"Yes," said Minnie, "$500 means a great deal for a man landless and
poor, with no assured support for the future. It means a comfortable
fire when the blasts of winter are roving around your home; it means
bread for the little ones, and medicine for the sick child, and little
start in life."

"But on the other hand," said Louis, "it meant betrayal of the interests
of his race, and I honor the faithfulness which shook his hands from
receiving the bribe and clasping hands politically with his life-long
oppressors. And I asked myself the question while he was telling his
story, which hand was the better custodian of the ballot, the white
hand that offered the bribe or the black one that refused it. I think
the time will come when some of the Anglo Saxon race will blush to
remember that when they were trailing the banner of freedom in the dust
black men were grasping it with earnest hands, bearing it aloft amid
persecution, pain, and death."

"Louis" said Minnie very seriously, "I think the nation makes one great
mistake in settling this question of suffrage. It seems to me that
everything gets settled on a partial basis. When they are reconstructing
the government why not lay the whole foundation anew, and base the right
of suffrage not on the claims of service or sex, but on the broader
basis of our common humanity."

"Because, Minnie, we are not prepared for it. This hour belongs to the
negro."

"But, Louis, is it not the negro woman's hour also? Has she not as many
rights and claims as the negro man?"