Unfettered Part 23

6. The Negro must join hands with the students of the agricultural problem in general, ready to avail himself of any new developments of value that may arise.

LITTLE AFRICAS.

In practically every Southern city there are certain sections inhabited almost exclusively by the poorer, s.h.i.+ftless, more ignorant cla.s.s of Negroes. The houses in these Negro settlements are small, dilapidated and often situated in marshy regions. The streets or alleys thereof are narrow and crooked and dest.i.tute of drainage. In such sections barrooms thrive, gambling dens flourish, and gathering places are afforded for lewd women and vicious men. By day Negro women in filthy, unbecoming attire, barefooted and bareheaded, congregate in the street and engage in loud, unseemly talk. Idle Negro men are to be seen lounging around these settlements. Garbage is emptied into the streets there to remain. Such settlements as these breed disease and are menaces to the health of the cities. They are the places where crimes and criminals of all kinds are developed. They mar the beauty of the cities and keep down the price of real estate in their neighborhoods. They do much to bring the whole Negro race into disrepute. A revolution must be wrought in these settlements at all hazards. The more refined among the Negroes must be employed to labor among the ma.s.ses and thus ameliorate the ills herein set forth. Tracts of land should be purchased just beyond corporate limits, in easy access to the business centers. Commodious houses should be constructed and sold to the Negroes at moderate prices and on easy terms.

"YE HAVE THE POOR WITH YOU ALWAYS."

The earnings of the Negroes being small, they have but little opportunity to acc.u.mulate a surplus for old age and decrepitude. This evil is accentuated by improvidence. So long as these conditions exist, there must be aged Negroes unable to take care of themselves. For these homes should be established.

Orphan Asylums are sadly needed and must be provided for the tens of thousands of young cast adrift annually through the deaths of impoverished parents. At present youthful Negro offenders are sent to prisons where they are in daily contact with hardened criminals. Reformatories must be established where these beginners in crime may be lured from the paths of vice, instead of being the better educated for evil as at present.

Comparisons unfavorable to the Negro have been so often inst.i.tuted that the pa.s.sion for appearing as well or better than the whites has taken hold of many. Living side by side with a wealthy rival race, the Negro often overstrains himself in an endeavor to keep well in sight of the white man.

As outgrowths of this condition their church houses, very often, their dwellings, the furnis.h.i.+ngs for their homes, their dress are wont to cost more than their earnings would warrant. There are money-seeking men who have discovered the depths of this desire of the Negro to appear well.

They have formed loan companies and accept mortgages on all sorts of possessions of the Negroes and exact rates of interest that are astounding.

Dealers in various lines of ware do not hesitate to sell to the Negroes the most costly articles on the installment plan, taking care to place charges thereon far above their real value. Thus the meagre earnings of the race are so largely absorbed in the manner indicated. It means perpetual poverty to the ma.s.ses unless corrected.

Negroes must be taught to live simply, in keeping with their financial condition. Penny saving banks must everywhere be established, and forces set to work to urge the Negroes to save their money, thus counteracting the influence of the myriad loan offices that tempt them to their financial ruin.

THE WINDS HAVE VEERED.

The age in which we live is fast s.h.i.+fting from a basis in which brute force is a great factor, to one in which skill and intelligence are the prime essentials. The day of the man who has naught to offer save his native strength is fast drawing to a close, and his night is all but upon us.

The general refinement of taste requiring a higher order of intelligence to satisfy it; the inventive genius of man bringing into use complicated machinery--these are influences at work rendering necessary a greater measure of skill and a higher order of intelligence in the modern laborer.

If the Negro would not be lost in the s.h.i.+ft of the age, he must be trained with a view to the requirements of modern civilization. To this end Technological schools must be established throughout the South and other centers of Negro labor.

"THE FIELD IS THE WORLD."

The Negroes have evinced a keen desire for education, until now there are more educated young men and women than there is congenial labor for them.

The schools have sent them forth far faster than conditions have permitted them to be absorbed.

The Negro parent that has to submit to great privations to educate his child, viewing education from the simple standpoint of its ability to afford a livelihood, has now under consideration the advisability of continuing his effort to educate his offspring. The pupil, confronted with so many of his fellows that have gone through school and failed of congenial employment, is inclined to lay down his books and bring his school days to a close. To relieve this very annoying congestion, Negroes must invade all the avenues of trade and found enterprises that will give employment to the trained members of the race. The labor of the race is fully able to sustain all branches of endeavor incident to civilized life.

Simultaneous with this development of the home field, Puerto Rico, Cuba, Hawaii, the Philippines and Africa must be utilized to relieve this congestion.

The well equipped young men and women must be inoculated with more of the pioneer spirit.

WHERE THE GALE BLOWS FIERCEST.

In labor, business, social and religious circles, a citizen is at liberty to avoid contact with an undesirable neighbor if he so elects. As these const.i.tute the bulk of the activities of the American people, the normal relation of the Negroes and whites is a peaceful one. But there are points where contact is unavoidable.

We have a common political structure, common courts and common public utilities. At these points all citizens must meet and such friction as arises comes mainly from these sources. We now outline the program to be carried out by our racial organization at these points, beginning with the ballot box.

The United States is pre-eminently a political country, politics occupying a relatively large s.p.a.ce in the public mind. With the national thought focused on politics, in that arena a man is more sorely tried, his powers put to more severe tests, his strong and his weak points more clearly developed than in any other sphere of activity. He who emerges from the galling fire of American politics unscathed, must be accorded a crown of unfading glory.

To ill.u.s.trate the ordeal through which one must pa.s.s, we cite the following comment:

"In turning over the files of the American press, we read of Was.h.i.+ngton as an embezzler; of Jefferson as an atheist, an anarchist and a libertine; of Adams as a tyrant; and of Jackson as a bully, a border ruffian and an a.s.sa.s.sin. Van Buren was accused of stealing gold spoons from the 'White House.' The stock epithet applied to President Lincoln was the 'Illinois baboon.' President Johnson was habitually described as a 'drunken boor.'

What was said by the newspapers of our later Presidents, from General Grant to Mr. Cleveland, is fresh in the memory of every person of mature age. How utterly insincere is all this hideous abuse may be seen in the fact that it is hushed into silence as soon as the object of it pa.s.ses out of the political arena into private life. No breath of it ever lingers in the allusions that are thereafter made to him by even the bitterest of his late opponents."

The Negro has a.s.suredly received his full measure of blows from the hand of America's master pa.s.sion. When the Negro stepped into the arena to play his part he had to encounter the feeling of caste, which insisted that he was inherently disqualified to enter, the claim being set up that nature had forever decreed against him in this respect. He was met with violence, with fraud, and vituperation, with misrepresentation, with disregard for all the forms of law. The votes which he sought to cast in his own favor were boldly appropriated to the opposition. His cupidity was tempted, his every weakness exploited. His virtues were minimized and his shortcomings exaggerated and unduly paraded. This treatment of the Negro was not necessarily special. It was in keeping with the rules of American politics in which the Darwinian law of the survival of the fittest everywhere obtains.

In view of the galling fire which all partic.i.p.ants in America who enter politics must encounter, our racial organization will be confronted with a serious task in the formulation of the political program for the Negro.

The following suggestions will afford a basis for the projecting of a policy that will enable the race to take care of itself at this, the most crucial, the really pivotal point in its battle for honorable station.

The difficulties in the way must not influence the Negro to regard the political tree as bearing forbidden fruit, as regards himself. Such a course would be an acceptance of the 'cla.s.s' system, which is contrary to the genius of American inst.i.tutions.

There is a development that comes from the contemplation of and the partic.i.p.ation in the affairs of State. Much of the superiority of the American civilization is due to the fact that its citizens as a body are treated as sovereigns, educated with a view to the fact that they are to pa.s.s upon most grave and intricate problems.

Again, as an encouragement to civic virtues the Negro youth, like other youths, must be allowed to feel that the social group which he is expected to serve, is permitted to reward him if his faithfulness to the needs of the group justify such a course. Thus the political door, through which a man enters to receive rewards from the State acting as a body, must never be closed to the Negro. Far be it from the Negroes to ever yield so vital a point. Instead of counselling retirement from politics, our racial organization is to arrange for a wiser partic.i.p.ation therein.

The manner of the emanc.i.p.ation of the Negro was most unfortunate indeed. It should have come from the nation as a whole, or should have been the direct result of the Negro's own efforts, if he was to begin his career as a citizen under ideal circ.u.mstances. As it is, he has been caused to feel that he owes a debt of grat.i.tude to one party, so great as to const.i.tute a perpetual mortgage. The Negro must shake himself loose from all such feelings if he is to be a true citizen. He must put the nation above the party even if that party is accredited with having done him a personal service. Nor must he be influenced by hatred of the party that in the past was a.s.sociated with his humiliation.

When our national government was but beginning its career in the family of nations, George Was.h.i.+ngton warned it against the undue cultivation of love and hatred. Said he in his farewell address:

"Cultivate peace and harmony with all. Nothing is more essential than that permanent, inveterate antipathies against particular nations and pa.s.sionate attachments for others should be excluded, and that in place of them just and amicable feelings toward all should be cultivated. The nation which indulges toward another an habitual hatred or an habitual fondness is in some degree a slave. It is a slave to its animosity or its affection, either of which is sufficient to lead it astray from its duty and its interest."

He could say this and desire its application to both England and France, though the former had fought against and the latter for the establishment of the republic.

Our racial organization must teach the Negro to observe this rule with regard to all existing political parties. Let an unbiased study of present and prospective policies influence party affiliations, rather than love and hatred based upon a past forever dead.

It is not wise for the Negroes to aspire to exercise political influence in proportion to mere numbers with a view to securing _race_ triumphs. Good government, pure and simple, and not race supremacy, must be the end forever sought. The right to rule must be accorded to the intelligence, to the moral and material worth of every community as ascertained with regard to the whole body of the people, whites and Negroes. No man white or black must be supported or opposed on account of his color.

The ranks of the Negroes must cease to be the place of refuge and the means of power for the renegade weaklings from the camps of the whites, whose only impelling motive is greed for the emoluments of office, and whose only recommendation is the color of the skin. The white face in Negro ranks must cease to bring a premium with the Negroes. That face, like all others, must be adjudged purely upon its merits. The Negroes must convince the better element of Southern whites that they will not take up and honor worthless white men rightfully cast off or denied distinction in and by their own race.

Again, the Negroes must not center their political activities on the mere holding of offices. The office is not always the real seat of political power. In American politics it is sometimes the political boss, sometimes the party caucus, sometimes the committee of the law-making body, that is the actual determining factor in matters.

The Negro must make a study of the larger needs of the people and persist in making himself felt at the most effective point. Though not holding office himself he may yet exert a wholesome influence on the man that does, if he but act wisely.

It is said of American politics as a whole, that the best citizens are too largely holding aloof. It is urged that the law making bodies do not any longer represent the highest mental and moral development of the people.

Even if the good and strong of other groups of Americans are adopting such a course, the better element of Negroes cannot afford to follow the example.

The interests of the race in matters political must not be left to those least qualified for the responsibilities. Men, good and true, the ablest of the race, must be induced to make the necessary sacrifices and enter politics with a view to taking care at this point of the honor and welfare of the race. Unworthy and incompetent men in the race must be given a back seat, and their influence neutralized in political affairs, the place where we are peculiarly on trial, and where so much may be won or lost.

Finally, knowing that our hereditary influences and environments in the past were not such as were best adapted to preparing a people temperamentally for self-government; knowing that America is infested with a strong color prejudice; knowing that the Negro's own record as a voter and lawmaker is not altogether in his own favor; knowing the difficulties that naturally arise from the attempts to blend such widely divergent race types into a common political life; knowing how galling is the fire upon any one who has the temerity to enter the arena of American politics; knowing these things, the guiding star of the Negro, the light from which his eye must never wander, is Caution. Others with less to lose may "play the game of politics" lightly, but the Negro must give to the task the highest there is in him.

That the policy herein set forth may be carried out; that the Negro may be prepared to demean himself n.o.bly in the maelstrom of American politics, our racial organization shall create a non-partisan bureau that shall thoroughly educate the Negro as to his own history; as to the history of the Anglo-Saxon race; as to our form of government; as to our political parties; as to all the problems confronting our nation; as to the predominating racial instincts of the Anglo-Saxon race which are often in reality more of a governing force with us than mere written laws.

WITH THE HEN GOES HER BROOD.