From such lessons they will be sure to gather at once that if they now show a trace of timidity or hesitation in their firm and just course, because somebody has said something in Washington or on the stump, or because there is an election coming on, they will fail.
Reid warns against the dangers of hesitation and political pressure in governance.
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And it is both natural and right that colored Americans, entitled to the rights of citizens, should claim their exercise.
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 has proved, also, that universal suffrage is the surest guarantee and most powerful stimulus of individual, social and political progress.
They should persist in this claim respectfully, but firmly, taking care to bring no discredit upon it by their own action.