The news & observer. [volume] (Raleigh, N.C.) 1894-current, 1904-07-24

| ject of craftsmanship, where two races
co-exist in the same community, with
some degree of jealousy, if not hate
upon the other, should be to remove
the causes of hostility between both
the races and sections, and employ
every practical means for bringing
about an era of good feeling. The
| trainers of this paragraph in the Re-
| publican platform have done what
| little they can to set section against
section and race against race. 1t is not
| easy to conceive of anything better
calculated to arouse political hostility
| ir the South to the Republican party
| than the suggestion that the Repub-
| lican party will reduce the political
power of the South in Congress and in
| the Electoral College if it has the op-
portunity. 1t is not easy to conceive
any action better calculated to excite
Ill Will between the black race and
| the white race in the South than the
| suggestion to the black race that per-
| haps they have been wronged by the
action of the white race and the sug-
gestion to the white race that if that
supposititious wrong has been perpe-
trated, the white race shall be poll
| tically punished for it by National ac-
| ton proceeding from the North
| There are certain fundamental prin-
1
in the North and the South, alike in
the black race and in the white race,
are agreed. The first duty of the
statesman is to ascertain what these
principles are and to enunciate them
| clearly and forcibly. The duty of Re-
publican statesmen to render this SER
vice to the country is emphasized by
the fact that, first the Civil War, next
| the Reconstruction period, and third
| the attempt to enact a force bill,
| have created a widespread impression
| in the South that the Republican par
| ty Is suspicious of Southern virtue and
hostile to Southern interests. States
manship and political eXpediency COM
bine to require Republican leaders to
| take advantage of every opportunity
| to assure the South that this is a mis-
| taken impression, that the Republican
party is not suspicious of Southern vir-
| ture nor hostile to Southern interests.
| This it would have been perfectly easy
| to do by asserting the principles upon
which all level-headed men, North
and South, black and white, are
| agreed. They are such as these: That
no form of servile labor can be allow
| ed in the Nation; that all men, what
ever their race or color, are entitled
to equal standing before the laws of
| the land and to equal protection UNI
| der those laws to life and property;
| that education should be universal,
| and as far as possible provided by the
State-that, in the words of DR.. Cur
ry, Ignorance is cure for nothing;
| that the qualifications for suffrage are
| to be determined by the State, subject
! only to the conditions that the right
| to vote "Shall not be denied or
| abridged on account of race, color, or
/ previous condition of servitude'; and
| that as long as this provision of the
L TSD.,e str,ft TO- tod tlt To
| should be denied the right to fix for
itself the conditions of suffrage within
/ it's borders.
| There are, it is true, some questions
growing out of these principles and
| connected with them on which there
| is no such unanimity. What, for ex-
ample, should be the education pro-
| vided for the negro race? on this
men are not agreed. But the dis
agreement is neither racial nor sec
| tional. The educational work of Book
| Ell II. Washington has no warmer en-
| dorsers in the North than in the South,
| and no keener critics from the white
! race than from some members of the
| black race. SO, again, should suffrage
| be universal, or should it be limited,
| and, if limited, should the qualifica-
| tons for the suffrage be property or
| educational, or both? Upon these
questions the divisions are neither
| sectional nor racial. There is an edu-
| cational qualification in Massachusetts
| as well as in Mississippi, and there are
influential and leading negroes who
are as much in favor of the disfran-
| chisement of the ignorant and shift
| less of their own race as are any of
| their white neighbors. 1t is morally
certain that on neither of these ques-
| tions-What should be the education
| of the negro? What should be the
| conditions of suffrage could agree
| ment have been secured in the Ma
| tional Republican Convention or even
/ in the committee on the platform.
| The Republican managers have, for
reasons which we do not understand,
| thrown away a great opportunity.
| They should have recognized those
| fundamental principles upon which
| the best men of both races and both
| sections are agreed. They should then
have sent into the Southern States
some of their ablest orators to explain,
eXpound, and enforce these principles.
They might not have succeeded in
breaking up the Solid South at this
election, but at least they would not
have done what they could to make
| it more solid, and they might have laid
the foundations of party organizations
in the Southern States. and done
something to heal the breach between
| the sections and between the races.