The Grenada sentinel., 1903-04-18
HENRY WATTERSON
Delivers 4 Powerful but Conservative
Speech on the Race Quesiion.

SpCCC0 ON t1tC HACG QO69s1O9Ss 4
The brilliant speech made by Hon.
Henry Watterson, ON the negro ques-
tion, before the Hamilton club in
Chicago on Wednesday OF last week, is
attracting wide attention throughout
the nation. Mr.. Watterson is re-
garded as the ablest journalist in
! America, and his utterances always
have great weight, both North and
South. On this occasion he opened
his speech with the statement that
he came to talk, not to Republicans
as a Democrat, but as an American
to Americans, and this was the
keynote Of his entire speech, which
was one of the ablest, most practical
and conservative that has ever been
delivered on this question. 1t was
an appeal to reason from a broad
plane of craftsmanship, and free from
sectional prejudice.
The brilliant Southerner made an
appeal for the elimination of sectional
lines, as the interests of both north
and south are indissoluble. He re-
sisted the idea that party lines are
lines OF battle, and spoke OF the burial
both north and south Of the feelings
engendered by the war.
He spoke of the folly Of recrimina-
tion between the sections and said,
Never since the creation of the gov
eminent was there greater uniformi-
ty, deeper effusion of national SEN
timent than now" Then turning to
the negro problem he said, "After
| thirty years observation. experience
and refection-always directed from
a sympathetic point OF view-I am
forced to agree with the Secretary or
! War that negro suffrage is failure.
, 1t is failure because the southern
whites will not have it,
He appeals to the Republicans of
the United States to have done with
the concett that unless they continue
the negro as an issue in politics, in
justice would be done him. He show
that the negro had made much prog
ress in the Southern States in better
ing his condition, and in the acqusi>
tion OF property. He could not have
done this without the sympathy and
cooperation OF the Southern whites.
But he has made little progress in
the arts of self government either
! North or South, and he can never be-
come in any benet1cient or genuine
sense, an integral and recognized part
OF the body politics except through:
the forces of evolution. Where there
is one negro fit for citizenship, there
are myriads of negros wholly unfit.
The hot house process has been fall
ure. 1t has brought corruption into
the suffrage and discredit upon the
negro.
! Mr.. Watterson appealed to his hear
ers for what he conceived to be the
best interest of the black man along
with the white people of both North
and South. What is good for one
section is good for the other. Sec-
tional lines have been erased by mod
ern progress. Evil winds will not
blow between the North and the
South, but between the East and
the West. II conflict between cap
ital and labor should come. the North
will need the conservatism of the
South. The law loving forces OF the
North will need the law breeding for
ces of the South. The Americanism
of the North will need the American
ism of the South. Then, indeed
shall both sections learn what racial
lhomogenity means, and know for GER
tain that blood is thicker than water.
In conclusion, Mr.. Watterson said,
''long ago the South, forgiving all,
laccepted the verdict in perfect faith
it is for the North, forgetting all, to
seal it in perfect love.''
| One speech like Mr.. Watterson s
will do more good than all the abusive
lspeeches that have been made in con-
Igress, or by politicians on the stump
since the war. Extremists do harm
instead of good. 1t is only in the
light of reason, on a broad, practical
and conservative basis, that the two
sections can be brought together or
issues of the living present for the
glory of a united country, and not by
breathing on the dry bones Of section
al hate that are bleaching in the deac