The gold leaf. [volume] (Henderson, N.C.) 1881-1911, 1899-08-31
NEG RIO EDUCATION
More Malignant Misrepresentation of
the South by a Boston Blatherskite
Newspaper Sheet.
(Washington Pvst.l

possible, or. at least, inconsistent
with its sense of the eternal fitness
of things. to say good word for the
wisest of the influential colored men
OF the country without doing injus-
tice to the white people of the South,
Here is fair average sample of its
editorial deliverances on subjects that
admit of display of sectional pref
udice:
Booker Washington is right when
he SAYS that he intends to devote
himself to the education of the color
ed race in the South. as he believes
that education is the only way in
which the race can be helped and
brought to better general conditions.
1t would be perfectly useless for MIR.
Washington TO try to get the permis-
sion for the colored citizens to vote.
SO long as Congress refuses to do
anything in the matter, the politi-
clans in the South will not permit the
negro to vote, and Mr.. Washington's
efforts in that direction would be
wasted. He will be fortunate, how
ever, if his present purpose can be
carried out. Southern sentiment is
against colored education, and some
of the leading Southern politicians
say that negro schools are a menace
TO the South"
1t is not true that Southern politi-
clans are opposed to the work that
Booker Washington is doing. On the
contrary, the leading people of the
South, including governors of States.
Judges of the highest courts, and
other men of high standing and large
influence, are doing all in their power
to aid him in his grandly beneiicent
mission. The press and the pulpit
of the South are coadjutors. Intel
ligent public sentiment in that see
tion sustains him. His plan of edu
cation-of educating the head, the
heart, the hands; Of graduating good,
honest workmen, educated up to and
not beyond any station in life which
they may reasonably hope to attain
that scheme finds not only approval,
but help in the section which it chief
ly affects.
AS to the general work of public
school education among the negroes
| of the South, the .4drertiser, if it
were willing to do Justice. if it were
| not Indignantly disinclined to be
! fair, would not hesitate to credit the
whites of the South. the property
holders and tax payers, with mag
nanimity unsurpassed in history.
consideration-the number of the
blacks, the poverty of the whites after
| the devastations of war and the loot
| ing of reconstruction-we challange
| the Boston AdCertiser to name n
| parallel in history to the sacrifices
made by the white people of the South
in establishing and supporting free
| schools for the children of the freed
men.
gress to do in the matter of negro
suffrage? What could Congress do
that would, in any practical way,
offset the fearful mistake of enfran-
chisement? We doubt if there is an
intelligent white man in the United
States, no matter to what party he
belongs, who has not become con-
vinced that, next to secession, the
greatest mistake in our history was
the adoption of the fifteenth amend,
ment. 1t has been, it is now, an un.
mitigated curse to both races. and an
attempt to enforce it would only
augment it's capacity for evil.
But it should comfort the Boston
advertiser to reflect that loug before
that amendment was shot into The
Constitution of the United States
the State of Massachusetts uncon
sciously provided simple remed.
for most of it's evils. The Massa
chusetts plan, disfranchisemcnt o
illterates, will go far toward effect
ing a solution of the great question:
forced on the South when the ballo
was put in the hands of the ex
slaves. And it seems eminently fit
ting that the Bay State, whose peo
pie took leading part in the slav
trade and in strengthening tha
peculiar institution in the South
should also have provided a model +
be utilized thereafter in saving tn
South from the necessity of usin
unlawful means to restrict the SUI
frage within safe limits. The peopl
of Massachusetts builded better tha
, they knew when, in the ante-bellur
days, they amended their Constitt
tion as safeguard against importe
ignorance.