Page:Speeches, correspondence and political papers of Carl Schurz, Volume 1.djvu/339

Rh question I shall speak in another part of this report. But there is another matter claiming the attention and foresight of the Government. It is well known that the levying of taxes for the payment of the interest on our National debt is, and will continue to be, very unpopular in the South. It is true, no striking demonstrations have as yet been made of any decided unwillingness on the part of the people to contribute to the discharge of our National obligations. But most of the conversations I had with Southerners upon this subject led me to apprehend that they, politicians and people, are rather inclined to ask money of the Government as compensation for their emancipated slaves, for the rebuilding of the levees on the Mississippi, and various kinds of damage done by our armies for military purposes, than, as the current expression is, to “help paying the expenses of the whipping they have received.” In fact, there are abundant indications in newspaper articles, public speeches, and electioneering documents of candidates, which render it eminently probable that on the claim of compensation for their emancipated slaves the Southern States, as soon as readmitted to representation in Congress, will be almost a unit. In the Mississippi convention the idea was broached by Mr. Potter, in an elaborate speech, to have the late slave States relieved from taxation “for years to come,” in consideration of “debt due them” for the emancipated slaves; and this plea I have frequently heard advocated in private conversations. I need not go into details as to the efforts made in some of the Southern States in favor of the assumption by those States of their debts contracted during the rebellion. It may be assumed with certainty that those who want to have the Southern people, poor as they are, taxed for the payment of rebel debts, do not mean to have them taxed for the purpose of meeting our National obligations.