Manchester Democrat. [volume] (Manchester, Iowa) 1875-1930, 1916-10-04
THE BIRTH OF A NATION.
(By Rev. Charles H. Park


1t is impossible to witness the film
drama, "The Birth of Nation" now
being shown at the Liberty Theatre,
and not want to say something about
it. Everyone who has seen it is say
ing something about it. . When one
has been crowded upon, pressed,
down and run over, it is against
Nature not to make some kind of an
cutlery. F94
That is the way one feels when
coming out of the Liberty Theatre.
The thing is vast. 1t is overwhelm-
ing. Nothing like it has ever been
put upon the stage.
The tension of the performance is
but a single feature of it-but it is
that which one feels most poignantly
after three straight hours. 1t begins
in an easy way but commences soon
to find it's muscle and goes on to
the end pounding upon ones senses
with blows that come heavier more
and more rapid. ..-......
1t is not apparent what are the
grounds Of the objections urged
against it, nor what is the animus Of
those who are scheming to have the
exhibition prohibited by court pro-
ceedings.
The National Board of Censorship
has approved it and when assault
was made convened again and reaf-
firmed their approval. The popular
endorsement which the play has
since received by the thousands who
are seeing it daily will require more
than small prejudices or moral &C.
centricities to disturb. In the mean
time efforts to suppress it are thus
far successful in nothing so much
as in giving it wider and more re-
munerative publicity.
The intimate familiarity which
Mr.. Griffith has shown with the
events of the Reconstruction Period
along with the detailed scholarly
study which he has made of the
wider territory Of events which the
play covers renders the production
one of surprising educational value
to those who were either young chill
dren still or even unborn in the
stirring years of go to 20. A boy
can learn more true history and get
more of the atmosphere of the period
by sitting down for three hours be-
fore the film which Mr.. Griffith has
produced with such skill, than by
weeks and months of study in the
class room.
This drama is telling illustration
of the possibilities of motion pictures
as an instrument of instruction in
history.
The criticism that it exhibits the
Negro in an unfortunate light and
that it is calculated to engender
racial animosity is fully met by the
consideration that it represents the
Negro, not as he is now at all, but
as he was in the days when he had
just had the chains broken from him,
and when he was rioting in the de-
liciousness of liberty, so new and
untried, that he had not yet learned
to understand it and was as ignorant
as a baby of the way to use it. 1t
is in this respect exactly true to his
tory and if it reflects upon the Negro
as he was then it is compliment
to the black man of today. An eX-
hibition of lawlessness might not
have been proper thirty or forty
years ago. Such proprieties change
with the passing of time.
The battle scenes which Mr.. Crit
fifth has depicted are of surprising
power and realism. Every lover Of
peace must experience certain
painful qualification that just at this
time the CHASTITY horrors of carnage
can be brought so closely home to