The Montgomery advertiser., 1905-06-18

now, as since the day the first fIagshiI
 was legaiized in it's trade in Massachu. setts that the trouble is the race ques.
 ton Is due to the persistent assertion
 on the part of northern friends and | philanthropists that they understand the problem and can devise the means for its solution.
 l The reconstruction period immedi-
 ately following the war was literally th'
 bringing of hell to the earth for both the black and the white race of the | South, and was due to no other caus'
 than the meddling of the North. What was done all good men in the South re- gret the necessity for doing. but the policy adopted by the North made 1t ab- solutely necessary for the Southern people to continue the war on the ne- gro race in the form of the Ku-Klux and otherwise. in order to keep the races life. Now we are passing through a period of reconstruction that Is fraught with the greatest dangers un- less 1t Is skilifully handled.
 The North's Attitude. "The North has put many millions In | educational institutions for negroes in l the South. It has led the negro to be- lieve that education will solve all his problems and relieve him of al his ills; | that Booker T. Washington has been lauded not only as a great man. but has been made to stand out as greater than the greatest man produced by the Saxon race. He has recently claimed that his race has accomplished In thirty years what 1t has taken the Latin race to accomplish In one thousand years: | that here his race is superior to the white race.
 No Confidence in the Theory. For myself. have never had any confidence in the Booker Washington theory of the reward education would bring his race. have read what he has written with care. and while am a strong advocate for the education of the negro, not alone on industrial lines, but on all lines that would fit him to inherit what has been worked out by | the races. nevertheless. I am firm in the belief that the theory. of education Is dangerous that leads any negro to believe that his race life will ever be parallel with that of the white race in this country, and from Booker washington's writings I most certainly understand that he teaches this can be done which appears to me to be num- buggery.
 How he has caught and held the American people is puzzling, for the reason his congregations are comical. For instance, he was born in 1859, yet
 
 batch of rags. lying on the dirt floor of a cabin on a slave plantation in Virgin ia, his sainted- mother bending over him utering a fervent prayer that Mar sa Lincoln might succeed This might not appear as comical had 1t not delib- erately been written down and sent to Philadelphia to be read at the celebra- tion of Abraham Lincoln's birth. It might be pardonable as an exagRera- In,a Af hut m 0f Bearing in mind he was born in 1859. yet he was able to take sacks of corn to mill on horseback in 1865, and when the corn shifted and fell to the ground he spent his time in crying until some passerby helped him up with his turn. This would put him late at the mill and late in arriving at home, for which he was severely beaten. Since he has be- come a man, after a hard days work in New York City, he would leave day coach, where there was room and com fortable seats, to stand in an already crowded sleeper, until finely dressed la dies were moved by his dejection and insisted on his taking a seat with them, and when they had tea served on the sleeper they insisted that he take tea with them, which he declined, all of which he offers as proof that he is not seeking social equality or he might
 
 work for his race he says that the ac-- |commodations were so poor that when it rained he and pupils were compelled to seek shelter under umbrellas, so in ferior was the roof of the schoolhouse and this in a land where pine slabs were easily gotten.
 T have nothing to say against the industrial education that he gives the negroes, for I know nothing about it, hut he ta1u fy,h that the negro may hope to become more than successful competitor with tine white race and his society may be made to be parallel with the best of the white race. It seems to me that along with the industrial educa- tion and all other kinds of education the negro should be taught that his rights of property. rights of person, safety of his family and the sanctity of his home should be as well safe- guarded as the white citizen; that he Is to be absolutely equal to any of the white race before the law, but not his equal socially, and he may not hope to be his equal, and that no Southern man or Northern man will ever permit his domination in governmental affairs in this country. He need never hope to enter into the inheritance of the race here Let the white men of the South
 
 You shall not govern us,' and in the same breath also say, Our government of you shall be kind and just
 A Significant Comparison.
 T am told that it. takes S300,O00 a year to run the Tuskegee institution. The income for Yale Is considerably less than this. Of the funds that sup ply this institution, comparatively nothing has been contributed. by the negro; the plans by which it is run were devised by white men. It is a de- fusion therefore to lead the negro to be- lieve that his skill and brain power have built up an institution that will eventually free him from burdens that came to him through hls inferior racial ideas.
 A Review of the Race.
 "A slight review of the negro race will suffice to show that there is need of taking a broader and a more thorough view of his condition than that which rests upon education and educational institutions made possible by Northern money and Northern ideas.
 ITO change the words of Thomas Nell son Page little, the dark continent re- mains darkest Africa still. and this is not true because of the lack of oppor- tunity. Civilization first lit her torch on her border The Nile flowed through a land where lettered and enlightened people lived; when the Tiber crept through the swamps in the wilderness; when the Acropolis was a waste and the hills of the Eternal City the range of wolves.
 "Thebes and Memphis and Hiliopolis