Edgefield advertiser. [volume] (Edgefield, S.C.) 1836-current, 1921-10-26
Valuable Paper on Edgefield County in
1876 by Mr.. Francis Simkins.

ancis si1nkins.
not for me to say. If you adhere to
the Jefersonian dogma of literal de-
mocracy4the control by the MAORI
ty of human beings within the state
then You must conclude that the
events wtHch had as their outstanding
purpose Fand result the deprival of
the maj jority Of the human beings
within tile state of their suffrage had
better not have happened. This the
Dry Of spular rule at any cost was.
the theory that moved Thaddeus
Stevenssand the Washington govern
ments id the Reconstruction period,
and resulted in universal negro suf-
.frage Such was the conviction OF
,WoodroM Wilson in our own day
when It was thought that the difficult
ties Of the world could be solved by
the application of the principles of
universal suffrage to all the divers
pc pulations of this world. Fortunate
" political thought has made more
progress Of late; farseeing men, CIV
ing less weight to democratic doc
.trineFand more light to the realities
of al given situation, have come to
realize the practical limitations OF
universal suffrage. With such a view
in mind these of you who care may
indorse the policies of the leaders of
1875 with full realization that it
marked a radical reaction from the
democratic constitution of 1858 as
well as practical relief from the ve-
nality and grotesqueness of black and
allen tenure of power. South Caro-
lima since 1876 has been govern
:ment of the minority because the
black majority has been by law de-
prtiyed of it's right to vote. This fact
none Of our historians will admit.
!Bea Tillman has been alone among
our politicians with candor and in
stelligences to indicate the nature of
DIR apeculiar institution" But to
my theme:
hen Daniel H. Chamberlain as
nsd The office Of governor of South
sSzroiiiia December 1874, this
state was nationally known as the
"prostrate state," having been s., .
ject. to the ravages of war and the
less destructive but more calling raw
ages of robber Governor Moses and
his unprincipled coadjutors. Moses
considered the pardoning power a
free instrument of bribery; through
him Offices Of trust were sold with
the unblushing abandon of Louis
XIV acting under the moral code OF
the seventeenth century; money in
trusted to the governor was wasted
in the scramble to satisfy personal
lusts; the state government was in a
condition of disorder bordering on
anarchy. The former wllite masters,
having spent their strength in civil
war and in vain attempts to redeem
their state through coalition with re-
forming Republican minorities, for
the time being resigned themselves to
the tax collectors of a government
which under no conditions of reform
or corruption would they have will
|lingly tolerated. The incompetent
|soldier-president of the United States
(Grant) himself surrounded by a
sea of corruption, continued to sup
port with troops, and words the cor
rupt state of affairs in South Caro-
lima. The northern politicians were
more zeaolus to keep the state surely
Republican than to advance the cause
Of reform. The wholesome public
opinion of the North was still blinded
by the hatreds of war, and the char
acteristic American adherence to
democratic dogma, than concerning
itself with the distribution of votes
to black peasants who wanted to "put
the votes in bags" The black man,
five per cent literate at the close of
the Civil War, was always ready to
fly to those who promised relief,
against the class that had recently
held them in slavery and bound them
with the black code of 1865, which
gave statutory evidence" of slave
psychology. The white minority-in
intelligence, tradition and economic
assets still master-preferred Afri-
can tactics in the state house in Co.
ell I. ',