The news & observer. [volume] (Raleigh, N.C.) 1894-current, 1900-05-05
SOUTHERN PEOPLE AS sAvAGEs

Senator Tillman delivered speech
before the Government League at Ann
Arbor the other night, in course Of
which he referred to the race ques-
ton in the South, using these words:
y You scratch one of these colored
graduates and under the skin you will
find the savage.
AS the folks in the Ann Arbor sec
ton have great love theoretically for
the negro but little use for him really
one of them expressed his dissent to
the words by Kissing, whereupon SEN
ator Tillman's one eye glared luridly
at them until quiet had been restored,
then he said:
When that man who Missed gets
ready to give his daughter in marriage
to negro and proves by his actions
and not by his Kisses that he means
business l will apologize and not be-
fore.
1t is hardly necessary to say that
this put an end to the kissing in that
audience.
Touching this incident the Charles
ton, Is. c. News and Courier makes
the following very sensible observa
tons:
The good people of Ann Arbor ought
to have known, and did know, just
what they had to expect when they
invited the Senator to discuss the
race question in the South at their
meeting, as his views on the subject
are no secret. If they wanted other
views they should have invited
another man to address them. And,
having invited him, they were bound
to hear him through with the respect
due TO a guest. Their ''hisses" were
very rude, and warranted the ugly re-
tort they elected. OF course, on the
other hand, the Senator was at fault.
too. AS an invited guest and speaker
on the occasion he should have avoid
ed any issue with his auditors, what
ever the provocation. If he did not
care to address a meeting with color
ed graduates of other colored persons
on the front seats, he should not have
gone to Ann Arbor.
But the Pittsburg, Pa.), Dispatch.
a northern negro loving newspaper,
has this comment to make on Senator
Tillman's speech and his reproof of
those kissing in the audience:
To the delightful manifestation it
would be sufficient to reply that it is
not necessary to get under the skin
of Senator Tillman's constituents and
associates in negotiating to find the
savage. When mobs shoot women in
the doors of their homes and burn Of
tenders at the stake the savagery is
not concealed by any integument.
even skin deep.
This is no new note. We've been
hearing it these many years. Once
it would have made us mad. 1t does
so no longer. We've long ago learned
that the negro's worst enemy is his
foOl-friend north and we are now
simply amused at such frantic rawlings
as the above.
The people of the South realize that
the negro question is their own pc
culiar problem. Having it to deal
with and settle, they've studied it as
people in no other section of the coun-
try have been able to study it: and
now. some thirty years after enamel
patton. they have found what they
believe to be its solution. The ballot
is to be taken from the hands of the
ignorant negro voter. Already South
have with good result applied this
remedy. In August North Carolina
will adopt it. and in November Ala
bama will follow suit, while only this
week Virginia adopted a platform
favoring it.