The Marlboro democrat. [volume] (Bennettsville, S.C.) 1882-1908, 1904-07-08
CHICAGO PLATFORM.
Hon John Shark Williams Sees Du.
plicity in Franchise Plank
he DECLARES THAT IT MEANS

One Law for Mass a Q hu 8 q
and Another for the South,
and Presages Another
Force Bill.
The following Is what John Shark
Williams, the Democtatic Congresion-
al Coder, says Of the suffrage clause Of
the Republican platform as adopted at
Chicago recently:
THE plank in which the party
promises, il it finds the suffrage in any
State unconstitutionally limited by
special discrimination, to reduce the
representation Of that State in Con-
gress and in the Electoral College,
strikes the South as producing an issue
upon Which all Southerners will meet
The adverb unconstituti onally' is USE
less and fools nobody, especially when
one remembers that the author of the
phrase, or at least the voice that read
it, was the author OF the old Force
bill Whether or not the uffrage has
been unconstitutionally limited is a
matter for the courts to determine,
and q report of a Republican Committee
on elections in the last CongesS so con-
fesses it. If a man be demonstrations
ally denied the suffrage, then, after a
determination to that effect, he eau
vote-that is his remedy, and the right
remedy, and having voted, of course
there can he no reduction Of represen-
tation on his account.
DEFINES TIE REAL OBJECT"
But all this deceives nobody, as 1
said. This real object OF the the Re-
publican party, in so far as this plank
is concerned, however specious the
phraSeology in which it is clothed, is
to reduce Southern representation
without reducing that of Massachu-
settS, Connecticut and other States,
wherever in the South negroes are dis
frarchiSed, rot as such, but because Of
ignorance, by an educational qualiii
cation, or because Of any other right
reason, in any other constitutional
way. DlSfranchiSement OF negro for
ignorance in Mississippi is horrible
thing; disfranchisement OF white
man Of ignorance in Massachusetts is
a part of "higher civilization.'
Let not the business interest Of
the country deceive itself; let these
controlling it prepare for another Pc
riod OF uncertainty, unrest, business
disturbance and race war in the South
ern States, instead OF THAT peace and
prosperity which both races now en-
ioy, aud which has been rendered pos
sible only hy hcme rule and 5y white
supremacy. Let the South not deceive
itself either.
IF the Republican rarty were sim
cere in its proposition to reduce South
ern repr, sentation on the ground Of
the edisfrancbiscment of the negro ra ce
in the South, thereby condoning the
disfranchisement or unconst tutional
limitation it elf, it could accompany
that proposition with another, to-wit;
the proposition to repeal the Fifteenth
Amendment.
| CALLS IT DOUBLE DEALING.
Their duplicity is shown in this;
they wish to maintain the amendment
which forbidS the negro, for racial
reasons, from being disfranchis,d, and
yet, on the pretence that he is fOr
racial reason disfranchised, they would
have the negro not counted as basis
Cf representation In the uthern
States, where he chiefly resides 1t Is
mot the white man, as Il white man,
who is injured by Il recurrence to the
tendencies Of force bill dayS-he car
and always will maintain himSelf-it
is business. commerce manufacturing
agriculture and the negro himself.
Commercially and induStrially the
white men OF the South will not be sc
much injured by this sort OF agitation
as Northern people WILL because the
average Southerner is not rich anynow
gets his food and clothes out of tn:
world, and these he would get anyhow
The mercantile class would be the first
to suffer, but as they owe debts to the
North and buy from the North, anC
as nearly everything they sell is manu-
featured in the North, they would not
be alone in their suffering. This is but
the entering wedge to a new period OF
Southern reconstruction
THEIR BOAST AS TO TRUSTS.
The boast that the administration
has executed the antitrust laws is, oi
course, ridiculous. The Attorney Gen
eral, in response to Il resolution OF my
own, frankly confessed that nothing
had been done, and left the inference
that nothing would be done toward
the criminal prosecution Of men found
guilty by the Supreme Court Of the
United States, in the Northern Sc.
curities case, which owned it's initial
tive to Governor Van SAINT OF having
violated the provisions OF antitrust
legislation.
The Attorney General, in answer
to another resolution (the Hearst re-
Solution), failed to show that nything
substantial was being done, civilly ol
c:iminally, against the anthracite cOal
carrying railroads and anthracite GOA
mine owners, constituting together, in
violation Of law, one Of the greatest
trusts in the country. This same
trust. buster" Attorney. General
Knox, has just been appointed by the
Governor OF Pennsylvania Senator
from that State on the demand Of the
very men who constituted this trust
and who are, at any rate, the presi-
dents OF the railroads and the owners
OF the mines constituting it," )
Mrs. Mary Anderson Navarro re.
fuses an offer Of 5000, 900 to give a
series OF public readings in the United
States. She says: Il have all that |
could want or wish for. The glory OF
IL woman is in her husband, her home,
her children. In one word, | have
learned the lesson OF content" These
! a ra pohlo words and Sh,t,l6 ha ,,np