The Paducah evening sun. [volume] (Paducah, Ky.) 1906-1929, 1907-06-17
WATTERSON ON THE RACE
QUESTION

lltuue OF every true man III lnS
south on the race question.
Coming, as it does, from one who
lis a southron of southrons, at a
time when Vardaman is enunciating
his creed of bitter hate, and sensa-
tional and ignorant writer's are stir
ring up a DEVILS broth of distrust
Throughout this section, Colonel Wat
terson's words should be taken to
heart by both the whiate man and
the colored man.
Witness that he begins with the
declaration that the white man and
black man must dwell together in the
south; that neither can get away from
the other.
He says in part:
eve may not escape our manifest
destiny. Neither of us can get rid
of the other. Schemes to that end,
however ingenious, are wholly Wis
ionary. Since this is so, let us take
account of what has been done these
forty years of freedom.
Il stand here tonight to declare
that the world has never witnessed
any such progress from darkness to
light as that which we see in those
districts of the south where the ne
gro has had a decent opportunity for
self-development. Look at Jamaica
nearly a century of emancipation,
the negro at a standstill-look at
South Africa, riches piled on riches,
the negro still a savage and less con-
sidered than the animals-yet it is
England that piques herself on what
she has done for freedom and the
black man.
''Turn southwark; plenty both of
work and wages for all who bring
tranquil minds and willing hands.
Bad people, slothful people, get on
nowhere; but nowhere on the habit
able globe has the liberated slave
Jared so well, nowhere has he so fair
an outlook, as in the southern states
of North America.
"Why? Because we know one an
other and because, no matter what
anybody says to the contrary, there
is a common bond of association be-
tween us. Never can the white man
of the south forget what the black
man did during a war waged for his
freedom; and what he might have
done. Never should the black man
of the south forget that he is the
weaker in the race toward perfection
and for a long time must look to the
white man for help of many kinds.
1t is through these reciprocal obliga-
tions and interests that the two races
will reach an institutional system of
living and doing entirely satisfactory
to both.
Nothing is to be expected from
the rushing dollhouse process, or.
from any artificial arrangement; ev-
erything is to be hoped from nature
left to herself-unvexed by misdirect
ed political considerations, uninfu
enced by outsiders teaching false
simple justice and
presiding over the ordinary
laws of common honesty, and COM
mon sense.
'"The negro in Africa has scarcely
bust the chrysalis of the primitive
state of man. In America he is yet
in a state of racial childhood As he
realizes this, the faster he viii grow,
the quicker he will learn, the sooner
he will reach his racial manhood. In
less than half a century he has done
Before the century we
have just begun is half over, he VIII
have done greater still. He has yet
and upon an extensive scale to learn
habits of method and order; habits
Of tenacity and acquisition; habits
Of sustained industry and sObriety
which no race--white, he'd,
brown or black-or any individual
man-can get on anr prosper.
Gle is "A bad white man who will
not help his neighbor black man
when that neighbor black man shows
the spirit to help himself. He is a
bad black man who cherishes hatred
In his heart against the white man.
He is "a foolish black man who thinks
because the mirage of social equality
which would prove curse rather
than a blessing, is denied him. that
The white man hates him. Social
questions the world over create their
own laws and settle themselves. They
cannot be forced. II is idle any
where for anybody to contest, or quar-
rel with them. No man should want
10 go where he is not wanted; true,
men dismiss the very
thought of It, going their own way
hoeing their own row, and giving
praise to God that their happiness is
within themselves and beyond the
recah of any man, be he white or
black, king or yassal!"