The news & observer. [volume] (Raleigh, N.C.) 1894-current, 1901-10-25
BOOKER WASHINGTON AGAIN

of the country. especially in the New
England States. Several prominent men
have FASTENED to commend President
Roosevelt for inviting Booker Washing
ton TO the White House for dinner as
fitting recognition of the most promi-
nent negro of his race. We have said
and we shall continue to reiterate, that
these men, however, exalted they may
be, are not wise spokesman for the
President. Booker Washington, the
negro race or any other person or class
in this country. If we looked at this
matter at this time-certainly so far as
the South is concerned as a political
understanding only of political sue
cess. we should say, the Democratic
party has nothing to lose from the in
cident. But looking beyond that-and
above that-and at the negro question as
one to be solved or dealt with the incl
dent is very unfortunate one. Most
unfortunate because it shows that in
other sections of the country, though we
ing for two generations during which
the most bloody contested war the
ly over the negro-some of the leaders
of thought, who evidently voice the SEN
timent of large and respectable part
of their people-do not understand or
are careless about the opinions of the
Southern people about this most mo-
mentous question known as the negro
problem.
We are not unmindful of the fact
that as result of the long contest over
the negro, that the, negro was freed,
but we believe if the New England
States had left the negro alone, and
had attended to those things they knew
more about the negro would have been
emancipated in time just as the serfs
were in Russia and as slavery was aboi-
ished in other parts Of the world, with
out the cost of the most bloody war
New England people had exercised that
patience for the Southern people as
dealing with the negro question, for
which Henry Grady pleaded in his
memorable speech in Boston just before
his DEATH we should have escaped in
our opinion the horrors of the war and
reconstruction and all the dire condi-
lions which have come to the country
from them.
The Southern people have no unkind
feelings towards the colored man
they wish him we'll, and are his true
friends, 0ruer than his Northern cod
dler) friends in the concrete and not
in the abstract, as shown in
business as well as in ! many
other ways, and we desire to
say to the colored people that in
criticising the new role which Booker
Washington has assumed, the Southern
people are assuming an attitude in this
matter which is best for the colored
man as we'll as the best for the white
man. and if there is any white man
or any coIored man North or South
who opposes this proposition, we desire
to say very earnestly to him, that he is
not a safe or a wise counsellor of the
colored race.
We know the New England people
publish great deal of literature, and
they think they know more about the
Chinese question and how it should be
managed than the people of California
but the people of California do not
think so; they think they know more
about the Indian question and how it
should be managed than the people of
Arizona, but the people of Arizona do
| not think SO; and they think they know
more about the negro question and how
it should be managed than the people
of the South, but the people of the
South do not think so-they never have
thought SO, and they never will think
SO; and while the New England peo-
pie will continue to proclaim their
| opinion about the negro question as
| they have always done we desire to say
| to the leaders of the colored people
| South that this Booker Washington
| incident should be condemned by them
rather than commended before their
people. Such a course will bring bet
| ter results to them and their people in
| the long run.
| The Southern people are irrevocably
| fixed in their disposition towards any
! thing that looks like social equality be-
| tween the races, and this disposition
| was not born of slavery or from unkind-
| ness towards the colored people. 1t is
| older and deeper than that, as is shown
! by the earliest statues of .this State
/ wherein it is provided that no Indian
| negro, mustee, or mulatto man or wo-
man, or any person of mixed blood to
| tho .tbipd onneratiou bood mr. fraa,, Sh n Il