The Daily Ardmoreite. [volume] (Ardmore, Okla.) 1893-current, 1919-08-03
The Negro Question
From The BrOwnwOOd
lTexas) Bulletin

Former President Taft thinks con
vestigation of the race troubles over
the country. and especially of the
lynchings which have occurred at va
rious points during the past few
months.
Patriotic citizens throughout the
country feel the shame with lynch
ings have cast upon the nation, but
they have assumed partial response
bility for this shame by their silence
and their acquiescence" said Mr.
Taft. The time has now come when
citizens of the United States can no
longer contemplate without protest
the setting at naught of the funda-
mental principles upon which their
citizenship is based"
Mr.. Taft is absolutely correct in his
statements. Lynchings must be stop
ped or the nation will slowly but sure
ly approach a condition of anarchy.
Mobs and mob violence are not com
patible with good government, for
mobs destroy government and mob
violence defies good government
1t is hardly possible however. that
the race riots occurring on such tre'
mendous scale in Washington and
Chicago have been caused by the lynch
ings which occurred at various places
in the United States recently. The
statistics show that a majority of the
a
the most serious race rioting has occur
red in the North. This leads to the
belief. apparently well founded. that
much of the racial trouble now being
experienced by some of the large cities
is a natural outgrowth of the custom
of the past fifty years of giving negroes
privileges which in effect place them
on an equal basis with whites rms
custom has not been followed in the
South. but has been emphasized IN
the North and especially in some OF
the great northern cities. Chicago Is
but reaping a harvest which has been
cultivated for fifty years.
The race problem can not be solved
bv any theory that has yet been eVolv'
ed. For years various Northern states
men and journalists have been trying
to tell tAe South what to do with the
negro. and now these same men stano
aghast at the bloodshed that Is Delhs
caused by race riots in their own CIT
les. I.ynchings contribute to a small
extent. to trouble between the races
for lynchings cause resentment IN the
hearts of the negroes, and resentiheh'
and revenge are closely akin. But the
principal evil of lynchings is that thes
destroy popular respect for the Ia"
~ the land rather than that they con- |
ribute to trouble between the races.
rhe rioting between the whites ana
blacks i'm Chicago is said to have been
started by a small white boy, whose
of a negro boy soon ieu
n n conflict involving two hundred
thousand men. Had there peen ho
leep- seated i'll feeling between the
aces the incident on the Lake shore
Sunday afternoon would have result.
ID in naught. A condition existed
which had been taking shape FOR nan
. century, and when the match was
applied there burst forth with tie
orce of mighty explosion all the peh''
I'D hatred of the races.
The Bulletin does not belleVe tha.
uch a condition as that which existeo
n Chicago Tuesday is possible in any
Southern city 1t does not peheVe
hat il is threatening any city which
loes not encourage fraternizing on
,asis of equality between the races
rhe fallacy of racial equality has been
10 repeatedly and so emphaticahy
hown that it is truly remarkable that
/ great city such as Chicako mas
waited for a holocaust to point out the
LANCER which has threatened Tor So
ong a time.