The Columbia herald. [volume] (Columbia, Tenn.) 18??-1935, 1909-11-26

desire TO have any one take our places
No matter what we engage in. whethe
farming, mechanical work, cooking
table serving. laundering or what not
i should be done so well that peopl,
who employ US should feel that the,
could OF dispense with our service
We must make ourselves actually
wanted in every community.
In some parts OF the country. as la
borers our people have a weakness
for not keeping their word, for not be
ing depended upon to report for Ia
Dor promptly. To be more exact, EN-
ployers too often feel that the negro
may be at his place of work only few
days out Of the six days in the week.
This reputation hurts our entire race.
From the beginning every boy and
girl should be taught in school or else
where the dignity Of labor; should be
taught that it is no disgrace to do any
kind of work with the hands; should
be taught that working in the field or
in the shop or in the kitchen is Just
as honorable as teaching school Of
preaching the gospel
Alone by the side of proper meth
DDS of work should put the impor-
lance of our learning how to save our
money after we have earned it. 1
advise each one to whom I speak to
start a bank account just as soon as
possible. If this bank account is
started with only few cents or a few
dollars, put that money in the bank
and add to it week by week, month by
month. A bank account will help turn
an inefficient, lazy individual into an
Industrious and prosperous individual. |
The larger bank account a man gets,
the harder he will work in order to |
make it still larger. l have found no
portion of the South where the best |
white people are not ready and
anxious to encourage our people to
save money, to buy property, to settle
Town and lead straightforward, hon
est, useful lives.
I'VE must use our influence to get
id of the idle, vicious element of our
ace. Wherever racial friction occurs,
wherever are outbreaks, mobs and
ynching bees, in most cases this trou-
lie arises by reason of the fact that
here is large element of idle people.
Every man who is in idleness on the
treet corner, who does not earn his I
ally bread, is not only a disgrace to
ur people. but financial burden up F.;
n the community. In a country like t
his there is no need why any man or l
1oman need live in idleness. Y
1--WE must learn to set high moral |
tandard for our people and see that q
is lived up to. Every immoral t
reacher, every immoral leader of any S
haracter should be gotten rid of, and t
'e must let the world understand that
re no longer mix up in a miscellan- {
Dus way the moral and immoral. {
I'VE are going to live together here
| the South as black people and white
eople. We can live separately social
: and are going to do so. No sensi-
ed negro desires to have social inter
ingling with the white people Of the
Outh. What the negro is interested Il
is to be sure that his life, liberty Ii
Id property are protected by the off, s.
,rs of the law u
"If the negro is to be punished when 2
]. fails to obey the law, if he is to be e
lnished by the same court and in the u
me manner that he white man is "
Inished when for example he fails to u
y his taxes, when he commits muir u
r or when he steals, we should be p'
re at the same time that in his III
nth the negro has opportunity to IL
epare himself so that he will know Ell
lat the law is. This can only be III
ne through some process of educa- u
N.
There are so directions in which r
color line can be drawn; filth draws
color line. Disease draws no color
e. If negro, by reason of his ig-
rance of the laws of health, carries
put in his body the germ Of con-
nption, of smallpox, of the disease
own as the hookworm, these germs Sc,
i spread from his body to that of me
white people by whose side he tos
IS. Negro women prepaer and serve an
food of white people. Negro an
men launder the clothes of the on
lite people; negro women nurse the of
lies of the white people. in word,
.roes touch the white man at almost the
ry vital point in his life. II the wa
no is ignorant as to the laws of the
lth she can convey disease to the wa
tie mans family through her I'M to
Ia