The bystander. [volume] (Des Moines, Iowa) 1916-1922, 1921-05-26
EDUCATION OF THE NEGRO.

1
Sioux City, Iowa.--A problem the
Negro race faces very keenly today is
how to make modern-day education
as commercially effectual as the So
called old time way of seeing and doing
things our foreparents had. - This,
when one stops to consider, is vital
question and essential principle that
recipients of modern-day education seem
in general to be quite unscrupulous
about. The question arises now, should
education make us unconscientious to
the originality of our fore PARENTS sue
cess or should it lay absolute claim to
the cultivation Of the fundamental laws
of morality, the unassumed but natural
modesty and sedateness Of their char
acters that necessarily composed a log
ical basis for elevation7 If the latter
thought were accepted we can but adj
nit that education is made commend
ably effectual because of its undying
principles and their practicability.
Studying carefully the moral situa-
vious that education is sorely missing
the mark of elevation and for a rem
edy, the laws of morality, modesty,
grace and Christian practices must be
applied apropos of the excision of the
popular evils of the day. Cultivation of
these high ideals cOerces education to
higher standard Of civilization.
One Of the membranes to progress
is the imaginary qualities Of the Amer
lean people and the Negro tries his
hard to duplicate them and thus no
real claim to originality and high
effectuality Of education can be made.
AS an endorsement to the foregoing
thought let me revive or create this
truth that leading criminals and master
minds law violaters commit some Of the
most appalling and Gastardly acts and
when run down and their early record
consulted they arc persons Of good
schooling and many are college grad
uates. May we quiz the sswhy7' It.
tial lacking not>in the schools alone,
but reaching bach to the home and
parental troining.
This message conveys the warmest
Kind of an admonition to parents. You
owe to your child the greatest respon-
sibility that life can afford and that
is "good training.'' Train the child
in the way you would have it go and
when he is old he will not depart from
it. This Biblical reference in itself is
instructive enough. Wouldn't it be all
right to ask the parents what your chill
dren dos Do you train them or do
they train you9 1t appears the latter
opinion is a serious fact in the do
lnestic life ow today and oh! how dis
graceful, how embarrassing to the dig
nifty of homelife and parental obliga-
tions. With all our foreparents illit-
eracy (so-called) we must admit that
they were at least the heads of their
families and all children must come
under adult supervision in those days.
We must admit all that is good and all
that is bad, all that means elevation
or degradation from human view
point depends upon the parents and the
kind of homelife and community en-
vironment for they create their sons
and daughters, who are in no wise re-
sponsible for their uebut in human
life.
AS a portion Of the human race let
us preserve the principles so dear 20
our foreparents These principles be-
cause Of their cleanliness of purpose
linked so strong together that they be-
came as domestice law and seemed to
find deep seated control because they
were based upon the emphatic recogni-
and the logical practice Of generalized
mind and the keeping of an unassumed,
unimaginary and solid character
brought about our opportunities ror a
better, broader and higher kind OF civ
Iization.
The writer does not mean TO infer
that education is non-essential in the
least. but show long before education
shall find a trua foundation upon which
through the medium of cultivation it
may build more commendable life struc-
tures?0
We oft times hear the expression,
- education makes one independent
and with the matrimonial policy Of
9 marrying for convenience we find
no grounds for repudiation. So inde-
pendent does it make some that hus-
band wont work with wife, neither
vice versa and the law that joins. dis
joins and once again both go about as
raving lions, as it were, seeking whom
they may be devour. Sad but true, and
as uncouth as it may seem to tell it,
this independence, rather than use the
education to assist legal husband and
wife, after the Sc eoaration generally
finds one or the other or maybe both
in the embrace Of common law support
ers, The man seeks to find an illegal
|accomplice and the woman imposes an
illegal disposition of her character.
Education should lift the mind above
such uncomely situations of life and
until it does it is not taking its place
in the civilization SO extolled in the
eyes Of American people.
We are making history for future
generations. Will our record be as
high and pure with all our education as
that Of our so.called liliterate forepar-
entsa