Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1909-02-13
EX-SLAVE LAUDS LEE
Courage of High Type, Says
Booker Washington.
LINCOLN DAY BANQUET
How He First Heard of Great
Emancipator.
WHITES ALSO FREED BY HIM
Leader Of African Race, Literally
Cheered, Tells of the Prog
ress of Negro.
WHITES ALSO FREED BY HIM

NEW YORK. February 13.-Booker T.
Washington was the principal speaker at
the Lincoln dinner Of the Republican Club
in the Waldorf-Astoria last night
Himself an ex-slave who had risen I'M
der the conditions made possible by LIN
coin to the leadership Of the black race,
he was qualified to speak for these made
free. He was applauded freely through
out his speech.
First knowledge of Lincoln.
MY first knowledge of Abraham Lin
coin came in this way" he said. Il was
awakened early one morning before the
dawn of day as 1 lay wrapped in a bundle
of rags on the dirt floor of our slave
cabin by the prayers of my mother. Just
before leaving for her days work. as she
was kneelinS over my body earnestly
praying that Abraham Lincoln might
succeed and that one day she and her
boy might be free
You give me the opportunity here this
evening to celebrate with you and the ma
ton the answer to that prayer.
BY the side of Armstrong and Garri-
son. Lincoln lives today. He lives in the
:'2,OO young men and women of the negro
race learning trades and useful Occupa-
tons; in the 2OoU0 farms acquired by
those he freed; in the more than 100000
homes built; in the fcrty-siX banks eStab-
S5oO.CO0pDo worth of taxable property
i'm hand: in the 2S.OO0 public schools
existing with 10000 teachers: i'll the 10
industrial schools and colleges: in the %, :
900 ministers and 46 900 churches.
But above all this, he lives in the
steady and unaltrable determination Of
ten millions of black citizens to continue
to climb year by year the ladder of the
highest usefulness and to perfect them
selves in strong, robust character.
More Than Negroes Free.
LAS an individual. grateful as l am to
Lincoln for freedom of body. my gratitude
is still greater for freedom of soul. The
signing of the emancipation proclamatio ton
was great event. and yet 1t was but the
symbol of another, still greater and more
momentous.
I'VE who celebrate this anniversary
should not forget that the same pen that
gave freedom to four millions of Afri-
can slaves, at the same time struck the
shackles from the souls of twenty-seven
millions of Americans Of another color.
In any country, regardless of what its
laws say, wherever people act upon the
idea that the disadvantage Of one man
is the good of another, there slavery eX-
lists. Wherever in any country the whole
people feel that the happiness of all is
dependent upon the happiness of the
The world is fast learning that of all
forms of slavery there is none that is
so hurtful and degrading AS that form of
slavery which tempts one human being
to hate another by reason of his race
or color. one man cannot hold anot her
man down in the ditch without remaining
down in the ditch with him. One who
goes through life with his eyes closed
against all that is good in another race is
weakened and circumscribed, as one who
fi,-l,t in, " Or ha-
hind him
Like Lincoln, the negro race should
seek to be simple. without bigotry and
without ostentation. There is great
power in simplicity. We, as race
should. like Lincoln, have moral
courage to be what we are and not pre-
tend to be what we are not. We should
keep in mind that no one can degrade
us except ourselves; that If We are
worthy no influence can defeat us.
Like other races, the negro will oft n
meet obstacles. often be sorely tried and
tempted. but we must keep in mind tina
freedom, in the broadcast and highest
sense. has never been a bequest; it has
been a conquest
Praises Southern Generals.
I'm paying my tribute to the great
emancipator OF my race. l desire to say
a word here and now in behalf of an
element of brave and true white men
in the south, who. though they saw in
Lncoln's policy the ruin of all they be-
lieved in and hoped for. have loyalty ac-
cepted the results of the civil war and
are today working with a courage few
people in the north can understand To up
lift the negro in the south and complete
the emancipation that Lincoln began.
Il am tempted TO say that it certain
1y required high a degree of courage
for men of the type of Robert f. Lee
and John Is. Gordon TO accept the re-