"From sources absolutely reliable, affecting affairs in Pointe Coupee
parish, we learn that since the hanging of four black men in the
Racourcee settlement by the bull-dozers of that section, the colored
people thereabouts have sought to leave the locality, going to Fordoche,
a bayou neighborhood where is a large colored settlement of small
farmers.
"Determined to stop this migration of colored people, and at the same
time terrorize the Fordoche farmers, on the night of the 14th inst.,
Wednesday, a crowd of bull-dozers, some sixty odd men from Racourcee,
came to this colored settlement, and for no known cause, save that which
we have expressed, outraged several inoffensive and hard-working colored
people. Lucy Allain, a colored woman, was stripped and whipped
unmercifully, and the same treatment was given William Abraham. Levi
Sherman was shot three times. All three of these victims are now
confined, by reason of this outrage, to their beds. Others of the
colored people would have received like treatment, but they got out of
the way. A prisoner in the jail there was hung for sport. Fortunately,
he was cut down in time to save his life. Some colored people were
outraged, and atrocities and indignities practised generally befitting
the lawless character of the Democratic party-workers and bull-dozers.
The good citizens (white) of the locality have called a mass meeting to
express their indignation and to attempt to redress these wrongs, or at
least put a stop to further outrages. The meeting was to have had place
on Wednesday, the 21st inst. A similar meeting was also called for the
same day at New Roads. The information furnished us of these horrible
crimes is from purely Democratic sources, gentlemen and decent citizens
who abhor the partisan atrocities of their party-workers. So far as we
can learn, Republicans of Pointe Coupee are so terrorized that even
prominent gentlemen there will say nothing of this act of atrocity, the
information in fact reaching this city and our office from responsible
Democratic citizens. We are informed that the plantation visited was
one of the New York Warehouse and Security Company's places, and of
which Mr. Bradish Johnson is the agent.
The Macon, Ga., "Telegraph" is only a little in advance of the
ex-Confederate "conservatives" when it demands the repeal of the
fourteenth amendment, that the Southern people may extort payment for
their liberated slaves. That will soon be one of the regular planks in
the Southern Democratic platform.
In Jasper County, Georgia, since the war (reports a local paper), there
have been sixty-nine men killed, and not a single hanging.
The Augusta (Ga.) "Chronicle" suggests that the proper place for
Congressman Rainey (the man whose sobriety enabled Congress to adjourn
on the day appointed) is the chain-gang. Perhaps his consignment to a
slave-gang would suit the "Chronicle" better.
The Democrats claim that white and colored school children have equal
school privileges in Georgia, but this is far from being true. In
Atlanta, there are fine houses for the white scholars; the colored
scholars are sent to cellars and other unfit places, and are limited in
accommodation at that.
The Charleston "News and Courier" is Wade Hampton's organ, and it is
leading his campaign in South Carolina. Alarmed because the Republicans
threatened to exercise their right to talk politics and vote, the organ
says: "Seceders and malcontents will be treated as public enemies, and
made political outcasts. The Democratic party will not lay down the
sceptre of authority in South Carolina, nor shall the sceptre be wrested
from the strong hands by which it is grasped." That is, Wade Hampton
says, in substance, "I am for conciliating those who vote for me, but
death to all who oppose!" Truly, as Gov. Boutwell said in his Maine
speech, the Southern question is given the greater importance in this
campaign by the action of the ex-rebels.
In North Carolina, the Republican leaders are trying to induce the
negroes to vote by telling them that the coming election will be a fair
and free one. The deception is not justifiable, and will cost the men
who resort to it the confidence of the colored voters.
The vote for the Democratic State ticket last week was about eighty
thousand. There was no opposition. The legislature will be almost
entirely Democratic.--_Despatch from Alabama_.
And where, pray, is that new Independent party; where are the old Whigs,
the administration Democrats, not to say anything about the resuscitated
Republicans, who were to arise from the policy of conciliation? Alabama
is pretty solid.
To deprive man of the fruit of his labors is to cut the sinews of
industry. Who will care to labor if another is to appropriate the
results of his toil? He is deprived of an inalienable right, the
enjoyment of which alone can induce him to exercise the self-denial
implied in labor and economy. To distribute the products of his industry
to the community, as some social theorists would teach us, is to
destroy individual enterprise, and to reduce society to a great
almshouse.--_Zion's Herald_.
[Despatch to the Traveller.]