46

tution of slavery, and that has always opposed the advancement of the
Negro, is here to-day appealing to popular suffrage, and asking at the
hands of sovereign voters the privilege of returning to power.  Busily
undoing by hellish discriminations in public places and by legal enact-
ment, the noble work of Abraham Lincoln, they present a ticket reek-
ing with prejudice and malevolence, inviting the freedman's suffrage.
    Will the Negro, even for the blandishments of money, yield one
jot or tittle of his manhood and vote the honor of the State into such
unclean hands? We think not.
    There is widespread interest in the South as to the outcome of the
suffrage amendment contest in North Carolina, in which the right of
about one hundred and  twenty  thousand Negroes to vote is involved.
Georgia and other States contemplate restricting the Negro vote after
the manner North Carolina has adopted.  If the amendment now be-
fore the people of that State is ratified and sustained by the courts, it
is a  natural sequence  that similar amendments will be adopted  by
other Southern States, which practically means the elimination of the
Negro from politics.  This is what is to be attempted in Maryland if
the Democratic party is permitted to grasp the reins of government.
This is a logical interpretation of the Democratic platform, which in-
veighs long and loud  against the danger of Negro suffrage to the
progress of the State  and modern civilization.
A VOTE TO RE-ESTABLISH DEMOCRATIC RULE IN MARYLAND IS:
    An endorsement of the restriction policy that disfranchises the
Negro by force in most of the Southern States, and by law in three.
    An endorsement of the lynchers and cut-throats, who murder black
men in the South, and escape  punishment because of the sympathy of
Democratic judges and juries.
    A repudiation of the generous souls who secured the adoption of
the 13th, 14th  and 15th amendments, and made us citizens.
    A confession of our incapacity for self-government, and an admis-
sion that it is safe to outrage and humiliate us to the limit.
    A  confession to the charge that we are an  "ignorant, non-tax-
paying class," when  it is a patent fact  that the most industrious,
knowledge-loving citizens of the State are the Afro-Americans.
    A  confession that we  contribute  nothing to the public revenues,
when  it is proven by the  most learned social economists that the
tenant pays the tax, and that all expenses of manufacture are paid by
the consumer.
   An admission that we are ready to desert the friends who have
given us aid in our day of dire distress, and cast our favors at the feet
of the party from whose violence the Republicans are called upon to
protect us.
    No!  THE NEGRO WILL NOT VOTE THE DEMOCRATIC TICKET
IN MARYLAND, and thus give encouragement and sustenance to the
remnants of the Ku-Klux-Klan, the Red-Shirters and Night-Riders  of
the Southland.
WHAT THE REPUBLICAN PARTY IN MARYLAND HAS DONE FOR
                           THE NEGRO.
   The Republican party has brought about radical reforms in the
school system of the State, and has made it possible for the educated
young colored man and woman to secure employment as teachers, and
thus reap practical benefit from their years of patient study. It has
given new impetus to popular education by furnishing the goal for
new ambitions, and opened an additional avenue for the utilization of
Negro talent.
   This leavening influence in the school system was conceived in the
brain of Hon. A. M. Gould, one of Maryland's brightest and best Re-
publicans, and was given the force of law by a Republican legislature.
Under its beneficent provisions, Baltimore's schools are being filled up




			

OHS Archives/Library Pamphlet Collection

Colored American Republican Text Book