Perhaps no piece of legislation, no policy, was ever more fatuous in every detail.

How could it be otherwise?
How could the men who devised it expect for it anything more than a speedy, ignominous collapse?
All the past history of the Southern states unmistakably pointed to the utter failure of any policy in which the whites were not made the masters; unless, indeed, they were subjected to that severe governmental control which their treason merited, until such time as the people were prepared for self-government by education, the oblivion of issues out of which the war grew, the passing away by death of the old spirits, and the complete metamorphosis of the peculiar conditions predicated upon and fostered by the unnatural state of slavery.
At the close of the Rebellion, in 1865, the United States government completely transformed the social fabric of the Southern state governments; and, without resorting to the slow process of educating the people; without even preparing them by proper warnings; without taking into consideration the peculiar relations of the subject and dominant classes--the slave class and the master class--instantly, as it were, the lamb and the lion were commanded to lie down together.
The master class, fresh from the fields of a bloody war, with his musket strapped to his shoulder and the sharp thorn of ignominious defeat penetrating his breast; the master class, educated for two hundred years to dominate in his home, in the councils of municipal, state and Federal government; the master class, who had been taught that slavery was a divine institution and that the black man, the unfortunate progeny of Ham, was his lawful slave and property; and the slave class, born to a state of slavery and obedience, educated in the school of improvidence, mendacity and the lowest vices--these two classes of people, born to such widely dissimilar stations in life and educated in the most extreme schools, were declared to be _free, and equal before the law_, with the right to vote; to testify in courts of law; to sit upon jury and in the halls of legislation, municipal and other; to sue and be sued; to buy and to sell; to marry and give in marriage.

In short, these two classes of people were made co-equal citizens, entitled alike to the protection of the laws and the benefits of government.
I know of no instance in the various history of mankind which equals in absurdity the presumption of the originators of our "Reconstruction policy" that the master class would accept cordially the conditions forced upon them, or that the enfranchised class would prove equal to the burden so unceremoniously forced upon them.

On the one hand, a proud and haughty people, who had stubbornly contested the right of the government to interfere with the extension of slavery, not to say confiscation of slave property--a people rich in lands, in mental resources, in courage; on the other, a poor, despised people, without lands, without money, without mental resources, without moral character--these peoples _equal_, indeed! These peoples go peaceably to the ballot-box together to decide upon the destiny of government! These peoples melt into an harmonious citizenry! These peoples have and exercise mutual confidence, esteem and appreciation of their common rights! These peoples _dissolve into one people!_ The bare statement of the case condemns it as impracticable, illusory, in the extreme.

And, yet, these two peoples, so different in character, in education and material condition, were turned loose to enjoy the same benefits in common--to be one! And the _wise men_ of the nation--as, Tourgee's _Fool_ ironically names them--thought they were legislating for the best; thought they were doing their duty.