The Hawaiian star. [volume] (Honolulu [Oahu]) 1893-1912, 1902-12-18
LIKE A NEW
SUNNY SOUTH
Continued from Page ~

plished by getting a man to deal with
the negro laborers who understands
and is trusted by them, not an agent
who is looking for his commission but
some leader and educator who has the
interests of his race at heart, why the
land will be a paradise to them if the
slight requirements which make them
happy are observed and an intelligent
review taken of the conditions under
which they will thrive
These conditions are simple but
vital The negro laborer must be allow
ed his own little cabin, you cannot herd
him in barracks like an Oriental. Give
him his little colony of cabins where he
can have his own truck patch and sit
under his own vine and fig tree, give
him his school house and his church
and he will be early and cheerful in
the field and happy and contented after
work. Put a preacher of his own race
and idiom in the church and have him
man approved by the men at the head
of the movement and, most important
perhaps of all have as schoolmaster
student of Hampton, Tuskogee or some
kindred institution who will guide their
mental as well as their moral develop
ment and you will have a race growing
up here who will till your fields, plant,
cultivate and cut your cane and be a
will be no need of the contract, or the
drivers whip to keep them at work.
Their children can perhaps after school
hours help in coffee plantations which
might be operated on share principles
by their parents to swell their earnings.
Their wants are simple, their willing
ness great.
They can be procured by the right
men. There are plenty of them who are
E.,1l ii,
culturists for three generations and
who are now dissatisfied with condi-
lions in their native states. To them
this will be land flowing with milk
and honey. Send a proper emisary to
Galveston, New Orleans and other ports
and you can ship your immigrants, who
will be neither leaving nor entering
the United States to the nearest rail-
road point and then, if necessary char
ter your own steamer to bring them
across. You could get ten thousand
here in six months. AS to wages, they
are used in their own states to get
from twenty-five to seventy-five cents
a day in the field. They buy their pro-
visions at a contract store and are,
even the small homesteaders, nearly
always in debt. OF course 1 have not
yet looked around but l should imagine
there would be no great disparity be-
tween their present wages and those
that you could afford to pay them.
Only the colonization methods must be
adhered to. They must be allowed to
live separately as a race apart.
Understand 1 am not advocating
this. 1t occurs to me as a feasible solu-
ton judging from past experience. 1
want to meet the planters and those in
terested and talk the matter over with
them. / am not here to eXpound any
theory but like any good American with
the sole resolve of aiding the newly ac-
quired territory"
Mr.. Fortune, who is the editor of the
New York Age and president of the Ma
tional Afro American Council is a great
admirer of the late General Armstrong
as a national educator and compares
him with his associate, Booker T.
Washington. Mr.. Fortune is a man of
considerable means and besides his New
York interests and property owns a
country place in New Jersey from
whence he obtained the present APP
pointment though he has voted there
but once. He was an active figure in
politics under Clevelands administra-
ton but did not hold office himself
though instrumental in securing the
coveted plums for others. Mr.. Fortune
is not a Democrat of today and endors-
ed Cleveland merely because of his be-
lief that the democratic leader was a.
better man for the country than either
Harrison or Blaine. President Roose-
welt he emphatiCally endorses.
1t is thought in both official and lay
circles that the recent conversations of
the President with Booker 7. Washing
ton and the appointment of as promi-
nent an Afro American as Mr.. Fortune
to the present commissionership, is in
dicative of a belief on the part of the
President that the colonization of Ha-
waiian territory by negro plantation
laborers is the correct solution of the
local labor problem.