A NEGRO PARLIAMENT.

Waikato Times, Volume 356, Issue VII, 25 August 1874, Page 2

A NEGRO PARLIAMENT.

Some interesting information respecting the Black Parliament of South Carolina given by Mr Pike, who lately travelled through the State, appears in the Nation. In the House of Representatives sit 124 members. Of these 30 are pure white men, and the remainder black ; but as 7 out of the 30 white men vote with the hlack, the real strength of the opposition is only 23. The Speaker is black, the clerk is black, the door-keepers are block, the pages are black, and the chaplnm ia black. At some oi the desks sit colored men whose type? it would be bard to find outside of Congo ; whoso costume, visages, attitude, and expressions only befit | the forecnstlo of a buccaneer. The Lieutenant-Governor^ thp President of the Senate, the Speaker of the House, the Treasurer, are all blacks. The Governor alone is a white, elected by black vofeei. The manner in which business is conducted in t'us black parliament is thus described by Mr Pike. " Tlioy are quick as lightning at detecting points of order, and they certainly make incessant and extraordinary use of their knowledge. No one is allowed to talk five minutes without interruption, and one interruption is the signal for another and another, until the original speaker is smothered under an avalanche of them. Forty questions of privilege will be raised in a day. At times nothing goes on but alternating questions of order and privilege. The inefficient coloured friend who sits in the Speaker's chair cannot suppioss Hub extraordinary element of the debate. Some of the blackest members exhibit a pertinacity of intrusion in raising these points of order and questions of privilege that few white men can equal. Their struggles to get the flooi, their bellowings and physical contortions bafflo description. The Speaker's hammer plays a perpetual tattooall to no purpose. The talking and the interruptions from all quarters go on with the utmost licence. Every one esteems himself as geod as his neighbour, and puts in his oar apparently as often, for love of not and confusion as for anything else. It is easy to imagine what are his ideas of propriety and dignity among a crowd of his own color, and these are illustrated without reserve. The Speaker orders a member wlom he has discovered to be particularly unruly to take his seat. The member obeys, and with the same motion Ui.iL ho sits down throws his feet on to his desk, hiding himself from the Speaker by the soles of his boot*. In an instant he appears again on the floor. After a few experience* of this sorb, the Speaker threatens, in a laugh, to call ' the nemman ' to order. This is considered a capital joke, and a guffaw follows. The Uugb. goes round, and then, the peanuts are cracked and munched faster than ever ; one hand beinj; employed in fortifying the inner man with this nutriment of universal use, while the other enforces the views of tl-o orator." "