Though the institution of African slavery was gone the negro continued the
subject of savage contention. I urged that he be taken out of the arena of
agitation, and my way of taking him out was to concede him his legal and
civil rights. The lately ratified Constitutional Amendments, I contended,
were the real Treaty of Peace between the North and South. The recognition
of these Amendments in good faith by the white people of the South was
indispensable to that perfect peace which was desired by the best people of
both sections. The political emancipation of the blacks was essential to
the moral emancipation of the whites. With the disappearence of the negro
question as cause of agitation, I argued, radicalism of the intense,
proscriptive sort would die out; the liberty-loving, patriotic people of
the North would assert themselves; and, this one obstacle to a better
understanding removed, the restoration of Constitutional Government would
follow, being a matter of momentous concern to the body of the people both
North and South.

Such a policy of conciliation suited the Southern extremists as little as
it suited the Northern extremists. It took from the politicians their best
card. South no less than North, "the bloody shirt" was trumps. It could
always be played. It was easy to play it and it never failed to catch the
unthinking and to arouse the excitable. What cared the perennial candidate
so he got votes enough? What cared the professional agitator so his appeals
to passion brought him his audience?

It is a fact that until Lamar delivered his eulogy on Sumner not a Southern
man of prominence used language calculated to placate the North, and
between Lamar and Grady there was an interval of fifteen years. There was
not a Democratic press worthy the name either North or South. During those
evil days the Courier-Journal stood alone, having no party or organized
following. At length it was joined on the Northern side by Greeley. Then