The Bridgeport evening farmer., 1912-08-03

Col. Roosevelt expresses his views on the position of the negro in national politics and the representation of ne- gro delegates in the convention of the progressive party in Chicago In part, Col. Roosevelt writes:
 In pursuance of our conversation, | write you this letter. There is ar,pe- culiar fitness in writing it to the son of the man whose work made all Americans his debtors. His life and his work tended to bring his fellow countrymen, north and south, into ever closer relations of good will and understanding; and surely it should be needless to say that the author of Uncle Remus' and of Free Joe and the Rest of the World felt a deep and most kindly interest in the welfare of the negro. ..
 Many letters dealing with the sub ject of which you spoke to me have been sent to me within the last few days. These letters, from equally posite positions. Those written by men living in the north usually. ask me to insist that we get from the south eoloFed delegates to the national progressive convention Those written by citizens of the south ask that T. de- clare that the new party shall be a white mans party. I am not able to agree to either proposal.
 t4In this country we cannot ,perma- nently succeed except upon the basis of treating each man on his, worth as man. We can fulfill our high mis- sion among the nations of the earth, we can. do lasting good to ourselves and to all mankind, only if we so act that the humblest among us, so long as he behaves in straight and decent fashion, has guaranteed to him under the law his right to life, to liberty, to S--4 l~S -m3~M enjoy the fruits of his own honest labor, and his right to the pursuit of happiness in his own way, so long as he does not trespaSs on the rights or others. For us to oppress any class of our fellow citizens is not only wrong to others but hurtful to ouf- selves; for in the long run such action is no more detrimental to the oppress- ed than to those who think that they temporarily benefit by the oppression. Surely no man can quarrel with those principles.
 Must Stand By Negro.
 'sI believe that the progressive move
 nent should be made, from the De- ginning, one dns the .iateFest of every honest, industrious, 1aw-abiding, col ored man, just as it is in the interest of every honest, industrious, law-abid- ing white man. further believe that the surest way to render the move ment impotent to help either the white man or the colored man, in those re- gions of the South where the col ored man is most numerous, would be to try to repeat the course that has been followed by the Republican party in those districts for so many years, or to endeavor, in the States in question, to build up a progressive party by the same methors which In those States have resulted in making the Republican party worse than inn potent.
 "In the South the Democratic ma chine. has sought to keep itself para mount by encouraging the hatred Of the white man for the black: the Re- publican machine has sought to per- petuate itself by stinfing up the black man against the white; and surely the time has come when we should un- derstand the mischief in both courses, and should abandon both. 1 beIleVe that wherever the racial issue IS per mitted to became dominant in our pol itics it always works harm to both races, but immeasurably most harm to the weaker race. I believe that in this movement only damage will come if we either abandon our ideals, on the one hand, or, on the ocner, fail resolutely to look facts in the face, however unpleasant these 1aces may be.
 sIn many of the States of the Union where there is a considerable ,colored population we are able, in very fact and at the present moment, to bring the best colored men into the move ment on the same terms as the Wnlte man. In Rhode Island and Maryiano, in New York and Indiana, In Ohio ana Illinois. in New Jersey and Pennsyl- vania, to speak only Of states or WdncH I have personal knowledge, this IS now being done, and from some or all or IA1 sent to the national progressive con vention in Chicago.
 Trouble In Appointing Negroes.
 sTJntil I was President the white Republicans of the North, although they had loudly insisted that the col ored man should have office, with even greater firmness insisted that ne should have office only in the south, or, at any rate, not in the Nor!n. when, for instance, I tried to appoint a. colored man to office in Ohio l was wholly unable to get the necessary assent from the white Republican leaders of Ohio, and had to appoint the man in Washington; and In ap- pointing a colored man to a nlsn position in New York I was obliged to do it by main force ana against the wish of the entire party organlza-
 "In the Republican national con- vention the colored members nays been almost exclusively from the south, and the great majority of them have been men of such character that their political activities were merely source of harm, and of very grave harm, to their own race. We, on the contrary, are hoping to see in the na- tionaI progressive convention colored delegates from the very places where we expect to develop our greatest strength, and we hope to see these men of such a character that thelf activities shall be of benefit not only to the people at large but especially to their own race.
 The Republican Fault.
 .'Fbr forty-five years the Republican party has striven to build up In the southern states in question a party based on the theory that the pyramid will, unsupported, stand permanently on it's apex instead of on it's base. For forty-five years the Republican narty has endeavored in these states to build up a party in which the negro should be dominant, a party consist ing almost exclusively of negroes. Those who took the lead in this ex- periment were actuated by high mo- tive. and no one should now blame them because of what, with the knowl- edge they then had and under the then existing circumstances, they strove to do. But in actual practice the result has been 1amentable from every standpoint. It has been pro- ductive of evil to the colored men of tt.a o011Alo. and if has worked the