The gold leaf. [volume] (Henderson, N.C.) 1881-1911, 1901-05-02
WONDERS WILL NEVER CEASE.
Candid Expression From the New
York Tribune on the Negro Question
Beginning to See Things In Their
True Light.
(RichmoDd Dispatch.)

Wonders will never cease" is an
old and true saying, yet some Of the
wonders we run against are so bso-
lutely beyond our conception that
they cause us to pinch ourselves and
question whether we are really
awake, and contemplating an actual
ity. A case in point is an article in
the New York Tribune.
After all these years of denuncia
ton Of the negro mote in the South
ern eve, the Tribune has discovered
that there is a negro beam in the
Northern eye. Moreover. it has dawn
ed upon our esteemed contemporary
that the negro is not the ideal speci-
men Of man it has been holding him
up to be, and that there is such
a thing as race prejudice-and strong
race prejudice-at the North.
Taking as it's text the difficulty the
negro finds in making living at the
North, which difficulty, it admits, is
due to race prejudice and the unde-
sirableness of the negro as citizen,
the Tribune breaches a regular sermon
on the duty Of that section to change
all this. The Tribune would not have
the public think that its love for the
negro is growing cold, and it would
still pose as the champion of the
"man and the brother" although it
recognizes that he is not a model
member of society. Yet it confesses
that the negro has few rights. if any,
up in that quarter that any one feels
bound to respect, and by implication
admits that that condition is not al
together unnatural.
Referring to the barring of the negro
at the North from many Of the spheres
Of labor. the Tribune says this is real
ly situation as important for North
ern people to consider as the South
ern phase OF the problem. which they
(the Northern people) have too ex-
clusively, and, perhaps too patron
| iZingly, concerned with.
The admission that the people Of
the North have been '.too exclusive
ly and "too phtronizingly concern
ed" with the negro problem at the
South is a remarkable one for the
Tribune to make, especially in view
Of the heretofore self-sufficient air
with which that paper has been lee
turing the South on the way to man.
age the negro. Nevertheless, the ad-
! mission involves the statement Of a
cold and important truth, that is
| justified by the article in the April
atlantic Monthly from the pom of Dan
iel H. Chamberlain, of Massachusetts,
| sometime reconstruction Governor oil
South Carolina, and from which we
quoted extensively the other day.
But the Tribune while in the humo1
for making admission and confessions,
springs another surprise. Unless, y
it says, 1.-The North gives the negro q
fair industrial opportunity. it cannot
reproach the South with it's inherited
prejudices, il his rights are there de.
MED, and il Northern ex-slave-holdel
ever sunk so low as solved they must
solve such part Of it as comes to theil
own doors"
Just there the Tribune set traI
for itself. The negro has never beer
denied "a fair Industrial opportun
ity" at the South-has never beer
denied in this section, what the
Tribune does not hesitate to declar,
is denied him at the North. AS some
intelligent negro in one Of the Gul
States remarked not long ago. M
Southern eN-slaveholder ever sunk 81
low as to shoot down a negro for ask
ing for work" The Tribune knows
or ought to know, the comparison thi
was intended to draw
The negro at the South is encour
aged to work, and would have ha,
still fairer industrial opportunitie
but for the patronizing concern il
the negro problem in this section
manifested at the North. Tina
patronizing concern has more tha
anything else melted the negro t
conduct calculated to ALLEVIATE hi
white friends down here, aud kse
alive friction between the races.
Claiming, IS we do. to be a bette
and more practical friend to the negr
than the Tribune, we hope that tn
Northern people will take our cor
temporary's sermon to heart. an
profit by it to the end OF doing thei
duty to the negro in that section
But we also hope that they will rolf
by the logic and confessions of tn
Tribune, so far as these bear o
solving the negro problem in thi
quarter. That is to say, we hope the
will stop their interference with th
Southern negro problem and lea,
the South to work it out Industrial,
politically and otherwise. Than b
: so doing they cannot better serve tt
| interests of both races