The Kansas City sun. (Kansas City, Mo.) 1908-1924, 1914-09-12
a NEW RooK

The old saying, ''of the making of
books there is no end" is probably
more nearly true today than ever be-
fore. So the publication of a new
book is not usually the signal for gem
eral public excitement. But when the
new book is written with particular
reference to a certain class or group
of people, the members of that group
are justified in noting carefully its
contents. Negroes then will be inter.
ested in reading Democracy and Race
Friction by John Moffatt Mecklin,
Phi. D. professor of philosophy in the
University of Pittsburg. Prof. Neck
Inns book is saturated with a militant
and all-absorbing Anglo-Saxonism;
and is the frankest statement yet put
forth by those who believe in the di-
vinity and %infallibility of the white
man, and that the Negro in America
has no rights whatever, 1t is above
the average of its type in force and
clarity of statement, and by being
couched in rather scientific phrase
ology, will be likely to catch the fan
~ II COhlAAdAlu lnG DGllCl VI lll6 ull-
thinking. The style of composition
is on its face almost purely exposl-
tional, but the exposition is deity
carried out in such a manner as TO
constitute a strong, subtle and menac-
ing argument.
Apart from the many little argu-
mentative side implications in which
the author delights to indulge, such
for instance as that the Anglo-SaXon
race is the chief creator, preserver
and guardian of civilization, the main
purpose of the book is to convince the
American people of two things: (1)
that the Negro being of a different
ethnic type from the white nan and
possessing different racial character
istics, can never appropriate unto him
self nor realize within his own life
those culture ideals of civilization
which constitute the white mans pc
culiar social heritage; and therefore,
(2) the American people should ex-
clude the Negro from any participa-
ton in our social democracy, and
should deny him every form of equal.
ity, including equality before the law.
Now if it were possible to sustain
the argument assumed in the first
proposition, namely, that the Negro
in America cannot take in and take on
the best in American civilization, the
deduction that therefore he has no
natural rights and should be denied
equality before the law, exemplifies a
species of logic of which John Stuart
Mill would hardly be proud. But the
attempt to show that one ethnic
group cannot appropriate and absorb
the civilization achieved by another
ethnic group-that assumption is sc
contrary to the history of civilization
and so totally at variance with con
temporaries human events that IL
really amounts to a crude and gross
absurdity. No race, as Prof. Kelly
Miller has already pointed out. has a
sole proprietorship in civilization; and
if the Anglo-Saxon race had been IN
der the necessity of inventing its own
alphabet and symbols to represent
numbers or evolving it's own religion
u II lSlllb6 II ClupOl dllh5 WltllOu'
borrowing from the Latin it's W Ian
guage, or creating without the benefit
of previous models it's own system Of
jurisprudence-in that case those PEG
pie today would be in the same state
they were when the Caesars used tc
sell them in the slave markets Of
Rome. In trying to show that the
Negro cannot acquire what he calls
the white mans social heritage, Prof
Mecklin rehashes a lot of matter that
has been exploded time and time
again, besides mis-stating, misinter
preting and suppressing facts.
There are two broad and fundamen
tai considerations that Prof. Mecklir
ignores. One is that the Negro is
after all, a human being; and the Other
is that ethics cannot be divorced from
the problem. But Prof. Mecklin has
n % patience with any effort to injec1
any considerations of equity or hu
manitarianism into the matter. HI
~denounces the attitude of those WHIT
believe that the Negro has natura
and inalienable rights in the case al
an 'uncritical humanitarianism," ant
repudiates Prof. Royce of Harvard al
being an 'uncritical humanitarian.
Dixon, V~ardaman, Thomas Nelson
Page, Ben Tillman-they are philoso
piers. But Josiah Royce, professor o
philosophy Of Harvard-he is uncrit
ical. But Prof. Mecklin's plea will b.
in vain. The greatest Americans will
never repudiate equity, and they will
never consent to pervert those funda
mental doctrines of natural rights, ant
equality before the law, which are tn,
particular safeguards of our ~civiliza
ton. Prof. Mecklin's book does no
add anything of value to the literatur,
of the problem he has under discus
sione w. E. GRIFFIN.