The extreme similarity of this method of reconstruction to that advocated by the Democracy could not escape attention, and Democrats freely asserted that in his ideas the President was "going over to them." This, while to a certain extent true, for he was always a Democrat in principle, was vigorously denied by Johnson in an interview with Geo. L. Stearns on October 3, 1865. In it he claimed that the Democratic party, finding its own views untenable, was gradually coming to adopt his principles, which he reasserted in the following form: "The States are in the Union, which is one and indivisible. Individuals tried to carry them out, but did not succeed, as a man may try to cut his throat and be prevented by the bystanders; and you can not say he cut his throat because he tried to do it. * * * Now we want to reconstruct the state governments, and have the power to do it. The state institutions are prostrated, laid out on the ground, and they must be taken up and adapted to the progress of events; this cannot be done in a moment. * * * We must not be in too much of a hurry; it is better to let them reconstruct themselves than to force them to do it; for if they go wrong the power is in our hands, and we can check them in any stage, to the end, and oblige them to correct their errors; we must be patient with them. I did not expect to keep out all who were excluded from the amnesty, or even a large number of them; but I intended they should sue for pardon, and so realize the enormity of the crime they had committed." 7. Johnson realized that the sentiment in favor of negro suffrage was gaining great power in the North; and while feeling that pure manhood suffrage was undesirable and totally impracticable, because of the danger of thereby creating a "war of races," which he seemed constantly to fear, he determined to use his influence towards a gradual introduction of the suffrage. He would give the suffrage to negroes who had served in the army, to those who could read and write, and to those owning real estate to the value of two hundred and fifty dollars. He made suggestions of this nature in letters to Governor Starkey of Mississippi, and Governor Hahn of Louisiana.[55] By some such limited suffrage he hoped that the radical element in the North would be satisfied, while there could result no danger to those States in which the negro population predominated.