Year: 1867

ms. 1t must die out of the South before
.Dyal blood can run in the veins of its pos
Gritty. These men are beyond the reach of
.rgument They shall die as the fool dieth,
nd the splendid fabric of national pros
.,erity which will rise above their graves
shall know them no more forever.


Then there is class of men, the old poll
ticians of the South, who desire power and
influence in the reorganized stateof affairs.
These men will vote against the Convention,
because they are disfranchised. Andrew
johnson once said very significant thing in
regard to such men as these" that traitors
must take back seats" Think the American
people will be more magnanimous. If these
men will join the Republican ranks, and
continue therein with good faith and stand
ing for two years, Congress will enfranchise
them as fast as you were disfranchising the
negroes down here short time ago, by the
whipping post.


Then 1 hear that there is much fear among
the Southern people of confiscation and
negro equality. believe assert the opinion
at the North in saying that confiscation will
never come upon the Southern people, unless
by their own perverseness.


But what is this confscation which the
people of the South so much tear2 Isit that
merciless robbery which has already impov-
erished your whole land2 Is it that system
of wholesale conscription by which the
father, the son and the brother were dragged
from their homes? By which rations were
not demanded for the soldier, but were left
for the family? BY which every thing of
value was swept into the Golfers of the State 2
BY which, in five years of Confederate rule,
the entire South was reduced to such degra-
dation as would never had been had the flag
of RrIfi Oh Hf,of a6
the continent forever2 Having tasted the
horrors of such confiscation do not wonder
that the citizens of North Carolina trembe
with dread of another. But in my humble
judgment it will never so come, save through
that same suicidal madness which brought
the horrors of the past.


think need not state to this intelligent
audience that neither the laws of Congress,
the principles of Republicanism, nor the
Constitution required at the hands of your
Convention, will require any negro woman
to marry or to have issue by white man.
Nor will they require any white man to sit
at the table of black man, or TO invite the
black man to his own. Such things as these
pertain to private social life, where the law
does not provide.


Republicanism simply demands the equal
civil rights OF the black man before the law;
that he shall have the right to SOW and reap;
that he shall have the right of protection for
his property, his person and his family;
that he shall have the right to public con-
veyance and to schools; and lastly, that SUI
preme right of the American, the right of
the ballot. Whoever will deny to the least
of these, such rights as these lawful and
civil, is not himself, in my humble judg
ment, prepared for American citizenship.


also learn that among the colored men
State there lS Con-
vention should be controlled too much by
their enemies. l mean that they fear the
Constitution which should be framed by
that Convention will not sufficiently guard
their rights. l know how jealous these men
are of their first privileges accorded their
race since two hundred years when they were
first permitted to work the rice and cotton
fields of the South.


This very jealousy of their liberty proves
them fit for liberty. But allow me to say to
the colored men here tonight that Congress
demands that Constitution be made and
presented by the Convention in North-Caro-
lima shall be Republican-that is, it shall
contain provisions for the rights of all men
before the law-those of the black mea as
well as those of the white man.


Cast your votes for that Convention. The
Congress of the United States which is the
great friend of your people expects it of you.
If North-Carolina forms Convention which
will not protect you, Congress will send that
North Carolina to smoke in her pipe.


Then it is told the black men that the Re-
publican party only wishes to use him for its
own purpose; that it desires his votes. but
will abandon him in future; that his best
friends are here in the South that his inter-
ests are with them. Let me say to you col
ored men, what have said before, the Re-
publican party is not party for black men or
for white men, but for all men. 1t can have
no possible object in securing the vote of the
black man save his own good. Whenever
this party which is now the nation itself,
ceases to be the friends of the black man,
then let the black man cease to be friend
to this party. Whenever the government of
the United States controlled by this party,
ceases to feed your poor. to clothe your ma
ked, to educate your children, to snatch you
from oppression and injustice, from the
stocks and the whipping post, then abandon
that and seek your friends elsewhere. When
ever those other men-now nameless-shall
prove by their words and acts that they are
your friends; whenever federal officer need
no longer stand in the courts to prevent your
rights being wrested from you by the unjust
decisions of magistrates; whenever blue
guard need no longer patrol this whole
South to prevent the robbing of your homes
and the slaughter of your people; whenever
contracts are no longer made which bind
you soul and body to employers; when
your children are no longer bound without
your consent to serve the will of others ;
when this class CT this party of men by
spirit of kindness and actions of justice, TO-
words you show that they are indeed your best
friends, then attach yourselves to them. If
before this any black man attaches himself
to those who now oppose the Republican
party. then he is not only unfit for suffrage,
but shame to his race.


A dog knows that the hand that feeds him
is his friend, and have yet to learn that
the black man is more ignorant than dog,
For my own part, belonging as do to the
great Republican party, I shall rejoice when
the black man no longer finds his especial
friends in the ranks of that party-when all
men and all parties are alike his friends
But, fellow citizens, when that time arrivea
all men will belong to the Republican party,
Or that party having fulfilled its mission
shall divide or pass away and leave the citir.
zens of this country black and white, North


Il .