The morning news. [volume] (Savannah, Ga.) 1887-1900, 1897-12-12
NO WHITE MAN CAN VOTE.
REV. MAX MANNING SAYS LIBERIA
Is THE NEGROES LAND.


States Legation at MOnrovia Talks
of Liberia and Its Government.
Men with Money and Brains
Wanted, But Poor People Had Bet
ter stay Away-The Savannah I'm
migrants Have Fared Badly.
Rev. c. Max Manning, secretary Of the
United States legation at Monrovia, Libe-
ria. will lecture at st. Philips African
Methodist Episcopal church tomorrow
night upon the subject of Africa In Cen
eral and Liberia in Particular" This
ought to be an interesting subject to the
colored people of Savannah, many of
whom had their hearts set upon going to
Liberia little over year ago.
Rev. Manning is in this country on a
sixty days leave of absence, after having
spent twelve months in Liberia in perform
ance of his official duties He was appoint
ed by President Cleveland June 80 last. w.
II. Heard, the present minister to Liberia
is also Georgia negro, having been ap-
pointed by President Cleveland in Febru-
airy, 1895. Rev. Manning is staying with
Rev. l. H. Smith, pastor of st. Philips
church. He is an educated man and
speaks intelHgently though somewhat
guardedly of things and conditions in Lii
IBERIA. Naturally he was asked as to the
condition of the emigrants who left Sa-
vannah for Liberia during 1895 and 1896. He
replied that he had seen and heard very
little of them, the last party, that which
went on the Laurada, having arrived
sometime before he reached there He
understood that they had chiefly gone into
the interior. He met a few from Arkan-
sas around Monrovia, but none from Geor-
gia. The reports which he received of
these immigrants were not the most fav-
orable, he said. He heard that at Crosier-
vile, a colony established by the immi-
grants in the interior, two-thirds of them
had died.
Inc great mortality among these peo-
ple.' said Rev. Manning, lis not due so
much to climatic influences as to the fact
that the greater number of them were I'M
prepared to take care of themselves, ond
should never have gone there. / do not
consider the climate especially unhealthy.
What Liberia needs is men with money
and brains to develop its resources. Cheap
labor is over plentiful. There are plenty
Of natives to attend to that and they will
do twice the work for half the money
that the people who go there from this
country can afford to work for. 1 know
of no place in the world where a man
with little capital and who is a good
trader can make money more rapidly, and
there is none where a man without money
is liable to suffer more quickly. The gov
eminent desires to encourage immigration
of the right sort. There is plenty of fer
tile land The government gives twenty
five acres of land to each head of a fam
lily, and ten acres to a single man. The
class of emigrants who left Savannah in
1895 and 1895 is not desired by the gov
eminent. 1t is tired of that class of emf
grants.
In speaking of the country Rev Man
ming admitted that Liberia had not pro-
crossed as rapidly as the friends of the
black republic might wish. The civilized
negroes are only a handful as compared
with the uncivilized natives. The civilized
negroes run the country, however, and the
natives cut no more figure with them than
a negro does with the white man in this
country, Rev. Manning said. No white
man is allowed to vote in Liberia. Only
land owners can vote, and no white man
Is allowed to own land This is a strange
state of affairs in a country which was
presented to its occupants by white peo-
pie.
They argue" said Rev. Manning, that
if the white people are allowed to own
land and vote in Liberia the condition of
affairs there will soon be pretty much the
same as it is in this country and that
Whita men would own and run the coun-
try. Because of this embargo upon white
man capital has been kept out of the
country, and its development is retarded.
1 tried to argue with the principal men
that it would be better for them TO induce
white peoplesto come in and build up their
colony for their own advantage, If for no
other reason, but they could not see it that
way. 1 cited them to the city of Freetown
in the British colony of Sierra Leone,
where the queens government controls
but everybody has an equal showing.
Freetown is one of the most progressive
cities to be found anywhere, and remind
ed me greatly of Augusta, with the ex-
cepton that the manufacturing element is
lacking. Yet negroes do business there
successfully in competition with white
men, The majority of the business houses
are owned and conducted by negroes.
There are two banks. One has negro
president and white cashier, and the
other white president and a negro cash
Ter. The tellers and other employees are
| negroes"