The Leon reporter. (Leon, Iowa) 1887-1930, 1907-07-18

FOf instance we may feel compass
sionate contempt for the shiftlessness,
squalor and barbarism of the savage;
but it is not more profound, or more
sincere than the contempt with which
the savage looks upon civilization and
its achievements. In America most
of us laugh at the folderol and fiummery
attendant upon royalty; in England gen.
orally our republican pretensions are
held in derision, yet the people of the
two nations are largely the same blood.
How perfectly natural then, and how
perfectly right that there should be
wholesome race prejudice between the
white and black races of America.
say perfectly right, because here race
prejudice is race patriotism, nothing
more, nothing less, and perfectly natur-
al because it is inborn, instructive and
as much part of the individual as the
color Of his skin or the texture of his
hair.
The mistake the negro makes is to
complain Of it's existence in the white
breast. The mistake that many white
people make is to misconceive its COM
position, to bewail its prevalence and to
waste time and talents in blind en-
deavor to eradicate it. 1t ought not to
be eradicated. To take from the people
Of the British empire, British pride and
British prejudices would be to emascu-
late the British soldier and to smother
British ambition. To take from the
people of the United States race pride
and race prejudice would soon place
them on social, moral and intellectual
plane with the amalgamated population
of Mexico.
ho oe ,LoIo
prejudice is to keep the integrity of the
races intact. But beware! The tendency
of any abatement of that prejudice,
however slight, is tendency toward an
indiscrin mate mixture Of races, pre-
race would eventually disappear and
the amalgamatede producs 81 which
would be in no sense an improvement
upon the negro. Politicians, philan-
thropists and kind hearted doctors of
divinity should reflect that while it is
now impossible for the most strenuous
race prejudice to make all America
white, it is possible and certain that
sufficient relaxation of that prejudice
would in comparatively short time
make it all black, of different shades
maybe, but all negro. For note this:
In any provocative fusion between
whites and blacks, it is the white race
that is swallowed up and disappears
and the black race that survives, always
in modified mulatto type that lacks
the genuine of it's white as well as the
virtues and usefulness of it's black pro-
genitors.
Let it be remembered that the only
obstacle in the way of such destiny
for the Caucasian is stubborn, virile,
rational, persistent and sleepless race
prejudice; and let that prejudice be
fostered just to the extent necessary to
forestall such destiny.
Race prejudice does not imply hatred
or i'll will. Whenever ! see really
capable negro ldeplore the handicap
that his black skin for the time gives
him; but that does not prompt me to
offer him business partnership that
would inevitably encompass the ruin Of
us both. may feel a thrill of compass
sion at his mistaken sense OF social
gest to me that must throw down
extinction of my race and prove trait
chum or taking him into the bosom of
1 NY A0"AAys 0uCA du OUSOS6AOA OA IL
part might be temporary salve for the
BILE black, but in the end it would cul-
inmate in permanent injury to me, with
out contributing anything toward the
permanent prosperity or happiness OF
the negro.
Those politicians, philanthropists and
doctors OF divinity who talk and write
and pant for social and political recog-
milton for the negro ought to be taught
that such recognition is the very last
thing on earth, at tho present time, that
the negro really needs; that by adyo-
eating it they*are propogating two in
slduous rousing the feverish
envy of the black race and placing the
very existence and perpetuation Of the
white race in imminent and deadly
peril. The fact is, and say it charit-
ably, it is the big-hearted, sympathetic
misguided busybody who is the curse of
the. black man; because all his efforts
toward establishing racial equality do
not serve to elevate the negro; they
only serve to make him more intolerably
rebeilious against the fact that he is a
negro. Instead of being, as he fondly
imagines, disseminator of happiness
and contentment among the blacks, he
Is really an apostle of disappointment,
discord and discomfort, for the reason
that ne persistently encourages in the
black breast hopes Of social and domes-
TIC equality and .intermixture. with the
whlteaEhopes that forever ought to- be
limpossible of fulf fiIment.
t.. let the races ateHe, each to accom-
lpliah it's own disstiny. Give to the
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