Staunton Vindicator

The New York Evening Post calls the attention of the political calculators to the fact that a great change has been made in the last few years, in the distribution of the negroes as compared with the census of 1800. Apart from those who went Northward, and from the increased mortality, the more northern of the Southern States have suffered a large loss from the tide of emigration that sets southward.

"With the removal of all restraints the negroes have wandered at will, sometimes towards the cities, but generally southwards. Late statistics show that in some counties in Virginia the number of laborers has been reduced full one-half, and throughout the State the negroes have noticeably thinned out. No figures are given in Kentucky to show the extent of the exodus from that State, but there is general complaint of the loss of labor, and the local journals say that all the best field hands are going to the Southern cotton grounds.

"From States South of Kentucky and Virginia the negro movement is still southward. Within a year the two Carolinas are estimated to have lost from one-forth to one-third of their negro population, though the Charleston News thinks that only 25,000 field hands have gone from South Carolina, and these went, it says, to Mississippi, Louisiana, Alabama, Texas and Florida. Still further South, the Macon Telegraph is still confident that Georgia has lost one-third of her negroes, and that the loss of North Carolina and South Carolina is still greater. The Augusta Constitutionalist says, "if a correct census should be taken of the negro population of Georgia, a startling exhibit of decrease would be manifest;" and that "one of the chief causes of this decrease is migration to the South and Southwest." Even in Alabama, which would seem, at least in summer, about as far South as the most aspiring or perspiring colored laborer would desire to go, there is a marked scarcity of labor which the Selma Times explains by stating the depletion is due to the agents who are everywhere "offering extraordinary inducements to the negroes to go to Mississippi, Louisiana and Texas."

This disposition to migrate will interfere very much with the calculation of the radical politicians, even could they control the negro vote as they hope. As twelve months' residence is requisite to voting, most of these rovers will be disfranchised everywhere; so that while the States which they have left will have the white preponderance greatly increased, those to which they have gone will be but little effected. This emigration will put the States of Virginia, North Carolina, Georgia, Florida, Alabama, and Arkansas, wholly above any serious interference thro' colored suffrage; while the whites of South Carolina, Mississippi and Louisiana will be able to maintain themselves without difficulty.

Nor will Texas, which has drawn off so many of the blacks, be in any jeopardy of coming under their control, as its white population exceeds the black nearly three to one.

It will be seen, therefore, that those who would organize the black population against the whites, would engage them in an utterly hopeless contest in every State in the South. They would be outvoted every where, and would besides forfeit that good will which is infinitely more important to them than votes.

In our last issue we publish the proceedings of the meeting of the colored people, held here, without comment, in the first place for want of space, they being received just before going to press and secondly, that we preferred to see the result of the convention which assembled in Richmond, on the 17th, to which the meeting here sent delegates.--The Richmond convention has had its say and has committed the unfortunate and ignorant colored people of this State to a policy, calculated to result is great injury to them. Judging from the resolutions which we published, the meeting of the colored people here was anything but conservative, yet the Richmond convention went a bow shot beyond. We feel that our colored people have been greatly misled by designing whites in the meeting here as well as at Richmond. They had no hand in getting up the resolution in either case, and infatuated with the idea of participating in a political meeting they could be and were easily manipulated to vote for any and everything. Great allowances should be made for them. They are ignorant and credulous. They surely have no ill will to those who have shown them only kindness throughout their lives, and have not the slightest idea of the purport of the resolutions they have voted for, and we again repeat that we should make many allowances for them.

There is, however, a duty incumbent upon each and every one of us. By our inertness we have allowed the ignorance of the colored people to be abused by evil-designers. Although we cautioned our people weeks since that they must explain candidly and truthfully to the colored people their new condition, yet we forebear to upbraid, but suggest that they lose no more time in dalliance between inclination and duty, but follow the course indicated by the latter. It is incumbent upon each and every one of us to explain to those around us their exact condition. That it was no love for them that induced those, who were brought them from the wilds of Africa and first enslaved them, and, finding them unprofitable chattels, not only sold them for a price, but guaranteed their possession and servitude forever to their Southern purchasers, but the exigencies of a war, thought to be fruitless by any other course, which caused the proclamation of their freedom. That is was no desire to see them awarded justice that they were suddenly lifted to the position of suffragans, but simply that the power and spoils might remain in the hands of the Radical leaders, the first crumb of which will be awarded none of those who wear dusky skins. If the contrary obtained, why are the few in the Northern States denied the political privileges thrust upon their sable brethren at the South? It must be truthfully explained to them wherein their interests and the interests of the whites of the South are identical and that a mutual dependence exists between them, the one for labor and the other for the means of honorable sustenance, and that this will only be interrupted by their failure to realize the fact, and act with confidence in and not distrust of those whites among whom they were born and raised. Then action based upon distrust of their former masters, and most reliable and sympathizing, friends, must exhibit itself sooner or later, and must result in their being supplanted by white labor which will understand that confidence between employer and employee is essential to the success of both. They must have it explained to them that the white people in every part of the world have been duped by fair promises, which were never intended to be kept, but simply to win their confidence to secure some benefit to the wily and unprincipled, and be warned that they are now being beset by adventurers, who seek only their own self emolument, which they deem easily attainable through the ignorance of the suddenly enfranchised blacks. We must cause them to consider who has aided in sustaining them since they were freed and see if they do not find it to be their old and tried friends in the South and not their pretended friends in the North. The negro, being called upon, is learning to reason, and with a little effort on our part, will reach the proper conclusion and act upon it. But if we allow him, by our inertness, to become the prey of those who will excite his passions and prejudices for their own advantage, it will not be his fault, but ours. We repeat therefore, that it is incumbent on us to impress upon the minds of the colored people these, and many other things which will suggest themselves to all, and which the narrow limits of a newspaper article forbids us to mention. Justice to ourselves and duty to those who were once our faithful slaves, and, from their general conduct, still entitled largely to our sympathy and friendship, alike demand it. We learn with pleasure that General Echols will address them, by invitation, on Saturday night, but we are not content with this.--Other prominent gentlemen must follow with timely advice, and each and every one must use our efforts to get the colored people to reason and reflect upon their condition and exercise judgement and discretion in their acts, and give them timely advice and counsel lest they be led astray by those who ever the lay in wait for the innocent.

Thank God we are not responsible for the present unfortunate conditions of the blacks, but unless we are alive to our duty we will be in a great degree responsible for the terrible future which awaits the colored people of this country. We have seen the Indian waste away because no sympathizing friend was by when avarice sought his broad domain, and "make room for the white man" was the cry which thrust him, reluctant, a pitiful pension from the Government, to the further side of the Continent whence the track of the last [unclear] vanished leaving [unclear] of time. It [unclear] from the black man we must instruct him and make him understand that his interests are ours, that his existence is no more incompatible with ours then when he was a slave, but that his labor is needed and desired, and that his place will only be supplied when he fails to do his duty and act for the best interest of his employer.