Evening star., 1901-12-16
DEFENSE OF The NEGRO.
Theme of an Address by Rev. AIger-
non s. Crapsey.

A largely attended meeting was held yes
terday afternoon i'll the Metropolitan A. NJ
E. Church, which was presided over by
Senator Cuilom of Illinois. An address en-
titled Constitutional Defense of the Ne
gro" was delivered by Rev. Algernon S
Crapsey of st. Andrews Church, Rochester,
N. Y. He said in part:
I'VE find ourselves forty years after the
outbreak of the war which the slave power
waged against the United States still strug-
Cling with that power for the common
rights of man, for the integrity of our
laws, and for the very existence of our
government. The Constitution guarantees
to every one of it's citizens that he shall
not be deprived of his life and liberty with
out due process of law. 1t is notorious
TACT that this provision of the Constitution
mas been set at naught and that men and
women and even children have been de-
prlved of their liberties and their lives
without any process of law whatever.
Anarchlstic events of this kind have. to
our shame, occurred In different parts of
our country, but they have been most fire.
quent in that part of the country where
the slave power was dominant before the
CIVIL war and where the spirit of the slave
driver is still dominant. The victims of
these violations of the law in ninety-nine
cases out of hundred are members of
that race which was formerly in bondage to
the race that now murders them.
So common is this method of Furnishing
supposed crimes in the southern section of
our country that it has displaced the regu-
lar proceedings of the law courts. Last
year more than $50 human beings charged
with crime died without trial. at the
hands Of the mob. More than three Il
week And the perpetrators of this treason
against the majesty of the state are today
living at large, their crime unpublished,
many boasting of their crimes, and their
sympathizers sit in the Congress of the
United States Surely anarchy can go no
further than this except it murder
rulers, ravish our women and burn our
homes"
The speaker dealt at length with the
feelings of the Shareholders before the
war, and then declared that the political
dlfhcult1es of the north. as of the south,
are to be solved not by disfranchisement
but by enfranchisement. The enfranchise-
ment of the mind frem ignorance and pride
and prejudice; the enfranchisement of the
heart from base hatreds and unhoy fears"
He then said:
THE white race has cause of quarrel
with the black race. While we have
spent blood and treasure to secure your
political and civil rights, we find that you
surrender those rights without a struggle
\ our Old white masters or the sons of your
Whlte masters say you shall not vote, and
you stay away from the polls. They make
laws placing upon you a degrading badge
OF inferiority, and you give your brows to
the branding iron. They shoot YOU down
In the streets and drive you into the
S"diipS, anu you 90 nothing TO guard your
homes and protect the lives of your wives
and children.
Your excuse for this submission to out
rage and wrong is that if you resist You
will be killed Killed! What if you are
killed? Were not white men killed by the
hundred thousand to secure you, under the
Constitution. the political and civil rights
which you SO easily surrender? Do your
duty by your country, and, whether you
nVe or die, your country will bless you.
God forbid that you should lift up vour
hands save in defense of the rights of man
and the lives of women and children. Do
not Kill, but be killed: be killed until your
blood becomes as a river defiIing all the
land; until. like the blood of Abel 1t cries
from the ground for vengeance. Be killed
until you have lost from your veins the
last drop of the blood of the slave and can
stand up as free men in free land