The Indianapolis journal. [volume] (Indianapolis [Ind.]) 1867-1904, 1883-05-30
HOMICIDE In THE SOUTH.
Address Before the Vanderbilt Alum
nj by Hon. Henry Watterson.
The Evil Declared To Be the Result of q
False but Waning Standard of Manly
Courage and Honor.

~NASitN Lille May EJ-fAI Lue
Alumni Associations annual banquet, to-
day. among the sentiments most loudly ap-
plauded was an expression in favor OF edu-
cation of the colored race in the South, and
that civil liberty was a hollow mockery
without the education commensurate with
its responsibilities. 1t was further declared
that the alumni associations were the best
sources for a proper consideration of the
subject of their thorough education. This
sentiment was loudly applauded, and the
negro visitors in attendance upon the BAN
quet heartily joined in the applause.
Tonight, at Vanderbilt University, Hon.
Henry Watterson delivered an address be-
fore the literary societies of the university,
taking for his subject The Homicidal Side
OF Southern Life" In the course of his ad-
dress Mr.. Watterson said:
We are a most homogeneous people; we
naturally love. not hate, one another; and, If
stop could be put to the nagging. the terms
North and South would become the simplest Of
geographic expressions. L say this to you.
young gentlemen of the South, III no bOmbastio
spirit. am glad to say 1t and am proud to say
country. But from, the inner depths Of my
thought and heart believe every word of IL.
Let each section, therefore, put its house in
is likely to exercise any good influence by crit
icsing the features of the other, and both should
remember the motherly crab, who reproducing
her offspring upon certain obhquity of gait,
was gently reminded of her own Nowhere in
our country is the taking of life punished ade-
quately. East AID West, North and South, the
nan-slayer who goes into court with plenty Of
friends ana money has at least an even chance
with the jury. am not prepared to say that he
has greater chance South than West; on the
whole, am inclined to think he has not; albeit,
as we are discussing the homlclda side of South
Tfn OF ia Il fhnrC Nnf T1n
count and consider our particular shortcom-
ing.
To-day no Southern man of character and re-
sponslbility would send or accept challenge.
He would shrink not so much from the encOuu-
ter as from the disgrace, and less from the dis.
grace than from the contempt which has fallen
upon the belligerent correspondence, the mock
heroic settlement on paper and the reciprocal
publication of mutually satisfied honor, Asa
rule, however, during the reign of the code, its
Votaries were either very hOt-headed young
men or men leading loose and reckless lives.
The same may be said of those who zoo impetu-
ons to wait for the formalities of the code. seek
the common thorOughfare as u field of honor,
and lmprOvtsC their duels without seconds
surgeons or benefit of clergy You and and all
OF us know that these episodes are, in nine cases
out of ten, the result of the use of stimulants,
and that those who take part in them, so far
from being representative men and admired of
the multitude, are generally men upon the down
grade of social consideration, or else men entire
ly outlawed from decent, Christian brother
hood
We have not reached the millennium yet in
But the fighters have had their day. Just after
our great war there was a childish effort made
IN certain quarters to revive the tourney. 1t
a dismal failure. The spirit OF chivalry was met
by the genius of labor. and the struggle was for
an instant only. Work won it, and so the heroes
OF our time are fast becoming the victOrs in
mans and wOmans fight for human freedom and
intellectual, moral and physical development.
In the popular imagination, saladin is replaced
by science; our troubadour is the trumpet.call Of
religion and the music of the Lutte is hushed for
ever by the deeper music Of the loom. Even
10 RhA h.rsa l,ou.
0lu VINO are nelu up as MODEL captains. but the
Haveocks and the Lees, the Stonewal Jacksous
to soldiership scholarship, and to both gen
tie manhood and simple truth. Everywhere the
world is seeking to rescue itself from
feudal darkness: At length the man
is saying to the woman. 'help me-"
and, 10, the woman-nO longer hand maiden
is taking her place by the side of her comrade,
not her lord, and. heart TO heart, the two are
hewing out oflite larger and richer fields f'hap-
piness and usefulness. The spirit Of the age is
movement, and nowhere in the world is it more
earnest or more active than it is at this moment
1t was my intention when 1 accepted your
kind message TO como and talk to you, to speak
to you. as said In the beginning, OF the homi-
cdal side of Southern life. That there is such q
side we all know. That it constitutes the worst
that can be said OF us is also true. But In gath
ing material for use on this occasion. encoun-
tered so much of mistaken assumption and so
much OF hostile exaggeratIon as left me little
choice. fear, therefore, that what have VEN
tured to say may seem rathsr a defense of the
~
be L have spoken to little purpose if
have not shown where the evil lies and
what lies at the base of 1t. I have spoken to
little purpose If have not pointed out the REM
edy. The evil Is false, but waning. standard of
manly courage and honor. Its origin is a tradi-
ton; its existence casualty. The remedy is
IN the hands of the church men, the school men
and the newspapers, and, until they prove def
cient and nm worthy, an entire community should
not be stigmatized because of conditions born OF
civilization not yet a century old. AS justly
might inveiGh against the social fabric OF the
great city of New York, as illustrated by race
OF young p0rvenues who. come swithout effort
to sudden wealth, imagine 1t a fine and manly
thug to initiate the bad manners of the English
and to emulate che bad morals of the French.
They are, with the DULLES of the South, but the
creatures of day. Both classes, like the me-
deval bandits OF the Black Forest and tho
ribald beauX of the Restoration, will run their
course and pass into the limbo of forgotten
legend and satire In the meantime we may
safely trust the result TO the better sense and
Judgment of the communities mostly and imme-
dttely concerned.