The Colorado statesman. [volume], September 30, 1905, Image 1

About The Colorado statesman. [volume] (Denver, Colo.) 1895-1961

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MONEY SAVED BY PATRONIZING MERCHANTS WHO ADVERTISE IN THIS PAPER.
The
Colorado Statesman
0 VOL. XII.
SENSELESS PREJUDICE
By Many of the American White People is Becoming: More
Noticeable Each Day Toward the Unfair Treatment
of the Negroes.
Senseless prejudice is cropping
out everywhere against the Negro.
It is enough to make one ask if
the American people are fools,
from the way some of them act.
Take up a paper almost any day
and you will find that America has
gone mail because of a massacre of
the Jews by Russians, or Armen
ians by Turks. Ou the same page
it will also be seen that this or
that community has gone into
conniptions because a Negro lias
been treated with civility by some
white man, who knows not a man
by the color of his skin, but by
I his worth. If this civility is ac-
J corded him in the North, whether
in hotel or private family, the
South thinks it is its imperative
duty to lecture both the Nortli and
the Negro on social equality. If,
ou the other hand, the Negro is
discriminated against in the
North, as was the case a few days
ago in Springfield, Mass., where
hotel keepers, with two exceptions,
refused to accomodate the Negro
delegates to the State Grand
Lodge of Odd Fellows; the South
ern white press makes it its duty
to lecture the North for not treat
ing the Negro better, and at once
becomes solicitous, sarcastically,
, about-the Northern jiress lectnr
" ing '‘the perpetrators of tin's out
rage upon the man and brother.
And this thing is cropping out
more and more every day. and in
more ways than one. Why. here,
the other day some man made in
quiry through a Richmond paper
as to whether the Richmond laun
dries washed the soiled linen of
their white and colored patrons in
the same wash. And the editor of
that paper said that he would like
for the laundry that did to say so.
Reading between the lines of the
reply could be clearly seen the
threats of a boycott. Here, the
other day, in the National Farmers
convention, in a pluin, practical
discussion upon immigration, a
Southern delegate, and a Virginian
injected the “social equality" and
“race” question into the discussion
as a pass at arms at the Northern
and Western delegates. In God s
, name, we ask is the Negro a man —
is he human? Is he a lineal de
scendant of the first man —Adam,
whom God created in his own im
age? Does Holy Writ refer to a
L particular race of men when it
i says that God “hath made of one
blood all nations?" Does the sa
cred Word refer to a particular
race when the Psalmist says:
“Thou hast made him a little low
er than the angels, and hast
crowned him with glory and hon
or?” Which is wrong, the God in
whom we believe and have our be
ing or the man, “Race prejudice”
; as it exists in America?
■ The Negro asks not “social
equality with the whites as it per
tains to those niceties which call
for an exchange of visits, etc; the
only equality he asks is that he be
allowed those civic and political
equalities that of right belong to
him, ho being a part and parcel of
our civic fabric. The Negro is
perfectly content with himself so
cially; separation on electric cars,
steam cars, steam boats, theatres,
hotels or anywhere else is agree
able to him, decidedly so, if the
accomodation is equal.
We know-that Negro washerwo
men wash their clothes along with
the clothes of their white patrons,
just the same as Negro cooks
knead their bread and roast their
meat along with their white em
ployers, or as the black “mammy”
suckles her baby from the same
breast as that from which she
suckles the white baby, who would
otherwise die for lack of proper
nourishment; there is no social
equality in that, nor will there be!
if he is given decent accommoda-l
tion on public carriers and the
same in public ordinaries. The
whole thing in a nutshell is a
mean, foolish prejudice of which
intelligence should be ashamed.
“Only that, and nothing .more.”- —
Reformer.
Wills Honey and Property to Negro.
Macon, Ga., Sept, 13. —Unless
the higher courts reverse Ordinary
Wiley’s decision Martha Johnson,
a Negro woman, will not partici
pate in the division of the esfute
of John Boardman.
In a decision handed down this
morning Ordinary Wiley allowed
the will to be probated us filed
with the exception of the eighth
provision, which makes a bequest
to the Negro woman, the section
of the will over which the fight
was waged.
It will be remembered that the
will of Boardman, who died some
weeks ago, was filed in the office of
Ordinaty Wiley for probate, and
almost immediately Mrs. Broad
man, acting as guardian for her
8-year-old daughter, Juliette, took
steps to prevent the will being pro
bated
Broadinan had a one-fourth in
terest in the estate of his father,
which has been estimated at sls,
000, and of this he left one-half to
his daughter. He made several
bequests and $2,000 to Alartha
DENVER, COLORADO, SATURDAY, SEPTEMBER 30, 11)05.
Johnson, the Negro woman, and
provided further that she was to
get all that was lelf after the other
provisions of the will had been car
ried out.
In his decision Ordinary Wiley
declares the document to be an in
officious will and contrary to na
tural atfections and moral duties.
He further gives the opinion
that the woman used undue inllu
ence on Broadinan and that such
a will was against public policy.
Judge W. D. Nottingham, coun
sel for the woman, will appeal the
case to the Superior Court, and
Major Marion W. Harris, attorney
for Mrs. Broadman. will make an
other strenuous fight opposing
him.
RACE NEWS
Gathered from Various Sources.
There are fourteen drug stores
conducted by colored men in Wash
ington. Seventy colored physi
cians minister unto the sick of
bailiwick.
Jacksonville, Fla., Sept. 22.
Early this morning, the charred
remains of Lulu Wise, a Negro
woman, and her four children were
fopud in the smoked ruins of her
home near this place. They had
been murdeied and the house set
on fire.
Nashville. Tenn , Sept. 12.—At
to-day's session of the great Im
proved Order of Red Alen the
West Virginia delegation offered a
resolution protesting against the
organization of Negro tribes of
Red Men and requesting that the
ritual of the order by copyrighted.
Alias Edna Gray, of St. Paul, a
S9OO clerk and stenographer in
the Patent Office at Washington,
was recently promoted as a recog
nition of her faithful and efficient
service. There are two other Afro
American copyist in this depart
ment, eight messengers and twenty
laborers.
There are more Negroes in Lex
ington and Fayette county, Ken
tucky, than there are of any other
single nationality, twice as many
as there are Irishman and twelve
times as many as there are Jews,
Germans and dagoes combined,
constituting two-fifths of the total
population—yet they have no re
spectable representation in the lo
cal government, whereas the Lex
ington Herald is justly indignant.
Muskegee, I T., Sept. 22.—The
Western Negro Press association
elected to-day: President, W. H.
Duncan, of Colorado Springs; vice
president, C. N. Sellers of Buxton,
la.; correspondent secretary, W.
11. Twine. Muskegee. I. T.; record
ing secretary, F. J. Mordou of
Muskegee. I. T.; treasurer. Miss S.
Tidley of Guthrie, Okla. The as
sociation will meet next year in
Colorado Springs.
Memphis, Term.. Sept. 17.
Fatty Grimes, a Negro with a
bloody St. Louis record, was kill
ed to-day in a duel with George
Fitzhugh, another Negro. Jeal
ly was the cause of the trouble,
which occured in Hammit Ash
ford’s saloon, where Fitzhugh was
employed as a bartender. The
police found S7OO worth of dia
monds on the dead man, which he
wore as studs and rings. His
body will be shipped to his mother
in St. Louis.
WflQnstown. \V. Ya„ Sept. 24
Breaking into the city jail here to
day an armed masked mob of
“white ribboners” took out Moses
Lovern, a Negro serving 00 days
for assaulting James Butcher.
Taking Lovern and Thomas Black
burn. the only other prisoner, ac
cross the river in a boat, upon
landing, the mob beat whipped
and stoned Lovern until he pre
sumably was dead. Both prison
ers were returned to jail. Lovern
will die. Blackburn gave the
names of eight men in the mob
and Prosecuting Attorney Shep
ard has issued warrants for them.
“The Negro needs a little more
time for improvement.” says the
Houston Post, “Undvr the many
difficulties clouding his pathway,
he is striving upward and onward.
Certainly he is seen in the wrong
light. Many of the short comings
of the Negro are due to the wide
spread influence which has gained
popularity over the South that he
is clamoring for social equality.
The old Negro is all right, they
say, but the new Negro is the bone
of contention. He wears a stand
ing collar and refuses to lift his
hut and does not as his father did,
answer to the name “uncle.” In
order to please the white man, it
seems that he must possess just
so much knowledge and that of a
certain kind—must strive to be a
good servant and never speak
above a whisper on certain topics.
If one Negro commits rape itsis
presumed that all other Negroes
will do likewise and if one steals
all others are thieves. This is
wrong. Those who try to be gcod
and help to uphold the law do not
feel that they have the respect of
the community when they are con
sidered in the same class as the
drunkard, the gambler the harlot
and the rupist. Give him a chance
let him who will, come. Right
now the Negro does not Know what
to do. The Negro needs symputhy
and the industrial caressess of his
white brother that the solution of
this question may be properly
deult with. There are some bad
Negroes, we admit, but they are
hopelessly in the manority and
have no respect whatever from the
intelligent and thrifty ones of the
race.
INDUSTRIAL TRAINING
For the Negro is a Very Necessary Vocation to Better His
Biased Chances in the Commercial
or Business World.
“Many have thought," says the
Seattle Searchlight, “that indus
trial training was meant to make
the Negro work, much as he work
ed during the days of slavery.
This is far from right. If this
training has any value for the Ne
gro, as it has for the white man; it
consists in teaching the Negro how
to make the forces of nature, air,
water, horse power, steam, and the
(dectric power, work for him, how
to lift labor up out of foil and
drudgery' into that which is digni
fied and beautiful. The Negro in
the South works, and he works
hard, but his luck of skill, coupled
with ignorance, causes him to do
work in the most costly manner,
and this has kept him near the
bottom of the ladder in the busi
ness world. Industrial education
teaches the Negro how not to
drudge in his work. Let, him who
doubts this, contrast the Negro in
the South toiling through a field
of oats with an old-fashioned reap
er, with the white man on a mod
ern farm, sitting upon a modern
harvester behind two spirited
horses, using a machine that cuts
and binds the oats at the same
time, doing four times as much
work as the black man with or.e
half the labor. Let us give the
black man so much skill and
brains that ho can cut oats like
the white man, then he can com
pete with him. The Negro works
in cotton and has no trouble so
long as his labor is confined to the
lower forms of work, the planting,
the picking and the ginning. But
when the Negro attempts to follow
the bale of cotton up through the
higher stages, through the mill
where it is made into the finer
fabrics, where the larger profit ap
pears, he is |told that he is not
wanted. The Negro can work in
wood and iron; no one objects so
long as he confines his work to the
felling of trees, and sawing of
boards, to the digging of iron ore
and making of pig-iron. But
1 when the Negro attempts to follow
this tree into the factory where it
is made into desks and chairs, or
when he attempts to follow the
pig-iron into the factory where it
is made into knife-blades and
watch springs the Negro’s trouble
begins.
And what is the objection?
Simply that the Negro lacks the
skill, coupled with brains neces
sary to compete with the white
man, or that when white n\en re
fuse to work with colored men,
enough skilled and educated color
ed men cannot be found to super
NO. 1
intend and man every part of one
large industry, and hence they are
constantly barred out. There
should be a more vital and prac
tical connection between the Ne
gro's educated brain and his op
portunity to earn his daily bread."
BlacK SKin Vs. White SKin.
In Shakespeare we have the fol
lowing romances: “Othello the
Moore,” we. find the storv of the
sable Moore making love to the
fair Desdemona; there was a white
suitor in the case; the dusky
Moor then said “Let us incision
make, to prove whose blood is red
dest, yours or mine.” In this way
they were to prove whose love was
truest, and most worthy to win the
hand of fair Desdemonia. Be
neath the outward covering of a
black skin there flows blood just
as red ns under a white skin. In
Holy Writ we find these words:
“Of one blood God hath made all
nations of men to dwell on all the
face of the earth." If it is really
true that a Negro is inferior to a
white man because of his color,
why does not tue same rule hold
good with other creatures, so that
a black horse is inferior to a white
horse, a black cow to a white cow.
etc. To conclude the one is as
absurd us to conclude the other.
The accident of race or color had
little or nothing to do with it.
There is nothing great in the
world but man, and nothing great
in man but mind. Hence we be
lieve with Pope, sho said:
“Were I so tall as to reach the poles
And fjrusp the ocean in my span,
l’l still be measured by my soul
The mind's the standard of the man.”
—Seattle Searchlight.
When the white board of educa
tion at a Kansas town wanted to
enroll the colored and white child
ren separately the colored parents
invaded the grounds. The men
retired when ordered to do so but
the women refused to leave and
seated their children with the
white children. They fought for
their rights until the board post
poned the enrollment.
St. Louis, Sept. 24. —A Negro
attempted to assault the wife of
Deputy Sheriff A. J. Shores at
Clayton to-night and was shot by
Shores and badly wounded. The
shooting attracted a mob of Ne
groes from the congregation of a
colored church who attempted to
lynch the Negro, Robert Taylor,
but were prevented and Taylor
! was safely landed in jail.