The Montgomery advertiser., 1903-02-05
A NoRrHrRN yYxW.

xA 8tS1A A4G&S&s 4S"
 The Hartford tConn) Times is one of the papers which can see through mill stone after a hole has been bored through. Discussing the President and Southern affairs it says:
 Mir. Roosevelt is a somewhat imphi- sive, not to say effusive person. and when he asked Booker Washington to take lunch with him in the White House he did q perfectly proper. but very unwise thing. It was thing that Mr. Mckin- ley would not have done. and few people will think that Mr. MciKniey's inten- tions were less kindly toward the colored people than are those of his successor. It was an unwise thing because it was unnecessary' it could not possibly be of any advantage to Mir Washington, southern white prejudiccs in way that nothing has aroused it in recent years. Mos. of us were inclined to applaud Mir Roosevelt at the time of the incident. but in the light of the results, We can all see. and the President can, perhaps sec that it was serious error.
 Whether the lunch Incident was a per- fectly proper thing to do Is a matter about which there will necessarily be wide divergence of opinion, but that is really of little consequence. Of itself. and it would long since have been forgotten but for more recent events which The Times itself comments on and deprecates in the same editorial from which the above extract was made.
 It is encouraging to find conservative Northern papers like our Hartford con- temporary taking d sensible view of the inevitable consequences of the Presidents $ ill-adyised acts. As that paper says, there is no possible chance to benefit the negroes of the South by forcing them in an official capacity on unwilling con- munities, On the contrary, the negro will be the sufferer in every case, and this will occur without regard to the reasons governing the Presidents ae- tions,
 The effort of some of Roosevelts de- lenders to palliate his blundering by calling attention to negroes who have been appointed to positions at the North is as illogical as 1t is absurd. We know, and the President Is bound to know, that conditions and feelings are entirely dif- ferent in the two sections. Northern communities sometimes elect or appoint negroes to minor offices, as they have a perfect right to do, and if the Presi- dent wishes to give office to a colored person in a community where there is no objection, we admit his right to do 1t, as we admit the right of the white people to be satisfied with the appointment. There's quite variety of tastes in the world.
 This has no real bearing on the trouble down here. It Is impossible for the President not to know that negro officials are distasteful to the Southern people, and his information to assume that he Is ignorant of the fact that his efforts to set up the negro Is a serious injury to the race in the South. He could hardly have thought out a surer method of revivipg and intensifying race feeling than he has adopted and whatever his object may have been. the result is in- furious to the negroes and to himself. If, as The Times intimates, he sees his error he ought to be brave enough to admit and correct it.
 And along this same line we find in one of the most intolerant of our republican contemporaries, The Kansas City Journal, some editorial comments on existing con ditions which are not unintoresting. The Journal contends that the real enemies of the negroes are those who encourage him to believe in or look for racial equai- ty, and adds;
 The former organized opposition to the emancipated slave during the dark days of the period of reconstruction was found ed on the appFehensive dread of negro domination. The present antagonism is more ominous and foreboding because it Is based upon some suggestive facts which ought no longer to be suppressed or concealed. The freedmen and their descendants arc not now the dependent paupers whose shackles were stricken of as a result of the war. They own thousands of farms. possess much other kind of property. and produce n iliions of dollars of wealth annually, Many arc chants who have been finely educated. All this of course, has been brought about through the indulgence, good will and assistance of their white brethren. But. nevertheless. vanity and ambition have kept pace with their development, ed leaders, like Hayes above quoted, are demanding unrestricted suffrage and political power and recognition Commen- surate with their numbers. They think that the only way the curse Of Ham can be removed is by holding office.