he old slave-owning aristocracy in the South has disappeared, but the
"poor whites" have also almost disappeared, and the average of comfort in
that section is greater than at any period in American history. The
negroes complain, and with too much cause, of political oppression and
exclusion from the suffrage, but they seem to be on good terms with their
"oppressors," and on the principle of the old Spanish proverb that "he is
my friend who brings grist to my mill," the Southern black has no better
friend than the Southern white.

Thirty Years of Peace.

CHAPTER XXXVII.

Reconstruction in the South--The Congress and the President--Liberal
Republican Movement--Nomination, Defeat and Death of Greeley--Troops
Withdrawn by President Hayes--Foreign Policy of the Past Thirty Years--
French Ordered from Mexico--Last Days of Maximilian--Russian-America
Bought--The Geneva Arbitration--Alabama Claims Paid--The Northwest
Boundary--The Fisheries--Spain and the Virginius--The Custer Massacre
--United States of Brazil Established--President Harrison and Chile
--Venezuela--American Prestige in South America--Hawaii--Behring
Sea--Garfield, the Martyr of Civil Service Reform--Labor Troubles--
Railway Riots of 1877 and 1894--Great Calamities--The Chicago Fire,
Boston Fire, Charleston Earthquake, Johnstown Flood.

The Southern people cannot be justly blamed for their resolute resistance
to negro domination. It was too much to expect that former masters should
accept political inferiority to a race emancipated from slavery, but not
emancipated from deplorable ignorance and debasement, and easily misled
by unscrupulous whites. On the other hand, gratitude and prudence
demanded, on the part of the North, that the negro should not only be a
freeman, but also a citizen; that he should not only be liberated from
slavery, but also protected against oppression. The negro, however
ignorant, was true to the Union, and attached to the Republican party;
the black soldiers had fought in the Union armies, and Abraham Lincoln
himself had advised Governor Hahn, of Louisiana, in 1863, that "the very
intelligent colored people, and especially those who fought gallantly in
our ranks, should be admitted to the franchise," for "they would probably
help in some trying time to come to keep the jewel of liberty within the
family of freedom."

Andrew Johnson, succeeding to the chair of Lincoln, and with his heart
softened toward his native Sout