Year: 1868

The Chicago Times Article I'm Favor OF


Negro Suffrage.
From the Chicago Times EDITORIAL. Nov. u, '66.


SHALL THE DEMOCRATIC PARTY LIVE OF DIFF


The present is a crisis in the Demo
cratic party which has no precedent in
its history, as it is a crisis in the pro-
gress of the country which is also with
out precedent. Never before has the
Democratic party encountered events
so seriously affecting its vitality as now
Not that it beholds itself diminished
in the magnitude of its numbers-for it
is numerically stronger than it has ever
been before-but that, having been
beaten on a great national issue, as to
which it believed itself to be wholly
right and the opposition wholly wrong
and still so believes, it mustneverthe-
less abandon that issue-for the deci-
sion OF 1t is fnal-and either sit down
in decaying and helpless inactivity, or
strike boldly out upon new line, Sc
lected with peculiar reference, not to
things as we would have them, but 10
things as they actually are, and in pur-
suing which line it shall cease to be q
holdback or conservative" party, and
become, what it was in its palmy days,
a progressive and an aggressive party.
These are the alternatives.


1t will not do to sit down in helpless
and decaying inactivity.


What, then, shall the new line be ?
In the first place, must we not clH loose
from Andre,o johnson, and leaUe that hybrid
concern 10 float on the sea of pubic contempt
INTO ghich Il some time SINCE entered, and
from l0hieh no poiGsr can rescue ~ Is not
the late defeat attributable more largely
to this administration than to all other
causes combined? What is there in
its composition to command popular
confidence? Who, belonging TO it, Is
entitled, by reason of his antecedents
or Of his craftsmanship, to the conf
! dence or the respect of the Democratic
party? Certainly is not Andrew john
son. nor William II. Seward, nor Edwin
NJ. Stanton. True, this administration
had right policy, and the Democratic
party in overlooking the chief men
comprising it, and thinking only of the
righIfuiness Of the policy, displayed a
patriotism whose purity was never ex-
celled; but the policy having failed
and having failed, too, through the
feebleness and folly and offeuses
against public propriety of the admins
tratiou-why should not the Demo
cratic party abandon the dead body,
longer adherence TO lChich is death also to
Itself!


What next? Can the Democratic par
ty succeed until the negro question be
got out of the way? It cannot. Why
not? Is not negro suffrage inevitable,
and is not the quickest way to. az once
eoaesds the suffrage, making issue only
on the degree to which it shall be con
ceded? We know that many Demo
Gratis have not reached this advanced
view of the case, and that such are still
| greatly inclined to revolt at the propo-
sition of negro suffrage in any degree;
4 but let US tell them that Il IS diiczys igise
10 accsp, the inevitable Uhen the insvit1bls
comes. Negro suffrage, we say, is insUi-
table, and whether it shall be qualified
or universal depends upon the prompt
ness or otherwisewith which the Demo
cratic party shall move with reference
I to it. The South lUiH speedily yield quad
fed negro suffrage upon tte HolioH Of the
Democratic party; because, if for no 9TH
er reason. she will soon see, if she does
not already see, that if she does not
yield il, she will ultimately be compelled
to accept universal negro suffrage.


Qualified negro snffrsge yielded by
the Southland by this we mean IN
PARTIAL SUFFRAGE, or suffrage depend
ent upon the intelligence Of the man,
irrespective Of color, as IS nO17 the rule IN
Massacknsetts-TH NEGRO QUESTION WILL
HAVE BEEN DISPOSED OF, AND THE occU-
PATTON OF TIE NORTHERN REPUBLICAN
PARTY WILL BE GONE FOREVER. Not one
inch of ground will it have to stand
upon and the country can once more
turn to hose material questions Of pub
lie policy, the right disposition of which
is so essential to the public prosperity.
II will be upon these questions that the
Democratic party will triumph, and
it will be by this triumph that consti-
tutional government and our Federal
system will be preserved.


If the South be wise it will not wait
on this suffrage question, even for the
motion of the Democratic party. II it
be wise, it will lose no time in putting
in motion the necessary machinery by
which it will, at the same time, save
itself from humiliation, preserve its
own self respect, rid the country of the
most vexatious questions that ever dis
tracted any country, kill the worst po-
litical party that ever existed on the
globe, and put the Union in the way of
speedy restoration. This machinery
consists, of course, in conventions to
revise the State Constitutions.