The Appeal. [volume] (Saint Paul, Minn. ;) 1889-19??, 1897-05-22

perty, actually pays 60 per cent, of the
taxes Up. 500.) That the white man,
through the operation of a poA-tax or
otherwise, contrlves to make the Negro
pay in proportion to his means two dol
lars for mis- one, will convince most per-
sons that, however much the Negroes
"are wanting in that sense of public
morality which demands that man
shall pay the taxes which his income,
property or political privile gas impose
upon him." their unwjllingness to yield
up more than they do Is not altogether
unnatural"
This conforms to the position we have
taken in regard to Hoffman but The
Nation does not let the poor fellow of
with this SHINING. It goes on to say:
"The accuracy and fairness of some
parts of Mr.. Hoffman's work can be
readily tested, and it is evident that
more care could have been profitably
exercised in it's preparation. We do not
refer to such obvious typographical slips
as that Up. 19) where he is made to say
that "Even in counties where the
Negroes outnumber the whites fifty to
one, the principal Offices of the county
are in the hands of the latter" There
are. of course, no such counties in the
United States. What he wrote or inten-
ded to write must have been fifteen to
one. Even then the remark was loose
one, for Issaquena County, Mississippi,
is the only one in which the Negroes
constitute as much as tifteen-sixteenths
of the population" %.... Z g.. ....
It then shows up, "the curiously mis-
leading character of the tables on pages
20 and 81" 1t says. "Upop what prin.
ciple this table was compiled, it is not
possible to discover"
The Nation next takes up what it calls
the basis Of Hofman's case "that the
Negroes are crowding into the cities to
die off,"
It shows the unfair manner in which
Hoffman handles the statistics of cities
by using such as confirm his theory and
saying nothing of others that disprove
1t. It concludes thus, "How, then, does
Mr.. Hoffman persuade himeelf or his re-
aders that the Negro population of the
cities is increasing more rapidly than the
white? Unfortunately, the story is a
long one. Its necessary to tell it, how
ever. if we are to understand with how
much reservation some OF the flndam-
entail assertions of this book must be
taken. In the first place, by combining
his comparisons to the cities which in
1890 had at least ten thousand Negro in
habitants, he includes those cities the
number of whose Negro inhabitants had
grown rapidly during the decade, and
excludes those which, while in 1880 in
the same class, had since grown slowly
or not at all. It may be that the Anne ri
car Negro is doomed to extinction. Mr..
Hoffman, however, has not convinced
US that any euch result is in the slightest
degree probable. Predictions as to the
future movements of population are of
very little value even when those who
make them are absolutely unbiased,
and have reached their conclusions after
an impartial, careful, and complete study
of all the available data"
These are not the rawlings of an angry
Negro" as an Q article from my pen
would be classed, but the language Of q
white journal Of the highest rank for in
telligent criticism. Hoffman is convicted
of blind prejudice, folly and dishonesty,
and doomed to extinction as statis-
tician.