The semi-weekly messenger. [volume] (Wilmington, N.C.) 1897-1908, 1898-05-17
4 STRONG ANTAGONIST TO THE
NEGRO.

"a The New York Globe Quarterly Re
view that was very bitter against the
degrees. In another issue, the editor,
Mr- w. II. Thorne, of English nativity,
referred to upon what he
said. We have not seen the Decem-
Der number, but in it he returns to his
discussion of the negro, and it is with
INTENSE vigor and hostility. Mr.. Thorne
vas one of the original abolitionists,
and used to take much stock in Sam
30 The Washington Post says OF him
that he was "one Of the noisiest and
most enthusiastic n~egrophiles of that
stormy period which preceded the war
OF 1851" He has been making a fresh
study of the negro race and has made
two visits into the south during which
he saw Sambo in all of his real, una
dulterated glory and perfection. The
result is that Mr.. Thorne returned a
Badder and wiser man, with new views
and an aroused dislike for which he
did not look. He writes in his Quarter
'y with much severely. but it is some
thing late in the day. The negro is
now invested with rights and privileges
that give him much consequence in
she south, and in North Carolina makes
him under the White radical combina-
zion the big dog in the barnyard. But
let Mr.. Thorne he heard:
During the spring of the year 1895,
and after more than thirty years of
sincere and old-fashioned abolition
sympathy with the negro race, i made
two visits to several of our southern
states, with results as follows:
First-All my old abolition syrnpa-
thies, which had been weakening for
over ten years in view of the fnsuffer-
able self-assertiOn Of our negroes since
the day of their emancipation, vanish
ed like so many scattered sOphistries,
for which 1 had no further use.
Second-On returning to New York
published in the next issue of the Globe
aSeview my conviction that, spite of
emancipation and our so-called educa-
zion of the negro and perhaps aided by
shese absurdfties-the negroes of this
country were more than ever a shift
less, unteachable, immoral race, inca
pable of any true civilization In our
aand, and unworthy of American c1ti-
-EenShip.
Third-That without mincing mat
tiers, or any longer writing or thinking
<on the basis of sympathy with the ne
gro, 1 was convinced that inside the
g next thirty years the south would be
Obliged to ~"re-enslave, kill or export
Che bulk of it's negro population
Harsh and bitter! Perhaps there are
Others in the north of the abolition
srang who see no longer through a
glass darkly, the scales having fallen
from their blinded eyes. The charge
OF Mr.. Thorne is far sweeping and gen
~aral. There is only a part that came
under his just censure. Among the
negroes are a great many worthy and
SnteHigent citizens, and the greatest
.cansetof complaint against them is,
that they invariably vote against the
respectable whites, against all that
class who treat them kindly and justly
and give them employment and sym
uafhy and appreciation. The better
classes Of whites in the south not only
/ understand the negroes. but almost
without exception treat them with
favor and extend to them always good
s1in. They tax themselves freely for
their beneit-to give their children
schooling, build asylums for their af-
flkc1ed, employ them ana oiceh neipeo
them with money and good advice.
The Post copies the Quarterly
said and comments sharply. 1t is
right in thinking that the true southern
peOpie do not mistake or misjudge the
They discriminate. 1t says
they adhere to the old-time sympa-
6hy and affection which in times past
bound the race firmly together" The
negroes, we regret to say, do not ap-
preciate this as they should or they
<xouid not he so ready to antagonize
them. The Post adds:
lit is as The Post has always said.
The negro has no real friends at the
north. We are willing to believe, for
we see something of it here, that the
negro does not show to advantage after
crossing the Potomac and the Ohio. II
seems to us that the further he wa nd
@ers rom the south the more bumptious