Keowee courier. [volume] (Pickens Court House, S.C.) 1849-current, 1904-06-01
sopHrsTaY OF AN ARGUMENT.


soPHIsTRY OF AN ARGUMENT.
Wise words and wisely spoken.
BY these principles 80 eloquently
enunciated by our great leaders, the
country will unfalteringly stand.
Whatever the discouragements and
seeming failures, the policy inspired
by Christianity and yindicated by
history will not be reversed. And
in all the coming years that which
will be spoken of most to the honor
of the South was that, out of the
wreck and ruin of war, with little
left but the charred and SCARED re-
mains of fire and tempest, she gave
with an almost lavish hand to the
education of the negroes. Every
line of that page Of her brilliant his
tory will be glorious with the un-
stinted praise of the civilized world.
From the declaration that educa-
ton has made the negro more i'm
moral and criminal, am constrained
to dissent. There are no data or
figures on which to base such an
indictment, or justify such an asser-
tion. On the contrary, undisputed
facts. attest the statement that edu-
cation and its attendant influence
have. elevated the standard and tone
of morals among the negroes of the
South. The horrid crimes which
furnish an apology for the too fre-
quent expressions of mob violence in
these parallels almost without excep.
tion, are committed by the most ig-
norant and brutal of the race. 1
have been at not n little pains to
ascertain from representatives of
various institutions the post-collegi-
ate history of their students, and 1
am profoundly sratitied at the record.
l believe it perfectly safe to say that
not single case of criminal assault
has ever been charged on a student
of mission school for negroes
founded and sustained by great
Christian denomination.
"To school the negro" says a cer-
tain editor, "is to increase his crimi-
nality. Official statistics do not lie,
and they tell us that the negroes who
can read and write are more criminal
than the illiterate. The more money
for negro education, the more crime.
This is the unmistakable showing
of the United States census"
EDUCATION DECREASES CRIME.
Now, | do not hesitate to affirm
that the United States census shows
exactly the opposite-that education
has decreased crime. A careful
study of the exact figures will show
that the proportion of negro crimi-
mails from the illiterate class has been
40 per cent larger than from the
class which has had school training.
And when we consider further that
it is naturally and notoriously easier
to convict poor negro of any crime
than white man who has influential
friends and well paid counsel, the
strength of the statement is irresisti-
BILE and unanswerable.
Joel Chandler Harris, the distin-
guished author and political philoso-
pher, and whose Interpretation of the
Southern negro has given him world
wide and immortal fame, in a recent
article in the Saturday Evening Post,
gives this emphatic testimony:
"The idle and criminal classes
among them make great show in
the police court records, but right
here in Atlanta, the reputable and
decent negroes far outnumber those
who are on the lists of the police as
new or old offenders. l am bound
to conclude from what | see about
me, and what | know of the race
elsewhere, that the negro, notwith-
standing the late start he has made
in civilization and enlightenment, is
capable of making himself useful
member of the community in which
he lives and moves; that he is becom-
ing more and more desirous of con-
forming to all the laws that have
been enacted for the protection of
society"
TRIBUTE AND DEFENSE.
Hon. w. M. Cox, of Mississippi,
prominent in the political councils of
his State, for years leading figure
in our State Legislature, and a
scholar, has given his judgment on
this question, which perfectly accords
with my own observations. He says ::
"When | consider all the circum-
stances of the case, the negro's weak
ness, his utter lack of preparation fey
freedom and citizenship and the null
titudinous temptations to disorder
and wrong doing which have assailed
him, the wonder to me is, not that
he has done go i'll, but that ne has
done SO well. No other race in the
world would have borne itself with
80 much of patience, docility and
ubmissiveness. 1t is true that many
grave crimes have been committed
by negroes and these have sorely
taxed the patience of the white peo.
pie of the South. do not blink at
their enormity, and know that they
must be sternly repressed and ter
ribly avenged. But | insist that the
entire race is not chargeable with
these exceptional crimes, and that
the overwhelming majority of the
race are peaceable, inoffensive and
submissive to whatever the superior
race sees fit to put upon them. Their
crimes are not the fruit of the little
learning their schools afford them.
They are the results of british in
sLinots and propensities which they
have not been taught to regulate and
restrain"
And in this scheme for their edu-
cation constructive craftsmanship
suggests that proper training be pro-
vided for those who may become the