St. Paul recorder. [volume] (St. Paul, Minn.) 1934-2000, 1942-03-27
Patterson |. L. d.
Leaders Urges All
Out War Effort

Speaking at an educational meet,
ing of Miscellaneous Workers, Lo,
cal 665, at 902 Hennepin Ave, Sun
day night, Mr.. William L. Patter,
son, Negro journalist and lecturer
from Chicago, appealed for unity
of Negro and white for full sup.
port of Americas war effort. Sale
Mr.. Patterson: "Negro America
places no conditions upon its serv-
ices to it's country. If fascism
wins, Negro America will lose
the gains of centuries. Its schools,
its businesses, it's professionals
will go down as the properties
of the Jewish people went down
in Hitler Germany. We make
no demands for full and complete
equality of opportunity now
Nevertheless we do not surrender
that demand. We suspend it. II
we surrendered this demand then
we would indeed be less than hui
man. If we surrendered this de-
mand we would not be defenders OF
democracy.
But you who are white must
take up this demand. In the inter-
est of our own future, your status
as free labor, you must demand
that democracy be extended to en-
brace all Americans regardless of
race, creed or color. If you concede
to the American friends of fascism
the right to destroy US, they will
inevitably destroy you later"
Mr.. Patterson cited the example
of the Soviet Union as a model of
unity of many nations upon the
principles of full equality and nom
discrimination. He quoted Stains
Order of the Day of February 23rd
on the anniversary of the Red
Army: 'The strength of the Red
Army lies in the fact that it can
not and does not entertain racial
hatred for other people, including
the German people, that it has been
brought up in the spirit of the
equality of all peoples and races, in
the spirit of respect for the rights
of other peoples"
Mr.. Patterson, as National Vice
president of the International La
Dor Defense, went to Sikeston, Mis-
souri,, last February to study the
facts in the lynching of Cleo
Wright, a Negro of that city. His
address dealt with those facts. He
said: "This lynching was not a
blow against single individual. 1t
was not alone against race. 1t was
a blow against democracy, against
the war program of our govern
ment. 1t was a blow against vic
tory. Whether fascist agents were
or were not active among the
lynchers makes little difference.
The murderous crew who lynched
Cleo Wright struck a blow against
America"
With reference to the race riots
at the Sojourner Truth Housing
project in Detroit which Mr.. Pat
terson was interested in through
the International Labor Defense, he
said: "Mr. John Blandsford of the
Federal Housing Agency said that
his project was war measure, and
that the people for whom it was
built should occupy it. But nothing
has been done to put them into
their homes. These war workers
are living here and there with
friends. They see that our war
production suffers as a result of
the discrimination against them.
They are deeply bordering the
ways of democracy. They are ques-
tioning our determination to win
the war"
Mr.. Patterson answered many
questions concerning the attitude
of Hitler Germany toward the col
ored peoples of the earth. In 1881,
Mr.. Patterson lectured in the Uni
versity of Berlin. In 1884, one year
after Hitler's rise to power, Mr.,
Patterson returned to Germany to
find all the colored persons of his
acquaintance there had beer
thrown into concentration camps.