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(Erftrtti) American
AUGUSTA, GA., JA!I
‘ MR. THOMAB P. BEARD
Will be general agent and editor oi
the “Colored AniericSnduring my ab
•ence from the city. He is fully author
ised to transact Ml business connected
with the paper.
J. T. Shuftex.
TO OUR SUBSCRIBERS.
Unforseen difficulties hate compelled
us to suspend tbe publication of the
‘Colored American’ for the present
But in order to fulfill our obligations to
our patrons, we have made arrangements
for them to be supplied with a New Pa
per entitled the COLORED GEOR
GIAN, the first number of which will
be delivered 4 on next Saturday Morning,
to all the subscribers of this paper.
* Thomas P. Beard,
Authorized Agent
EQUALITY.
SOCIAL AND POLITICAL.
In our last issue we considered the
question: ‘What is Social Equality?’
If, in defining that question, as we found
it, by the every day practice of the white
man, we gave utterance to language which
might have offended the finer feelings of
the guilty, we plead in extenuation of our
Conduct, that we could not help it— truth
would out. If it has done its mission bj
condemning the guilty and exonerating
the innocent, it has accomplished the
work which we intended it to perform.
Truth, plainly spoken, although it is
given in language not altogether pleasant
to the ear, ought never to produce of
fence ; but to the contrary, it ought to
arouse the mind to a proper sense of tbe
sin, and endeavor to atone to the best of
its ability for the wrong committed, and
we hope this will be the result of our last
honest and outspoken homethrust.
We shall now consider the other ques
tion under the above head, namely:
* What is Political Equality ? ’
If all men acted upon the great funda
mental law of equality, by ‘ doing unto
others as they wculd have others de unto
them/ there would be no need- for gov
ernments and law makers, and conse
quently we would not Know wnat politics'
meant. But tbe fact that men will not
do this is the reason that we must govern
and be governed, and that fact gives birth
to a thousand and one difficulties and
troubles which otherwise would not exist
if they would all act upon the law’s
simple mandates. Somebody, however,
must make laws, and somebody has the
right to say who that privileged some
body shall be. Now if these laws are to
be Catholic, or universal in their nature
and operations, it would only be just and
reasonable to suppose that all would have
a right to judge and to consent who it
shall be that shall make and administer
those laws, but this is far from being the
case. When we take into consideration,
the number of those who have. and those
who have not that right, we will find that
the latter is vastly in the majority. Now
the question arises, Why is this ? There
must be reasons for this, and good ones
also, for it is almost universal in its work
ing. We presume they are both nume
rous and sufficient, but whether they are
or not, it would only be wasting words
—on our side—to find fault with them,
for they are the s?me in every well gov
erned country, apd consequently must be
just and reasonable. But it may not be
uninteresting to know who these are which
are thus excluded, and the reasons fqr
their exclusion, for it may afford us some
definite idea of the justice of the reasons
given for the exclusion of the colored man
along with them. Tbe first of these is
the Foreigner. He is excluded from
participating in the choice of law-makers,
first, because he is not native born, se
cond, because not being native born, he is
ignorant of our institutions of govern
ment, and must understand them before
he can participate in them; and third he
is excluded, as a precaution, for the safe*
ty of the country. There is another
reason which might be given, and that is,
in nearly every case he is ignorant of
our language. Every one is willing to
acknowledge that these reasons are right
■oa proper, anu vumoienv SO eXGIUaO ufm
from immediate participation in thechoice
of rulers. The second class which is
excluded are children and adult minors.
They are excluded because of the want
of sufficient self-control and undeveloped
ideas. They are native born and under*
stand our language, and, m not a few
cases, our institutions of government also,
but they have not arrived at the yeart
of discretion which admits of firmness of
decision in the most important affairs of
life. Hence they are declared unfit by
all nations, to participate in the ballot
box.
The third class which are excluded
are women. They are excluded from the
simple reason that they are, or ought to
be a part of man, and that their sphere is
anywhere but in the arena of politics and
governments. ‘ The Head of the Woman
is the man/ says the Scriptures, and all
civilized nations have accepted that posi
tion, and keeps her, as they ought to keep
her, away, and free from the tumult of
politics.
Thus there are three classes excluded
from participating in the choice of rulers
and law makers, although these three
classes have to bow to the mandates of
those whom they never authorised to
make them; yet the reasons for their ex
clusion are accepted by themselves and
all others as being both good and suffici
ent. Now, those same reasons are used
by a certain class in order to effect the
exclusion of the colored man from parti
cipating in these same benefits. The late
slaveh dder and his Northern friends de
clare that colored men are totally unfit
for enjoying the privilege of saying who
shall judge them and make laws for their
obedience, because they have been slaves.
Let us see if this objection is a reasonable
one. The fact of them being slaves un*
doubtedly declares that they are igno
ravt, because they were not allowed to
read and write, and on account of this
deficiency in mental culture, they stand
in precisely the same relation to suffrage
as the Foreigner does. But is there not
a number—and an immense number they
do make—who have this much valued
vf Winy Bti»n gUVUrtT
them, but who are as far behind, in point
of intellectual development, as the late
slaves are? How many thousands are there
of enfranchised white voters who know
no more about the qualifications of a
candidate for office, but what they gather
from word of mouth and in the
debate of the barroom. They cannot
read a word for themselves, and, in con
sequence, are totally unable to form an
independent opinion of the great questions
of the day, or who is T»r is not the proper
parties to place in office to work out thef e
questions. Their ignorance makes them
become the willing tools of the stump
demagogue and the dupes of the
plausible retoric of the political ora
tor, so that the man with the sweet*
est tongue and the smoothest *■ bun
kum ’ captivates their ears and also their
votes. Yet they are hauled to the polls
and compelled to vote because they have
white skins on their bodies. The South
ern planter, or the moncyocracy of the
country, has no fears of their ignorance;
to the contrary, they want them to re
main in that condition so that they can
bend them all the more easily to their
whims and wishes. But they raise a
terrific howl when bare mention is made
pf elevating a colored man to tnat posi
tion. Because he is ignorant cannot be
the basis of their objections, so long as
they Lave the same amount of ignorance
among themselves. Their only ground
for objections must lie in the fact that he
has a black skin, and if this is really all
the foundation which their objections
rest upon, it must appear, in the eyes of
every man of common sense, prejudice,
and prejudice alone that gives birth to
these objections. The colored man is
native born, and thus far he is ahead of
ths Foreigner, and if he is ignorant, he is
not so ignorant as him, for the language
of the country is bis mother tongue, and
mother wit is perhaps as largely develop
ed in his brain, as in the brain of any
other man taking into bonsyieration
meat.
necessary
the ballot box 0n account of danger to
the county byam jvMfe
the case of the Foreigner, for he knows
do party but these h< was born and
raisec among, andllF knows no country
but bis native country, so that there is
no rasemblanee between him’and the
Foreigner inn sufferage point of view, in
any single instance. But he knows be is
ignorant, and on th a 1 account ho is per
tly willing to accept education and
mental development as the basis upon
which he is to approach the polls of his
country, provided, the same is applied to
the white man also. But reason and
justice demands impartiality in this toat
ter, and until this is done, selfishness and
injustice will characterize ail attempts of
the white man to exclude him from par
ticipating irUhe ballot box. As political
equality is, to a great extent, based upon
commercial equality, and as commercial
equality is universally accorded - to evpty
man irrespective of color, we cannot see
any just reason for making such a marked
discrimination when the former is in
point
But waiving all objections, both pro
and am f we are of the opinion that it
will be the interest of the whites, especi*
ally his former owners, to extend political
equality to the colored man. He is now
a free man, and as a free man he has the
right to acquire wealth as the product of
his honest labor, and with that wealth he
has the inalienable right to dispose of it
as be may think proper. Now, one thing
is certain, he is not to permit that wealth
to find its way into the bands of bis
enemies; those who would hold him sub
ject to their will and pleasure. The
population of this S f ate, is almost, if not
actually so, man to man; the white and
black making a population of one million.
Now, in the course of a pear, these five
hundred thousand colored people will
spend an immense amount of moneythe
sum may be comparatively small at the
present time, for they are newly out of
a bondage which did not remunerate them
IwifWf’f,. li w * —wilt IritniMwn HW
the years of their freedom increase, and
as a natural consequence, they will spend
it more profusely. Bn l let us take it at
an estimate of twenty million dolla s per
year as the amount earned by these five
hundred thousand—and this is far below
what it actually will be. Out of that sum
there will be spent ten of those millions.
Now, here is a power (for ‘ money is
power,’ and that a great one) we are con
fident our far seeing white financiers will
not despise. This amount of money—
and millions more than that—will find
its way into the coffers of commercial men,
but only into the coffers of certain com
mercial men,, and these will be, the true
friends of the colored race, for their de*
termination is—and we speak advisedly
in this matter—that not one cent shall
find its way iuto the pockets of their ene
mies. White men may laugh to scorn
this idea, but it is a practical one, as every
business man knows, and will most as
suredly be carried out—then * let those
laugh who win. 1 It is but right and
just on our part to aid him who
aids us in procuring our rights, which
he is satisfied ip his own mind we
are entitled to, and he will be sup*
ported by our weans in so far as lids in
our power. We believe there is a good
deal of truth in the old saw which says
that ‘ there is more power in the pocket
then in the priest/ for we see it daily
demonstrated in our midst Money is
the &reat lever of society, no matter under
what government the society may exist J
and just as the purse strings are tied or
untied in a particular direction, all
things can be procured. We are not
ignorant of this, by any means, and our
cry in. future shall be, Millions to our
friendly but nd one cent to our foot;
and ww shall await patiently the result. .
A poor woman in Nashville, 54 years
old, was turned out of her tenement on
Thanksgiving night, because of her mar
bility to pay tbp rent. The next monk
ing she was found dead among the debris
of her household goods.
SOI THE COM
ON
EDMEN. . |
ft of the Commia
r the Legislature of
a code of laws, to
frith the exception of
,W 0 or three opinion) unjust
ar rides, we are much inclined to approve
of them. But, why require a special
code of laws to regulate them, more than
to rrgulate any other branch of society F
Are their criminals worse than white
criminals, and is virtue among them less
in substance, than among white society,
which demands a new system of laws to
punish Or reward, as the ease may be ?
If a freedman is guilty of thieft, is ,he a
worie thief than a white man guilty of
the same crime ? If he is caught at house
breaking, or horse stealing, or commit*
ting any depredation on property, ojher
than his own lawful possession, does the
fact that he is a freeman make the guilt
the more glaring, or the crime the more
despicable ? Or if he is to be rewarded
for doing right, is his measure of right,
less than that of a white man who does
the same? If not so, then what in the
name of sense is the use of spoiling good
pens and paper compiling laws and regu
lations to guide him, wher. there are laws
and' regulations already in existence,
which reach his case exactly ? If he is
free, let him be free in good faith. Do
not take the shackles off his bands to
bind them on his feet, but let him stand
on the broad basis of bis freedom and
manhood. You cannot tell what he is,
nor what he will do, unless you trust
him, and you cannot but know and feel,
that he never betrayed that trust before.
He is not going to do so now If be
stood to you as you now stand to him,
and be was to enact a special code of
laws to regulate ‘your conduct, while
there was in existence a code amply suffi
cient for that purpose, would you not
grumble and growel about it ? Aye 1 there
would not be paper enough, nor printers
enough in the land to publish your re*
monstrances against such an inovation of
the rights pf W>y not do to
him as you would have him to do to you,
if you were so situated ?
The fact that a special code of lays
is prepared for freedmen, is a proof that
a crime committed by a freedman is
greater in point of importance, than if it
was committed by a freeman or a white
and that existing laws, which would
re ch the white’s case, could not possibly
reach the black’s. Is not this virtually
declaring that slavery, though dead in
name, is yet alive and as rampant as ever,
and that the constitutional amendment
is a declaration bf rank bypocracy before
High Heaven,! a seal of a nation’s per
jury. You may deny them the right ot
suffrage—they -are not fighting so hard
for that at present—but beyond that
there is no law, necessary to be enacted
to govern them, but what can be found
on the statute books of the state to day.
The white’s criminal laws will do for
them; the whites’ testimony laws will do
for them, the whites’ labor and contract
laws will do for them; and the whites’
marriage and legitimacy laws will do for
them. Is there necessity for other than
these ? Reason and justice does not think
so, and it will be well for our law makers
to remember that others have as been a
sense of reason and justice as they have.
Makenao class laws, or you sap the very
foundation of the superstructure of re
publicanism. Better ten thousand times
banish that class by an act of eviction
than make one-sided laws for them, and
have the knowing of the worm of eon -
science continually reminding you that
wrong is stamped upon your wisdom.
Parade of the Colored Fireman.—
On Monday afternoon last the following
companies composing the colored portion
of the Savannah Fire Department, had a
New Year parade. Warren No 1, Pul*
aski No 2, Pulaski Branch Hose Cart
No 2, Franklin No 3, Wright No 11,
Tomocbiohi No 7. The procession was
under the charge of Foreman Jordan, of
Pulaski No 2—Chief Marshal, Charles
Ripley. The pr occasion was conducted
in a very orderly meaner, and the deport*
common*
■' • j
i * «, i S’ ? G.-iir,'’..’-4* i- ■ f **■ *
MI80B1XANROV&
In (WMWquence of the Legislature of
Tennessee having refused to admit negro
ifi the mvil emrte, Get. m,
Meistant commissioner of the Freedmen’.
Bureau for that State, has issued aa er*
dor which provides for special courts,
under bis superinteadenee, to hoar coms
id which negroes are interested.
A man in Maine lost a cow last wook
without any apparent disease: baton ex
amination after her death discovered the
cause—a piece of hoop-skirt steel-spring,
about two* inches in length, which the
cow had swallowed, and not being able to
digest it, had worked through the stom
ach, and had just penetrated the heart,
causing instant death.
It is noted as a peculiar fact that three
of the prominent members of the Re
publican party have died, within a.brief
space of time, while indulging in pleasur
able recreation. Joshua R. Gddings
fell by the side of a billiard-table; Presi
dent Lincoln died in a theatre, and Mr.
Corwin was stricken down . nile enliven
ing the festivities of an evening with
jokes.
i Cuba.-—The population of this beauti
i ful island at the last census was a little
over a million. The area embraced by
it and its dependencies is 47,278 square
miles. The great staples are sugar,
coffee and tobacco; and the annual value
of the products of the plantations is esti
mated at $60,000,000, although only
about one twentieth of the island is in
cultivation. The annual revenues of the
Government amount to something like
$13,000,000. There are 1,442 sugar
estates, 1,818 coffee estates, 912 tobacco
estates and about 10,000 grazing farms.
•
Our neighbor, the Journal and Mes
senger, gets off the fallowing:
A Crawford County correspondent
sends us the following with (indisputable
evidence that the statement is literally
true: *
Died, on the 24th of November last,
at the residence of Mrs. Eubanks, in
Crawfbrd County, Mrs. Lucretia Em
fitiger, aged forty-nine years and eight
months. Mrs. E. was a most excellent
woman and exemplary Christian. For
ten years she labored under dropsy of the
abdomen, a d was, during that time, tap-,
ped one hundred andfour times, and the
erormous amount of eight hundred and
sixty- wo gallons of Water drawn off.
During her protracted suffering she was
ever patient and generally cheerful.
A good story is told of Gen. Steadman,
now in command of the Department of
Georgia;
A railroad contractor came to him one
day and asked fora military force to com
pel the negroes to work in repairiug the
line from Savanuah to Augusta.
‘They won’t work,’ he said.
‘How much do you pay them?’ asked
the General, who has been a railroad and
canal contractor from bis boyhood up.
‘Ten dollars.’
•The Devil I’ said Steadman, ‘you go,
and give ’em thirty, and see whether
they’ll work then. 1 never gave a man
less than 87j cents a day in my life. J
think 1 could get a brigade at that price
here. You go and try it I’
He went 1 Berwick. •
The other evening, at Bloomington*
Illinois, the daughter of Mr. Peter Whits,
mer, accidentally pushed a kerosene lamp
from the table where she was reading,
and as it broke it set fire to the oil, &c
Mr. W. instantly smothered the fire with
shawls, pillows, &c., thinking he had a
narrow e. cape ffom conflagration. To
his surprise, in a few minutes he heard %
fire behind the plastering of the wall,
roaring like a chimney. Some of the
liquid fire had crept through a creviee in
the floor, not over a twentieth of an inch
wide, and ignited the woodwork in the
ceiling He it through, put out
the lower part of the fire, and was then
obliged to break through from the ouU
side, /md also in the second story, before
he could save the house. It is one of
the most singular cases we have ever
heard of, and shows the great danger of
kerosene oil.
Recently, the wife of John Cranford,
slater, Ewe and Lamb Close, Damfries,
Scotland, gave birth to a son j who ex*
hibits the rare, if not unprecedented,
peculiarity of having three tongue*. We
saw the child, and found it to be seeming
ly in excellent health, of full sixe, and in
other respects well formed. The middle
tongue is the largest of the three; it ia
rounded at the top, and is fastened to the
lower part of the palate in such a way as
to prevent the child sucking readily.
Each of the tongues is separated from the
other, and those on each side do not ap*
pear to cause the infant much ineon*
veuienca. The curious malformation
does not, so for as appearance goes, res <
suit from any disease. The child has
been seen by several physicians, and they
are of opinion it would be advisable, after
he is a little older to liberate the middle
■tongue from the palate by an operation.
Meanwhile the infant is suckled by weana
of a hMtU