Filled with the hatred to the negroes, nearly always inspired in any ruling class by the loss of accustomed power over inferiors, they nevertheless yielded to the Freedmen’s Bureau, and acquiesced in the necessity for according civil rights to their slaves.
Reid describes the complex feelings of Southern leaders towards civil rights for freed slaves, despite their hatred.
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Let me repeat, that I think it best for all men—white men, black men, and brown men, if you make that distinction, that all men of proper age and unconvicted of crime, should have the right of suffrage.
It is my firm conviction, that suffrage is not only the best security for freedom, but the most potent agent of amelioration and civilization.
Our national experience has demonstrated that public order reposes most securely on the broad base of universal suffrage.
It has proved, also, that universal suffrage is the surest guarantee and most powerful stimulus of individual, social and political progress.