POPULATION. 



397 



Similar data from the same sources, in regard to the number of males 

 at the age of citizenship, are exhibited in the following table : 



MALES 21 YEARS OF AGE AND UPWARDS. 



Here a more remarkable increase is shown in the ratio of voters in the 

 native white population, and it is quite sufficient to dispel any apprehen- 

 sion than any but native whites will preponderate in this country. This 

 increase occurs in South Carolina, but is less marked than in the country 

 at large, the population of the State not having yet, in this regard, re- 

 covered fully from the losses incurred during the war. Were the races 

 arrayed politically against each other, as was practically the case prior to 

 1876, it would have required a change of thirteen per cent, of the colored 

 voters to the whites in 1880 to give the latter a majority, and, in 1770 it 

 would have required a change of more than fourteen per cent. Local 

 and restricted political issues between the races may occur hereafter, but 

 the plea, that if the whites obtained representation the liberties of the 

 colored race would be lost, with which alien white men organized a solid 

 black vote in the State, has forever lost its force. The experience of seven 

 years has assured the colored race in South Carolina that they have noth- 

 ing to fear, as a race, from the native wdiites of the State. 



