550 



NORTH CAROLINA. 



2. Upon representation that improper and unfair 

 advantages have been taken of the provisions of the 

 seventh section of the act of the General Assembly 

 of North Carolina, ratified on the 10th day of March, 

 1866, and entitled " An act concerning negroes and 

 persons of color or of mixed blood" (see Public Laws 

 of North Carolina, 1866, chap. 40, 7, p. 101) 



It is ordered : 



That all parole " contracts between any persons 

 whatever, whereof one or more of them shall be a 

 person of color," shall be of the same validity, be 

 established by the same evidence, be determined by 

 the same rules, and be enforced in the same manner 

 as in like contracts where all the parties thereto are 

 whites. By command of 



Brevet Maj.-Gen. EDWAED E. S. CANBY. 



Lons V. CA/IAEC, Aide-de-Camp, Acting A. A. G. 



On the 4th of September a Republican con- 

 vention met at Raleigh, attended by delegates, 

 white and colored, from sixty-six counties. A 

 resolution was adopted reaffirming the "prin- 

 ciples enunciated in the convention of true Re- 

 publicans," which assembled at Raleigh on the 

 27th of March. A resolution was also intro- 

 duced touching the subject of confiscation, in 

 the following terms : 



Resolved, That confiscation of private property, for 

 political offences, is repugnant to republican liberty, 

 and ought not to be resorted to except as an inexora- 

 ble necessity to save the life of the nation, after all 

 other means have been tried ; and the Eepublican 

 party in North Carolina does not consider that the 

 present condition of public affairs requires or justi- 

 fies the confiscation of personal property, and hopes 

 that no such necessity will arise. 



After a somewhat excited discussion, the fol- 

 lowing was adopted as a substitute : 



Resolved, That the Eepublican party of North Caro- 

 lina, on the subject of confiscation, and all other mat- 

 ters pertaining to reconstruction, will faithfully ad- 

 here to and abide by the reconstruction plan and 

 measures of Congress. 



Other resolutions were discussed, which de- 

 clared that every male citizen of the age of 

 twenty-one years ought to be allowed to vote 

 in all popular elections ; that the Republicans of 

 North Carolina were " constrained to call the 

 attention of Congress to the continuance of the 

 disfranchisement and disabilities now imposed 

 upon thousands of true and loyal citizens ; and 

 that a committee be appointed to urge upon 

 Congress to remove, within safe and just limits, 

 the disabilities complained of." These resolu- 

 tions failed of adoption. 



On the 27th of September there was a mass 

 meeting of Conservatives at Raleigh. The 

 resolutions of this body declared the unwaver- 

 ing devotion of the party, as there represented, 

 to the "fundamental principles of American 

 liberty, as embodied in the Mecklenburg Decla- 

 ration of Independence, of May 20, 1775, the 

 Declaration of American Independence, of July 

 4, 1776, and in the Constitution of the United 

 States." Among the resolutions, unanimously 

 adopted in this meeting, were the following : 



Resolved, That 'we deem it unwise, wicked, and 

 unjust for the State of North Carolina to pass any 

 law, organic or statutory, disfranchising, proscribing, 

 or confiscating the property of any of her citizens for 

 past political offences. 



Resolved, That the unmistakable developments of 

 a vindictive and persecuting spirit in the speeches 

 and doings of a majority of the delegates to the late 

 Eadical Convention in this city, toward the body of 

 the white people of this State, call for the unanimous 

 efforts of all truly conservative men, of all classes, 

 whether white or colored, to endeavor to check the 

 progress of that spirit, and to defeat the aims of those 

 bad men among us who seek to destroy the peace of 

 our people, to stir up strife between the whites and 

 blacks, and to inaugurate a state of tilings in North 

 Carolina which must effectually prevent immigration, 

 check the investment of capital, destroy confidence 

 in all business enterprise, and diminish largely the 

 sources of employment to our large laboring popula- 

 tion. 



Resolved, That our movement is not partisan in its 

 character, that it has no connection with national 

 politics or either of the g_reat national parties, nor is 

 it designed to form a white man's party, but origi- 

 nates in the spontaneous uprising of the conserva- 

 tive men of the State, of all shades of political opin- 

 ionj for the one object of warding off the dangers 

 which threaten us from the success of the ultra Ee- 

 publican or Eadical party in this State ; and we hail, 

 as a hopeful indication, the manly and more moder- 

 ate stand taken in the aforesaid Eadical Convention, 

 by the calm and moderate Eepubh'cans of that body. 



In common with other Southern States, 

 North Carolina suffered much during the year 

 from destitution. Contributions from the 

 North, and the distribution of rations by the 

 Freedmeu's Bureau, did something to relieve 

 the general distress, but accounts from many 

 counties represented the want as extreme in 

 hundreds of cases. 



A printed statement of the Treasurer of the 

 State, made early in December, shows the total 

 indebtedness to be $13,698,000; while the as- 

 sets of the public Treasury, consisting of stocks 

 in railroad companies, and bonds due from cor- 

 porations, amounted to $10,031,000. These 

 figures are only approximatively correct, as 

 neither the indebtedness nor the assets can be 

 accurately ascertained at present. 



The trustees of the University of North 

 Carolina, having referred to a committee some 

 resolutions relating to a change in the system 

 of education, requiring the committee to report 

 a scheme "embodying, as near as may be, what 

 is commonly called the University or Elective 

 System," a report was submitted, in December, 

 in which the merits of the elective system were 

 fully discussed. The scheme presented by the 

 committee proposed the establishment of four 

 departments in the university: an Academical 

 Department divided into ten separate schools 

 for instruction in the various branches of study 

 falling within its province ; a Department of 

 Agriculture and the Mechanic Arts; a Law 

 Department ; and a Medical Department. Pre- 

 vious to the late war, this institution was in a 

 very flourishing condition, but the failure of the 

 Bank of North Carolina, after the repudiation 

 of the war-debt by the convention of October, 

 1865, had, in the language of the trustees in a 

 memorial to the last General Assembly, "anni- 

 hilated and more than annihilated the entire 

 endowment of the university," which was in- 

 vested in the stock of the bank to the amount 

 of $200,000. 



