Union is strength, has long since passed into a proverb. The colored
people of the South should at once form associations, combine and make
them strong, and live up to them by all hazards. All civilized races
have risen by means of combination and co-operation. The Irishman, the
German, the Frenchman, all come to this country poor, and they stay
here but a short time before you see them succeeding in some branch of
business. This success is not the result of individual effort--it is
the result of combination and co-operation. Whatever an Irishman has
to spend he puts in the till of one of his own countrymen, and that
accounts for Irish success.
A German succeeds in this country because all his fellow-countrymen
patronize him in whatever business he engages. A German will put
himself to inconvenience, and go miles out of his way to spend money
with one of his own race and nationality.
With all his fickleness, the Frenchman never forgets to find out and
patronize one of his own people. Italians flock together and stand by
each other, right or wrong. The Chinese are clannish, and stick by one
another. The Caucasian race is the foremost in the world in everything
that pertains to advanced civilization,--simply owing to the fact
that an Englishman never passes the door of a countryman to patronize
another race; and a Yankee is a Yankee all the days of his life, and
will never desert his colors. But where is the Negro?
A gentlemanly and well-informed colored man came to me a few days
since, wishing to impart to me some important information, and he
commenced by saying: “Now, Doctor, what I am going to tell you, you
may rely on its being true, because I got it from a white man--no
nigger told me this.”
On Duke Street, in Alexandria, Va., resides an Irishman, who began
business in that place a dozen years ago, with two jugs, one filled
with whiskey, the other with molasses, a little pork, some vegetables,
sugar and salt. On the opposite side of the street was our good friend,
Mr. A. S. Perpener. The latter had a respectable provision store,
minus the whiskey. Colored people inhabited the greater part of the
street. Did they patronize their own countryman? Not a bit of it. The
Irishman’s business increased rapidly; he soon enlarged his premises,
adding wood and coal to his salables. Perpener did the same, but the
blacks passed by and went over on the other side, gave their patronage
to the son of Erin, who now has houses “to let,” but he will not rent
them to colored tenants.
The Jews, though scattered throughout the world, are still Jews. Their
race and their religion they have maintained in all countries and all
ages. They never forsake each other. If they fall out, over some trade,
they make up in time to combine against the rest of mankind. Shylock
says: “I will buy with you, sell with you, talk with you, walk with
you, and so following; but I will not eat with you, drink with you, nor
pray with you.” Thus, the Jew, with all his love of money, will not
throw off his religion to satisfy others, and for this we honor him.
It is the misfortune of our race that the impression prevails that
“one nigger is as good as another.” Now this is a great error; there
are colored men in this country as far ahead of others of their own
race as Webster and Sumner were superior to the average white man.
Then, again, we have no confidence in each other. We consider the goods
from the store of a white man necessarily better than can be purchased
from a colored man.
No man ever succeeded who lacked confidence in himself. No race ever
did or ever will prosper or make a respectable history which has no
confidence in its own nationality.
Those who do not appreciate their own people will not be appreciated by
other people. If a white man will pat a colored man on the shoulder,
bow to him, and call him “Mr.,” he will go a mile out of his way to
patronize him, if in doing so he passes a first-class dealer of his own
race. I asked a colored man in Columbia if he patronized Mr. Frierson.
He said, “No.” I inquired, “Why?” “He never invited me to his house in
his life,” was the reply.
“Does the white man you deal with invite you?”
“No.”
“Then, why do you expect Mr. Frierson to do it?”
“Oh! he’s a nigger and I look for more from him than I do from a white
man.” So it is clear that this is the result of jealousy.
The recent case of the ill-treatment of Cadet Whittaker, at West Point,
shows most clearly the unsuspecting character of the negro, when
dealing with whites. Although Whittaker had been repeatedly warned that
an attack was to be made upon him, and especially told to look out for
the assault the very night that the crime was committed, he laid down
with his room-door unfastened, went off into a sound sleep, with no
weapon or means of defence near him. This was, for all the world, like
a negro. A Yankee would have had a revolver with every chamber loaded;
an Irishman would have slept with one eye open, and a stout shillalah
in his right hand, and in all probability somebody would have had a
nice funeral after the attack. But that want of courage and energy, so
characteristic of the race, permitted one of the foulest crimes to be
perpetrated which has come to light for years.
But the most disgraceful part in this whole transaction lies with the
Court of Investigation, now being conducted at West Point under the
supervision of United States officials. The unfeeling and unruly cadets
that outraged Whittaker, no doubt, laid a deep plan to cover up their
tracks, and this was to make it appear that their victim had inflicted
upon himself his own injuries. And acting upon this theory, one of
the young scamps, who had no doubt been rehearsing for the occasion,
volunteered to show the Court how the negro could have practised the
imposition.
And, strange to say, these sage _investigators_ sat quietly and looked
on while the young ruffian laid down upon the floor, tied himself, and
explained how the thing was done.
If the victim had been a white man and his persecutors black, does any
one believe for a moment that such a theory would have been listened to?
Generations of oppression have done their work too thoroughly to have
its traces wiped away in a dozen years. The race must be educated out
of the ignorance in which it at present dwells, and lifted to a level
with other races. Colored lawyers, doctors, artisans and mechanics,
starve for patronage, while the negro is begging the white man to do
his work. Combinations have made other races what they are to-day.
The great achievements of scientific men could not have been made
practical by individual effort. The great works of genius could never
have benefited the world, had those who composed them been mean and
selfish. All great and useful enterprises have succeeded through the
influence and energy of numbers.
I would not have it thought that all colored men are to be bought by
the white man’s smiles, or to be frightened by intimidation. Far from
it. In all the Southern States we have some of the noblest specimens of
mankind,--men of genius, refinement, courage and liberality, ready to
do and to die for the race.