The Ocala banner. (Ocala, Marion County, Fla.) 1883-194?, 1917-07-27
NEGROES NORTH AND SOUTH
Ocala, Fla, July g, 1917.

| A friend living IN your city has
mailed me a copy of the Evening
Times under date July Is. containing
marked article, entitled, Negroes
Coming North.
| confess 10 you that i was not irr'.
tated, and perused the article more
] in sorrow than in anger, for / can
feel but pity for those living either
north or south who all their lives are
condemned to go through the world
nursing a blind, morbid, deep-seated,
irrepressible prejudice.
! Just how one can manage to enter
tain a prejudice against whole peo-
plea people Of his own race and
lineage, a people fighting for and I'M
der the same flag and worshipping the
same Gods beyond my power to
anaIyze or comprehend.
It seems a mockery that one could
seriously entertain the belief that the
southern people, or any considerable
number of them, should make 1t either
business or a pastime to shoot,
hang or burn innocent negroes"
If this were true this race could
not have increased in population from
four millions to four times four mil
lions within the period of fifty years.
And how is it possible for you to
believe that they are held in condi-
ton little less than slavery when in
the same article you quote from the
Age that within period of fifty years
the negroes in the south have accumu-
lated farm lands to the amount of two
billions OF dollars; farm implements
lions, and have deposited in southern
banks two billions of dollars. for it is
we'll known fact that the negro has
yet to learn the lesson Of frugality?
If it be true that they are still held
in a condition little less intolerable
than slavery, think you, that these &C.
cumulations were possible?
You do a whole people an injustice.
We of the south are not preternat-
urally bad, intolerant, overbearing,
oppressive. and certainly not vicious
or murderous people.
If you were to come amongst us and
become fairly we'll acquainted with
US, you would find US very good peo-
pie; if not loving and lovable, we
would at least average up with the
population of other sections.
Pardon me for saying it, but we
boastingly profess to spring from the
loins OF the very best stock that has
ever landed on these shores. and the
strain OF our blood is the purest that
flows in American veins.
One ought to know that a section of
country that can give birth to such
race OF men as Washington Jefferson,
Madison, Monroe, Patrick Henry, John
Randolph, Henry Clay, John Rutledge,
McDuffie, Andrew Jackson, Winfield
Scott, Zahcry Taylor, Andrew John
son. Abraham Lincoln, woodrow Will
son, and thousand men like them,
cannot possibly be wholly bad.
And the sun shines on no nobler
women than the women of the south.
The mothers OF these men prove this
assertion.
= 1t must be confessed that we have
full share of race pride and a love
for the pride of ancestry. We feel
that we owe something to posterity.
So believing we feel 1t sacred
duty to stand unequivocally for race
purity, race integrity.
Is that a fiendish crime? Is it a
crime at all? Is it one for which any
race should be ashamed?
We have only to cast our eyes
across the border into Mexico, towards
Central America, Cuba, Haiti or San
Domingo to measure the results OF
race impurity, so we are trying as
best we can to avoid like condition
We do not want the south-fair as
any spot on Gods domain-to become
mongrelized. Why blame US?
Should we be mathematical for
that? Is it immoral? Is it un-Chris.
tian? Is it in contravention of Gods
ordinances or the very work Of his
hands?
If it is any or all OF these things
then the whole people of the sonth
need to be born again.
All of my life l have lived in the
south; have travelled through many
states. and l make the statement with
fingers uncrossed that l have vet to
see sign that reads: Negroes and
Dogs Not Admitted Here" Nor have
ever seen person who would say
on his honor that he had ever seen
such sign in any part of the south.
| can. therefore regard l. hut fah