The Life and Work of James A. Garfield, Twentieth President of the United States / Embracing an Account of the Scenes and Incidents of His Boyhood; the Struggles of His Youth; the Might of His Early Manhood; His Valor As a Soldier; His Career As a Statesman; His Election to the Presidency; and the Tragic Story of His Death.

by John Clark Ridpath

“No thoughtful man can fail to appreciate its beneficent effect upon our people. It has freed us from the perpetual danger of war and dissolution; it has added immensely to the moral and industrial forces of our people; it has liberated the master as well as the slave from a relation which wronged and enfeebled both.

“It has surrendered to their own guardianship the manhood of more than five millions of people, and has opened to each of them a career of freedom and usefulness. It has given new inspiration to the power of self-help in both races by making labor more honorable to one and more necessary to the other.

“The influence of this force will grow greater and bear richer fruit with coming years. No doubt the great change has caused serious disturbance to the Southern community—this is to be deplored, though it was unavoidable; but those who resisted the change should remember that in our institutions there was no middle ground for the negro race between slavery and equal citizenship. There can be no permanent disfranchised peasantry in the United States. Freedom can never yield its fullness of blessing as long as law or its administration places the smallest obstacle in the pathway of any virtuous citizenship.

“The emancipated race has already made remarkable progress. With unquestionable devotion to the Union, with a patience and gentleness not born of fear, ‘they have followed the light as God gave them to see the light.’

“They are rapidly laying the material foundation for self-support, widening their circle of intelligence, and beginning to enjoy the blessings that gather around the homes of the industrious poor. They deserve the generous encouragement of all good men.

“So far as my authority can lawfully extend, they shall enjoy full and equal protection of the Constitution and laws. The free enjoyment of equal suffrage is still in question, and a frank statement of the issue may aid its solution.

“It is alleged that in many communities negro citizens are practically denied freedom of the ballot. In so far as the truth of this allegation is admitted, it is answered that in many places honest local government is impossible if the mass of uneducated negroes are allowed to vote. These are grave allegations.

“So far as the latter is true, it is no palliation that can be offered for opposing the freedom of the ballot. Bad local government is certainly a great evil which ought to be prevented, but to violate the freedom and sanctity of suffrage is more than an evil, it is a crime, which, if persisted in, will destroy the Government itself. Suicide is not a remedy.

“If in other lands it be high treason to compass the death of a king, it should be counted no less a crime here to strangle our sovereign power and stifle its voice. It has been said that unsettled questions have no pity for the repose of nations. It should be said, with the utmost emphasis, that this question of suffrage will never give repose or safety to the States or to the Nation, until each, within its own jurisdiction, makes and keeps the ballot free and pure by strong sanctions of law.

“But the danger which arises from ignorance in voters can not be denied. It covers a field far wider than that of negro suffrage and the present condition of that race. It is a danger that lurks and hides in the sources and fountains of power in every State. We have no standard by which to measure the disaster that may be brought upon us by ignorance and vice in citizens when joined to corruption and fraud in suffrage. The voters of the Union, who make and unmake constitutions, and upon whose will hangs the destiny of our government, can transmit their supreme authority to no successor save the coming generation of voters, who are the sole heirs of sovereign power. If that generation comes to its inheritance blinded by ignorance and corrupted by vice, the fall of the Republic will be certain and remediless. The census has already sounded the alarm in appalling figures, which mark how dangerously high the tide of illiteracy has arisen among our voters and their children. To the South the question is of supreme importance, but the responsibility for its existence and for slavery does not rest upon the South alone.