INFLUENCE IN GEORGIA.
In spite of his arduous labors and duties at Augusta, Dr. Walker yet
found time to be interested in all matters which concerned the welfare
of all the people throughout the State of Georgia, and was an active
participant in many State gatherings of various kinds, aside from the
large number of evangelistic meetings he found time to conduct in many
Georgia cities. For several years he was Moderator of the Western
Union Baptist Association; for four or five years he was Chairman of
the Executive Board of the Missionary Baptist Convention of Georgia;
for two years he was Vice President, and for eight years Secretary of
the same body; he was Treasurer for several years of the Sunday School
Workers’ Convention of Georgia; he was at one time Vice President of
the Georgia Interdenominational Sunday School Convention; he was for a
number of years a member of the Republican State Executive Committee;
he has been, from the beginning, a member of the Board of Trustees of
the Walker Baptist Institute, and was also a member of the Board of
Trustees of the Atlanta Baptist College. The filling of these various
offices of trust and responsibility indicate in a small way the immense
activity which he has displayed in the general welfare of the State,
and particularly the welfare of the Baptist denomination.
In addition to these things, there has not been a convention of any
kind called by the colored citizens of Georgia, as has frequently been
the case during the past twenty years, which he has not attended,
anxious always to do something to advance the Negro in the scale
of civilization. He has many times visited the annual meetings of
the State Teachers’ Association of Georgia and, by invitation, has
addressed them, trying to show what part the teachers ought to take
in solving the so-called “Race Problem.” He has been a favorite
commencement orator at many of Georgia’s schools and colleges, and
has never been able in any one year to accept all the numerous
invitations which have come to him to deliver baccalaureate sermons.
On the first day of January each year, it is customary for the colored
people throughout the South to hold public meetings, where addresses
are delivered by distinguished men, in commemoration of the issuing
of the Emancipation Proclamation by Abraham Lincoln, Jan. 1st, 1863.
Dr. Walker’s addresses, delivered at different places in the State
on Emancipation Day, would alone make a very large and interesting
volume. Nor has he felt that his duties as a preacher have of necessity
absolved him from active participation in public affairs, or what
is more generally called politics. He was for years a member of the
Richmond County Executive Committee of the Republican Party, and also
a member of the Republican State Committee. He has believed and has
taught that it is the duty of every citizen to be interested in the
political welfare of his city, State and country, and, in his judgment,
no man is entitled to be called a good citizen who allows the vicious
and corrupt to do all the voting and all the dictating, and then sits
down and sighs for what is called “the better and purer days of the
Republic.” Of his work as an evangelist, mention will be made in a
later chapter. But let it be said now that no one man in Georgia has
held a larger number of special meetings throughout the State, nor has
had a larger number of conversions to be attributed to his preaching,
than has Dr. Walker. It is not exaggeration to say that he is the best
known Negro minister of the State of Georgia, and that more people will
go to hear him preach than will go to hear any other colored man. Not
the celebrated, plain-spoken, claw and hammer preaching of Sam Jones,
nor the Holy Ghost preaching of the pious Dwight L. Moody, of sainted
memory, drew larger crowds to the auditorium at Exposition Park,
Atlanta, Ga., than did the thunderous proclamation of the gospel by
Charles T. Walker.
Perhaps in no way has his influence been felt in Georgia more than
in the selection of competent men for Baptist pastorates and in the
appointment of competent men and women as teachers at many places
in the State. Dr. Walker’s reputation as a safe leader and wise
counsellor, his extensive travels and consequent wide acquaintance
with men and women throughout the State and nation have proved to be
very helpful to all concerned in the recommendations he has been asked
to make. No one in Georgia who knows of these things can recall a
single instance in which the recommendation of Dr. Walker, in the case
of a church or school, has been turned down. So interested has Dr.
Walker been in the welfare of others, and so eager has he been to see
competent leaders set over the people, that he has been known time and
again to go 500, 600, and sometimes 1,000 miles at his own expense to
assist those who needed and asked his opinion and advice, or to help
some person to secure a position. Not all of those whom he has helped
have been grateful; not all of them will admit their obligation; only
a few of them remember the bridge that carried them over. When told of
the ungratefulness of different ones, Dr. Walker only laughs and says:
“I do not help anybody with the expectation of being thanked. It is my
duty to do my duty toward my fellow men, whether they thank me or not.”
Thus he dismisses the subject, and goes to talking about something
else. Several times larger churches in Georgia, that could pay him more
money than Tabernacle Baptist Church, extended calls to him to occupy
their pulpits, but he always replied that Tabernacle Church was good
enough for him, and then would assist the churches in securing good
men. Such unselfishness is rare, and has helped very much to perpetuate
the hold which Dr. Walker has had on the people of Georgia for so many
years.