The farmer and mechanic. [volume] (Raleigh, N.C.) 18??-19??, 1903-04-21
LESSONS TAUGHT BY THE AND GEN
ERAL EDUCATIONAL A

quoting 4 reLnaEk hy Henry Ward
BeecEer. to the effect that We should
make the negro worthy first and then
give him suffrage, Dr.. Abbott said:
we made the mistake Of giving hin,
suffrage first ard tn unfortunate negro
has had to suffer ever since. What the
negro wants is education. II all depends
upon education whether the negro will be
a shackle to our feet or wings TO our
body"
8. Only last week an attempt was made
in the Union League to commit that old
time Republican club to the aid of certain
agitators Who are trying to overturn the
limited Suffrage constitutional amend
ments. Some OF the ablest and most
influential members of the club were
earnestly in favor of joining hands
in this sectional fight on the South.
After the debate had gone on for
some time, Mr.. Robert c. Ogden,
president of the Southern Educa-
tion Board, made a short speech which
killed the proposition. He told the mem
bers Of the League that he was in q
position to know much Of Southern sen
timent and Of what the South was doing.
He urged the club to leave this matter
to the Southern people and told them that
such action would do moro harm than
good. They listened to Mr.. Ogden's wise
counsel and dropped the matter. If Mr..
Ogden had not been much in the South
and mingled with representative South
ern men. he would not have been able to
save the Union League from a blunder
equal to a crime. In fact, but for the
education Mr.. Ogden has received through
his efforts to advance education, he would
have been as ignorant Of true conditions
in the South as the men who advocated
joining hands with the political agita-
tor to destroy the purified suffrage Of
the South.
4. The press is le~arning-all except the
hide-bound rural New York Republican
press. The New York Herald's editorials
Upon the appointment Of Crum and Cleve-
lands speech show that that great>news-
paper has studied the Southern question
with good results. It is not given to
zig tuitoii1lSO 4 " attempting " lldiS
public sentiment except upon matters it
regards as of great moment. In its crit
icism of the Crum appointment it mani
tested a breadth and knowledge that are
obtained only by long study and true
appreciation of all phases of Southern
conditions. 1t is wise in its treatment
of Mr.. Cleveland's speech. We quote a
portion of the EDITORIAL:
'Mr. Cleveland in effect holds that it is
a condition, not a theory, which im1ne-
diately confronts US, and confined himself
to the immediate phase of the situation.
Mr.. James Bryce, in his lecture on THE
Relations of the Advanced and Backward
Races Of Mankind" speaks of "the ire
mendous problem presented in the
Southern States, suggests that similar
ones will arise in South Africa and the
PHILIPPINES and inquiries what should be
the duty and the policy Of a dominant
race where it cannot fuse with a back
ward race. Careful readers are unable
to discover that he presents any final
solution of the problem or that his sug-
g~estions are calculated to meet anything
more than the immediate difficulties pre-
scented. In like manner Mr.. Cleveland
says:
I'VE are not brought to the point
of doing or overlooking evil that good
may come when we proceed upon the
theory that, before reaching the stage
where We may be directly and prac-
tically confronted with the question
of the negro's full enjoyment Of civic
advantages, or even Of all his polit-
ical advantages, there are imme-
diately before US and around US ques-
lions demanding our immediate care,
and that, in dealing effectively with
these, we can confidently rely upon
the ~couragem and assistance OF
every thoughtful and patriotic citizen
Of the and-wherever he may live and
whatever may be his ideas or predi-
1ections concerning the more remote
phases Of the negro problem"
There is the right ring, too. in the dec
laratiCn Of DR.. Lyman Abbott that it Is
a national problem, not q sectional one,
that the North and the South combined
to bring the negro here, and that we must
not go into the South in a. holier-than-
thou spirit. Neither force nor phari-
seeism ever converted a race" said DR..
Abbott. suffrage must wait for eduCa-
consolidation is primary, political
rights are secondary. We have tried the
experiment Of giving to the negro suf-
Aa5 H4o ILL tduIdIIOu dIltlW dIu, ana
bitterly has the country suffered from
our blunder.' 1t is we'll enough to re-
member that when South Carolina IN
1883 prohibited the importation of slaves
from Africa, they We're imported by New
York and shipped South as American
slaves, and that when the climate, and
not the superior humanity, of the North
ern States banished the slaves. they We're
not freed, but sold to the South. There
need be no phariseeism in dealing with
the present stage of the problem"
The chief object of the Education
Boards is not to give money, though in
Gullford and Mecklenburg counties,
North Carolina, alone they have agreed to
give eight thousand dollars to rural
schools dollar for every dollar con
tributed by the local authorities. 1t is
not to stimulate the interest of the South
ern people in public education. Their
own leaders are doing that work with
enthusiasm and success, and are glad II
nave the cooperation of broad-minGe