The Greenville times. [volume] (Greenville, Miss.) 1868-1917, 1901-02-09

DR.. j. L. NJ Curr. made of certain expressions with
the purport of which the Vlcksburg Herald takes issue
DR.. Curry was discussing the education
II EDUCATION of the negro and his offending language
II was, in part follows: l know that no
II two live in peace together when one
II SOLUTION is emi-barbarous and the other enght
II ened. If the Southern States refuse to
do justice to the negroes, they will become nsurrecon
airy and awess and it will require all the powers OF the
government to control them You must educate them.
We most emphatically agree with the Herald that
"Whatever the merits of negro education, 1T
does not touch the problem Justice to the negroes,
at the hands of the SOUTH may best he rendered lines
other than educating him. We believe that he should
always be given school educaton he this,
and should have it. We believe also in industrial educa
ton for him; hut not popular fad, SO extensively
preached these davs not solution of the problem
Education will not solve t-Mr Washington, Mr. Coun-
Gil Mr. Fortune, and host of Others black and white,
to the contrary notwithstanding As to negroes becom
ing 'nsurrectonar and awless," through failure to edu
cate them, and finally, requiring al the powers of the
government control them,' such expressions in
harmony with the general views those who expect such
wonderful results from education Dr. Curry too old
man, however, and lifetime the south has enabled
bin to the uneducated negro under too many condi
ons to Justify his entertaining any such 1t
this line that the suggestion to apporon Mssssipps
school fund in proportion to the paid by the two
races, MADE during session OF Lno eSSlaCuro
moved T. Thomas Fortune to remark: ''She will dis
that it vastly cheaper to build schoohouses than
to build ais to support school teachers than to support
constable and militia force to put down the criminals
reared in the school of ilteracy and state berality
There is much in Fortunes remarks in DR..
Curry s. and none in either
Thirty years, and MORE ago the ranks of those who
looked to education for the regeneration and salvation of
the negro had more enthusiastic supporter than
1bor1a D,JIa Yat oftor cofh
servaton of results his last public utterance largely
formal abandonment of his cherished ideas. He
lived to declare that 'there to from
theory and experience of the higher education in its
effect upon white races that the result would be different
from what 1t is When the negro colleges first opened
there glow of enthusiasm, eagerness of study
facility of requirement and good order that promised
Everything for the future 1t seemed If the light then
kindled would only continue burn, but would pen
citrate all the dark and stolid communities 1t was my
fortune to many of these institutions in their early
days. and to believe that they full of the greatest
promise for the race. only say that
have been disappointed extravagan expectations
of what this education would do for undeveoped
and wanting in certain elements of character, and that
the millions of money devoted to it might have been much
better applied Though Dr. Warner felt and expressed
but the kndest sentiments towards the negro he
cursed for this language by the highest opponents
their higher education and his death did not save
him from their vicious attacks.
One of the careful students negro criminality
is Dr. w F. Wilcox, of Cornell University. He cannot
be accused of prejudice for he says of himself he
born and reared 'whin the shadow of Bunker Hill Mon
ument." The results of his Investigations, based upon
the figures of the federal of $780, most lm
pressve He shows that 'flom 1880 $780, the negro
prisoners in the Southern Thousand negroes
increased 30 per cent while the white prisoners to
thousand whites increased only per cent This exhib
its difference, in the former slave sates between the
negro and white increase of crmnaty of 81 per cent
In the states where slavery established, or
early abolished 'be white prisoners increased per cent.
faster than the white population while the negro prison
less than SO per cent faster than the negro
population" This shows the difference between the /
negro and white increase in the nOnslave states to
have been 80 per cent in those states wherein the Negroes
educational advantages Oldest most extensive
beng in most csse identical with those possessed by the
white race his crminay showed greater increase
that Of the white than exhibited in those states
where his reAve status educationay, is considered
so favorable.
In laundering about in search of solutions for
problems it is just well to remember that education
will all the ills that flesh heir to-whether the
flesh he white black 1t has yet eradcated those
persistent characteristics by which radically opposite
differentiated and the "hgher variety of it,
when offered the of the negro race tends unques
tonaby the diminishing rather than the increasing of
that amity and accord between the two without
which education and all else avail the negro nothing