SOUTH CAROLINA. 



097 



duty must be fully, faithfully, and impartially 

 performed." Military commissioners were also 

 appointed for each county with the powers of 

 justices of the peace, and sheriffs, constables, 

 police officers, and troops, if necessary, were 

 placed at their command for the enforcement 

 of the regulations laid down in regard to the 

 election under the reconstruction laws. Some 

 of the complaints had reference to the conduct 

 of colored citizens, and to these the command- 

 ing general considered it "proper to say that the 

 elective franchise conferred upon them by law 

 carries with it no authority to restrict others 

 in the free exercise of that right; and that 

 while it is their duty not to regard threats or 

 intimidation as to themselves, any combinations, 

 to prevent by force, intimidation, or threats, the 

 same free exercise of this right by others will 

 be unlawful, and will subject the offenders to 

 the penalties prescribed by law and by military 

 orders. They are counselled to exercise the 

 right of voting in a quiet and orderly manner, 

 giving offence to no one; and, after casting 

 their votes, not' to linger about the polling- 

 places, but to return quietly to their homes and 

 to their customary avocations." 



The election took place without serious dis- 

 turbance, and resulted in the choice of the Re- 

 publican candidates for the State offices. The 

 vote on the constitution was as follows : 



The constitution having been ratified, a copy 

 of the instrument was forwarded to Congress 

 for its approval. The Democratic Central 

 Committee at once framed a remonstrance 

 against it, which was prepared by the Hon. B. 

 F. Perry, and sent three of their number to 

 "Washington, to urge it upon the attention of 

 Congress. They argued their case before the 

 Reconstruction Committee, and the remon- 



strance was submitted in the House of Repre- 

 sentatives, and there it was laid on tho table. 

 The principal ground. of oppo.sition to the con- 

 stitution, on tho part of tho Democratic party, 

 is exhibited in tho following passages from 

 the " remonstrance : " 



Section two of article eight enfranchises every 

 male negro over tho age of twenty-one, whether a 

 convict, felon, or a pauper, and disfranchises every 

 white man who has held office in South Carolina. 

 Intelligence, virtue, and patriotism are to give place* 

 in all elections, to ignorance, stupidity, and vice. 

 The superior race is to be made subservient to the 

 inferior. Taxation and representation are no longer 

 to be united. They who own no property are to levy 

 taxes and make all appropriations. The property- 

 holders have to pay these taxes, without having any 

 voice in levying them ! The consequences will be, 

 in effect, confiscation. The appropriations to sup- 

 port free schools for the education of negro children, 

 for the support of old negroes in the poor-houses, 

 and the vicious in jails and penitentiary, together 

 with a standing army of negro soldiers, will be crush- 

 ing and utterly ruinous to the State. Every man's 

 property will have to be sold to pay his taxes. 



We have thus suggested to your honorable body 

 some^of the prominent objections to your adoption 

 of this constitution. We waive all argument upon 

 the subject of its validity. It is a constitution de 

 facto, and that is the ground upon which we approach 

 your honorable body in the spirit of earnest remon- 

 strance. That constitution was the work of Northern 

 adventurers, Southern renegades, and ignorant ne- 

 groes. Not one per cent, of the white population of 

 the State approves it, and not two per cent, of the 

 negroes who voted for its adoption understand what 

 their act of voting implied. That constitution enfran- 

 chises every male negro over the age of twenty-one, 

 and disfranchises many of the purest and best white 

 men of the State. The negro being in a large nu- 

 merical majority as compared with the whites, the 

 effect is that the new constitution establishes in this 

 State negro supremacy, with all its train of count- 

 less evils.- A superior race a portion, Senators and 

 Representatives, of the same proud race to which it 

 is your pride to belong^ is put under the rule of an 

 inferior race ; the abject slaves of yesterday, the 

 flushed freedmen of to-day. And think you that 

 there can be any just, lasting reconstruction on this 

 basis ?_ The^ committee respectfully reply, in behalf 

 of their, white fellow-citizens, that this cannot be. 

 "We do not mean to threaten resistance by arms. But 

 the white people of our State will never quietly sub- 

 mit to negro rule. We may have to pass under the 

 yoke you have authorized, but by moral agencies, 

 by political organization, by every peaceful means 

 left us, we will keep up this contest until we have 

 regained the heritage of political control handed 

 down to us by an honored ancestry. This is a duty 

 we owe to the land that is ours, to the graves that it 

 contains, and to the race of which you and we are 

 alike members the proud Caucasian race, whoso 

 sovereignty on earth God has ordained, and they 

 themselves have illustrated on the most brilliant 

 pages of the world's history. 



After the passage of the act of Congress, of 

 June 25th, popularly known as the " Omnibus 

 Bill," the Governor-elect issued a proclamation 

 for the assembling of the Legislature on the 

 6th of July. The new Governor was inaugu- 

 rated on the 9th of July, and, in his inaugural 

 address to the Assembly, declared his full con- 

 fidence in the validity and wisdom of the Fed- 

 eral legislation which had been adopted in 

 reconstructing the State. On taking leave of 

 the office, which he had filled since November 



