The Laurens advertiser. (Laurens, S.C.) 1885-1973, 1901-03-13
NEGRO AS A LABOR MACHINE
The Race IS Warned to Keep Away
From Politics and Get to Work.

ohASANS bu "St " w O1h.
Chicago Times.IIcrald.
ITO raise u dead issue is not nv oh.
ject When the new generation goes to
see Uncle Toms Cabin they believe all
Southcrncrs were btutcs, that the
~bloOdhounds and the lash and the oaths
o fLcgrec typilicd the South before the
war, the s~laveholding South. Tha. is
false"
F. IIopkinson Smith, marine engineer
and author, thus summed up his reason
for dcnouncing Mrs. Bcccher Stoves
revolution causing book. He was at the
Great Northern hotel and was about to
leave for the Art Institute to deliver his
lecture. he looks the man Of the world
and the man Of affairs rather than the
Ia of letters. His clothes and his
manner Of wearing them are those of
New York. But about him is a touch
OF the C cgancc Of the old time South as
well as much Of the general goodfellow-
ship of the present day American. His
face shows his executive ability, his rrac-
tical force, and only the eyes reveal the
dreamer, the poet behind the wording.
He described the old South
The slave system was partriarchal.
We took care Of our negroes as We did
OF our animals and %valuables The able
BODIED men and ONE worked, but the
mammicS and ancient uGcles, liks the
little children were cared for till thew
died. They were fixed charges upon the
land
mo, | don't think Mrs Stoves book
was any nearer the truth concerning
conditions in the gulf States than it was
concerning those in the border States.
The Southern people are Americans of
the same blood and temper as the North
n1n1Aln - rin an ~, nrn 80
We are not II brutal race. Americans
treated their negroes well. The only
instances of brutality to negroes in the
South are the lynchings that now take
place, but unfortunately the Noithcrn
people are as swift to lynch as we are.
The truth is white men will not stand
crimes against their m And who
ever heard Of negro crimes upon white
women before the war? They did not
exist. When The greatest American,
Abraham Lincoln, signed the cmanci.
patton proclamation by a stroke OF the
pen 100000 ignorant, childish, semi
savage black men became free to order
their own lives.
meant, and the carpet bag COVER lmcnt
further dcmoralizcd them. A niger
who found himself no longer a slave put
up a shack in the next vacant pasture.
lie had always been furnished food, and
SO he stole his late masters chickens
The race had been dependent, and so
hrst OF all it became a race of thieves.
Left to themselves and their own
original instances they developed i'm
morality and became drones.
THE result was the killing of the
Niger. -Four millions of them died
twenty years before their time. Idle.
ness, vice, starvation. disease killed
them. Only lately old Aunt Chloe in
CINCINNATI told me with tears flowing
down her checks how she had to leave
her old master when she became free
and how she had suffered hardsbips
aver since.
The new niger, he who was born
since the wal and who since infancy
has had to rely upon himself, is a new
factor. lie may survive. But he has
got to get out of politics and he has pot
to quit being a dronc | believe Booker
T.. Washington has told of the right
idea The niger must get over the
IDEA that he is a gentleman and the no
ton that he can give himself gentlcmanly
airs
HE must regard himself, as Booker
washington tells him, as a labor mach
Inc. AS n cellar digging machine he
is worth rs cents a day; as a book max.
ing machine SO a day; as a machinist
machine he may become worth 81 a day.
Unless he be a digger, a shoemaker or
something, he is no account and worth
nothing to society. Going into politics
will not save him, neither will playing
gentleman. When he is some ac
the white man will employ him
treat him we'll as long as he behaves
and no longer.
81 am asked PRAY, Mr.. Smith. do
you believe in slavcry?' | say do
not And, Mr.. Smith, are you not
glad the negro is free? Il am. Then
Smith, is not the negro better off In
he South than he was before the war -
answer, Not by 102 per cent?
"Mrs. Stowe'a book misrepresents
zach section to the other. II made pos.
lblc John Browns raid 1t intlamed
he North and maddone1 the South. It
provoked the irrcpressiblc conflict
made 1t irrcpressible. in fine. But for
t the war and its slaughter might have
cen averted. 30 might the wholesale
lying off Of the old negroes, the do.
1oralization and resultant criminality
( the race.
There would have been little OF a
ace problem then today. The South
ould nave been persuaded to take a
ioney substitute for its slaves and the
reed negroes would have remained un.
or the tute'age OF heir former masters
united with them in the familiar
,timacy Of the old plantation life.
MRS. Stoves book Is to be classed
18th Roasseau's 'Contrat Social, as
In It's effect. There is
llh n thtnn On NhA l g.