The Kansas City sun. (Kansas City, Mo.) 1908-1924, 1916-02-12

the Negro race as a peculiar people,
none is more significant than the fact
that he is insistently adjured to look
to the future. Other men may rejoice
not only in the present, but also in
the past. But if the Negro recalls
the past, this is merely to enable him
to measure his progress away from it.
If he thinks of the present, it is as a
basis for the radiant time that is to
come. No doubt may ever cross his
mind as to whether the present is as
noble as some parts of the past. His
past is happily dead. There is Moth
ing in it he would perpetuate. His
duty and his pleasure are to travel
as fast and as far from it as he may.
His W feeling about it has been en-
forced from the first day of freedom
by those of more fortunate races who
have shown an interest in him.
Why then, asks the New York Eve
ming Post, should the new year be
signalized by the appearance Of a
magazine bearing the title, The Jour
nal of Negro History? How can
there be such a thing as history for a
race which is Just beginning tC live?
For the Journal does not juggle the
words; by history" it means history
and rot current events. The answer
is to be found within its pages. The
opening article, The Negros Of Gin
cinnati Prior to the Civil War;" is a
reminder that slavery did not cover
oil fha ansrnf-r~ TT-In.,-AAI 49, war
sistent opposition. writes Doctor
Woodson, the Negroes of Cincinnati
achieved so much during the years
between 1885 and 1S4C that they de-
served to be ranked among the nest
progressive people of the world"
Still, 1885 and 1910 are not very far
back in the past, as other races meas
ure time. By history most people
mean ancient history. What has the
Negro to look back to Ia that sort of
past that he would not prefer to ig-
more? Well, in ar article on The
Passing Tradition and the African
Civilization" Monroe N. Work IRE
sents litt~le-regardei developments il
the Dark Continent q thousand years
ago which show that the black man
need not despise the rock whence he
vas hewn. Not all black men every
where throughout the ages have been
hewers of wood and drawers of water.
On the contrary, through long periods
of time there were powerful black ma
tons which have left the records of
their achievements and Of which we
are Just now beginning to learn q lit.
tie"
More impressive than these shad.
owy records are literary productions
of which neither the Negro nor his
better-educated white brother is often
a These are the most interest.
ing and impressive things in the ini
tial number Of the Journal, as to the
Negro they should be the most in
spring. Here is one passage:
That the Americans after consider
ing the subject in this light-after
making the most manly of all possible
exertions in defense of liberty-after
publishing to the world the principle
upon which they commended, viz.
That all men are by nature and Of
right ought to be free should still re
tain in subsection a numerous tribe o.
the human race merely for their owl
private use and emolument, is, Of al
things, the strongest Inconsistency
the deepest reflection on our conduct
and the most abandoned apostacy
that ever took place, since the AL
mighty fiat spoke into existence thi'
habitable world"
How many white men have argued