FREE BOOKS

Author's List




PREV.   NEXT  
|<   115   116   117   118   119   120   121   122   123   124   125   126   127   128   129   130   131   132   133   134   135   136   137   138   139  
140   141   142   143   144   145   146   147   148   149   150   151   152   153   154   155   156   157   158   159   160   161   162   163   164   >>   >|  
Negro voters, instead of standing aloof from them and leaving them to be swayed by a set of _educated men_, many of whom were neither "to the manor born," nor particularly interested in the welfare of the several communities in which they operated. (4) We must never lose sight of the fact that the welfare of the Republic is not resident altogether in the _brains_ of the voters. The _heart_ plays a very conspicuous part in the casting of a pure and salutary ballot. As between a voter possessing a pure, kind and patriotic heart but an uncultivated mind, and another endowed with all the learning of the universities, but swayed by ulterior and unpatriotic designs, one would experience little or no difficulty in making choice of the former, even though clad in a black skin. (5) The fact that a Negro is a "non-property-holding Negro" should not militate against his right to exercise his rights of citizenship; for, many of the most useful and valuable of our voters, of both races, are "non-property-holding" voters. The fact of holding property is frequently predicated on conditions altogether fortuitous--a reverse of the wheel of fortune, a large or expensive family--a drought or flood, as well as many other contingencies all play conspicuous parts in preventing good and true citizens from accumulating property, even to the extent of an humble homestead; while fire, cyclone and flood often reduce a man of great possessions in a day to the conditions of a "non-property-holding" citizen; and did his right to vote depend on his property holding, he would be utterly bereft of it. On the contrary, it is no extraordinary thing to see a man of less than average intelligence endowed with "worldly goods" through a turn of the wheel of fortune or the expansion or contraction of a "margin," where men win or lose all on the casting of a die. It does not seem to have occurred to many of those who are exceedingly anxious to deprive "ignorant and non-property-holding Negroes" of the ballot, that ignorance in a white man is just as vicious as ignorance in any other class of citizens; yet they go on eliminating, by laws of questionable validity, the hard working, wealth producing Negro of the South, while in most instances the ignorant, dilettante and faneant, with a white skin, is not only permitted to vote, but even protected in the exercise of the function. Upon the whole, after mature reflection, an affirmative answer would seem t
PREV.   NEXT  
|<   115   116   117   118   119   120   121   122   123   124   125   126   127   128   129   130   131   132   133   134   135   136   137   138   139  
140   141   142   143   144   145   146   147   148   149   150   151   152   153   154   155   156   157   158   159   160   161   162   163   164   >>   >|  



Top keywords:
property
 

holding

 

voters

 

altogether

 

ignorant

 
endowed
 
ignorance
 

conspicuous

 
casting
 

ballot


fortune

 

swayed

 
citizens
 

conditions

 
welfare
 

exercise

 
average
 
intelligence
 

worldly

 

reduce


possessions

 

cyclone

 

humble

 

homestead

 

citizen

 

contrary

 

extraordinary

 

bereft

 

depend

 

utterly


exceedingly

 
instances
 

dilettante

 

faneant

 

producing

 
wealth
 

questionable

 
validity
 

working

 
permitted

reflection
 

affirmative

 
answer
 
mature
 

protected

 

function

 
eliminating
 

occurred

 
expansion
 

contraction