Statesmen might decide upon the course of statesmen for such emergencies; and whether it was pleasant or unpleasant, Virginia would submit, make the best of it, and go to work to improve her condition.
Reid reflects on Virginia's resilience and commitment to improving its situation after the Civil War.
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They should persist in this claim respectfully, but firmly, taking care to bring no discredit upon it by their own action.
And it is both natural and right that colored Americans, entitled to the rights of citizens, should claim their exercise.
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.