The Lafayette gazette. [volume] (Lafayette, La.) 1893-1921, 1901-12-07

nGn6aasoa and tho Negro
4 Problem.
u tNe Nsv York Journal Of Sunday Mr..
TAoaas Nelson Page makes his contribution
10 The race question symposium, which has
recently experienced a recrudescence OF re-
maskAhle energy and vigor: AS was to
have been expected from such a source. the
paper IL just. truthful. and intelligent from
beginaing to end. Mr.. Page is a representa-
tive q the old slave holding landlord aristo-
cracy Of the South. He speaks for the only
class Of whites that still retain sentiment
of sympathy and affection for the negro.
And he speaks, furthermore, upon the
thority of an absolute acquaintanc with the
subject in all its details.
1t need hardly be said, therefore, that Mr..
Page finds the negro undergoing II moral
and physical degeneration. He points out
the fact-the indisputable fact-that the
death rate among the blacks has increased
to an appalling extent since their ema ncipa-
ton, and quoting from an official report in
The Washington Post, November IL. 1901,
which report says. "The death rate of the
colored race is far in excess of the white
race, being nearly double. y The ex-
cessive mortality among the colored race has
not been confined to any particular age or
sex. The average age of death of the whites
is foun,, to be forty years one month and
twenty-five days, and of the colored twenty
seven years nine months and four days.
The cause of the excessive death rate of the
colored race is attributable to defective
houses and clothing. ignorance of the rudi-
ments of sanitary science. and neglect he
makes it quite clear that thirty five years of
freedom have served only to lower the race
in the social scale. AS slaves they were
compelled to observeSh laws of health and
good behavior, and it is true to-day that the
negroes who have the best manners, the best
dispositions, and lead the most moral lives
kAre crosse who were born in slavery. The
snae comparison holds gaed in the material
aAairs Of life Mr.. Page gpes on to say:
"a NEGRO mamlsrr~of Congress, in defense
Aad eoIogy Of his race, declared in a speech
delivered on january ze. 1901, that since
the war the negroes have reduced the litter
acy of the race at least IS per cent; that
they have in practice over 1000 lawyers
and a corresponding number of doctors; that
they have about 100000 farms and homes
valued at about $7So,ooo,ooo, and personal
property valued at about $4,000, 900; that
of this they have over GOO, acres of land
in the South alone. This is a fair showing,
though the speaker committed an error in
attrbuting all of this advance to the negro.
'.Unfortunately, the statistics not at
hand to speak generally, but judging the
whole South by that part with which the
writer is familiar, he would say that of the
rural real estate owned by negroes in the
South over 90 per cent. has been accumu-
lated by those born in slavery
What Mr.. Page says of Virginia is true of
Georgia, Louisiana, Alabama-every South
ern State in which the race has accumulated
property and achieved material advance
ment. The work has been done, in nine
cases out of ten, by those who enjoyed the
moral industrial training that was part of
the institution of slavery. Speaking this
point, Mr.. Page says: |
GAS matter of fact, speaking philoso-
Phically, slavery, whateves it may have been
SO tar the whites concerned, was, if
not the means, at least the avenue through
which the negro race has attained the
greatest good that has come to it since the
dawn of authentic history. Two hundred
years of slavery under the Southern whites
have brought large section of the negro
race to a higher poin: of civilization than it
had ever attained elsewhere.''
Thus to that sadly misrep,e-
scented and misunderstood questionable
education of the Negro The report of
the Commissioner of Education, 1898 90,
shows that during the nineteen years pre-
ceding its compilation the sixteen former
slave States and the District of Columbia
had expended the education of the ne
groes SOL, 800, COL THE statistics of the
various States show that less than one tenth
of this fund was drawn from taxes paid by
negroes. How much good this sseducation'
has done for the negro in particular for
society in general can be calculated by re-
ference to the statistics of crime and health
in the localities to which it has been APP
piled. In this connection MIR. Page gives
US the result of his observation in no uncer-
tain terms:
stUnhappily, the system of education
heretofore pursued has been SO futile in Its
results that a considerable section of the
whites in the South, knowing the facts, be-
lieve sincerely that the educated negroes are
more worthless and more dangerous to the
peace and welfare of the community in
which they live than the uneducated.
s'That is, that education for him has been
failure. 1t is undoubtedly true that the
apparent result has been disappointing.
There are few thousand professional men,
a considerobleenumter of college or high
school graduates, bot for the create, part
there is discernihle little apparent breadth
of view, no growth in ability tendency to