Keowee courier. [volume] (Pickens Court House, S.C.) 1849-current, 1906-11-21

white people OF the right sort into
the South as servants, tenants and
farmers. He advocated the forma-
tion of land company with capi.
tai of at least 81, 100000 to buy lauds
throughout the cotton States and
sell them on time to desirable immi-
grants. A hopeful sign, Mr.. Will
llams said, is the fact that the negro
birth rate in the country is decreas-
ing very remarkably, while the birth
rate of the white people in the Gulf
States is the largest anywhere in the
world. Mr.. Williams recommended
the establishment of mounted rural
police, after the Cape Colony and
Canadian systems.
MIR. WILLIAMS PROPHECY.
"The political phase of the negro
problem we have pretty well worked
out to an approximately satisfactory
issue," he went on to say, and recon-
mended limitation of the franchise
to the white race. He prophesied
that similar action would be taken a
generation hence in Illinois, Indiana
and Ohio. He favored the rigid en-
forcemeDt of vagrancy laws and said
that if the negro would not work he
must get out of the field. The i'm.
portation of desirable white immi.
grants, not only from foreign coun-
tries, but from the North, was also
suggested in the letter.
The report of the good roads COM
mite. favored the adoption of the
Latimer- Brownlow bill, now pending
in Congress, asking for national aid
in the construction of good roads
and that the States use every effort
to improve their highways.
The government aid feature of the
report precipitatcd debate which
lasted nearly two hours and in which
about IL delegates were heard.
This portion of the report was finally
stricken out.
At the afternoon session N. f..
Thompson, of Chattanooga, advo.
Gated the strictesJ enforcement of
the vagrancy laws with suspension
of sentence in case the negro would
go to the Panama canal. Continu-
ing he said:
THE POLITICIANS HOBBY.
T would have the world know
that this race problem has its most
fertile source of perpetuity in the
efforts of politicians who find it a
most efficient hobby on which to ride
into place and power. When there
are no elections in the South we
hear very little about this race mat
ter.
"Have you ever considered that
there does not exist in the South
any problem that begins to compare
in seriousness to that which springs
from slums in New York, the an.
archists in Chicago, the race problem
in San Francisco and the mob
spirit' found practically in all the
laber centers of the North and East ?
"The enforcement of the vagrancy
laws uniformly all over the South
will tend largely to the elimination
of the idle negro.
"This brings me to suggestion
that | made to President Roosevelt
recently and which appears to have
been generally misunderstood. In
order to aid both races lin the South
to get clear of these idle negros and
aid in the speedy completion of an
enterprise in which the South is
deeply interested, 1 told him that
believed that planscould be adopted
that wouldsssstake thesclasses largely
out of the South and send them to
dig the Panama canal. At his re-
quest l went over.the matter with
Chairman Shonts, of the isthmian
com mission and5 Secretary of War
Taft. The.plan involves the placing
of the limit on all vagrants and then
suspending Judgment if they would