Pittsburg dispatch. [volume] (Pittsburg [Pa.]) 1880-1923, 1890-01-13
EMIGRATION IDIOCY.
The Conclusions of a Man Who Has
Studied the Negro Problem
AT CLOSE RANGE AS POSSIBLE.
lmpOSSibility Of Transporting the Race to
the Congo Free State.
THE NEGRO An UKDOUBTED AMERICAN

tne way corner OF the WorlQ, anu senator
Morgan, of Alabama, has made a speech on
the subject which occupies almost one dozen
pages ofthe Congressional Record, most Of
it in very fine type. The reading consumed
several hours of the valuable time of the
Senate, for in that august body
no member presumes to insert a
speech in the Record without having
first reeited it to the empty benches that
usually greet their eofrts Senator Morgan
will be followed by others in the same vein,
and his speech may be accepted as a fair
presentation of that side of the question.
Whether Republicans will try to make a
substantial point on the other side they have
not indicated.
INDIFFERENCE IN THE NORTH.
Mr., Morgan said there is great deal of
indifference felt IN the North as to the fate
Of the negro, and it is possible the Republi-
can Senators may be content to let the Dem
ocrats have swing, saying nothing, knowing
that it is practical impossibiliiy to COM
pass the enactment of any law for the ex-
IIortation of the negroes that can be made
operative.
Mr.. Morgan starts out with the assertion
that to assimilate the two races is impossi-
bic; that the antagonIsm between them is
deadly and eternal; that it is fight to the
death, and that the negro must be got out Of
the South or the South abandoned to him.
The most pleasing view is that the negro
will be eliminated from the South. This
being the Senator's conclusion, he indulges
in the most amusing jumble of representa-
tions about the wondrous and inviting char
aeter of the Congo Free State in Africa ever
spread in the pages of the Record.
A GLOWING PROSPECT.
In quotations from one authority Mr..
Morgan gives q glowing prospect of the
possibilities of the American negro in the
region of the Congo, vast Republic OF the
future, with a hundred million population
and negro Governors and Presidents From
another he shows that any sppreciable i'm
proVement of the negro is impossible that
the Congo negroes are a most undesirable
population, that the negro per Sc is an imi-
tative and not creative nor progressive
creature, and that there is no hope for him
except in his translation to another world.
And with this fine prospect in view he
arrives at the extraordinary conclusion that
If the negro is to be deported it must be by
his own consent. He cannot be forced to
expRtriate himself. He is a fixture unless
he can be cosxed out of the country hy the
dreary prospect of life in Africa, which
the Senator intended should be attractive in
his picture, but in his anxiety to say some
thing derog atory of the race he made abso-
lutely repulsive.
THE WRITER'S OPINION.
'ave, within the last few years, made a
carer u study at close range of the NEGRO
problem" Not particularly Of the sense
less and criminal antagOnism toward him of
the whites, but of his own characteristics
and i,.pulses. NY observation leads me to
the conclusion that the negroes are, all
things considered, fully the equals of the
whites. Given an equal number of white
men and women, trampled upon as brutes
for long generations, kept in ignorance of
everything except that God had ordained
they should be slaves to the whites, with all
the passi ~ and affections Of their masters,
and yet Urn apart and sold and driven and
mutilated more cruelty than the beasts with
which they are associated, and l am con-
WINGED they would, after 25 years of so-called
freedom, be far less of men and women than
these creatures of swarthy skins.
The negroes are ambitious, quick to learn,
proud Of accomplishments, determined to
make their way in the world. Their prog
reSs is almost beyond belief They are,
generally speaking, fully the equals Of the
whites in their station of life.
THIS THEIR COUNTRY.
In every sense of the word they are
"Americans." They cling to this country
as their country, aud possibly the more
tenaciously for the reason that they were
brought here not of their own volition, but
in satisfaction of the worse than brutal
greed of their masters. If ever there was
race that proposed to make a name and
place for itself in a country other than that
Of its origin, it is the negroes of America.
They may shift from one spot to another in
America, but Americans they are and Will
be, an important and a useful part of the
body polite, despite the indignities put
upon them. They are aggressive to an as
tOnishing degree, remembering the condition
from which they were recently liberated.
They have more self-asSertion and indepen-
denee than white people in humble station.
There is less serYility among them than
among whites in similar conditions. This
is one great reason why the whites Of the
South hate them so much. They would
prefer the cringing and servile of their own
race to the impudent encroachments of the
pushing, determined black.
THE PROBLEM NOW.
This negro, independent, virile, coura-
geous, waiting opportunity to avenge every
insult heaped upon him now-whst are we
going TO do with him7 He is here to STAY.
viii neither be driven nor coaxed out of the
country which is his the more truly because
he was planted here against his Will-what
are we going to do with him?
We must take him by the hand and give
him absolutely equal political and social
rights, or be will at no distant day sweep
the South with a ruin greater than that
which followed in the wake of the armies of
the Union. With blindness more dense,
if possible, than that which led the South
into the war of secession, such leaders as
Butler and Morgan are provoking q race
conflict in which the negro, if lett to a fair
fight between him and the Southern white,
would wipe the latter out of existence In
such circumstances the conflict is as sure to
come as the war for the perpetuation of
slavery, and it is as sure to 60 against the
injustice, the narrowness, the meanness and
the brutality Of those who would repress and
degrade the race, as the war of secession was
TO 60 against those who would have in
creased the area of the territory cursed by
the system of chattel slavery.
VENGEANCE CONTEMPLATED.
There is a feeling Of bitterness among the
negroes that must have its natural result
unless the cause is removed. Vengeance is
now in their minds. Patient, long suffer-
ing, as they were when whipped and beaten
to death for the least exhibition of man
hood in days when children were torn from
parents and wives from husbands aud sold
at auction. they are far more intelligent, more
capable of united action, more determined to
throw of their yoke, than then. They will
have q free ballot in one way If not in
another. If they cannot ride in frst-class
carriages on the railroads when they pay for
them they will tear the railroads 70 pieces
II driven out Of the theaters they will tear
the thesters down. Men who stab at the
rights and life of the negro will themselves
be put to the knife. 1t requires no prophet
to ioretell this. II will simply be the eject
OF the cause. There is little hope that any
thing will be done to prevent the catastro-
phe. The South will not see, and the
humanity Of the North toward the negro is
measured BY the desire Of the Republican