The daily morning journal and courier., 1898-09-10
POSITION OF THE NEGRO
ELOQUENT ADDRESSES DELIVERED
 BETHEL 4. 1T. F. PICNIC.

Prominent Colored Citizens Discuss the
 Social and Political Position of the
 AfrO-American-R Relative Good Done
 by the Political Parties.
 Probably the most interesting feature of the ox-roast and barbecue held in Scheutzen Park on Wednesday after noon was the literary programme, in which the following subjects were dis cussed: "The Negro's Place in Ameri- can Politics." "The Attitude of the South Towards the Negro,' "The Atti- tude of the American Mind Towards the Negro, as Evinced by the Recent War with Spain." MT. Robert H. Bonner presided over the deliberations and in- troduced MT. William H. Ferris, of Harvard University, as the first speak CT. MT. Ferris first criticised the theo- ries of MT. Booker T. Washington, the president of Tuskeegee. He admitted that MT. Washington was doing a mag nificent work at Tuskegee, but he thought that MT. Washington made too many concessions to southern preju- dice. MT. Ferris challenged Booker T. Washingtons assertion that the south erner was so favorably disposed to- wards the negro. He said that the south likes the negro in the capacity of an inferior or slave, but took offense when the negro aspired to be man and demanded to be treated as a man. He admitted that aboIitionists of the stamp of Wendell Phillips, Charles | Sumner and William Lloyd Garrison 1 were dying out; that the republican party was controlled by men who were | not inspired with the spirit of Sumner, | Phillips, etc.; that the north did not go l to war for the purpose of freeing the | slaves, but went to preserve the Union; | but still he maintained that in national | politics it was for the negro's best in- terests to be allied to the republican l party, because the south, which crushed the manhood out of the negro, exerted more controlling influence in the democratic party than in the repub- lican party MT. Ferris admitted that | in Massachusetts the democratic party was doing as much for the negro as the | Tammany Hall gave the negroes one hundred and thirty-six positions in l New York city alone, and far eclipsed anything that the republicans had done for the negro. But he maintained that | in Connecticut the negro had more to | hope for from the republican party than from the democratic party. Still it was true that the republicans of | Massachusetts and Rhode Island who did not need the negro vote, were doing more for the negro than the republicans | of Connecticut, who did need the negro vote New Haven objects to a negro l alderman, and Connecticut thinks 1t l has done something wonderful if it has a colored man in the cloak room at Hartford. But Boston sent two colored delegates to the republican national convention in 1S96 and has sent many colored men to represent her in the Massachusetts legislature The same city has colored deputy sheriff who gets eighteen hundred dollars year, and 1 colored sereant on the police force. These are only few of the instances. In conclusion MT. Ferris said that what was called the negro problem would nev- | CT be solved until the negro was given 1 the same chance to rise in political and industrial life that any other American | received. MT. Ferris claimed that | American prejudice made the negro problem, because it put artificial re- strictions upon the negro's activity and did not give the negro an equal chance in the higher walks of life. The south attempts to crush the self-respect out of the negro. But when you de- stroy the self-respect of man you cut the foundations from under his character and self-reliance
 COL. MURRELI1S GREAT SPEECH.
 Then Colonel Murrell was introduced
 as the orator of the day. He first
 spoke of the negro as a soldier, and in
 language which thrilled the audience
 described the assault of the gallant 54th
 Massachusetts regiment upon Fort
 Wagner. Colonel Murrell received two
 bullet wounds and one bayonet thrust
 in that desperate assault, and he spoke
 as only one could who was in the thick of the battle. Then he mentioned other
 instances of the heroism which the ne- gro exhibited during the civil war; com
 ing down to the Spanish war, Colonel
 Murrell vividly described the desperate | iieoIiliio bCLpiC AoilIioSOJ etiu oPOhC VI
 the valor of the negro soldiers at Fl Clancy, La Quassina and on San Juan
 hill Colonel Murrell is a born orator
 and possesses a genius for picturine
 events and actions in words that burn
 into the imagination. He is tall
 handsome man, with the gallant and chivalrous bearing of a soldier. And
 his whole body, his very voice, trem-
 bled with intense feeling as he spoke ot
 the fighting before San Juan hill and
 Fl Caney He told how the Rough Riders were composed of varied ele- ments, some negro haters from Texas
 being among their number. And he told how they made their desperate , charge. He quoted the words of one o1 , their leaders, who said that if the 9th ) and 10th cavalry (colored) and the 24tf : and 25th infantry (colored), upon theil
 right, had wavered the Rough Riders l would have been cut to pieces. But when Colonel Murrell vividly pictured | the battle and told how the negro sol diers, in the face of a terrible fire stood like stone wall, climbed over
 barbed wire fences and routed the
 Spaniards the audience went wild Then Colonel Murrell made a powerful
 plea for the negro. He said that the