Rensselaer Union, Volume 2, Number 6, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 4 November 1869 — The Fifteenth Amendment. [ARTICLE]

The Fifteenth Amendment.

Nothing of recent date, in connection with our politics, is, or can be, of more importance to all parties of the Republic than the pending or Fifteenth AaradNational whereby ft Is proposed to put a final extinguisher upon all further negro questions in American politics. The purpose in framing this amendment was to establish a standard of American citizenship rather higher than anything of previous date; for while, by the Fourteenth Amendment, all persons born or naturalized in the V nited States are declared citizens of the Republic and of the several States thereof, it allowed of disfranchisement on account of race, color, or previous condition of servitude, which, though unavoidable at the lime of its adoption, cannot now be regarded by reflectirfg’ inen ij arfyffaibg less than monstrous, placfng,* as it din’ the suffrage in the attitude of distinguishing a hideous system of caste, and making *of fcih’itdde where hdne should i nder the new, or Fifteenth Amendment, no such distinction can be tolerated any longer in this land of freedom, since they are and can be nothing more than remnants of that fearful bondage called chattel slavery, that we have exterminate ed at the cost of so much blood and treasure. Whether, having gone sp far and done so fetich, and paid #uck an-awftil price to rid ourselves of this monstrous creation of -cruelty, cupidity and avarice, we should now allow this reminiscence of it to blacken our statutesand cast dingrace and reproach upon the nation is a question for every man to solve for himself If we do so allow it to aemain, we may rest assured thatrlike slavery, it will constitute an endless source of agitation, political trouble, internecine stnfeand dis-coed-throughout the Republic. What that state of things is we know from sad experience, and the sufferings endured by tl)e whole country from it should, by this time, have warned all sufficiently against

Yet we find these Bourbons of the itcpublic, the patient aU. rallying to a man against all attempts to change the statute, and determined, stall hazards, in every way, legal and irregular, and to the last degree, to resist the ratification of the Fifteenth Ameuflmcnt, which fe deMioe*4o be a new charter of freedom,' to Wan example shining from afar unto' the nations of the earth, ks td the capkrfty of humanity for self-government These desperate lovers of agitation and.- OMte hung on to the lust vestige of that*system which has for so many years been their very meat and drink, •"i*Sfti<jalry, as though it tore their very heart strings to separate from it. Thftv see that it must come eventually. There is hardly a man of them bpt trill privuti ly admit it in an unguarded moment. Mgn say: ‘1 Those poor blacks are too ignorant and degraded to be allowed to vote.” But it seems they know friends from their enemies; that they know free institutions from aristocratic: that they know those who will sustain and protect from thpse. , jvJIQ impose them. The purpose of a niart’s Vnfo is to enable him to defend his own rights. Hence tho*cU>lack» are quite as intelligent to that end as most other people, and may freely be flowed to vote. > We do not take the ground that the "right to vote Jefferson’s doctrine 6f the right of selfgovernment seems to bear that interpretation.' *5 doubtless meant that the people, as a body, have the right of selfgovernment, subject, pf course, to restriction indeSpen sable, imorder -to guard the purity of the ballot-box and to distinguish the permanent resident and thelawabiding citizen from the shifting mass of adventurers and unsettled people, and the horde of vagabonds and thieves. But that every permanent resident shouid be subject to the same equal righto, we do maintain and always'have. The adored citizen is, like ourselves, native. He has- nsver known. any other land or flag. Rqyicver expects to know any other. He has his record on the battlefields And in Jhe «triuy roils of the Republic." He liveghere subject to the same condition of life as the rest, and asks nothing more than to take his chances. This amendment is one ot peace and harmony. It wllTput the negro upon the same level. North and South, ana make him no longer a protege of the nation because of his emancipation, hut an enfranchise citizen like the rest, to take his chances as best he may. It will forever put an end to agitation on the subject of the negro.— PMtaddphia North American.

HT The Cincinaati Commercial, which cannot be accused of any blind fealty to the Republican-party, commenting on the result of the Ohio campaign, says - “ Pendleton is beaten hy a larger majority than Thurman waa. The fact is, there is a manifest decline in the popular terror of negro Mffrage, and a growth in knowledge that-a national credit and a »" imd currency concern the poor no leas ihan the rich, and are more..Unportant ev n to the laborer than to the capitalist.” tarßemo*»te areadtod by a journal, Of the party in Wisconsin to Inscribe their ticket on their “paniars, and flaunt them