Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1907-07-28
FORAKER NURSES
RACE ANT|PATHY
SColds TiIIman for His Color
Question Views.
TALKS TO THE CHAUTAUQUA
Says South Brought Fifteenth
Amendment On Itself.
ACCUSES STATES OF BAD FAITH
Social and Political Equality, He
Holds, Are Two Different Things.
Human Progress.
TALKS TO THE CHAUTAUQUA
ACCUSES STATES OF BAD FAITH

| BELLEFONTAINE.. Ohio, July 27.-Re-
cent remarks on the race question by Sena-
tor Tilman of South Carolina before SINH
lar Ohio gathering brought extended an
| swer from Senator Foraker of Ohio in an
address to the Chautauqua Assembly at this
place. In part Senator Foraker said:
Before taking up anything else 1 want
| to speak briefly In answer to some utter
| ances Of Senator Tilman. He has been
making a speech in Ohio 1t was on the
race problem. This is his favorite topic.
He is at his best when he talks on hat
| subject but his best Is also his worst.
He Is one of the frankest and one of the
| abest men the south has ever produced.
Every one is fond of him a man. but his
views on this subject are so extreme that
| but few of his democratic colleagues in the
Senate. If any of them. fully agree with
| him. In this latest speech he is quoted as
| saying: If after the war the north had not
| in its passion and sectional hatred gone
| far beyond the bounds of reason. decency
| and righteousness there would today be no
| race problem.
| 1--WE resent and resist the doctrine of
equality under the fourteenth and fifteenth
| amendments.
-"''You have done wrong. The north has
done wrong. 1t can remedy the feeling by
repeating the fifteenth amendment and let
ting the states control the franchise
Fifteenth Amendment Necessary.
"All the way through his discussion is in
| the nature of protest against social equal
| ity. Nothing could be more wide of the
| mark Everybody understood then now
| that social equality cannot be forced upon
anybody.
1.-The purpose of the fourteenth and fff-
| tenth amendments was to provide political
I equality; to put all citizens of the United
/ States, whether rich or poor. white or
black. upon the same plane. so far as the
political rights Of citizenship were con-
cerned.
What I want to answer is his charge
that in hatred and passion the fourteenth
and fifteenth amendments to the Consti-
tuition were forced upon the south and that
in this way the north needlessly precipi
tated upon the south the evils they suf-
fered. during the reconstruction period.
These amendments, If not fully demanded
by the war itself, were made necessary
BY. the situation created by the seeding
SldteS alteT. the war -
Senator Foraker discussed conditions at
the close Of the civil war at considerable
length, and then continued:
IF they had accepted the fourteenth
amendment there would not have been any
fifteenth amendment, for with the four
teenth amendment accepted and all the
seeding states restored to their places in
the government, the ratification of the if
tenth amendment by the requisite number
of states would have been an impossibility
If. therefore. there be any fault to find with
anybody on account Of the fifteenth amend
ment it rests with the seeding states, for
they by their refusal to accept the four
teenth amendment, not only compelled re-
construction. but precipitated a submission
and ratification Of the fifteenth amendment.
South Was Unjust
They accentuated all this by their treat
| ment of the freedmen. 1t would be diff
cult to exaggerate the unfriendly character
of the legislation affecting them that was
enacted Immediately after the war in most
| of the seeding states
ut is no exaggeration to say that the
spirit Of this legislation was not Justice.
but injustice and that of the most malic-
ious and revengeful character. This kind
of legislation. coupled with refusal to ac-
eept what were thought to be the generous
terms of the fourteenth amendment nat
uraly created a public sentiment in the
north that secured the ratification of the
fourteenth amendment, and led to the fif-
teenth amendment by which 1t was pro-
vided that no state should have the right
to deny or abridge the right to vote on ac-
court Of race, color or previous condition of
Servitude.
But 1t was not passion. neither was it
hatred that brought about these results,
but only a solemn sense of duty. There
was never time except only when the fff-
teenth amendment was adopted that it
could have been adopted and there has never
| been time since it was adopted when it
could have been repealed. and in my opn-
| ion there never will be a time when it
| can be repealed. simply because it was
| right then and is right now.
Was Gods Work
cit was a great forward step in the recog-
milton by government of the right of citi-
| zens governed to participate in their gov
eminent and to have equal protection
under 1t. If in some places it has failed to
bring good results. that fact is due more
| to the bad faith that has been practiced to
defeat it's purpose than to any inherent
trouble.
Except only to state these facts Of his
tory l have no desire to pursue this sub
ject further at this time. but l cannot help
remarking that God moves in a mysterious
way His wonders to perform. Out of the
vanity and folly of Andrew Johnson and
the obduracy and unreas onable conduct
of the seeding states came the conditions
that prevented the American people from
stopping short in the great work of estab-
fishing the doctrine of human equality be-
fore the law for all men. That was not
the work of the republican party or the
people of the north. but of the ever living
God. The noble men who were the actors
were his instruments to register HIS de-