The Caucasian. (Shreveport, La.) 1900-192?, 1907-09-03
TAFT'S IGNORANCE

His Socalled Message to the South !"
AS Others, His knowledge of the Ne
gro Is Theoretical.
The following is an editorial clipped
from the New Orleans States:
Secretary Taft's so-called message to
the South" which he delivered at Lex
ington, Kentucky, was in effect that if
the white people of the Southern States
would abandon their political principles
and birthright and accept Booker Wash
ington's and the North's view of the ne
gro question they would be rewarded
with representation in the councils of
the nation. This is tremendous price
for rather trihing thing and the South
declines to even consider the proposition
which in the final analysis is an inn
moral one as it involves a surrender of
principle and conviction for the sake of
a share in the governmental f1eshpots.
What has amused the people of this
section of the country is Mr.. Taft's as
sertion that "the South has permitted
the shadow of an issue which circum-
stances ought long ago have removed to
bind it to the Democratic party, no mat
ter what principles orr candidates that
party adopts" This can not be other
wise than amusing in the light of the
| fact that the Republican party used the
military forces of the national govern
ment, fortunately without success, to
subject the Southern States to negro
domination, and through the negro vote
to subject them to the Republican party.
There was certainly nothing shadowy in
the issue which the white people of the
South had to face in the palmy days of
carpet bag rule when Federal troops
were in the capitals of the Southern
States backing up the most degraded set
of thieves and scoundrels that ever
preyed upon a community.
These governments by thieves were
overthrown by force and the revolution
airy action of the Southern people was
sustained by white public sentiment in
the North which had become Disguised
by the frightful orgie of corruption under
the carpet bag regime But no longer
ago than the Harrison administration
the Republican party committed itself to
a force bill the object of which was to
secure political control of the South
through the negro vote. Had the force
bill been passed, the South would have
had no course open to it to maintain
white supremacy except by resort to
arms, and this is what it would have
done In discussing Secretary Taft's
speech the Brooklyn Citizen states a
good deal of truth in very few words
when it says:
The plain truth is, as any one who
lays prejudice aside can see, is that, not
the South, but the Republican party in
the North, is responsible for keeping the
negro issue alive Every important in
terest of the South is on the side of hav-
ing the issue banished forever from the
politics of the country, and it is quite
probable that if tbs were done, the Re-
publican party would gain at least as
much by accessions from the white men
in the South who believe in a high pro-
tective tariff, as it would lose from the
extinction of its present African sup
port
Secretary Taft no doubt deems it
highly desirable to have several South
ern States brought into the Republican
party, but there is little in his Lexing-
ton speech to tempt them to abandon
their Democratic moorings. He like
every other leader of the Republican
party, and the party itself. refuses to
admit that the Fifteenth Amendment
was "a political crime as it has been
called by some of the most eminent STU
dents of political history in this country
and Europe On the contrary, Mr.. Taft
invites Democratic States in the South
to abandon their political faith by max
ing such foolish argument as that the
Fifteenth Amendment is really val
liable contribution to- the solution of the
race problem.