Rather, let the United States profit by the experience of the British in their emancipation policies and arrange a system of apprenticeship for a period of transition.

When the Negro should be fit, let him be advanced to citizenship.
Most Southern leaders agreed that the removal of the master's protection was a real loss to the Negro which must be made good to some extent by giving the Negro a status in court and by accepting Negro testimony in all cases in which blacks were concerned.

The North Carolina committee on laws for freedmen agreed with objectors that "there are comparatively few of the slaves lately freed who are honest" and truthful, but maintained that the Negroes were capable of improvement.

The chief executives of Mississippi and Florida declared that there was no danger to the whites in admitting the more or less unreliable Negro testimony, for the courts and juries would in every case arrive at a proper valuation of it.

Governors Marvin of Florida and Humphreys of Mississippi advocated practical civil equality, while in North Carolina and several other States there was a disposition to admit Negro testimony only in cases in which Negroes were concerned.