The news & observer. [volume] (Raleigh, N.C.) 1894-current, 1903-12-12
Spirit of the Press.


Lynchburg News.
Not only does The News take issue will
the refusal of the trustees OF Trinity
College, North Carolina, to accept the
resignation of Professor Bassett, tht
member of the faculty who declared
Booker Washington to be the greatest
man, except Robert e. Lee, produced By
the South in a hundred years; it thinks
the resignation of the Trinity
trustees should be compelled by the
Southern Methodist church, if such
result can be accomplished under
the charter of the institution and the
laws of church and State. The plea adj
vanced by these trustees, that freedom oil
speech was involved in their action, is
an invention devoid even of plausibility
an excuse that is entitled to just as
little respect, and quite as much contempt
as the offending opinion proclaimed by
| MIR. Bassett.
Freedom of opinion and of speech, as
guaranteed by the written constitution
and as tolerated by civilized society
means only that man shall not be re
strained or constrained by pains or pen.
alties of the law in holding or expressing
any belief that he may please to entertain
1
of his fellowman or treason to his coun-
try. Such freedom of speech does not i'm
ply, and no power on earth can ever
make it mean, that every man is not re-
sponsible to the community for the opin-
ions he holds or expresses; and it is as
certain as fate itself that every man is,
and always will be. applauded or con-
| demned, approved or censured according
/ IN hnIi off fnr, 'nS hi Dlr
so is he.''
AS already indicated, Trinity College is
under the patronage of the Southern
Methodist church. Suppose Professor Bas-
sett had entertained and expressed the
belief that John Wesley was clerical
brawler and Jamaican opinion We
hemently proclaimed in England at an
early stage of Wesleys ministry-would
these trustees, who gable about freedom
| Of speech, have permitted him to hold his
chair an hour longer than was required
to drive him out of the college precincts?
Not a bit of it; and yet the opinion given
| by Bassett, heralding this negro teacher
as the greatest product of Southern CIV
/ ilization IN century, except Lee, is every
whit as repugnant to the truth and dis
susting to public sentiment in North
have been the suggested denunciation of
Wesley. Fancy that Professor Bassett
had denied the doctrine of triune God
which one of these Trinity trustees would
have prated about free speech instead of
kicking the "heretic" out instantly? In
deed, having invoked the character of the
Methodist church in their vapid plea for
free Speech it is pertinent to ask if
Trir,i ~ Vol isr,n ant
to know that there is scarcely a Meth
odist preacher in America who has not
joined in the protest against he~seating
Of Reed Smoot as United States Senator
from Utah because of his belief in the
abstract doctrine of polygamy! If the
clergy may approach that near to trench
ing on the constitutional guaranty of lib
erty of opinion, shall these Methodist trus-
tees be permitted to bring odium on a
great denomination by delusively plead
ing, in it's name. for a totally false, if
not positively depraved, conception Of
free speech? The truth of the business,
IN sentence, is, that any college ought
to be ashamed to have for its Professor
of History a pedagogue stolid enough to
think and rash enough to proclaim that
a negro manual school trainer, clever
the North, outranks in qualities of char
acter and mind Stonewall Jackson and
Albert Sidney Johnston, jefferson Davis
and Abraham Lincoln, Alexander H.
Stephens and Matthew F. Maury; in
short, scores of other great men the best
types of an imperial race
Moreover and conclusively, the capital
transgression of Professor Bassett did
not consist in his twisted mental percep-
ton of the comparative greatness of q
man whose moiety Of Caucasian blood
seems to be have lodged in his brain and
rescued him from the congenitai supersti-
ton and ignorance of his race; but the
really atrocious feature of Bassett's a"
ticle was it's obvious advocacy of social
equality for the blacks and eventual mis-
cegenation! The trustees of Trinity Col
lege and Professor Bassett, too, may deny
this until they are blue in the face; bat
mo- ody who VI not, at all hazards, deterlr
il to extenuate Bassetts offense can
c3TSit their protestations If the North
Carolina professors article did not mean
what we have said. it is a sheer congeries
OF gibberish, without point or pith. How
soever and nevertheless, if Trinity Col
lege wants that sort of a professor, as
Mr. Lincoln would say, that is the sort
Of professor it wants"