NORTH CAROLINA. 



585 



unreasonable, with the law still in force that 

 allows the poor to sue in forma pauperis. The 

 dockets of the Superior Courts are also over- 

 crowded. It is necessary either to increase 

 the number of circuits and Judges, or to estab- 

 lish separate courts for the trial of criminal 

 cases. The Judges should hold three courts a 

 year in each county ; but no court should be 

 held, as is now done, in the month of June, 

 the busiest month for agriculturists. A codi- 

 fication of the statutes is demanded. This labor 

 has not been done since the preparation of 

 Battle's revisal. The Governor calls for the es- 

 tablishment of a Board of Pardons. He granted 

 sixteen pardons in 1879, and forty-six in 1880. 

 There have been held for two years past 

 colored industrial fairs, in which much interest 

 has been shown by public-spirited citizens of 

 both races. At the fair held at Raleigh in 

 September, Frederick Douglass, United States 

 Marshal in Washington, who had been the 

 most prominent colored champion of abolition, 

 was present to deliver the oration. Introduced 

 by Governor Jarvis, he expressed surprise and 

 gratification at the evidences he saw of the 

 amicable relations of the two races, and the 

 material progress of the negro race : 



It was well worth coming all the way from Wash- 

 ington, nay, from a much greater distance north, to 

 see what he had seen to-day, to witness the presence 

 in North Carolina of the Chief Executive of your great 

 State coming here and meeting with you, men of the 

 colored race, and holding forth to you in words of 

 truth and soberness^; encouraging and uplifting you 

 from the dust ; giving you a glorious send-off in the 

 direction of knowledge and virtue and excellence. 

 There was no eloquence equal to that which he had 

 just listened to from the lips of the noble Governor, 

 lie should go home and in the North and West would 

 tell what he had seen and heard to day. He would 

 speak it from the platform, spread it from the press. 

 He could not tell how much he had been affected by 

 his experience here to-day. He never expected to 

 hear what he had heard or see what he had seen. 

 Abroad it was supposed that there is a state of warfare 

 between the races aggression on the one hand, op- 

 pression on the other. What he saw and heard con- 

 tradicted the idea plainly, unless he did not possess 

 the ability to see, hear, or comprehend aright. He said 

 that the colored race was emancipated under peculiar 

 conditions, not under the action of cool, deliberate 

 judgment, but in a moment, in the heat of war and 

 passion. The development of the race since was little 

 less than a miracle. Its labor had saved it, and its la- 

 bor was to save it further on. He saw in North Car- 

 olina not the slightest evidence of anything but the 

 kindest treatment of the colored people. He then 

 spoke of the " exodus" in plain words, saying that a 

 colored man had a right, no doubt, to go where and 

 when he pleased, provided he did so at his own expense, 

 without a stampede or calls for help ; but it was folly 

 for a people to leave a land to which they are suited, and 

 where they are at home, to go to a strange place. Here 

 they could often elect a man of their own color to of- 

 fice, but in Indiana or in other Northern and Western 

 States they would be but a drop in a bucket, and 

 voiceless. He declared that a flea in a tar-barrel with- 

 out claws was far better off than a Southern darkey up 

 North without money. The exodus the colored peo- 

 ple want is the exodus from ignorance, vice, and lack 

 of thrift. 



Governor Jarvis comments upon the mutual 

 relations between the white and colored races, 



in referring to these industrial exhibitions, in 

 the following terms: 



The two races are working together in peace and 

 harmony, with increasing respect for each other. The 

 colored population, I am glad to say, arc becoming 

 more industrious and thrifty. Many of them arc prop- 

 erty-owners and tax-payers. They seem to b*t Ivarrj- 

 ing the important lesson that they have nothing to rely 

 upon but their own labor. I have tried, on cverv im- 

 portant occasion, to impress this lesson upon them, and 

 to assure them of the sympathy and hearty coopera- 

 tion of the white race in their efforts to make them- 

 selves good and useful citizens. 



I regard it as an imperative duty, from which the 

 whites can not escape if they would, to see that in all 

 things full and exact justice is done the blacks, and 

 that they are not left alone to work out their own des- 

 tiny. They are entitled, by many binding considera- 

 tions, to receive aid and encouragement from the 

 whites in their effort to be better men and women, and 

 I have no doubt will receive it. 



Of the history of the Swepson embezzlement 

 case, which is still pending in the courts, Gov- 

 ernor Jarvis gives the following account in his 

 biennial message : 



During the administration of Governor Caldwell, 

 an indictment was found in Wake Superior Court 

 against George W. Swepson and M. S. Littlefield for 

 obtaining the bonds of the State under false pretenses. 

 A farce of a trial was had before Judge Watts, and, 

 in the absence of the defendants, he ordered a verdict 

 of " not guilty " to be entered, and the State appealed. 

 The appeal, after being in the Supreme Court a long 

 time, was finally decided against the defendants, dur- 

 ing the administration of Governor Vance, who em- 

 ployed counsel to prosecute the case. This case has 

 twice since been to the Supreme Court on collateral 

 questions, and both times the decisions have been in 

 favor of the State. 



He reviews the extradition proceedings in 

 the case of Littlefield, as follows : 



The defendant, Littlefield, has not been in the State 

 since the indictment. In May, 1879, I heard he was 

 in Florida, and having procured a certified copy of the 

 indictment, I sent a messenger, with my requisition 

 on the Governor of that State, for his arrest and de- 

 livery to my as:ent. The Governor issued his warrant 

 promptly and Littlefield was arrested, but he was at 

 once released upon a writ of habeas corn vs, issued by a 

 Judge Archibald, of that State. I then procured a 

 copy of a bill of indictment, which had been found 

 against him in Buncombe, and made a requisition 

 upon that bill ; but upon this the Governor refused to 

 issue his warrant, holding that it was substantially the 

 same offense. I was then powerless to do more. 



Precedents have lately been established in 

 some of the States which strip the clause in 

 the United States Constitution, requiring the 

 extradition between the States of persons 

 charged with crime, of its compulsory charac- 

 ter. This was notably the case in the refusal 

 of the Massachusetts Executive to deliver up 

 upon the requisition of the Governor of South 

 Carolina a fugitive charged with a felony, who 

 had been a prominent political character, it 

 claiming the right to inquire into the merits 

 of the case. A case involving the interpreta- 

 tion of the constitutional requirement, and the 

 duty it imposes upon the Executives of the sev- 

 eral States, has recently been decided in the 

 Supreme Court of the District of Columbia. 

 The case came up on a requisition from the 



