Evening bulletin. [volume] (Honolulu [Oahu, Hawaii]) 1895-1912, 1905-08-19
Books, Bookish People and Things
We get good by being ungenerous 10 book
E. B. Browning.

marred the face Of peace for many
year to follow. and has left an ugly
problem unsolved. And there Is no
doubt that for all our Northern cool
ness we were excited to our zeal for
the Negro by an excess Of emotion
rather than by a surplus Of wisdom.
Under the waving OF flags and within
hearing and sight OF martial music and
marching soldiers, we thought we had
only one thing to do and that was
to bring the South into humiliation arrl
absolute subsection. In one small cor
ner the flag was fired upon-the whole
broad South must suffer for II.
The party that approved Of the mis-
take was little more than hasty-it did
what n man in hot passion does when
he strikes his dearest friend. But the
South was too proud to acknowledge
regret or remorse before untactful, I'M
sympathetic leaders. Even then per-
haps war could have been avoided by
a tactful human touch.
For many OF the best men in the
South did not favor secession though
the trend Of fateful events forced them
into fighting for their homes. It cost
Lee and others many pang and heart
wrench to separate themselves from
their brothers at the North.
1t Is true. as our author states, but
It was not considered by anti-slavery
agitators, that the North was responsI
BILE for slavery in the South: that the
institution was not perpetuated in New
England because OF economic reasons
only; that It spread its roots deeper
and deeper into Southern soil because
it was profitable there.
The Yankee is about the last person
to give up a thing that pays. no mat
ter what principle is involved. on the
other hand, the Southerner is quick
to act from an ideal impulse and to
throw material prospects away for a
Purpose or Principle
When the flag was fired on and the
North went down to fight the South
in tremendous and inconsiderate wrath
it did not meet the true South on
the battlefield It was not fighting
against slavery. either.
Gradually the real causes for all this
bloodshed on both sides began to ap-
pear through the passion and the
smoke. In the end, the whole South
was fighting for its homes, and be-
cause it had begun to fight: and the
North because rebellion must be put
down at any cost. It was all a sad
mistake followed by others hardly less
terrible.
Then came the browning error: the
practical carrying out of the theories
by infusing into the body polite a
whole race just emerging from slav-
cry. The most intelligent and con-
sentative class OF the whites were dis
franchised; the entire adult Negro pop
ulation were enfranchised.
II is useless to discuss the motives
with which this was done. No matter
what the motives 1t was national
hlunder; in its way as great blunder
rs secession.
"The injury to the whites was not
the only injury caused by the recon-
struction system. To the Negroes, the
objects OF its bounty, 1t was no less
calamity.
However high the motive may have
been, no greater error could have been
committed; nothing could have been
more disastrous to the Negroes future
than the teaching he thus received.
He was taught that the white man
was his enemy when he should have
been taught to cultivate his friendship.
He was told he was the equal of the
white when he was not the equal; he
was given to understand that he was
the ward OF the nation when he should
have been trained in self-reliance; he
was led to believe that tho government
would sustain him when he could not
be sustained. In legislation, he was
taught thieving; in politics, he was
taught not to think for himself, but
to follow slavishly his leaders land
such leadersD; in private life he was
taught insolence."
Very justly Mr.. Page asks (Chap
III, p. 74D: What have the thousands
OF churches and schools and colleges.
maintained at the cost OF more than
hundred and fifty million dollars pro.
duced? What kind of men and women
have they turned out? What fruits
have they brought forth, of moral sta
mi n nf I,,.,