The Kansas City sun. (Kansas City, Mo.) 1908-1924, 1920-01-10
THE BLACK FOUNDER OF A
STATE.

In a recent editorial one of our
dailies justly attempts to remove from
Oliver Cromwell the reproach applied
by the mastery French critic, H. A.
Taine, who called the great commoner
and greater General a hypocrit. When
a great man enters the lists to set in
motion a reform and encounters stud
led, trained and untrenched 'sition,
he may use weapons fl -lltic on
the sidelines q sanction be-
cause the Jrtler has to work quick
and fast and the approved weapon
may be wanting. Cromwell did his
work well considering his environment
and time will declare it so. 1t is well
from time to time to uncover forgot
ten heroes and to examine the condi-
tions and the circumstances that pro-
duced them.
| Mr.. Rucker Smith is performing a
task of inestimable value to the Negro
in his recurring articles on Liberia de-
picting the struggles of Christianized
Negroes to establish and maintain in
dependence. All the heroes the Negro
child meets are white. 1t is next to
| impossible for Negro to be hero in
| countries where the Teuton predomin-
ates. Russia a Slav country has her
Pushkin, FraDce her Dumas, Dodd and
others, Spain her Murille. Even Teu-
tonic England has her Coleridge Tay-
lor. But the American Negro child
knows but little of them. The black
heroes of the United States are either
obscured or taken as jokes.
But l wish to call attention to a
black man who like Cromwell, born
on an island and like Cromwell arose
to be ruler of his island In his bril-
liant panegyric, the eloquent Wendell
Phillips exclaimed: Il would call him
Cromwell, but Cromwell was only a
soldier and the state he founded went
down with him into his grave. This
Negro himself slave, the son of
slaves brought fresh from Africa who
never saw a soldier until he was fifty
years old, defeated the Spanish, whip
ped the French, humiliated and drove
the English from his island. Then he
ruled the issland as it had never been
before, nor since. 1t was a happy
country and no slaves tread sullied
its soil. His sstrictness was that of
the spartan. His humanity according
to an enthusiastic admiring French
man ssurpassed that of the lowly Naz-
arene. His justice was impartial. A
recital of his virtues, his sterling
character were forced from the re-
luctant pens of his enemies. He ap-
preciated the superior intelligence,
trainig and learning of the whites and
when he was forming a Constistption
for his country he employed eight
whites and one colored. This virtue
proved the one fault that his black
countrymen could not overlook. Jul
ius Caesar founded the Roman Empire
but he never lived to rule. Toussaint
L'Overture founded the Republic of
Hayti but he never lived to preside
over it,
Napoleon Bona Parte sent his vet
Grams, the heroes of countless battles
in Italy, in Austria and in Egypt to
reduce the island to slavery but let
the historian tell the result Ashley in
his modern European civilization Page
17S records: ITO protect Louisiana
from any possible invasion of the Eng.
lish, Napoleon sent an army to the
new world, which was first TO subdue
Santo Domingo on the island of Hay
ii. Through the influence of an able
Negro patriot, Toussaint Boverture,
aided by the swamps of the island,
NapoIeon's army was destroyed. AS
he had now no troops for the protec-
tion of Louisiana and was ready for
another conflict with his arch-enemy,
Great Britain Napoleon in 1903 sold
Louisiana to the United States.
Therefore the United States is indebt
ed to a Negro for the acquisition OF
Louisiana.
The French resorted to treachery
lead Toussaint L'Overture into a trap
disarmed him, carried him on board a
man-of.war took him to Franch and
cast him into a damp prison in its
mountains and left him to die Thus
ended one of the most remarkable
men the Western Hemisphere has pro
duced. And the state he founded
stood independent for more than q
hundred years until our present ad
ministration landed marines upon the
island and forced the Haytians tC
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