ill needed the fostering care and the protecting hand of
the paternal source of its existence.

When the smoke of the political battle that was fought in the early part
of November, 1874, had cleared away, it was found that this strong,
vigorous and healthy parent had been carried from the battle-field
seriously wounded and unable to administer to the wants of its Southern
offspring. The offspring was not strong enough to stand alone. The
result was that its demise soon followed because it had been deprived of
that nourishment, that sustenance and that support which were essential
to its existence and which could come only from the parent which had
been seriously if not fatally wounded upon the field of battle. After
the Presidential election of 1872 Southern white men were not only
coming into the Republican party in large numbers, but the liberal and
progressive element of the Democracy was in the ascendency in that
organization. That element, therefore, shaped the policy and declared
the principles for which that organization stood. This meant the
acceptance by all political parties of what was regarded as the settled
policy of the National Government. In proof of this assertion a
quotation from a political editorial which appeared about that time in
the Jackson, Mississippi, _Clarion_,--the organ of the Democratic
party,--will not be out of place. In speaking of the colored people and
their attitude towards the whites, that able and influential paper said:

"While they [the colored people] have been naturally tenacious of their
newly-acquired privileges, their general conduct will bear them witness
that they have shown consideration for the feelings of the whites. The
race line in politics would never have been drawn if opposition had not
been made to their enjoyment of equal privileges in the government and
under the laws after they were emancipated."

In other words, the colored people had manifested no disposition to rule
or dominate the whites, and the only color line which had existed grew
out of the unwise policy which had previously been pursued by the
Democratic party in its efforts to prevent the enjoyment by the
newly-emancipated race of the rights and privileges to which they were
entitled under the Constitution and laws of the country. But after the
State and Congressional elections of 1874 the situation was materially
changed. The liberal and conservative element of the Democracy was
relegated to the