Shadow and Light: An Autobiography with Reminiscences of the Last and Present CenturyGibbs, Mifflin Wistar
History
Shadow and Light: An Autobiography with Reminiscences of the Last and Present Century
Gibbs, Mifflin Wistar
African Americans
Born in Kentucky--A Colonel in the Union Army--Candidate for
Vice-President of the United States--One of the Foremost Authorities on
Constitutional Law--Learned and Impartial.]
For the law-abiding citizens of these Commonwealths we have this other,
the second section of the same article: "When the right to vote at any
election for the choice of electors for President or Vice-President of
the United States, Representatives in Congress, the executive or
judicial officers of a State, or the members of the legislature thereof,
is denied to any one of the male inhabitants of such State being
twenty-one years of age and a citizen of the United States, or in any
way abridged, except for participation in rebellion or other crimes, the
basis of representation thereon shall be reduced in the proportion which
the number of such male citizens shall bear to the whole number of male
citizens twenty-one years of age in such State."
If, as avowed, that it is for the welfare of such Southern States that
they desire to banish the Negro from politics, can welfare be promoted
or national integrity sustained by such rank injustice, as their Members
of Congress occupying seats therein, or having representation in the
electoral college based upon an apportionment in which the Negro
numerically is so prominent a factor, and in the exercise of rights
pertaining thereto, he is a nonentity.
"The Baptist Watchman" takes this unassailable position of this misrule:
"Ex-Governor Northen, of Georgia, in his address before the
Congregational Club the other evening, declared that the status of the
black race in the South was that of permanent dependence upon the white
race. The central point of his contention is that capacity to rule
confers the right to rule. The white man can give the black man a better
government that he can give himself; therefore, the black man should be
glad to receive the blessing at the hands of the white man. For our
part, we believe that, whatever specious defense on the ground of
philanthropy, civilization and religion may be made for this position,
it is radically repugnant to the genius of American institutions. If the
men of the nation who are best qualified to rule have a right to rule,
they themselves being the judge of their qualifications, England or
Russia would be justified in attempting to impose their sovereignty on
the United States, if they thought they could give us a better
government than we are apt to give ourselves. Unless the doctrine is
vigorously maintained that governments 'derive their just powers from
the consent of the governed,' and not from the conceit of an aristocracy
as to its own capacity, then we of the North will not find it easy to
protest effectively against the disfranchisement of the Southern
Negroes."
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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