St. Paul recorder., 1945-01-05

VI Jul Sd1 1l11lSO OuC VI C1lO az
Not being producers, we have no
powerful economic stick in our own
communities. With the expendi-
ture of three-fourths of our ma
tional income on what the other fell
low has to sell and-knowing that
we have asked no special considera-
ton or attention-we thus have left
our flanks wide open for attacks,
exploitation, and subjections be-
cause the other fellow has not been
bound by any means to treat us in
accordance with the worth of our
buying power.
Now comes the most cruel and
crowning fact of all that, due to a
national ignorance in reading scales
and performing the most simple of
arithmetic problems, we are cheated
out of a huge chunk of our earnings
each year the sum total of which
could possibly build complete city
some place in these United States
if it were salvaged.
Crooked ManipulatiOns
Where we are tricked is on the
scales in the small corner grocery
stores, the butcher shop, and at the
dry goods counter where we buy
by the yard. The placing of weights,
the hands, or other contrivances,
designed to swing the scales in
favor of the merchant, in many
cases have been discontinued as
these unscrupulous and foxy in
dividuals, who are in our midst on
a raincheck as it were, have come
to realize that they need not go
into this effort when their victims
can't read the scales in the first
place. The purchase by pound of
foodstuffs including meat, vege-
tables, flour, lard, ETC., is so much
Greek to two out of every three
housewives who trade in the neigh
borhood stores. Multiply these wom-
en- by four or five million and you
will get an idea of the picture I
am attempting to paint.
The desire to steal or to take
advantage of someone is usually
prevalent in any breast, be it white
or black, and thus race has little
or nothing to do with it. In our
case, the problem is clearly one
which can be solved by ourselves
if somebody takes the matter up
and tries to do something about
it. The half penny, the penny, the
nickel, and even the quarter that is
pilfered by them through the
manipulation of scales by thieving
merchants in Negro communities
add up to millions of dollars an
nually. This is money that never
comes back because the merchant
or the man who stole it has no in
tention of investing it in the COM
munity in the form of Fairgrounds,
charitable organizations, and civic
improvements that are made to
private sources.
Ignorance of Figures Widespread
Our main fault is an almost uni
versal unfamiliarity with figures.
One great philosopher decided that
the person or race who has at his
fingertips mathematics, geography
and psychology can rule the world.
In this case it might be noted that
the white race is in the ascendency
since it is obvious that they are
masters of mathematics, know
geography thoroughly, and are the
greatest practitioners of psychology
the world has yet known.
In this breakdown of the reasons
why mathematics, geography and
psychology are the three necessary
adjuncts Of education and, incl
dentally, the yardstick by which
leadership is measured, he declared:
Mathematics means the science of
measurement, a language so to
speak" With mathematics, society
will set up houses, will construct
roads, will build gadgets of a
thousand varieties, battleships are
constructed, street cars, automo-