RESENTMENT OF THE DELEGATES. 369 compel the intelligent men of the State to emigrate. Though the black population outnumbered the white by one hundred and twenty thousand, it could best afford to be magnanimous, for if the delegates should attempt proscription and injustice, there would be a continual war between the two races which must result in bloodshed.1 No delegate openly resented the governor's words, but some of the colored members remarked that the value of the governor's advice, however great, should be measured perhaps in inverse relation to his prominence in the convention, which, eight years before, had issued the ordinance of secession, for he was a member of the committee of seven which reported the draft of that ordinance.2 All the reconstruction conventions had to overcome, in some way, the obstacles of a broken public credit. Each convention had authority, under the reconstruction acts, to levy a special tax for its expenses. There was little money in circulation and the bills receivable of the State of South Carolina were, with difficulty, circulated at seventy-five cents on the dollar. The convention, therefore, was soon absorbed in the attempt to solve the problem of paying its expenses. Should they issue bonds and attempt to negotiate them in Boston and New York, at the best rate possible for greenbacks? Would not the Northern friends of the freedmen be willing to lend the State money at seven per cent? But the members doubted this and believed such a step imprudent, because Northern capital had not yet begun floating southward for investment. The fiat character of the money in circulation compelled the mem 1 Proceedings, 45-55. 3 2 Journal of the Convention of South Carolina held in 1860, 1861 and 1862, 23. 3 Proceedings, 155. 370 PAY OF THE DELEGATES. bers to vote themselves a daily allowance, which, in a State whose financial system was sound, would have seemed excessive. Nine dollars a day might appear an extravagant price for a delegate's services, unless the public knew, as did that of South Carolina, that the amount was scarcely equal to five dollars in gold. The amount was finally fixed at eleven dollars1 with mileage, by the usual mail route, of twenty cents per mile to and from the convention. The apparently high pay which the delegates fixed for themselves intensified the hostility of the white population toward the convention and was the foundation for the belief, soon widely accepted, that the negro delegates were robbing the State treasury. The convention was greatly tempted to assume legislative functions. The terrible depression of trade and industry in the State clamored for relief, and, particularly, the condition of the freedmen suddenly thrust upon themselves without land, occupation or friends. The form of relief most seriously discussed, as in adjoining States, was the passage of a stay-law, or homestead act, which should secure a piece of land to the freedmen whatever his indebtedness. This form of public immorality was not without precedent in the northern States, for Michigan in 1850 had established it. The whites in the State feared for a time lest the convention would confiscate their property and turn it over to the negroes, but no delegate suggested such an act of violence. When we consider the superior numbers of the negroes, and the fact that they had control of the State, and further, that every negro who was capable of reflecting on his condition believed that he had been the victim of ages of wrong, it is to the lasting credit of the race that now, in its moment of triumph, it did not enter upon a general proscription against the 1 Proceedings, 177-189, 204. THE CONSTITUTION OF 1868. 371 whites. On the contrary it set an illustrious example which the whites have since rarely followed in their treatment of the negro. Occasionally the vote on a measure divided strictly along the racial line, as on the ordinance declaring null and void all contracts and judgments in which the consideration was for the purchase of slaves. For such an ordinance every negro delegate voted aye.1 A constitution was reported on the fifth of February,2 containing many provisions which attested the completeness of the political revolution through which the State had passed. In its Bill of Rights, it forbade slavery; declared that the citizens of South Carolina owed paramount allegiance to the Constitution and Government of the United States; that the State should ever remain a part of the Union; and that all attempts to dissolve it ought to be resisted with the whole power of the Commonwealth. Rejecting the advice of Governor Orr, it prohibited a property qualification for the voter or the officeholder. It provided for a system of public schools, open to all the children of the State, "without regard to race or color," and made it obligatory upon the general assembly to provide for the maintenance of higher institutions of learning. The opening words of the new instrument, "All men are born free and equal," precipitated a debate on the exact meaning of the statement. In many discussions before this time white men had debated whether the words applied to the black race, but now, and for the first time, negroes were discussing its meaning for themselves. They, however, added nothing new to the interpretation, and perhaps, contrary to what might be expected, they did 1 Proceedings, 248-249. 2 Proceedings, 255-256. 3 It is not found in the constitution of South Carolina of 1895. 372 THE NEGRO'S OPPORTUNITY. not claim that the words were intended to recognize natural, equal political privileges among men.1 It was agreed, quite unanimously, that the right to vote and to hold office should be without discrimination on account of race or color.2 Some of the delegates were anxious that civil and political privileges should be granted to their race by the constitution in such a way that no lawyer, however cunning or astute could possibly misinterpret the meaning. Colored men had been cheated out of their rights for two centuries; their opportunity had now come; nearly all the inhabitants of the State were ready, at any moment, to deprive the race of these rights, and "no loophole should be left that would permit them to do it constitutionally." The insistence of the colored delegates on this point led to the definition of the right of suffrage at last adopted, that every male citizen of the United States and of South Carolina, "without discrimination of race, color or former condition," should, if otherwise qualified, be entitled to vote. The distrust of the white race shown by the negro members was as pitiful as it was well grounded. Perhaps, if the negroes of the South had realized their power at this time, they would have appropriated the public lands of the southern States to members of their race, in severalty, if they did not confiscate the land of all who had borne arms against the general government. There was a widespread, childish belief among the negroes that they were to receive land grants from the United States, and farming tools and stock wherewith to cultivate them. Doubtless this delusive expectation made the negroes magnanimous toward their former masters. The natural timidity of the race, in the presence of the whites, saved the South from the 1 Proceedings, 268-269. 2 Proceedings, 355. 3 Proceedings, 254-255. THE NEGRO DEFENDS HIS RACE. 373 miseries of a proscription. For a time it seemed that an educational or a property qualification might be required of the voter, but all arguments for either, and they were brief, were in vain. The negro delegates promptly characterized them as devices to deprive members of their race of their rights, and they were rejected as they had been rejected in Mississippi, for this reason. No argument could equal in force the pitiful plea of one negro member that his race had been debarred from the rights of voting and education for ages, and he was now determined it should exercise them.2 As in North Carolina the militia was declared to consist of all able-bodied male residents between the ages of eighteen and forty-five, and a more generous definition could not be found in any constitution north of Mason and Dixon's line. The Jeffersonian idea, that the actual exercise of the rights of citizenship is the best training for the citizen, was exploited to the full. Let it be granted, said one negro delegate, that the negro was inferior to the white in knowledge of public affairs and public duties, but give him as fully as the white man the privileges of participating in government and he would "take a forward bound toward humanity," and become a capable and trustworthy citizen. Upon the sound basis of universal suffrage, said another, South Carolina could be wheeled into line with the other States of the Union. Moreover, any attempt to abridge the right to vote would endanger the ratification of the constitution and delay the return of the State to the Union. A proposition to require the voter, after 1875, to be able to read and write, was reThe constitution at last 3 jected almost unanimously.5 1 Proceedings, 724. 2 Proceedings, 826. > Proceedings, 830-831. 4 Id. 833. 5 107 to 2: Proceedings, 834. |