Viewing page 187 of 239

This transcription has been completed. Contact us with corrections.

"and responsibilities of the very highest character - We are solemnly bound on the one hand to dispense criminal Justice to the negro race with the same firmness. - yet with the same merciful fairness and impartiality in every case, which under like circumstances we would extend to the white men - and on the other hand we are equaly bound to be vigilant and faithful in debating and punishing all offences against the colored portion of our population.- These people have had no voluntary agency in bringing about our present unhappy condition If in some sense they were the cause they were the inconvenience and innocent cause of our trouble. and I am free to declare that so far as my observation extends their conduct during the last five years amid the perilous and trying circumstances in which they were placed has as a general rule been well calculated to excite almost in unequal our argument and our admiration- If therefore we would be true and Just to ourselves we must be Just and even generous to them.- If indeed we should fail in this: If amid our suffering and trials- through the influence of prejudice or passions or even of prevarication whether real or immaginary and no matter from what source; we should make the administration of Justice to mean one thing when applied to the whites and or annother different thing when applied to the negroes we shall have no right to exspect the blessing of the Almighty upon us or to have his generous intersession in granually resoring us to happiness and prosperity as a Christian" people-