The Colorado statesman., 1917-03-10

One spot in Africa that the greed or
Europe has not touched Is Liberia.
Cheated and bulldozed to within a
fraction of an inch of its very life, this
little republic may yet give favor
able answer to the question: Can the
Negro stand alone?
Liberia owes it's independence to
the fact that it Is the only protege
of the United States in Africa, says
the Kansas City Times. Just as
Americans seldom think of their coun-
try as an Asiatic power by reason of
its hold on the Philippines, or as
Caribbean power by its control OF
Panama, Nicaragua, Haiti, Santo Do
/, mingo, the Danish West Indies, Porto
Rico, and various naval bases, so are
they not cognizant that the United
States is sharing responsibility in At
rlca with the European nations.
Freed American slaves constituted
Liberia an Independent republic in
1S47. The first settlement on the ever
lasting green shores of West Africa
had been made % years before, in the
administration of President Monroe,
after whom the capital, Monrovia, is
named. BY the treaty of 1862 the
United States undertook to preserve
the constitutional form of government
and its independent existence.
Control Only Coast.
According to Herbert Adams Glib
bons, in his recent book, "The New
Map of Africa" (the Century COM
pany), there are about twelve thou
sand Negroes of American descent in
Liberia, and about fifty thousand of
the population of almost two million
can be said to be civilized. The wild
tribes who sold their lands to the
Y American Colonization society retired
into the hinterland, leaving strip of
25 miles wide along the coast to the
settlers, who numbered besides the
original freed slaves, other Africans
rescued from slave traders by United
States warships and freedmen emf
grating after the Civil war. The ma
ton is about half the size of Kansas.
Affection for everything that bears
Z the American name characterizes the
colonists. The language is English,
and in spirit and customs they have
been guided by American tradition.
The flag is the Stars and Stripes, modi-
fed, the homes of the wealthier citi-
zenss are modelled after the Southern
mansions, where their ancestors
served.
The people of Monrovia and of Her
per, the capital of the Maryland set
tlement, act and dress very like the
better class of Negroes in Louisville
or Atlanta. While they are neatly but
fashily dressed, their neighbors, the
aborigines, merely put on an extra
cloth when they come to town. There
is less boisterousness, profanity ano
indecency than in America, and one
traveller said that he saw no one
drunk in month. The Sundays are
of the New England variety, and there
are no saloons or cabarets.
Teach Trades to Children.
"Everything is reminiscent of
home" one returned traveller writes
"The flags on the houses, the name:
of the streets. Every college is found
ed by American benevolence. / wan
dered through the cemetery, and on
every tombstone 1 read Born in Vir
gnia,' "A Native of South Carolina,
and so on.
"After painstaking effort to get al
the bottom of things l am convinced
that the government is to be com
mended for having kept its head above
water in spite of poverty, and that the
future is secure if the Liberians could
only have the assurance that the in