Part 9 (2/2)
Ours were not. I am before the people at the urgent request of many friends; not by any nomination made at Jackson.
I heartily approve of the action of the convention. But this action will be useless unless the legislature you elect meet and build the structure upon the foundation laid by the convention. The convention did not abolish slavery. The result of four and a half years of struggle determined whether it was abolished by the bayonet or by legislation. It remains for you to show by your action whether this was done to rid the State of bayonets, or to obtain your representation in Was.h.i.+ngton. It is not enough to say the negro is free. The convention requires the legislature to adopt such laws as will protect the negro in his rights of person and property.
We are not willing that the negro shall testify in our courts. We all revolt at it, and it is natural that we should do so; but we must allow it as one of the requisites of our admission to our original standing in the Union. To-day the negro is as competent a witness in our State as the white man, made so by the action of the convention. The credibility of the witness is to be determined by the jurors and justices. If you refuse his testimony, as is being done, the result will be the military courts and Freedmen's Bureau will take it up, and jurisdiction is lost, and those who best know the negro will be denied the privilege of pa.s.sing judgment upon it, and those who know him least are often more in favor of his testimony than yours. I am opposed to negro testimony, but by the const.i.tution it is admitted. (The speaker was here interrupted by an inquiry by one of the audience: ”Has this const.i.tution been ratified by the people, and has the old const.i.tution been abolished?” To which Mr. Evans replied: The people did not have an opportunity to ratify it. The convention did not see fit to submit it to them, and its action in the matter is final.)
Slavery was destroyed eternally before the convention met, by the last four years of struggle. The convention only indorsed it, because it could do nothing else. I consider that convention the most important ever held on this continent--the determination of the war pending upon its action, and its great influence upon our southern sister States. The unanimity of the convention was unparalleled: the result of which has met with universal approval.
The only objectors to its action is the radicalism of the north, which thinks it should have conferred universal suffrage on the freedmen.
It is useless to send any one to Was.h.i.+ngton to gain admission to the Congress of the United States unless the legislature carries out the dictations of the convention for the protection of the freedmen's rights and property, and let them have access to the courts of justice.
Do you not desire to get rid of the Freedmen's Bureau and the bayonets and meet the President half way in his policy of reconstruction? If you do, be careful and send men to the legislature who will carry out this point, and thereby enable your congressmen to obtain their seats, and not have to return.
The speaker was here again interrupted by Mr. John Vallandigham, who wished to inform the gentleman and all present that there were no secessionists now.
(The speaker requested not to be interrupted again.) [Great applause.] I am no demagogue. Supposing you fail to meet the President in his policy, what will be the result? The convention has done its duty. It remains for you to elect men to the next legislature who will secure to the freedman his right. There are large republican majorities in the United States Congress. The northern press, denouncing the President's policy, are a.s.suming that Congress has the right to dictate to you who shall be your rulers. The result of the large majorities will be to give the right of suffrage to every man in the State, and the negroes will elect officers to govern you.
The President and the conservative element of the north are determined that the negro shall be placed where nature places him, in spite of the fanatics.
We can only make free labor profitable by giving the negro justice and a right at the courts.
It is hard to accept the fact that our slaves stand as freedmen, and that we have no more right to direct them. It is hard to realize, but let us look at it as it is, and act accordingly.
Your country is laid desolate, your farms have been ravished and impoverished by the war. Vicksburg, the city of hills, everywhere bears marks of war. The Mississippi valley is desolate. You have been deprived of your property in the negro, your houses burned and destroyed.
We can meet the President and the conservative element of the north by a simple act of legislation, and it becomes us as a country-loving people to look well to the candidates for the legislature. If they fail to take the necessary step, the result will be that the Freedmen's Bureau and bayonets will remain with us until they do.
Although somewhat ignorant of the proceeding of the federal Congress, if elected I shall try to promote the especial interests of this State. I shall urge that the United States government owe it as a duty to the State of Mississippi to repair her levees; her people are so impoverished by the war that they cannot stand the taxation necessary to rebuild them. I believe it to be the duty of the general government to appropriate money to a.s.sist the people to improve their railroads, rivers, and a.s.sist in like new enterprises.
Another important question, that of labor, I believe can only be settled by legislation. I believe it to be for the interests of the people of the south to have the vagrant freedmen removed, as they are the cause of continued strife and tumult.
I am sure we do not want the scenes of St. Domingo and Hayti repeated in our midst. I believe such will be the case if they are not removed. If elected, I shall urge upon the general government the duty of colonizing the negroes; it being the duty of the government to do this, as we are deprived of that amount of property, and the negroes should be removed where they can be distinct and by themselves. It is impossible for the two cla.s.ses to exist equal together, for we would always be liable to outbreaks and bloodshed. We must either educate them or abolish them, for they know but little more now than to lie all day in the sun and think some one will look out for them. Though free, they cannot yet understand what freedom is, and in many cases it is an injury rather than a benefit.
It would be better to have white labor than to try and retain the black.
Another important point--a great debt has been contracted by the federal government. The south cannot pay a proportion of that debt. I am opposed to repudiation, but am in favor of relieving the south of the internal revenue tax.
My opponent, Mr. West, contends that Mississippi must pay her taxes up to 1865. I do not think so; and this is the only issue between us. I deny that the government has a right to levy such a tax, and contend that the government cannot impose a tax upon a State unless that State partic.i.p.ates in the acc.u.mulation of that debt. At the time this debt was contracted we were recognized as belligerents, and not liable to a share of the debt then contracted for. That back tax can only be collected by a special act of Congress, and, if elected, I shall oppose any such act.
Mr. West proposed an amendment in favor of secession into the State senate, while I was opposed to it. I always contended that slavery would die with secession, while Mr. West said it was the only remedy. But I do not consider this any time to talk of secession, but rather bury all such in oblivion, and talk of the best way to restore peace.
In many instances those who opposed secession the most were the first to enter the army and fight most valiantly. (Applause.) I believe it to be our duty to forget all this and attend to present issues.
It is time the war was over, and it is time that the results of the war were settled, and those are to be settled by the actions of the people themselves.
Determine for yourselves whether or not the President does not offer terms that should suit any of us; is he not trying to stay the tide of fanaticism at the north that would overwhelm us? Has he not shown it in our own State in the appointment of our military governor? No man in the State could have been appointed to give more general satisfaction than W.L. Sharkey, an able, straightforward, just man.
The President, in his speech to the southern delegation, a.s.sures them that he is determined to stay the tremendous tide of the fanatics of the north, and that suffrage to the negro shall not be forced upon the people of the south.
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