Year: 1874

TWO Ways or LOOKING at IT.


On Monday, two members OF Congress from
Mississippi made rather remarkable speeches
on the condition of political affairs in the
South. Both men are persons OF some note,
"A the representatives of the two great classes
into which Southern society has always been
divided and in both speeches we find matter
not only for immediate interest but for care
full thought. Mr.. l.. O. G. Lamar in old times
was n typical planter and fire-eater. He left
Congress to take a seat in the Convention
which voted Mississippi out of the Union. He
was a colonel in the Confederate Army. He
was diplomatic envoy from the Confederacy
to Russia. He is a man of culture and a Pro-
fessor in the University of Mississippi. No
one could be better qualified to speak for the
class which ruled the South before the war;
and which still embraces nearly all the eduCa-
ton and social refinement of that unfortunate
region. 1t is only few weeks since Mr..
Lamar won the respect of the whole country by
his noble tribute to the memory of Charles Sum-
ner; he deserves no less honor LOT his address
on Monday, in which he reiterated those sent-
ments of union and brotherhood which, in spite
of the bloody past and the cruel expressions
of the present, do unquestiOnably animate the
Southern white population. Mr.. Lamar con-
fessed not only that the Lost Cause was lost
beyond all hope of recovery, but that the war
had utterly Overthrown the principle upon
which it was founded. Secession, hereafter,
was not merely impracticable and unwise, but
it was false in theory, and repugnant to the
well-settled principles of the American Gov
ernment. Slavery was not merely destroyed.
but it was acknowledged on all hands to be
gigantic wrong which the South would not
restore if it had the power. And with the
downfall of Slavery the South recognized the
full personal and political rights of the freed
men, and the sacred force OF the Constitu-
tional Amendments enacted to secure their
privileges. But Mr.. Lamar spoke with honest
indignation of the outrageous abuse OF the
Federal power i'm the reconstructed States (the
contested election case of Sheridan against
Pinchback being the subject of dcbate), and
warned his Republican hearers that "no party
"cOuld endure tho infamy and disgrace that
chad been brought upon the American name
"by those grotesque caricatures of the Gov
"ernment." All which was strictly true ana
most proper to be said.


On tIle Sa1no uty, MI VI MiSoiooipPi
made speech in the Republican caucus,
where the faithful were discussing the pros
poets of the party for the next campaign, and
considering what principles it should profess
during the canvass, or whether it was prudent
to profess any at all. Mr.. Lynch Is young
negro, born in slavery. He was entirely with
out education until the Union armies at
Natchez made him a cOntraband. Then he
picked up little schooling, and after the war
was made a justice of the peace under the
carpet-bag government of Gen. Ames. From
one Office to another he worked his way along
until he got to Congress. He seems to be
type of the shrewd, glib, active, ambitious
colorcd men i'm whom Northern adventurers
find their aptest allies and instruments in the
manipulation of the Southern satrapies. We
know nothing discredtable to him personally.
but there can be no question of the class to
which he belongs. Mr.. Lynch spoke of the
Civil Rights bill, and he was of course not
we'll pleased at the manner in which the
House had treated it but he assured the cau-
Gus of the strict party fidelity OF the cOlOred
people. There was to be no reconciliation be-
tween them and their old masters. They
would not believe that Slavery was beyond
revival. They would not trust q Southern
white man with their liberties. They cared
comparatively little for honesty in Ofiice-this
at least was the general drift of his address
they could pardon fraud, corruption, licen-
tlOusness, anything mean or disgracoful, to an
orthodox Republican politician; and they
would sooner vote for a thief like Moses than
an upright gentleman like Lamar. These are
the conclusions logically to be drawn from the
remarks of Mr.. Lynch, as We cOllate them
from the reports of the various papers, and it
will be seen that they are equivalent to no
tice to the party that it may nominate any
rascal they please, and the Southern negroes
will swallow him.


These two speeches are the platforms of the
two contrasted forces between which the
future of the South remains to be decided-one
caring little for party and everything for
pure and honest Government, the other valu-
ing party above everything and official integ-
rity not at all. We need not ask which offers
the country the fairer prospect of peace and
prosperity. But we ask the Northern Repub-
licans if they have no moral duty to fulfill
toward their ignorant colored wards, and if it
will not be their fault if Republication in the
reconstructed States become merely q syno-
nyme for fraud and embezzlement


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