The semi-weekly messenger. [volume] (Wilmington, N.C.) 1897-1908, 1902-05-06
SOME rssrRucrrvE POINTS.

Hon: Clark HowelI. a native Of North
Carolina, but q lea.er in Georgia, at
the Southern Educational Conference
q. Athens. stated that southern people
had given four times mere for negro
| education h had been given out
side o. the Staie for that cause. u
vas statad that ss Per cent. came FRI
the whites. As interesting an account
as we have seen Of the conference Is
by DR.. McEelway In the Charlotte
Presbyterian Standard Here are two
pleasant extracts concerning two ma
tire North Ca~roiinians::
DIR. kcIver's report was most inter-
esting and encouraging Several our
ties have 1Sopled the scheme OF local
! taxation. and scores of libraries have
been established. He declared tina. u
people feared nothing but tyranny n
hated nothing but tax He makes a
fine impression Of moral earnestness.
e And hen His Excellency. Governor
Charles B. Aycock-we made no notes
Of his great speech. It was too absorb
ingly and thriilngly eloquent. We
caught one sentence: Education does
not mean reading and writing. IL
means the willingness TO toll and sacTi-
fee in order to achieve the higher n
nobler ends OF life But the effect OF
the address was most marked upon the
audience. Eloqaence is not a lost art,
and there is Tie ring of sincerity IL
what Aycock says, that vibrates in the
| hearts OF his auditors. A prominent
| northern editor asked about his exc
| cutive ability, With the idea that lie
might be the ext president OF the
| United States"
The difference IN population in Massa-
| chusetts and Georgia is most startling.
Som enthusiastic teacher owe might
name them, when waxing warm like
| to castigate the south by comparing 1t
with Massachusetts. The latter is
| small, immensely rich and long at it.
But Hoke Smith gave some suggestive
statistical facts in his speech. Read
this and wonder and say, no more
against Georgia and North Carolina:
"Sparsity of population is one Of the
conditions that make our problem
| harder. In Massachusetts, in every
square mile of territory there are 90
school childr IN. In Georgia only
eleven, six white and five black, and
we must have two schools. There were
wv AioAS F~oPAS ~
than in Georgia, and yet in Georgia
there are 200. 900 more children Of school
age. Happy is ne that hath his CULVER
full of them. Moreover a sparse popu-
lation cannot have good roads, and the
trouble about getting to h school
house is another difficulty. The north
ern friends were given the benefit OF
some more fgurs. In 1860 there were
$11, 600, 000, 600 of property in the United
States $500, OOC, 900 belonging to the
southern states Then after the War
and throughout the reconstruction pc
riod the south Fept getting poorer and
poorer until in 1880 there was only 81
400, 900, 900 of property in the south. And
we have just reached again the point
that we had reached in 1850"
DR.. Albert Shaw, northern, editor of
Review of Ra,iews, mentioned a fact
not to be ignored or forgotten-that
1.-The south vas paying into the COM
, NOR treasury fifty millions a year for
the pension fund and receiving none of
it back and that he regarded it as bur
justice for individuals thus to return
to the south some of the none to help
the south in carrying it's burden" That
northern scholar and literary journal
list has gumption and candor and gen.
crosby evidently.
One of the most attractive, and pos
sibIy the most rhetorical of the many
addresses, was by a northern man of
letters, Felix Adler. He so aroused
DR.. McKelway as to cause him to strike
his Tyre for a finer strain of reporting.
He wrote of Hill in this style:
"Feliz Adler is another master OF
English prose. He compared the south
spoke delicately of the thorns and the
cruel stones that had barred the way
to the enchanted castle, but declared
| that his people would persevere until
they had her n won her
with her unique glories of character
| and wed her to all that was nobleSt in
themselves. He declared that the ideal
| democracy was the best life for every
man and that the best Should rule.
| There should b. thus, not the old fixed
~aristocracy but a fluid aristocracy, the
best nen coming always to the top.
And he then declared that the south's
disdain OF conmercialism and its be-
lief in the Importance of aristocracy
were noble characteristics"
DIR. E A. Alderman spoke with his
fine rhetoric and admirable ~phrasing
and yet both charmed and edited. The
state was exceiiently represented. May
| great good conc from it all.