The news & observer. [volume] (Raleigh, N.C.) 1894-current, 1898-09-10
CONDITION IN THE EAST
CAN HARDLY BE EXAGGERATED SAYS Mr..
KERR.
'he Story Tells Itself to the Man who will
Stand on the Street Corner and Hear
and See. Men in the West will
Go to the Rescue.

Mr.. J. +. Kerr, of the Asheville Citi-
zen, who has been on a tour through
Eastern Carolina observing negro rule il
its favorite haunts, was here yesterday
on his return. While away he visited
Edgecombe, Halifax, Pitt, Craven, am
New Hanover counties.
did you find that published reports
exaggerate conditions in the East!' hi
was asked.
1T is practically impossible to exag.
gerate conditions. The white people are
really in Il state that is pitiabe. They
feel Inundated and degraded. They are
to-day submitting to outrages that five
years ago would have precipitated riot
Take Newbern, for example. The white
girl who was brutally slapped in the
face on the public street by negro is
as highly respected as anybody in the
town.
within a stones throw of one house
six burglaries were committed in II sin
gle night. At one house the thieves stole
all.the chickens one night and came back
the next and tried to force the front door.
A neighbor frightened them away with
a pistol 1t is hardly too much to say
that burglaries in Newbern are commit
ted at will so far as the authorities are
concerned.
1.-THE story of negro rule in eastern
towns tells itself. No one need say y
word to you. You can stand on the
street corners and tell that the town is
under negro rule. 1t is next to impossi-
bic for any man to realize what the Goa
ditions are until he has seen for him
self.
"The white men of the section practice
all fOrbearance, but the insolence and
arrogance of the negro increases daily
The man who goes there and studies the
situation as it is can not fail to reach
the conclusion that as matters now
stand the fartherest point of endurance
will be reached sooner or later. The
only thing that can prevent such an oc
currence will be the restoration of tho
rule of intelligence. In Wilmington alone
there were more than 100 burglaries il
as many nights
''Do you think the people of the West
can be made TO realize the real situa.
ton in the East?"
II think the people in the West can
Ue Hldue 10 uUueFSldHu the outrageous
way in which white towns
have been negorized. The peo-
pie of the West are white
men and understand what ncgroizina
means. They will not vote in favor OF
it. They will get together as the ne
groes are doing. A negro Democrat in
Newbern recently declared that he would
hereafter vote the Republican ticket;
that it was simply the negro against the
white man, and he was going with his
color.
''There can be no doubt that the negro
in the East has made up his mind 10
hold all the ollIces The whites are send
ing up the Macedonian cry to their
brethren in the West. The arrogance
and insolence of the negroes is not all
There is an appalling abuse of official
power and crime is rampant as a re-
suit. The negorizing manifests different
ly in different places. In some it has
progressed much further than in others
but there is tendency toward the same
low level"
Mr.. Kerr left on the afternoon train
for Asheyille