Whitelaw Reid: “Point out any way for a return to an established order of things, and they would walk in it.”

They should strive for distinction by economy, by industry, by sobriety, by patient perseverance in well-doing, by constant improvement of religious instruction, and by the constant practice of Christian virtues.

And it is both natural and right that colored Americans, entitled to the rights of citizens, should claim their exercise.

They should persist in this claim respectfully, but firmly, taking care to bring no discredit upon it by their own action.

May it not prove, moreover, in that work of reorganization, which now engages the thoughts of all patriotic men, that universal suffrage is the best reconciler of the most comprehensive lenity with the most perfect public security and the…