The Birmingham age-herald., 1911-10-14
WASHINGTON ON
 NEED FOR SAVING
Negro Leader Delivers Ad-
 dress at Orpheum
BOWIE MAKES SPEECH
Washington Urges Hearers to Do All They Can to Get Members of the Negro Race to Save
 Their Money

l Booker T. Washington, founder and principal of Tuskegee institute, reached the city last night a few minutes after o'clock and was driven immediately to the Orpheum theatre, where he was greeted by an immense audience, about 300 of whom were leading white citi- zens
 The negro leader and educator and his travelling secretary, Edwin J. Chesnutt, were met at the Louisville and Nashville railroad depot by Dr. w. R. Pettiford, Dr. L. G. Mason. J. O. Diffay, pr. Lau- derdale and Windham.
 l When Dr. Washington appeared upon the stage he received an ovation by the largest audience he ever faced in .Bir- mingham.
 l The Rev. C. l.. Fisher, D. D., former pastor of the" Sixteenth Street Baptist church. was master of ceremonies.
 The audience seemed delighted with several plantation melodies sung by a trained chorus of 100 voices.
 pr. W. IT. Nelson led in prayer. After 1 statement by the Rev. J. A. Whitted, pastor of the Sixteenth Street Baptist church. and a collection taken for the church, Dr. Fisher introduced in felici- tous words former Congressman s. J. Bowie, who in turn delivered an address which was frequently applauded. | Mir Bowie began by saying
 1 Tt is with pleasure that l have &C., cepted the opportunity of presenting Dr. l Washington to this audience. He needs no introduction. He is known not only throughout the length and breadth of 1 this country, but throughout the world. That he stands for sane and rational | programme for the improvement and up- 1 lift of his own people 1t seems to me 1 cannot be reasonably doubted. However much certain theorists may wish 1t were otherwise and however much it may have avoided complications and prob l lems that would not now confront us 1T 1 it had been otherwise, the fact remains l that eight-tenths of the negroes Of the l United States live in the southern states and here they must continue 10 live. Some of them will, doubtless, as others have l in the past move to other states, and some who have moved to other states will doubtless return to these states. Such | movements of population are common | among the whites as well as among the l blacks, but the fact still remains that the great majority of the blacks in thls country not only now but for an indefi- nite time in the future must remain cit 1 izens of the south The truth Is that | when efforts have been made in times past by emigration agents to move any considerable number of negro laborers from any neighborhood or county in the southern states to some other place, sucn movements have almost invariably been
 met with pronounced and efnphatic nos | tiity of their white neghbors and em-
 blowers. and so clear is this hostility that
 laws upon the subject having the deii-
 mite object and purpose of checking the exodus of laborers by means of this sort have been enacted
 After citing the law MT. Bowie con- tinued:
 But there is a law of higher nature and of greater consequence than the CIVIL law which you see manifested in the courts and in the police officials refer
 to the moral law. That law enjoins not
 only that you shall refrain from the com
 mission of crime, but 1t enjoins certain
 positive duties. In the sweat of your
 own face shall you eat bread, is di-
 vine command. Industry and sobriety
 are required by laws as positive as that
 which says. Thou shalt not kill And
 this brings me to the point that is upper
 most in my mind.
 "A few months ago Col. J. ". Church. who is now connected with Hampton in-
 stitute, came into my office with Dr.
 Phillips and invited me to attend the
 commencement exercises of that nstitu- ton. In the course of his conversation
 he referred to what Hampton was do-
 ing in the way of industrial education.
 and what it had done, and what it pro- | posed to do in the future. He referred to the plan that had been adopted to have
 hundreds of small Hamptons educating the
 hand of the colored man to work so as 70 get the highest results of his labor al the same time that they educated the
 brain. These smaller institutions were to
 be spread not only all over Virginia, but , throughout the south. have right to refer to Hampton institute, because the : speaker of the evening is its most dis tinguished product. I listened with greA:
 interest as he unfolded the splendid plans
 which he had Tn his mind for the further
 growth and enlargement of that instltu- , ton, and when l got an opportunity said: But why should this work be , i, started, why should so much money be : expended for the negroes alone? Is no,
 industrial education, the training of the
 hand, the training of the eye, along with
 the training of the brain, just as import
 ant for the white race as for the black?
 If We need industrial education to make
 Dettef farmers, To make better carDen-
 ters, to make better brickmasons, to make better citizens for one race, why do we
 not need it for both? He said in re-
 ply: I thoroughly agree with you, indus
 trial education must be for both races , Just now, he said, our particular vorl,
 Is for the negroes and the Indians alone the other will have to be evolved in the future I do not know of any req. : son why emphasis should be placed upon r the observance of the primary virtues of
 industrial economy or thrift by one race
 above another, unless 1t Is that one race needs teaching of that sort more than an. other. If so. then the greater emphasis . should be placed where the greater ne. s cessity lies. But. at all events, if I rn. , derstand the lesson which the eminnn, I speaker of the evening has been teachin na 1 from one end of this country to the other 1t is certainly a lesson which can and V should command our unfailing and en. . thusiastic support"
 At 13 minutes to 10 o'clock Dr
 Washington began his address wbich
 lasted one hour and ten minutes. II
 was enthusiastically received. the ap.
 plause being often led by the whit, 7 listeners
 It was considered to be one of in.
 most remarkable addresses ever de. = livered to the colored citizens of BIr. f mingham--remarkable for it's abso.