The daily morning journal and courier., 1899-05-23
SOUTHERN NEGRO QUESTION
VIGOROUS WORDS OF FORMER COY.
 ERNOR NORTHEN OF GEORGIA.

| Status of the Negro fin American Civili-
 zation of vaster Importance Than Problem National, Not seotional-Ths Relation to oSociety-Lynching. Boston, May 22.--The Congregational club held a May festival in Fremont
 Temple this evening and listened to two
 eloquent speeches on the southern negro
 question by Former Governor Northen
 of Georgia and Bishop Arnett of Ohio.
 Governor Northen spoke on "The White
 Mans View of the Relations of the
 Negro at the South" In the course of
 his address he said: "No people ever
 met more bravely so serious condition
 as confronts the south or sought more
 righteously an equitable adjustment of
 a difficult problem than the people of
 the south have undertaken in the negro
 problem" He then referred to the de-
 nunciations of the south which have
 appeared in the northern press and the
 incendiary statements made from the
 lecture platform, and asked: twill the
 day ever come when the south can be
 heard without prejudice and her peo- pie accorded a fair audience before the
 world?" Taking up the negro question, he said, for the negroes of the south, taken as mass, he would not exchange them for any he had ever seen in any other parts of the United States with-R out tremendous money to boot in the ex- change.
 Continuing, he said: '"The status Of the negro in American civilization is d problem of a vast deal more import than many are inclined to believe. The problem is national and not sectional. The sins of slavery, whatever that may have been, was the sin of the nation and not the sin of the south.''
 Concerning the negroes relation td education, he said that since 1875 the south had expended between $75, 1000, ,O0O < and $S0000,000 for the education of the colored children; that in thirty years 40 per cent. of illiteracy of the colored race had disappeared and that of the 162 institutions in the United States for the secondary and higher education of the colored race only six are located outside the borders of the former slave states.
 Taking up the negroes relation toS law, the speaker said Just as in the case of his franchise, so the negro is absolutely protected in his life, liberty and property, as is the white man. Vio- { fence is meted out to the negro for only such crimes as would bring a white man to the same torturing end."
 Of the negroes relations to society the speaker said that negro preacher at Birmingham, discussing the race ~ recently said that many peo- < ole seemed afraid the negro would at no distant day maintain social equality, He said there need be no fear on this point as he knew many white men he would not allow to sleep in his bed. And so, we are pretty we'll agreed on both sides down south that social equal- % ty is not desired by either race, andy n my candid judgment it will never 1btain.'
 Taking up the recent lynchings ex- Governor Northen declared firmly his 'PPooitiCii lO HUI ldW dIIu SIdI6u LIdC le condemned the burning of Sam Hose IS strongly as it was condemned by he northern press, but that he con- iemned the course of the northern press With all the vehemence of an offended nature.
 He then read the head lines put over he Hose story by northern paper, in which the words "Fiendish Brutality" Human Devils" "Barabrism' and 'Savages" occurred, and said: Mot N ne word of sympathy for pure and 'lrtuous woman; her honor gone; her husband murdered in her presence; she md her children dragged in the fresh. warm blood of the dying man. SureIy N n all the north is there no sympathy xcept for negro? No kindly feeling nd no tender word for the defenseless Vomen of the south, who carry with hem a living shame, in a living death. n life all too long for it's miseries, if lasts but for a day?'
 In closing the speaker said: Do vou six me how these lynchings can be topped at the south? I answer prornnt- J-just as they can be stopped at tha orth, and in no other way. Stop the NA'A'SSo oiAt eiiC iy lIClllIlSS VIII cease. continue the outrages, and the lynch lgs will always follow, regardless of treats by the law, whether in Georgia. Illinois. Ohio or other states. he negro problem at the south will not e settled in a day. Step by step, as it larches into the future of the nation.
 must be met by the conditions best lited to the detail of it's solution. What
 needed now is, at least toleration and on-interference, if the south is to be- ome responsible for results. Let me " in conclusion that the relations be- veen the races at the south are in no .nse alarming. Under God we will ork out the problem in righteous set ement for both races, if we are left one. Sam Hose is by no means a rep sentative of his race. It is only a 3ry. small percentage of negroes that e malicious, criminal and mean. The
 Ice should not suffer in reputation be- use of the bad character of few. he better part of the negroes, and this
 by far the larger part, are beginning
 cooperate with the white people for stter conditions"