Edgefield advertiser. [volume] (Edgefield, S.C.) 1836-current, 1921-10-26
Valuable Paper on Edge6eld
County in 1876 by MIR.
Francis Sinakins.
CONTINUED from first page.)

high gift of oratory and excellent
education was supreme faith in the
efficacy of negro enfranchisement
and willingness to compromise with
realities in South Carolina. With
such qualities political rise was easy.
When he came into office with
words of reform on his lips, black
and white Republican corruptionists
smiled, and Democrats mourned, for
all were familiar with the habit of po-
licitians of even the Moses stamp,
making promises that they had no
idea of redeeming. Chamberlain rest
ed under the shadow of some of the
corrupt transactions of the Moses re-
gime; he had as his colleagues in of
fee the same corrupt crew of adven-
turers; worst of all, the native mem
bers of his race, he was an alien ad-
venturer with a New Englander's be-
lief in. the salvation of the negro
through an impartial application of
the principals of the Declaration of
independence. Had South Carolina
Democrats in 1874 had any faith in
his words, so hopeless were their pros
poets of victory, it is not probable
that they would have offered any op-
position to his candidacy.
Yet in spite of all handicaps, Cham
berlain was true to his words; all his
efforts, with partial success, were
bent towards the accomplishment of
reform. He recommended to his
"black and tan" legislature the sol
emn duty of reducing public expen-
ditures to their lowest level; of ad-
ministering the public funds honest
ly in the public interest; and of elect
ing competent public officials. Every
subsequent utterance was but COM
mentary OH the foregoing concrete
statement of abuse; every subsequent
act so far as not handicapped by
practical political expediency and his
own vicious colleagues in govern
ment, was but a vindication of the
plighted word. For the details of the
reforms accomplished-the reduction
of expenditures, the effective vetoes
and lashing messages refer you to
a more extended article of mine* and
to the Acts of South Carolina, 1875
and 1876.
Yet the reforms that Chamberlain
ATTEMPTED to accomplish were largely
frustrated by the legislature domi-
mated as it were by the hardly less
forceful and brilliant black speaker,
r. B. Elliott. This legislature was as
corrupt as its immediate predeces-
sors and only less evil because a will
more determined was able at times
to bring it to its senses. Good natur-
edly some corrupt scheme would be
passed amid an outburst of African
oratory, only to be nullifed by the
dramatic appearance of the governor
before committee or a dashing mes
sage or an effective veto.
The high water mark of the un-
blusning abandon of public interest
was reached by this legislature, in
the absence of the governor, in the
election of ex-governor and W. j.
Whipper, two self-confessed corrup-
tionists and defaulters TO the judicial
seats once held by O'Neal and Ward
law on "black Thursday" December
16, 1875. Only the Democratic mi
nority voted against them. 'Civiliza-
tion is at stake in some of the de-
based democracies of the South" was
Northern opinion. The governor in
q firm outburst of moral passion, hav-
ing as mis- pretext flimsy technical
ity of the law, refused to commission
these men as judges. The legislature
repented and Whipper's abusive
speech against Chamberlain was ex-
plunged from the journal.
In openly denouncing the rascal
ity of those who had put him in Of
fee, Chamberlain came dangerously
near bringing about his own political
doom, finding himself the despised
ruler of a state divided into two hos
tile racial factions. A mass meeting
in Charleston called him "a traitor
trying to sell out for social recogni-
tion." An agitation was started for
the founding of a newspaper to push
the candidacy of Judge R. B. Car
penter for governor. The Republicans
Of Charleston divided into two con-
ventions.
Yet the white people of South Car