The Lexington dispatch. [volume] (Lexington, South Carolina) 1870-1917, 1903-02-04
The Lexington Dispatch.
Wednesday, February q, 1903.
Ineenaiasy Easrangue.
A Negro Raves and Rants About the
Supposed Rights of Coons.

supposed hlgntS Ol CuullS.
A special to the News and Courier
from WASHINGTON, over date of JAN
uary 9th, says: Because meeting
over which he presided was charac-
terized by some incindiary speeches,
Cyrus Adams, a negro, who is assist
ant register of the treasury, is having
his part in the affair scrutinized by
officials above him. The meeting was
under the auspicies of the Afro-Ameri-
can Council, of which Pledger, of
Georgia, is president, which has re-
Gently resolved itself into an Office
trust to relieve the President OF the
burden of awarding federal Offices to
the negroes.
The reports furnished the press
made no mention of the most sensa-
tional feature of this gathering. It
was mass meeting at one of the
coiored churches, with long list OF
speakers, among them Lincoln john
son, of Atlanta. The star of the oc-
cssion was negro Hays, an attorney
at Richmond, who has figured in
the efforts to test the disfranchise-
ment laws of Virginia. His speech
was full Of fight and fire. Incident
ally he quoted the Atlanta Con-
stitution as shaving threatened
the negroes with ku klux il the
growth of federal appointments in
the Sonsh continues" I make the
prediction" he declared, "that
when the Southern people start
to ku kluxing this time they will not
have as their objects of oppression
the same timid people they ku kluxed
IN the sixties" In the course of his
speech Hayes is reported to have de-
clared that the negro has now reach.
ed the limit of his Endurance, and he
advocated the sword and torch ss q
means for the negro to maintain his
manhood. His remarks were received
with high enthusiasm. He referred
to the fact that during the years
which have elapsed since the war
sectional feelings between the North
and South have died out to such an
extent that Virginia now proposes to
place monument to Lee in Statury
Hall in the national capital, but that
all this period has not been sufficient
for the negro to advance one inch be-
yond the place he held when liberated
from slavery. "There is nothing in
Virginia for the negro" he said, 'but
degradation, unless the negroes make
irm stand, contend for their rights
and, if necessary, die for them" II
ann not anarchist" he added, land I
don't mean to go out and kill anybody
bat to let somebody else kill you"
This yelled sally provoked loud ap-
plause and laughter.
':You opened this meeting tonight by
singing ''My Croutry, 'Tis of Thee"
but I wonder how negroes can sing
that song. For myself I am a man
without a country. The time has come
when the negro must fight; not theo-
retically, not Intellectually, but fight
with his hand. The disfranchise-
ment of the children of Israel in
Egypt has been followed letter by
letter by the Acknowledgement in the
South. Negroes are leaving the
State of Virginia because of the treat
ment they are receiving. What we
want to do is to start something and
keep up until the white people stop
something. We don't intend to be
oppressed any longer; we don't intend
to be crushed. am afraid We are
anarchistic, and I give the warning
that if this oppression in the South
continues the negro must resort to
the sword and the torch, and that the
Southland will become land of
blood and desolation.
II want to make the assertion right
here that We are not going to be dis
franchissd in Virginia. Il is written
in the heavens and engraved upon