The Marietta journal. [volume] (Marietta, Ga.) 1866-1909, 1901-09-05
1T MUST BE SETTLED.

week i referred TO the terrible
criminal record of the negro race
during the last month or two.
This record is being maintained
with a. uniformity which indi
Gates that a crisis in our social
organization is imminent. Just
now q frenzied concourse of citi-
zens of Missouri i will not call
them a mob, as such bodies are
usually termed, for that express
sion implies that the people who
compose it belong to the lower
class of society are moving heav-
en- and earth in their efforts to
capture negro fiend who assault
ed and then murdered highly re-
spectacle white woman in that
state.
The readers of the Atlanta pa
pers must be impressed with the
overwhelming preponderance of
negro criminals over those of the
white race as Indicated in the
news items Of these journals.
Even in the city of Atlanta, with
its excellent police force, negro
outrages of various kinds are be-
coming frightfully common. Of
course there are white criminals
there also, but i'll proportion to
population their number is small
in comparison with those of the
other race.
This suggests the inquiry, What
is the cause of this state of affairs
and what will be the result if
matters are allowed to continue as
they are? 1t is easy enough to
ask questions but not SO easy to
answer them to the satisfaction of
all; but any answer that serves tc
throw light upon a subject of par
amount importance is worthy of
the most serious attention. 1t
must he evident to all observers
that the white and the negro races
in the south have, ever since the
close of the war between the
states, been gradually drifting
apart. In ante-bellum days there
was a bond of sympathy between
the two which the cruel hand of
war snapped asunder. Their d.
vergence, gradual at first because
the newly emancIpated negro had
lot yet lost his moral training de-
rived under regime, has been
steadily growing year by year,
"even with a uniformity acceler-
ated veloclty"(to quote the Ian
guage of physics) until now, as
between the masses of each race,
there is not only no sympathy
whatever, but, instead positive
hatred. AS consequence of
these unhappy conditions we see
outbreaks and blood
shed between the races as such,
showing that it is race antipathy
and not merely an ebullition of
Inherent savagery that is at the
bottom Of it all. If you doubt
this keep a record of the crimes
in the papers and observe
the number recorded as occurring
between whites and blacks and
those having as their parties,
of the same race.
Does any sane man believe that
any country can prosper where
such abnormal and irremediable
conditions prevail ? None have
ever done so under the same cir
cumstances in the past. / say the
present state of affairs in the south
is irremediable. By this l mean
that | have no faith whatever in
Booker Washington's plan of set
thing the problem by universal
moral, mental and manual train
ing, as things are at present ad-
Justed. The vast majority of ne
groes never can nor will (they
would not if they could) enter
such training schools and remain
there sufficiently long to be ma
terially benefited thereby. A
little common school education
and such moral training as the
young negro can obtain at home is
all that the bulk of this race can
ever expect. 1t is the bulk and
not the individual that fixes the
status of the race, and if that bulk
is bad the individual good ones
belonging to it must share the
same fate. Besides, suppose we
had two or more of such training
schools as Washington's in every
county of the Southern states,
what would be the result? There
would be no work for nine-tenths
& L