Emancipation And Emigration Part 4
"Surely, no one, who is worthy of the name of man, can hesitate, under such conditions, to take a hand on Sat.u.r.day."
The following, to the rifle clubs, is given as the programme for the Democrats, on Sat.u.r.day, Oct. 19, the day the Republican meetings are called for nominations:--
"Presidents of clubs are requested to report to county chairman, who can be found at the rooms of the executive committee, in the rear of the town hall, up stairs. The clubs will be earnestly enjoined, by those in authority, to remain in line and under command of their respective presidents until they are turned over to some higher officer, from whom they will receive orders during the day."
Ex-Senator Swails, of Williamsburg County, and also deputy United States marshal, has committed the unpardonable sin against the Wade-Hampton, Hamburg-Butler, shot-gun Democracy, by speaking at Republican meetings, for which offence he has been twice shot at, and finally driven from the county, having been visited by the Democratic Executive Committee, accompanied by a band of Red Shirts or Rifle Clubs, and presented with these good Democratic resolutions:--
_Resolved_, That S. A. Swails be required to leave Williamsburg in ten days.
_Resolved_, That he is a high-handed robber.
_Resolved_, That he and his rioters be held responsible for all incendiarism which may happen.
_Resolved_, That unless the above be complied with, he must forfeit his life.
These facts were yesterday brought to the attention of the President by Congressman Rainey and Mr. Swails, and it is reported that he thinks something ought to be done about it, and says just what the man whom he made Governor of South Carolina said: "Tell the people they shall have all the protection the law can give." Wade Hampton has the power to fulfil his promise, and it is apparent he never intended to give the Republicans the protection they asked, and we fear that President Hayes is putting them off with a promise of the protection he is well aware he cannot give.
These South Carolinians come to Washington and claim government protection to their persons and property while in the exercise of their const.i.tutional political rights. The President "thinks something ought to be done about it"! Wonderful! So does an old hen when the hawks are after her chickens. But the difference between the two is this: the hen bl.u.s.ters about and immediately calls her subjects under her wings, thus giving them all the protection in her power. But the President _thinks something ought to be done_, but does nothing worthy of the occasion.
Wade Hampton promises "all the protection the law can give," and that was none at all while in his hands to administer, for the reason that the theory of the shot-gun Democracy is, that the negro has no _rights_ that the white man is bound to protect.
While the South is ent.i.tled to the palm of victory for shot-gun Democracy, the North is a fair compet.i.tor for doughface flunkyism.
Ex-Senator Swails, by the testimony of his personal friends in Boston, bears a character the direct opposite of that given him in the following paragraph from the Philadelphia "Times." While despotism is the rule in the South, owing to the natural soil in which it is nurtured, we are happy to believe that flunkyism _in the superlative degree_ at the North is the exception.
"If State Senator Swails of South Carolina, had lived in any Northern State and prost.i.tuted his senatorial office as openly and recklessly as is clearly proven he did in that State, he would be in the penitentiary; but having resigned his seat to escape dismissal and fled to escape punishment, he has settled down in Washington, where a few carpet-bag thieves yet linger, and is telegraphing over the country how the Hampton rifle clubs have driven him from the State. As the South Carolina penitentiary evidently haunts his dreams, he should hie himself to the Ma.s.sachusetts Botany Bay of public thieves, and put himself under the protecting wing of Governor Rice. He will find Kimpton there, and a fellow feeling will make Kimpton wondrous kind to Swails."--_Philadelphia Times_.
[Special Despatch to the Boston Traveller.]
Washington, D. C., Oct. 21.--The statement made to the President, last week, by State Senator Swails, that he was forced to leave South Carolina in consequence of receiving a notice that his life would pay the penalty if he remained, is fully confirmed by the Charleston "News and Courier" received here to-day.
That paper admits that such a notice was served on Swails, and says it was done because he was a dangerous man, and disturbing the peace of the country where he resided. Instead of lynching him the Democrats gave him the opportunity of leaving the State.
The "News and Courier" contains an account of the capture of a Republican meeting at Lawtonville on Friday last, showing that the Democrats are determined to carry out their policy regardless of the instructions sent out by Attorney-General Devens to the U. S. officials.
The meeting was called by the Republicans in the interest of Smalls, the Republican candidate for re-election to Congress. The despatch to the "News and Courier," from Lawtonville, says:
"This morning the negroes began pouring in, attired in the recently-adopted radical uniform of blue shirts, several mounted clubs and other clubs on foot, embracing large numbers, being included. Fully 2,000 men, women and children gathered, when some eight red shirts galloped in and captured the meeting and proceeded to run it on a division of time schedule. Rousing Democratic speeches were made. Mr.
Smalls failed to appear. Some of Hampton's men rode forty miles to hear Smalls. The effect of the day's work was exceedingly good."
SCOTT.
As goes South Carolina so go the other rebel States, as in the _first_ rebellion. Georgia next falls into line after this fashion:
The "Augusta (Georgia) Const.i.tutionalist" insists that the Democrats of South Carolina shall defy the lawful direction of the Attorney-General of the United States in regard to conspiracies against the political rights of the citizens, and shall continue to disturb, and, if need be, break up Republican meetings. The advice is equally plain and peremptory. Republicans are not to be allowed to hold meetings without the presence and partic.i.p.ation of Democrats. What that partic.i.p.ation is, is well understood. It is the attendance of armed men who will not allow a word said which does not meet with their approbation; it is the warning of citizens not to join in the meetings; it is the threatening of life if they do; it is the savage a.s.saulting of those who are conspicuous in proclaiming their intention to vote the Republican ticket; it is armed and violent defiance of the law, and, in the last resort, a.s.sa.s.sination. The issue is clearly defined. It is, pure and simple, whether the government of the United States can and will protect its citizens in their const.i.tutional rights, when those are rights which it is authorized and required to conserve and defend. Evidently the rebellion was not ended at Appomattox.--_Providence Journal_.
We have contemplated deferring the publication of this pamphlet until we could ascertain from the Secretary of the Interior the number of acres of unpre-empted land in each State, together with their location &c., &c., but we are informed by the commissioner of the land office in Washington that there are no data or statistics in his office that will give us that information.
As we may have to wait for Congress to a.s.semble before we can obtain the necessary statistics, we shall send out our pamphlet at once, and set the ball in motion.
The question that has recently come up between the Secretary of the Interior and the Pacific railroads must be settled, so far as we can see, in favor of the Secretary, who has just issued a pamphlet with the grounds of his decision, and which has been sent us.
The railroads, however, may delay matters by their dilatoriness in making their returns to government of the lands sold by them, their location, &c., and it may be necessary for Congress to hurry up that matter a little, so that the land commissioner can give the desired information.
But there is no time to be lost. The "conciliated" Wade Hampton, and the Hamburg-ma.s.sacre-Butler crowd have already organized the second rebellion in South Carolina, and armed their militia with "federal bayonets," over which waves the "b.l.o.o.d.y shirt," inscribed with Hampton's declaration in a speech in Sumter County, "that the Democrats must carry that county at all hazards," supplemented by Senator!! Butler, who "said it was unnecessary to tell them _how_ to do it." "Webb," a correspondent of the Boston "Journal," tells us in the following paragraph, how they are doing it:--
SHAMEFUL CONDUCT OF THE MILITARY.
"Armed men have been stationed as pickets on roads leading to county conventions. These men were supplied with State arms, furnished through the United States, were evidently under good military discipline, had recognized officers, and were known as members of the State volunteer militia. At first they appeared without uniforms; of late they have attempted in uniform to break up Republican meetings. They have not hesitated to announce publicly that the white people of South Carolina had decided that Republican meetings should not be held, and that any attempt to hold such meetings might result in personal injury. At one of the meetings at Sumter County, one of the aids of Governor Hampton knocked the Republican chairman from the stand. Another seized the chairman by the throat and severely injured him. The speaker was Probate Judge Lee, who acted as chairman of the meeting, and who at that time was threatened both with shooting and hanging. So many authorized details of those acts of violence have been brought to the knowledge of the Administration here that the President and his Cabinet are convinced that there is an organized movement in South Carolina to put down by violence any attempt at Republican organization, and that Wade Hampton is giving this revolutionary and cowardly movement his active personal support. It is, perhaps, needless to say that the President is very much surprised at Hampton's conduct."
If "the President and his Cabinet" had consulted the Principia Club papers more, and Southern rebels less, it would not have taken them half of their Presidential term to learn that rebel promises are of no account whatever, for they would have discovered abundant evidence of their utter worthlessness. As "federal bayonets" are now so popular in _rebel_ hands, and getting to be so useful to put down _Republicanism_ in South Carolina, perhaps our verdant President, in his "_surprise_,"
may break the shackles with which he was voluntarily bound, and use "federal bayonets" to put down _rebellion_. At all events, he ought to obey the United States Const.i.tution he has sworn to support, which tells him he "shall guarantee to every State in the Union a republican form of government." If he hasn't given away all his "federal bayonets"
to the rebels, is it not about time for our commander-in-chief to use them in South Carolina? (See Principia Club Papers No. 7, pp. 152-5: The Southern Policy.)
[Special Despatch to the Boston Traveller.]
Washington, D. C., Oct. 18.--The President has taken steps, through the proper officers, to have the outrage perpetrated at Sumter, South Carolina, investigated, with a view of ascertaining who is responsible, and whether or not there has not been an open violation of the United States laws.
District-Attorney Northrup has the case in charge, and will, said a member of the Cabinet to your correspondent to-day, make an energetic investigation of the outrage and report the facts promptly. There is no reason to doubt that he will do his whole duty and make a fearless investigation of the affair, which, according to the Democratic account, was brutal in the extreme. The Administration, said the Cabinet Minister further, will see that the rights of the colored people in South Carolina are maintained, and to this end will, if necessary, go to the full extent of the United States laws.
We may be too faithless in this matter, we hope we are, but when "investigations" shall result in the _punishment of criminals_, instead of their protection from further molestation, we may have more confidence that justice will triumph in rebeldom.
VIRGINIA COMES NEXT.
"President Hayes, who is attending an agricultural fair at Winchester, Virginia, made a hard money speech yesterday, and quoted Washington, Jefferson, Madison, and other distinguished Virginians in favor of sound money."--_Traveller, Oct. 17_.
While the President was making stump speeches in Winchester, in the direct line of civil service reform, as he understands it we suppose, the shot-gun brigade were at Hicksford demonstrating the fruits of his Southern policy. The "Traveller" states this case in the following strain of sarcasm.
A "saucy" negro was shot at Hicksford, Virginia, yesterday. It was a political meeting, of course. A Republican was speaking, and the negro had the audacity to applaud his sentiments. This was in the Court House.
A leader of the Democracy named Reese, not wishing to soil the temple of justice with blood, called the negro out of the building and promptly shot him dead. There were four hundred colored men present and this shooting will be a lesson for them. They will now know better than to applaud Republican speakers, or vote a Republican ticket.
CONCLUSION.
We have thus spread out the present condition of the freedmen, before the American people. It is a plain case for the former, and not a hard one for the latter.
The whole question of emigration, as it now stands, lies in three propositions, one of which every freedman _must_ choose.
1. He must remain, as he is, under the political trinity of despotism; be denied the free ballot, conferred upon him by the amendments to the United States Const.i.tution; be forced to vote for the despotism that crushes him, already deserted by the government he fought to save, and which is const.i.tutionally bound to protect him in his political rights and Christian privileges; or,
2. He must, _vi et armis_, maintain those rights against rebel despotism, with the "Federal bayonets" in rebel hands, and the power to send the army to the Indians or the devil; or,
3. He must, _quietly_, if he can, _forcibly_, if he must, emigrate to the public lands in the West, pre-empt a farm, and enjoy the rights of citizenship under a republican form of government, of which he is an integral part, and be represented in Congress by one elected by a majority of legal voters, and not by a minority of rebels, as is now the case in large Republican districts in the Southern States.
For obvious reasons, we pray the freedmen, in Christ's stead, to be reconciled to the last proposition, and in every county and town where their political rights are ignored by a rebel Democracy, let them form colonies under a chosen leader and emigrate West. If they cannot go without a.s.sistance, let that fact be communicated to us, and we will appeal to the people of the North to furnish them the means to do so.
It will be readily perceived that the converse of all this will be, that the landed aristocracy of the South must pay their laborers honest wages, recognize their const.i.tutional rights as citizens of this Republic, acknowledge the ownership of their capital, which means the fruits of their labor (land and labor being co-operative capital, neither being available or profitable without the other), or, otherwise, the land-owners must submit to the loss of their laborers by emigration, perform their own labor, or employ foreign emigrants.