The Indianapolis journal. [volume] (Indianapolis [Ind.]) 1867-1904, 1885-02-16
WORK FOR AMERICANWOMEN
Mrs. JennieF. Willing Points Out Fruit
full Fields for WOman's Influence.
The Indian Question, Mormonism, the Opium
Habit and the Liquor Traffic-0rganiza-
tiOns Effected in the Churches.

Mrs. Jennie F. Willing occupied the Meridian
street pulpit yesterday morning. speaking chiefly
| in the interest of the womans Home Missionary
| Society, which was organized last May for the
| purpose of the education and moral training of
| the INDECENT young boys and girls of the United
States.
1.-The children of Israel" said Mrs. Willing
''were in bondage as scorching as the land of
the cloven hoof, although Israel was the land of
milk and honey. The old world is under the do
minion of tyrants and freedom Of speech, wor
ship and the ballot is unknown to millions.
America is the worlds land of promise Other
nations are bending and groaning under the load
of oppression, and wistfully looking across the
sea to our beautiful land of freedom. Ours
is good land. We have lakes great enough to
be seas, and broad rivers that afford the means
of trade and commerce We have rich mines,
great forests, abundant grain fields, and withal
population of 10000 900 of people within our
territory. The American was born for liberty,
as the Roman for dominion. Our public school
system is not equaled in point of excellence in
the whole world. Above all, we have absolute
freedom of worship.
I'm Milan a service was held by the nobility
over the dead President Garfield, and in the as
semblage was an American tourist, who, upon
being invited to say something of the dead
President remarked that Garfeld's great
ness was born in lowly log
cabin and developed while a canal boy.
This opportunity to rise from obscurity and OBJ
livion to the highest and most honorable
stations in life, is possible in only country in
the world-our own. We ought to thank God
for those blessings, and also render faithful and
intelligent service to country by studying its
political necessities it's society and institutions
IA great work lies ahead of all our country
men. We have great territory in Alaska. with
mineral wealth and fur; but the natives must be
civilized and christianized if we would realize the
greatest honor and profit from the territory.
Along the western border of our country are
200, 600 Chinese heathens, who, if not christian
lied, will heathenize us. Here the opium habit
is coiling ITSELF like the poisonous rattlesnake,
around our society. This vice is getting hold Of
the American people. In New York. Chicago
and Boston, and all our large cities the opium
habit is taking root.
'"Then there is the Mormon problem. What
shall we do with this unholy religion that at
tacks the homea The home is the only Eden In
this world Mormonism is a systematic and
organized attack on every Christian family. 1t
is at war with our government, and is rapidly
spreading throughout the West and South. If
you go to Utah to closely investigate Mormon
ism, YOU are threatened with your life, for to
every aggressive gentle is preached the gospel
of the pistol and dagger. There are many places
where Christian sermon was never heard but
Morrnonism is there firmly grounded.
'The Indian question, too demands treat
ment. All this land once belonged to the In
h,,k b1x1 %olrn hNy
whites, who for more than two hundred years
have been maltreatins, saughtering and driving
away from their homes and mother earth these
poor aborigines. To-day the Indians are
pays annually $4,000 900 to have them
shot. Why not educate them and civilize them2
The Bible is cheaper than bullets. 1t is far bet
ter, anyhow, to convert them than to kill them.
We do not want our civilization to crush but
rather to elevate the Indian race.
1.-THE freedmen of our country must be the OBJ
| ject of special attention. Our Nation is octo-
room, one eighth of its population being colorej.
| The negro was brought here first by force; he
| did not come at his own solicitation. We stole
negroes from Africa and put them under the
| lash for $50 years. Now we wonder that they
| are so ignorant, that they steal, and dislike
work How could they be otherwise2 We took
| away from the negro every motive for industry,
! and did not try to Christianze him. We wonder
| why the marriage tie is so loosely regarded by
| the negro, but if we remember that the COM
| mandmentS were not taught him, the mystery
will clear away Yet he has the ballot to-day,
and his influence in law making is as
great as our own. The negro population is rap
| idly increasing In Louisiana Mississippi,
| Georgia and Alabama it is now in the majority.
| Each twenty years the negro population
| doubles Soon they will outnum Der the whites.
! We cannot kill them or send them away. Africa
/ is at our doors, and her descendants are growing
| in the tide of ignorance and immortality There
| is danger ahead, and we must provide means to
| prevent or escape it. The poor whites of the
| South are hardly superior to the negroes but
| they have the advantage of good blood. What
| they need is the school-house and the church.
| Lincoln and johnson were poor whites, and this
fact shows that they lack only the means and a6-
| vantages of culture.
another danger to our country is communism.
| Once this movement had Chicago under control,
and it was only the timely arrival of the soldiery
that saved the city from ravage and blood.
| In Cincinnati the late mob demonstration
| was the effect of the pernicious doctrine. The
| demagogues who declare that the blood of CAPT
| talist will make good dynamite, the politicians
| who preach fire and plumber, the men who in
| England blow up the houses of Parliament and
| in America plot against liberty and property are
| all included in this movement.
This is a dark day. yet there is streak of
| dawn in the sky above. Women is everywhere
! lending her aid in movements of reform When
the mothers begin to work, the sons and daugh-
| tiers will not go very far in the wrong Ten
| years ago the liquor traffic received its death
| stab at the hands of woman. Our work must
| begin with the home. We must teach the young
men and women to get an honest living. Thou
sands of girls in this country know nothing about
| sewing the use of even the broom We
| must establish homes and schools of industry
where the young may be taught to be useful
| and upright men and women. Home-making is
our business. We want to save America at her
own hearthstone America must look to her
women for the amelioration Of the many evils
| that exist among u.s. 1t is the work of women
to educate public sentiment against these wrongs,
| and it is for this that women urge the general
public to cooperate with and aid them in their
| work by helping them to establish and maintain
| theirmissionary and charitable organizations"
| The Womans' Home Missionary Society or
| ganized last night at Roberts Park M Z.
! Church. after hearing Mrs Willing speak in its