The Glenwood post., 1905-10-28
NEGRO ADVANCEMENT.
Address of President Roosevelt at Tus.
keaee Institute.

Address of President Roosevelt at Tus.
keaee Institute.
birmingham, Ala-President Roose-
Selt concluded strenuous day in Ala.
bama by two hours visit to Bir-
mingham, where his reception, in keep.
ing with those given him at Mont
gomery and Tuskegee, was hearty and
soul-stirring. His day began at
o'clock, when the special train left
Montgomery for Tuskegee. Visits to
the Tuskegee Normal and Industrial
Institute and to the Methodist Female
College were crowded into little less
than two hours, and the noon hour had
Just arrived when the executive
stepped from his car in Montgomery
Here he spoke to a great throng
under the shadow of the confederacys
first capital and was on his way again
sharply at 2 o'clock. A few minutes
before the President was the guest of
birmingham, and until his train left
at GAS p. m, on the night run to
Little Rock the President was cheered
at every turn.
AT Tuskegee the President said:
To the white population as well as
the black it is of the utmost import
ance that the negro must be encour-
aged to make himself citizen of the
highest type of usefulness 1t is to the
interest of the white people that this
policy be conscientiouSly pursued, and
to the interest of the colored people
that they clearly realize that they have
opportunities for economic develop
ment here in the South not offered
elsewhere.
Hence the work of the Tuskegee
Normal and Industrial Institute is
matter of the highest practical import
ance to both the white man and the
black man, and well worth the support
of both races, alike in the South and
the North. Your 1900 students are not
only being educated in head and heart,
but also trained to individual efficiency,
for from the beginning Tuskegee has
placed especial emphasis upon the
training of men and women in agricul-
ture, mechanics and household duties.
Training in these three funda-
mental directions does not embrace all
that the negro or any other race needs,
but it does cover in very large de-
gree the field in which the negro can
at present do most for himself and be
most helpful to his white neighbors.
Every black man who leaves this insti-
tute better able to do mechanical or in
dustrial work, adds by so much to the
wealth of the whole community and
benefits all people in the community.
The professional and mercantile
avenues to success are overcrowded.
For the present the best chance of sue
cess awaits the intelligent worker at
some mechanical trade, or on a farm;
for this man will almost certainly
tn nj i,I,
81 am pleased, but not in the least
surprised, to learn that many among
the women trained at Tuskegee find
workers among their own people, and
that their services are generally sought
by white people for various kinds of in
dustrial work. the demand being much
greater than the supply.
"Viewed from any angle, ignorance
is the costliest crop that can be raised
in this Union. Every dollar put into
the education of either white man or
black man, in head, in hands and in
heart yields rich dividends to the en-
tire community.
"In the interest of humanity, of
justice and of self-protection, every
white man in America, no matter
where he lives, should try to help the
negro to help himself.
1T is not only the duty of the white
man, but it is to his interest to see
that the negro is protected in property,
in life and in all his legal rights.
Every time a law Is broken every
individual In the community has the
moral tone of his life lowered. Law
lessness in the United States is not
confined to any one section; lynching
is not confined to any one section; and
there is perhaps no body Of American
citizens who have deserved SO well of
the entire American people as the
public men, the publicists, the clergy
men, the countless thousands of high.
minded private citizens who have done
such heroic work in the South in arous-
ing public opinion against lawlessness
in all it's forms and especially against
lynching. l very earnestly hope that
their example will count in the North
as well as in the South, for there are
just as great evils to be warred against
in one region Of our country as in an
other, though they are not in all places
the same evils"