Virginia citizen. (Irvington, Va.) 1891-1921, 1907-05-31

was just across the Potomac. He knew
his property might be confiscated and
his homestead demolished. Yet with
out hesitation he sacrificed an honora-
bic position. land, family, homestead
and money, and threw them all into
the southern cause. Then study the
life of Robert II. Lee after the civil
war Even amid poverty, after his
great pillared mansion had been eX-
changed for an old tumbledown negro
hut. not fit for an clubhouse or a cattle
pen, he was brave enough to refuse to
take position Offering n great finan-
cial income. because he did not want
to do another an injustice.
Accepted the Decision.
These flags were returned to the
southern states FOR another reason
not only did the north realize that the
southerners We're honest men, but they
found that they were reconstructed
men. The southern leaders loyalty and
gracefully accepted the decision of the
sword and regarded II as decided for
ever. They were willing to confess
that under no conditions would they
ever attempt TO get their slaves back
again. These great facts were the
mighty means of welding the hearts Of
the American people together even
more strongly than they were united
before
Now, let us impartially consider the
slave question, which was indirectly
90 II,
in the time of Thomas jefferson the
Sage of Monticello advocated the
emancipation of the negro slave. But.
though Thomas Jefferson was i'm many
ways the strongest statesman the south
ever produced. all the planters rose up
In arms. Absurd, Absurdr' they
cried. "YOu free the slaves and the
cotton plantations will be ruined. We
must have the slaves or die" This
was the stand of the south. Most of
the southerners deprecated the holding
of slaves. but they did not see how
the plantations could be cultivated
without them. Yet no sooner were
the slaves emancipated than the plant
ers rubbed their eyes and awoke to
the fact that the plantations were bet
ter Off with hired labor than when
cultivated by slaves. They could make
more money out of their cotton crops
by hiring field hands than by owning
them. The result was that whereas
before the war ninety-nine southern
men out of n hundred wanted slavery
To exist. today. if put to the southern
vote. ninety-nine men out of hundred
-NrnlI g, N,l-
even il they could. This Is q sociolog-
zeal fact of the southern labor problem
with which every intelligent American
student is well conversant
A Dead Issue.
Second fact: When the god OF battles
decided the civil strife the southerners
almost to man were ready to accept
that decision. When Finland was con-
quered by the Russians in 1909 and Al
SAGE and Lorraine We're conquered by
Germany I'm 1871 and Spain and Italy
and Holland and Naples and Westpha-
LA were conquered 10y France In the
Napoleonic wars these people were
compelled TO bend the knee at the
stroke OF the sword, but they and
their conqucrors never became one.
Finland today is no more Russian than
it is Japanese. Alsace and Lorraine
may pay their taxes to Germany, but
their hearts are in the Tuileries. No
sooner did Napoleon abdicate than the
kings and queens whom he had de-
posed were gladly welcomed back by
their people TO their vacated thrones.
Not thus was the ending OF the civil
war. The southern people are not a
subjugated people. They are not a peo-
pie trembling at the sound OF the can
mons explosion. They are people
who had an issue. They said. LET us
decide this issue once for all ut the
lannon's mouth" And when the god
OF battles decided against them these
people said. The issue is forever
dead" The northerner said Here.
men OF the south. here are your flags.
We have no differences today. Take
them back as heroic emblems of your
glorious deeds on many battlefields.
Take them and keep them for your
children To look upon with reverence
and awe. They are yours and not ours.
We are all brothers. OF one race and
one nation" oh, today thank God that
these questions are all settled and that
all the old heartburnings are over.
The returning OF the southern flags
proves IL.
There was still another reason Why
those old Gags Were returned. No
sooner vas the war over than the
southern men began to work side by
side with their northern countrymen
for the upbuilding OF the nation. They
dropped the sword for the pillow. the
gun for the moving machine. But
they did more-they began TO work for
the benefit OF the north as well as for
the south, for the west as well as for
the east. And MS in the Spanish-Amer-
lean war U. 5. Grant, Jr, served upon
the STAFF Of Fitz-IIugh Lee and Joe
Wheeler fought under the stars and
stripes by the side of Lawton> so side
by side in congressional halls and on
judicial bench and in mercantile es-
adjustment the southerners worked
with the northerners for the deyelop-
ment OF our whole nation. You could
not find any difference In these mems
patriotism by the place of their birth.
Like Bugls Call.
i was very much struck with this
fact when my mind ran over the names
prominent in our national legislative
nails thirty years ago. A great army
or statesmen had entered Washington
from our southern states. Nearly all
or these men had worn the Confederate
gray or been prominent in Richmond.
Ihere We're Alexander Stephens and
Lamar and Harris and Gordon and
Pugh and Morgan and Wade Hamntnn