Cameron County press. [volume] (Emporium, Cameron County, Pa.) 1866-1922, 1901-11-21
STRAIGHTFORWARD TALK.
Regarding the Booker Wash
ington Incident.


q communication from w. A. Gambler,
which makes some points that the
southern people would do well to
think about in connection with the
subject of ''social equality" that is
Just now worrying them a good deal.
The journal does not know anything
about Mr.. Gambler beyond the inter
nal evidence his letter affords that he
is a southern man of progressive
views and possessed of more "horse
sense" than nonsense. He may possi-
bly, be relative of Gov. Gambler, OF
Georgia, though he is evidently not
republican. He makes the recent
Booker r. Washington incident the
text for some remarks regarding the
race question which do not seem to
have occurred to those who think it
is only skin deep. He admits that
personally he thinks that in inviting
Mr.. Booker Washington to dine with
him President Roosevelt "blundered
badly" but he ridicules the idea that
any number of such acts could bring
about social equality. But he re-
marks there is real danger, if south
ern whites do not rouse themselves,
that the negro will achieve another
kind of equality, or rather of superb
ority over the whites, namely, edr-
cational. He says the negroes have
better educational advantages in che
south than the whites have and that
the latter are relatively losing ground
rather than gaining. To quote his
words:
1.-The colleges for negroes are far.better
equipped than the colleges for whites, and
their superiority in this particular rapidly
increases every day. Booker Washington
can get more money for his school by an
hours speech in Boston or New York than
any president of white college in the
south can get by years campaign among
our own people. Now let this sort of thing
go on for another % years, and the most
undesirable conditions will inevitably arise
in the south, bringing to pass results in
furious to both races. While be-
grudge the negro nothing, I cannot believe
1t would be best for him or best for anybody
else, that he should continue to have better
educational advantages than the whites.
But this Will be the case if our own people
do not deal more literally with the col
leges of the whites. The north will do in
the future, as in the past, most of what it
does for higher education in the south on
behalf of the negroes. Southern white peo-
pie must depend upon themselves to main
tain and equip the colleges OF the whites
in this section. And we are abundantly
able to do it. Our horse shows and the
like prove the plethora of our purses
Coming to facts, he mentions two
colleges in. Georgia for the education
of whites which are now appealing
for support. Mr.. John ID. Rockefel-
Ter has offered to give $4,000 to Mer-
Ger university if the friends of the in
stitution will raise $500 more, and
southern man has offered $4,000 to
Emory college on the same condi-
tions. The writer says these two in
stitutions ought to be as dear to the
hearts of all Georgians as Booker
Washington's school is to Bostonians
and New Workers, and they should
initiate the example of northern peo-
pie by putting their hands in their
pockets and contributing to the sup
port of their own institutions. He
concludes:
II propose that any Georgian who is 100
stingy to give to either of them quit abus-
ing the president about dining Booker
Washington. Men who really care to
maintain proper relations between the
races in the south will do something more
substantial to promote that object than to
blow hot blasts of Indignation about social
equality. That sort of windiness is cheap;
1t is also very Improbable. Let US help
our colleges for whites-or hush"
A northern man would hardly ven
ture to put the matter in as person
al a way as this. The argument is
clear that educational progress in
wolves to certain extent social ad-
vancement and elevation, and that if
the southern whites wish to maintain
their traditional superiority they
must adopt a more liberal and pro-
gressive policy in support of educa-
tion. The whites cannot keep the ne
groes down by "hot blasts of indig-
nation" if they allow them to main
tain permanent superiority in educa-
tional advantages. Mr.. Candler's let
ter goes to the heart of the subject
indianapolis Journal.
nT7 NnTnrTnny