New-York tribune. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1866-1924, 1917-06-16
No Negro Problem"
A TranspIanted Northerner Discusses
Whiskey, Lynching, Social Equality

To the Editor of The Tribune.
Sir: 1t is disgusting to read some Of the
articles as to why the negroes are leaving
the South. | was born in Pennsylvania, but
have lived in the South for thirtyfve years
| have been working about fifty negroes for
twenty five years in my manufacturing bust
ness | claim to know and understand
negroes as we'll as any man in the South.
have studied them in every walk of life and
in every profession.
The letter Peculiar Friendship" printed in
your paper, is written by a man who knows
absolutely nothing about the negro. If he did
know the negro as he really is, then he would
know that every word of his article is de-
fusion.
There is no place on earth where negroes
are treated as well as they are in the South
They are well paid for all they do, and in
many cases overpaid. The colored schools as
a rule are as good as the white schools. They
have every advantage that a white man has
except social equality The author of "Pe-
culiar Friendship" says C. Ryland comes
along with the worn out social equality
talk, which does not enter the negro's
mind This I~want to brand as a misstate-
mert
/ Did not Jack Johnson marry white wom-
an in Brooklyn? After she died did he not
marry another one in Chicago?
II is only the viest wretches who are
lvnched: in many cases the good colored citi-
zens help the white men to lynch these fiends.
! On several occasions negroes themselves have
lynched negroes for such crimes.
If it were not for the lynchngs in the
South there would be no limit to these ter
rible crimes.
A lot of our Southern negroes were shot
and beaten in New York last week because
enc of them wanted to buy drink in one of
the hell-holes you license and call saloon.
You called that mob riot. II it had hap
pened in the South you would have called 1t
a lynching. If you love the negro why don't
YOU sell him drinks in your white saloons
If you had as many negroes in New York
as we have in Virginia you would have ten
lynchings 70 every one we have in Virginia.
Why are negroes leaving Virginia? Be-
cause we voted whskey out of our state. The
good men of Virginia voted the state dry, and
they are men enough to enforce the laws after
they make them. The negroes left this state
I by thousands. after the state went dry, for
Baltimore, Philadelphia and New York, to
work where they could get whiskey | know
what 4 am talking about, for number OF my
employees told me when they lett that they
| had TO go where they could get whiskey.
You had better attend to your own bust
ness, clean up some of your own filth, enforce
your own laws, drive the saloons and the rum
demon out, as we have, and protect your own
white girls from worse fends than we have,
the white slavers."
We respect the negroes in Virginia as they
do not in New York. The negro loves the
Southern people and respects them more than
any other people on the globe. We do not al
low social equality, mixed schools, hotels, res
taurants, cars and depots. We do provide all
these things for them and as good as the
whites have, where they can be to themselves
and feel at home and enjoy themselves in
their own original way. The negroes in Vir-
ginia prefer this; they would rather be to
/ themselves. There is no negro problem. The
negro problem in the South was solved many
wears ago If the people in the North would
attend to their own business and let the
Southern people and the Southern negroes
alone there would be no negro question
raised at all, and the negroes would all be a
happy lot. h. l.. JACOBS.
Suffolk Va, June II, 1917.