to
mark the spots where many homo
of happiness and plenty once stood
with crane on almost every door
knob with her best and brayest sons
sleeping in bloody graves uDon dis
tant battlefieldS and thousands of the
survivors wrecked by disease and
raimed by CHASTITY wounds with hel
citizenship DISTINGUISHED ana her bal
lot box hemmed in by Federal bavo-
nets with the cnrpet-ba~ the
scaliawag, the freed negro in power
piiing up debts and sauandering the
scanty resources that remained 10
her after the havoc of War--undel
the crushing weight of all these bur
dens. such as no other people ever
bore and lived, the South struggled
a h 1i,D0E