The Appeal. [volume] (Saint Paul, Minn. ;) 1889-19??, 1892-03-26
Congress retitiOned.

Congress PetitiOned.
At mass meeting held at Qrinn
Chapel the following resolutions were
adopted:
To the Honorable Members of the SEN
ate and House of Represen' atives of ii e
United States assembled.
We, the Colored citizens of Chicago in
mass meeting assembled. adopt the fol
Lowing resolutions unanimously:
WHEREAS, The Colored people of the country
being entitled in common with all citizens and tax
payers to just representation in the agencies and
forces now at work in developing the World :
Fair: and
WHEREAS, They have frequently and respect
fully presented their claims to the appointing
Power and the Board of Reference and Control
which claims have been repeatedly ignored and
denied and
WHEREAS, We believe this Worlds Fair viii
trial life Of all who actively engage in its stirring
developments. be it therefore
RESOLVED, That it is the sense of this meeting
that our best interests can only be served in an
appeal to Congress to set apart ten per cent 40 per
=
Fair. and to enact such legislation as will enable
the Colored people to control the sum thus set
apart for their benefit at the Worlds Fair.
Believing that an organized policy prevails in
the Worlds Fair management to prevent the Col
orep people Of the count. from securing respect
able representation in the departments thereof;
Knowing that orr claims have been repeatedly
presented to the proper authority and that the
common courtesy Of reply has never been az
corded 10 our appeals confident that the long con-
tnued silence Of the Powers at Chicago bodies no
good to the Colored people, and precudes the DOS.
sibility and hope Of securing such representation
as Will command the respect and confidence of our
leaders of thought and actual producers in their
respective communities; believing that the govern
ment will be as proporionately liberal in her ap
preparation for our needs in this National enter
prise as she will be in the appropriation to her
more resourceful and wealthy Saxon citizen, who
as agent and servant of the government and the
people has treated our claim with contempt; be
Hevlns that II the present 'freeze out policy con.
unues much longer, unless relieved by Congress
sional action, the Colorcd people will remain in
that obscurity and seclus;on into which Saxon
nate ana cruelty have forced them; believing that
the plea on the part of the managers of lack of
iunds to pay some representative Colored man
to take charge of Il department with a competent
working force to awaken the CoiOred people to
activity and to inspire them with confidence in the
Fair as a means Of commercial as well as moral
and intellectual benefit t? them. is matter for
careful investigation. since in The opinion of n
large number Of tax payers. friends and bedefac
tors OF the Negro race, much OF the millions of
money of the government lavished on big salaried
officials and unnecessary and extravasant elabora
ton might have been devoted to the sublimer DIR
pose maintaining Il bureau and aiding to pay
the debt Of reparation they owe to those whom
they have wronged for over two generations.
knowing these facts to be true and to be but part
OF the history of the injustice we have endured at
the hands Of the appointing power. commission
and directory we hereby appeal to our repr. santa
ves In Congress for such an appropriation as will
enable us to awaken to activity the energies of the
100000 Colored people in this country-such
relief rs shall dignity rather than bettIe us in the
ewes OF this and other nations. I'D.