The Oppressed Race

The Oppressed Race

A report on the 1874 Alabama State Convention of Colored Men held in Montgomery published in the Bangor Daily Whig and Courier (December 14, 1874)

From Gale. 19th Century U.S. Newspapers. ©2008 Gale, a part of Cengage Learning, Inc. Reproduced by permission. www.cengage.com/permissions

Bangor Daily Whig and Courier

1874-12-14

Newspaper article

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Whig & Courier. Boutelle & Burr, Proprietors C. A. Boutelle, Editor. All business letters should be addressed to Boutelle & Burr, and communications intended for publication should be addressed: "Editor of Whig and Courier." Monday, December 14, 1874.

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THE OPPRESSED RACE. The address of the Colored Convention recently assembled at Montgomery, Alabama, to the "People of the United States north of Mason and Dixon's line," is a well written and apparently candid paper. Preceding it, the New York Republic makes this statement: "One of our resident correspondents in Alabama, in forwarding this address, uses the following language: "The feeling against the Republicans is so strong in Alabama, now that the Democracy is victorious, that I find it all my life is worth to remain in the State much longer. I must leave here.'" " Few of the negroes of Alabama knew that they had been made free until after the surrender of the rebel armies. That is, not until two years after the promulgation of the emancipation proclamation of President Lincoln. At that time the time slaves being, in the words of the address, "in as degraded a condition as it was possible for human beings to be lowered to," they were suddenly bidden to rise to the stature and conduct of free men. The freedman had then to be taught civilization as it was understood at the north. At once the State of Alabama, by its Legislature, passed various laws which practically reduced the negroes to a state of slavery. The ex-slaveholder believed, and taught his children to believe, that the slaves had been stolen from him by a superior power, an enemy all-powerful. Every white man and every negro who would improve the condition of the negro, was and is held as an alien enemy. To oppose this the freedman had only his ballot, which he hardly knew how to use, and in casting which he was often cheated by the ex-slaveholder.

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Leagues were formed by the native whites to prevent negroes from voting; to prevent their acquiring an education; to rescue any member of the league who should be arrested. The ex-slaveholders owned the land; controlled the public press; held the majority of the judicial and administrative offices, all the powers of which were directed against the colored people. The ex-slaves have performed the work of producing the crops, yet not more than two per cent. of those laborers have had either clothes enough to wear, or food which a northern laborer would eat. Within the last two years hundreds of negroes have been murdered, and thousands driven from their homes, without being permitted to take their own personal property.

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The persistency of the Democratic journals in denying these outrages cannot have deceived many intelligent persons who note what is actually transpiring in the South from day to day. For obvious reasons in the intimidation and assassination were specially rampant just prior to the elections, when it was the policy of the whites to inspire the negroes with such dread as would keep them away from the polls. The passing of a single week without the perpetration of an extensive massacre was deemed by the opposition press an ample excuse for ignoring the horrors of Coushatta and Gibson County, and a studied effort was made to convince the public, in despite of the bloody record of the past nine years, that the reports of "outrages" were all fabrications, and that the White Leaguers of the South were the chivalrous protectors and the best friends of the colored race. In the

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midst of this jeering at "outrages," and this proclamation of the new protectorate of colored rights, the true condition of affairs is again made manifest by the horrible slaughter at Vicksburg. The treatment of this case by the White League sympathizers who send despatches from the South is in keeping with the sympathetic misrepresentation of events in that section since the war. Our first reports announced an unprovoked attack by immense bodies of armed negroes upon the terrified white citizens of Vicksburg, with the intention of capturing the city. A little later it appeared that blood had been shed, and the sympathies of the law abiding North were excited by the condition of a quiet populace [/unclear] threatened by an infuriated negro mob.

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Later still we were informed that a number of colored men had managed to get killed, but the losses of the pacific whites were not stated. Gradually it transpired that seventy-five colored men had been shot down, while only one white man was killed and a few wounded. And finally we are told that three white men were killed, while the colored victims will number no less than one hundred and fifty and that "forty-eight were buried in one [unclear]field [/unclear]Thursday!" Have any of our readers ever tried to imagine the appaling spectacle presented by one hundred and fifty corpses, strewn over the ground as the victims of a bloodthirsty hatred? Such a spectacle was presented only last week in the vicinity of a Southern city, which was the the scene of one of the most important triumphs of the Union Army, and in that section of the country where the Democratic organs would have us believe that the rights of the colored man are most scrupulously respected.

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From a consideration of all the statements we are enabled to present the following parallel: Suppose that a large number of the citizens of Bangor should inform the Sheriff of this County that he had better resign; that he should hesitate a little and that thereupon five hundred or more men with as many hundred pistols about their clothing should quietly intimate that he had better obey the request; that he should go home to his dinner without transacting any business and on his return should be seized and thrust in jail by a mob; that the news getting abroad a large number of citizens of the suburbs should flock toward the city by the different roads, many of them from curiosity and few of them armed; that the Mayor should issue a proclamation to the citizens of Bangor and that they should at once organize with full equipments and falling upon on the different parties of suburbans proceed to shoot them down indiscriminately until one hundred and fifty dead bodies were stretched along the roads. Supposing these things will give a tolerable idea of how they seem to have preserved law and order in Vicksburg.

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The merits of the Sheriff controversy have nothing to do with the matter, as that officer's tenure was subject to law and not to the dictum of the mob. This most recent wholesale butchery affords an example of the condition of the colored people in the South to-day.

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At the convention to which we have referred forty counties were duly represented, and an Emigrant Association was formed. But it was conceded that in order to emigrate they must have aid from the North. The question is thus presented whether these people, constitutionally declared citizens of our country, shall be protected by the Government or be assisted by the people of the North to find a home and safety beyond the reach of their vindictive oppressors. Certainly the people of this country will not consent to the extermination of a peaceful and industrious race, but the facts must be squarely recognized. It is the duty of the National Government to guarantee to every State "a republican form of government" which shall be such in fact as well as in name. In seeking to perform this duty it is met by the cry of "Home Rule" and embarrassments of a serious nature are presented on every hand. The colored man is a citizen and is entitled

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to protection in all his rights, but thus far the very lives and liberties of that race have been in constant peril. When a hundred and fifty citizens of this country are slaughtered in a single raid, it will not answer to evade the issue presented. It is the old issue of State Rights in a bloodier and more threatening form, and notwithstanding the repeated assurance that the results of our national struggle are no longer in controversy, the American people need only to open their eyes to see that they are standing face to face and daily coming into closer contact with the most dangerous of the heresies involved in the rebellion. The final victory is not won by hoisting the national flag over the whole are of the Republic if every American citizen is not yet assured equal protection everywhere beneath its folds.

Montgomery

AL

USA

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1874.AL-12.01.MONT