The semi-weekly messenger. [volume] (Wilmington, N.C.) 1897-1908, 1901-06-18

Ah4ClliAkAG hnOWlSuSG ALI CT.
Some Of the men who spoke el%oquently
Tor the cause are dead now. Peace
10 their ashes. And from year to year
no meeting of the assembly has been
allowed to take place, no body of
teacher have come out from their
homes without some effort for the bet
terment Of public schools. AS we have
learned each other better we have
trusted and respected each other more
and We have found that all our little
school rivulets and rills, smaller creeks
and larger stream form a part of a
larger system-do not flow In
different, but in the same directions
and that when they are come together
there on the bosom Of the commingled
waters float the ship of state more
or less grandly, with every mast and
sail reflected in it's pellucid depths.
Because of his assembly, we have
been enabled to shape legislation in
educational matters as the teachers of
a state should do, and to command
the respect. in a measure. or other pro-
fessions, and If this influence and If
this regard have been less than we
had hoped, it is because We have been
human and have not always depressed
self and labored for the exclusive good
OF the children of the state. This work
Of the assembly is as it should be-, for
while l believe that in one sense we
diS eHlltieu 10 dl outing IN WHICH
there is no element of work, where
we may shake off the weight of CEN
turies' from our stopped shoulders,
may court nature in her coyest needs,
in another we dare not to forget that
we must be about our Fathers bust
ness"
1 shall not tonight take up your
time in coming over the statistics Of
our alarming illiteracy. They tell a
n4InT1l story 0fhnro ho,,4 = II -
more effectively than I could do and
we have all heard it with such sorrow
that there is danger Of our sinking un-
der the load of humiliation that we
are compelled to carry. 1 would prefer
rather to sound a note of encourage
ment, hat hearing, you might take
courage and go forward. If, as I
think We have, already touched bot
tom. and the lowest point of our hu-
initiation has already been reached and
passed. then there is reason for an
encouraging note. I lave felt tina
many criticisms which hayebeen made
with reference to our educational con-
dltlon were to some extent misleading
and perhaps all of them would be in
the nature of an injustice but for the
certainty that they have been made
In love. There will be one great saw
ing feature in the Last Jugdment-
every ex~tenuation circumstance will
be considered if not made known. The
Great Teacher when upon earth was
not harsh in His exactions, but tenn
pered justice with mercy. He seemed
to recognize the principle in human
nature that responds more quickly
to a kind word than to a blow-the
former takes you by the hand and lifts
you up, the harsh judgment knocks
you down n tells you to get up. The
criticism may be necessary, and often
10 hI+ - LII
father says to his son., Harry, come
on, son." Il am coming, father" says
Harry. and the little fellow comes,
blowing and putting under his load,
with commendable speed. but the i'm
patient father slapS his jaws for his
failure to make fast enough time, and
the sensitive boy is discouraged be-
cause too much was expected of him
and goes off M sulks. doing worse
the next time. No people of cfviliza-
ton since history began were ever left
with SO great a burden to bear and
with SO little with which to bear it as
our southern Ieople in the gloomy
April of 1865. Scarcely an a~ble-Bodied
man was left except the ignorant,
newly emancipated negro, who, with
out a red cent in his pocket, undertook
to hew a fortune for himself in an I'M
tried world. The southern soldier re-
turned to a home from which two
fifths of the wealth had gone by one
single act n half of the remainder
by the terrible devastations of civil
war. and from which since hat time
a sum equal to the whole has been
taken in the way OF national pensions
for which scarcely any return has
been made. When the county n
state collects a tax it goes right back
to the township in the payment OF
public school teachers, the building Of
roads and bridges. the payment of jul
rOrS, witness fees. and in other similar
ways. A very small part of the coun-
ty tax money leaves the county, or Of
the state tax money leaves the state
it comes right bac to uS-but the
vast sum. said to have been over $780,
000, 900. which is AIKEN from the south
by indirect taxation for pensions, only
an infiniteSimal part has ever reach
ed us again. 1t has been as If for
thirty-fve years a farmer should have
taken of the products of his whole
farm and should each year put on
the northern section in the shape OF
fertilizers the whole OF the profits
| arising from the southern section OF
the plantation. Not only have we
| been deprived of the $500, 600, 900, none
of which has been returned in any
form. but We have lost the interest
and wealth-proGucing power of that
amount. which would have prove to
be a larger sum yet l am not COM
planning, not grumbling. The home
coming Of the southern soldier has
been so often. so e~loquently and so
pathetically toll hat I need not say
that he met the conditions which con-
| fronted hin with a courage as
sublime as the world ever saw. He
did not stop with working with his
| own unaccustomed hands that he
might feed and educate his own chill
| dren. he was ready to divide the pit
| lance left him with the race that had
| served him, and which for all these
| years has been unable to do more
than make a scanty living for itself.
1t is consequently not to be wondered
at that the south has found the a
something more than its ability to
meet with the same measure of sue
cess that has been found elsewhere.
Of necessity a double system oi
schools has had to be maintained side
by side in districts where the popula-
ton is scattered n shifting. The
double system has had the effect OF