The Colorado statesman., 1906-09-29
ATROCIOUS ATLANTA.

First cast the Deam out OF your
own eye might be justly hurled in
the face of protectorate America,
who is sympathizing with the Jews
in Russian and commanding peace
in Cuba, but permitting innocent
blood to flow in prejudice-cursed
and riotious Atlanta, Ga. 0, Amer
lea ! Consistency, thou art a jewel
abroad but farce at home.
The race riots at Atlanta dur
ing the past week ought to call
for public condemnation from
those high up in position as peace
preservers and in power, but as
yet that word has not been spoken.
The Colorado Statesman has no
word of complaint against taking
the life of criminals by due pro-
cess of law, but when peace-loving,
law abiding, industrious Negroes,
teachers, professional and bust
ness men are made to suffer in
discriminatory, then the cry ought
to be raised over the nation:
"Down with the mob. - The ar
rest of that gentlemanly, digni-
fed Christian scholar, Professor
j. w. E. Bowen, and forty
students of Cannon Seminary
shows that the animus of the mob
and militia is not against the
crime producing elements, as we
have all along said, but against
the educated, God-fearing, peace
loving, intelligent, and progressive
Negroes who are trying to fit them
selves for exalted citizenship and
leaders in business life.
1t is a plain, open and unde-
Tended case of race hatred and
nothing else. The authorities sim
ply let the mob satisfy itself for
blood before interfering. The
newspapers aroused the mob and
famed the fury until fully a half
hundred colored men, who had no
more to do with crime in Atlanta
than the staff of this paper had to
do with it, have been killed and
nearly a hundred more injured
and nearly 500 hundred arrested
and lodged in Jail.
Instead of charging the riots to
leaders of the Negro race they can
be laid directly to the influence
of Pitchfork Tillman, Vardamen,
Thomas Dixon, Hoke Smith and
Clark Howell, who ought to be
hailed into court as causing and as
sisting in disturbing the peace.
1t cannot be argued that the
Georgia authorities were prompt,
because as a matter of fact, the
governor could have had troops on
the street in couple of hours.
Therefore the naked truth is that
one of the meanest things in the
world is race prejudice and we can
not say any longer to atrocious
Russia: 81 am holier than thou. "
One of Denver's leading papers,
the Evening Post of the 24th, has
the following which fits the facts
exactly.
The race riots in Atlanta ought
to have a chastened effect upon
our quickness to call Russia bar
barous when they have race riots
ever there. To be sure, the cause
of the massacres in Russia and the
cause of the rioting in Atlanta are
not to be compared; but there were
deep popular prejudices and pop
ular demand for reprisal for pop
ularly conceived wrongs behind
the massacre of Jews in Russia.
So far as our own rioters and mas
sacre-makers are concerned, we can
hardly argue that Negroes in gen
eral were responsible for crimes OF
members of their race and we can
hardly contend that the indis-
criminate killings in Atlanta were
different, ethically, from the mas
sacres in Russia.
In each case they originated in
race hatred and in each case. the
| authorities Let the mnhs satisfv