Q. All you ask is to continue to be let alone?  —­A.  Just to be let alone.  The South, with her natural resources and advantages of climate and soil, feels that she is perfectly able to take care of herself and her affairs, and all she wants is that the legislation of the country, both Federal and State, should be that which will mete out justice to all her citizens, colored as well as white.

Q. Does the South feel as though all she had got to do was to take care of herself, or does she feel a little responsibility for the other section of the country?  —­A.  She feels, more immediately now, responsibility for that section, for this reason, that the negro population of the South, compared with the white population of the South, might be a dangerous element, but the negro population, compared with the whole white population of the United States as an integral body, sinks into insignificance.  Therefore, the forces which are at work in the South today make us strongly Union.  They are directly contrary to what were existing before the war, and there are no people in this Government today who have the same interest in the Federal Union that the people of the Southern States have, and they appreciate it.

Q. You feel that it is to your advantage that the negro population should be dealt with by the forty or fifty millions of whites, that the races should be balanced in that proportion rather than in the proportion that exists between them and the white population of the South alone?  —­A.  Yes, sir.

     Q. The central idea of the South is a national idea, then? 
     —­A.  The central idea of the South is more a national idea
     now than it has been in this respect.

Q. I would use the word “leading” rather than “central” there—­the leading idea?  —­A.  We, of course, claim that we want to manage the internal affairs of our States just as much as New York, or New Hampshire, or Massachusetts would want to manage theirs, but that it is necessary for us to have the guidance and protection of the Government:  we want it just as much as either of those States.

     Q. Have you traveled considerably through the North? 
     —­A.  I have.

Q. What portions of the North have you visited within the last few years?  —­A.  I have visited Philadelphia, New York, Boston, Hartford, and I might say a number of other points in the States of which they are the chief cities.

Q. While we are speaking of this matter of reciprocal feeling between the sections of country, as you have mentioned the attitude of the South, I should like to know from you, from your personal observation and knowledge, what you find to be that of the North toward the South?  —­A.  I think it is of the kindliest character.  I have never in my life been treated with more consideration than I have been by gentlemen in the East who were most opposed to the