CHAPTER XXX.

THE TELEGRAM.

Arriving in the city of Galveston, Dorlan, anxious to receive the expected

message from Morlene at the earliest possible moment, took up his abode in

an establishment just opposite the telegraph office.

Day after day Dorlan took his seat at the window of his room and watched

the messenger boys as they hurried to an fro delivering messages. He

thought of how much anxiety the countless messages represented, but

concluded that his was equal to all the other anxieties combined. Each

night, when he regarded the hour as too late to reasonably expect a message

from Morlene, he would go down to the beach and gaze out upon the great

expanse of waters. The tossing waves and the heaving billows reminded him

of his own heart. The tides would roll in to the shore and the waves would

lap his feet with their spray, as much as to say, "Come with us. We are

like you. We are restless. Come with us." Dorlan would look up at the

watching stars and out into the depths of the silent dark. Then he would

whisper to the pleading waves: "Not yet. Perhaps some day."

Dorlan's _love_, in keeping with the well earned reputation of that master

passion, had led him to hope for an early answer from Morlene, in spite of

the extreme gravity and manifold complexity of the question that she was

now trying to decide. His _reason_ told him better than to expect so early

a reply. Thus, when love gave evidence of disappointment, reason would say,

"Much love hath made thee mad, my boy. Give the dear girl a chance, will

you?" At the close of each day this colloquy between love and reason would

take place.

But Morlene's delay began to extend beyond the utmost limits that Dorlan

had set. Thereupon love's tone became more insistent and the voice of

reason grew correspondingly feeble.

Dorlan at last concluded that Morlene's decision was unfavorable to him,

and that she hesitated to deliver the final blow. Every vestige of hope had

fled and he now kept up his daily vigil purely out of respect for Morlene,

not that he longer expected a favorable answer.

Unwilling for Morlene's sake to listen in the nights' solitude to the

wooing of the restless waves, Dorlan changed his nightly course and moved

about in the city. As he was listlessly wandering through the city one

night, he came upon a crowd standing in a vacant lot listening to a man

detail the reputed virtues of medicines which he was trying to sell.

The medicine man's face was handsome, his head covered with a profusion of

flaxen hair which fell in curls over his shoulders. His voice had a

pleasing ring and his whole personality was alluring. On the platform with

the man was a group of Negro boys who provided entertainment for the crowd

in the intervals between the introduction of the various medicines. Dorlan

stood on the outer edge of the throng and thought on the spectacle

presented.

The white people of the South, as evidenced by their pleasure in Negro

minstrelsy, were prone to regard the Negro as a joke. And the unthinking

youths were now employed to dance and sing and laugh away the aspirations

of a people.

Dorlan's veins began to pulsate with indignation as he reflected on the

fact that the ludicrous in the race was the only feature that had free

access to the public gaze. He was longing for an opportunity to show to the

audience that there was something in the Negro that could make their bosoms

thrill with admiration. In a most unexpected manner the opportunity was to

come.

The medicine man near the hour of closing addressed the audience, saying:

"Gentlemen, it pains me to state that our aeronaut is confined to his bed

and will be unable to-night to make his customary balloon ascension and

descent in the parachute. That part of our evening's entertainment must

therefore be omitted, unless some one of you will volunteer to act in his

stead."

The last remark was accompanied with a smile, the speaker taking it for

granted that no one would be willing to take the risk.

"Two birds with one stone," said Dorlan. "The boys have taught this

audience how to laugh. I can show them an act of bravery. One bird!

"There must be a great force somewhere directing the affairs of the

universe. His plannings puzzle me. Men have accidentally gone from balloons

to solve the great mystery of all things. Bird number two! Morlene

evidently does not care."

Elbowing his way through the crowd, Dorlan clambered upon the platform and

said: "Gentlemen, the phases of Negro character are as varied as those of

other men. There is in us the sense of the humorous and the possibilities

of the tragic. We can partake of life to satiety, we can die of grief.

These boys have made you laugh. Allow me to awaken in you higher emotions.

I will make the ascension and descent and thus prevent the marring of our

evening's entertainment."

The medicine man looked at Dorlan in astonishment, approached him and

talked with him a short while. Concluding that Dorlan was sane, knew what

he was about, and would not undertake the feat if incapable of successfully

performing it, the man now had the balloon prepared. The audience, glad

that they were not to be robbed of their expected pleasure, cheered lustily

when it was found that Dorlan was to make the trip into the air.

Dorlan stepped into the balloon and was soon being whirled upward. His soul

felt a measure of relief as he rose above the staring crowd, above the tall

buildings, as he entered the regions of floating clouds, as he passed

upward toward the brightly shining moon and the quiet light of the stars.

On and on he swept.

The pure air into which he had now come refreshed his spirit and he could

look at matters with a clearer vision. "Think," said Dorlan, as he stood in

the balloon and gazed into the stellar depths, "how long it took this

universe to evolve unto its present state. Think of the seemingly slow

process of world formation now going on in the Nebulae scattered through

those realms yonder." His mind reverting to his attitude toward Morlene, he

said:

"And here I am impatient because that dear girl on whose heart the woes of

the world now rest has not hastened in deciding that I had harnessed the

forces that will solve one of the most difficult problems that ever

perplexed mankind."

The utter unreasonableness of expecting so early an answer upon a question

that demanded such earnest thought, now appeared to him as almost

criminal. He saw that the time allowed Morlene, in what he regarded as his

saner moods, was thoroughly inadequate. These moments of elevation and

reflection restored hope to his bosom.

Stimulated by the thought that Morlene was not necessarily lost to him as

yet, Dorlan now caused the balloon to start toward the earth. He would have

liked to come down all the way in the balloon since he was no longer

yearning for death, but he remembered his brave speech and the expectations

of the crowd below. So, in spite or his keen desire to live, he decided to

maintain his honor in the eyes of the waiting audience and descend in the

parachute at whatever cost. Not knowing what would be his fate, Dorlan

sprang out of the balloon, trusting to the parachute. At a terrific speed

he shot downward toward the earth. For a few seconds the parachute seemed

that it was not going to bear him safely to earth, but, happily for the

innocent Morlene, soon readjusted itself. Down, down, down, it came

bringing to the murky atmosphere, to the crowded streets, to the regions of

jarring ambitions, the troubled spirit that sought in an hour of despair to

fly its ills.

Dorlan reached the ground in safety and received the congratulations of the

spectators, who, guided by the light attached to the balloon, had succeeded

in locating the possible point of descent.

Dorlan now went home, fully resolved to await in calmer spirit the expected

answer.

One day as Dorlan was sitting before his window, he saw a messenger boy

come out of the telegraph office, pause and look up at the number on the

house in which he was stopping.

The boy then started across the street in Dorlan's direction. Dorlan ran

out of his room and down the steps, reaching the door before the boy. Sure

enough the telegram was for Dorlan. He snatched it from the boy and handed

him a dollar.

Dorlan turned to go upstairs. "Wait for your change, Mister. We don't get

but ten cents extra."

"Keep the dollar, lad," said Dorlan, hurrying up the stairway. Entering his

room he gently laid the telegram upon the center table and stood back to

gaze upon it. Dorlan could not conceive how he could endure the excess of

grief if the message was unfavorable, or the excess of joy if it was

favorable. Cautiously he approached the table, then seized the telegram and

tore it open.

The next instant the lady of the house verily thought that a Comanche

Indian had broken into her establishment, so loud was Dorlan's shout of joy

when his eyes fell on the one word, "Unfettered." Her astonishment was even

greater when Dorlan so suddenly departed, leaving in her hands a roll of

money far in excess of her charges.

Dorlan had no time for explanations. The soul that had come into the world

to mate with his was calling for him and all other considerations had to

fade away.

* * * * *

As the train rolled into the shed adjacent to the great depot at R----,

Dorlan, who was standing on the platform of a coach, caught sight of

Morlene, who had come down to the station to meet him. He seemed to feel

that he could cover the remaining distance between himself and Morlene

quicker than the train, for he leapt upon the platform before the train

stopped and urged his way through the throng to the spot where she stood.

Then, half forgetting and half remembering the multitude present, Dorlan

grasped the outstretched hands of Morlene drew her to him, and planted on

her lips a kiss--just one, mark you. The ladies who were standing near

looked searchingly at Dorlan, and rendered a silent verdict that Morlene

could be excused for not resenting the salutation from so handsome and so

noble looking a man.

The men looked at Morlene and wondered how Dorlan could be content with

just that one. Those men always thereafter gave Dorlan the credit of being

a man of marvelous self-control. You see, they did not consult Morlene on

that point, who and who alone knew how frequent and how fervent were those

manifestations of regard after the proper authorities had said that she

was to be Mrs. Morlene Warthell thenceforth until death.

* * * * *

Over the hillsides of life, through its many valleys, alongside its

babbling brooks, in the splendor of the noonday, in the gloaming, in

deepest shades of evening, on and on, Dorlan and Morlene go, happy that

they are freed from the narrow and narrowing problems of race; happy that

at last they, in common with the rest of mankind, may labor for the

solution of those larger humanistic problems that have so long vexed the

heart of earth.

We now bid this loving and laboring couple a fond adieu, well knowing that

wherever in this broad world these true souls may wander they will be

gladly received and housed as the benefactors of mankind.

THE END OF UNFETTERED.

DORLAN'S PLAN.

(SEQUEL TO "UNFETTERED.")

A DISSERTATION ON THE RACE PROBLEM.

BY

SUTTON E. GRIGGS.

* * * * *

"The solution of the Negro Problem involves the honor

or dishonor, the glory or shame, the happiness or

misery of the entire American people."--_Frederick

Douglass_.

"I had rather see my people render back this question

rightly solved than to see them gather all the spoils

over which faction has contended since Cataline

conspired and Caesar fought."--_Henry W. Grady_.

FOREWORD.

Prior to the coming of Dorlan Warthell, there were many to be found in the

United States who utterly despaired of a happy solution of the problem of

adjusting the relations of the Anglo-Saxon and Negro races to each other on

an honorable and mutually satisfactory basis, taking care the while to meet

the highest demands of the present and of all future ages.

Others, while not despairing, confessed that in the horizon subject to

their vision not a glimmer of light appeared; confessed that they were only

sustained by their general knowledge of nature's power to solve, through

tears and years, all her problems.

Thus, until the day when Dorlan came, Columbia sat chained on the one side

by benumbing pessimism and on the other by deferred hope. Accepting the

judgment of so sweet and true a soul as Morlene, it was he who solved the

problem. In view of the complicated nature of the problem and the great

interests involved, its solution must ever be regarded as a noteworthy

achievement.

It occurred to us that the ages which now sleep in the womb of time would

be pleased to ponder the achievement, hoping to find in the spirit and

method of its undertaking, suggestions that would enable them to deal

wisely with the problems of their day.

For the sake, therefore, of posterity we have concluded to place on record

a copy of Dorlan's Plan by means of which he swept away the last barrier

that stood between himself and the woman who had entered into his life to

give color to the whole of his existence in this world and in such other

worlds as may afford a dwelling place for the spirit of man.

Perhaps a majority of those who have read "Unfettered" and have learned to

share Dorlan's exalted opinion of Morlene, will not care to read the Plan,

being content to rest the whole matter upon Morlene's decision. Those who

pay such a tribute to our heroine may thus escape the tedium of wading

through the dry details of a plan by means of which a long suffering race

was saved.

Others who may be disposed to question Morlene's judgment, who think that

her love for Dorlan influenced her to decide in his favor, are hereby

furnished with the Plan and ordered to read it as a befitting punishment

for their temerity.

As these "doubting Thomases" wearily plod their way through the Plan we

hope that they will have ever present with them to add to their torture,

the thought that they would have escaped the punishment of reading all that

Dorlan wrote had they meekly accepted Morlene's verdict. As wail after wail

shall arise proclaiming what dull reading the Plan makes, we shall chuckle

gleefully and rub our hands joyfully, happy that those who would not take

the word of our heroine have come to the end so richly deserved.

Those who accepted Morlene's verdict and now read the Plan simply for the

purpose of defending her from hypercritical personages are heroes indeed.

For, be it remembered, it often requires more courage to read some books

than it does to fight a battle.

Such may be the case with Dorlan's Plan, and all have fair warning.

THE AUTHOR.

DORLAN'S PLAN.

WHERE THE TROUBLE ARISES.

The Negro is a human being. He has manifested every essential trait of

human nature. The following words from Emerson, spoken of each individual

member of the human family, may be specially affirmed with regard to the

Negro: "What Plato has thought he may think; what a saint has felt he may

feel; what at any time has befallen any man, he can understand."

The general laws governing the physical and psychic natures of men; that

unfold the workings of the human body and the mental, moral, religious,

social and aesthetic processes of the soul--the general laws governing these

operations may be applied with as much force to the Negro as to any other

human being.

This has been an age of astounding discoveries; but the physiologist, the

psychist, the ethical writer, the ecclesiastic, the sociologist, the

investigator of aesthetic manifestations, the ethnologist, the philologist,

the natural scientist, though searching eagerly, have discovered naught to

controvert or in anywise impair the doctrine of the unity of the human

race as set forth in the declaration of Paul, "that all nations of men"

have been "made of one blood to dwell on all the face of the earth."

Those who concede to the humanity of the Negro and hold to the theory that

man is upon the earth through the direct, specific, creative fiat of God,

are forced to admit that the Negro's certificate of membership in the human

family is signed by the Deity, and by virtue of that fact must be received

at face value.

He who holds with the evolutionist that man is the product of evolutionary

forces, working incessantly through the countless ages that lie behind us,

must perceive that, in that event, the Negro can point to the fact that his

presence in the human family has the sanction of the multiplied myriads of

experiences that, from one forge, out of one material, through the one

process, made him along with other human beings. If God is represented as

presiding over the forces of evolution, the Negro may claim that God and

nature have fixed his status as a human being.

Being forever established by the Supreme Architect of the universe within

the line drawn to encircle humanity to the exclusion of all things else,

the Negro is entitled to every right that inheres in the fact of his

humanity. He is entitled to all the benefits of the feeling of distinctive

fellowship--that feeling which operates to bind ant to ant, bird to bird,

and man to man, as apart from other orders of beings. He is entitled to the

designation, Brother. The Negro has identically the same right to live as

other human beings; the same right as they to tread unfettered any and all

of the pathways that destiny has marked out for human feet.

It is this conception of the basic, inherent right of the Negro to share on

equal terms with all other human beings all the rights and privileges

appertaining to membership in the human family that gives rise to the Race

Problem in the United States of America. For, while the claim is

passionately cherished by the Negroes and is espoused with varying degrees

of warmth by one section of the American whites, it is most vigorously

opposed by another.

OUR PROBLEM.

It is our task to so utilize the forces at our command as to nullify all

artificial hindrances to the development of the Negro; to remove from his

soul the man-imposed fetters; to so open the way that the man with a black

skin shall have his opportunities limited solely by his capacity, as is the

case with those not of his color. We are to institute merit as the test of

preferment; mind, as the measure of the man. To reverse the standard of

measurement, to transfer it from color to culture, is our problem.

The plan to be submitted must take cognizance of all the factors in the

situation; must be capable of being operated by the race constituted,

environed and conditioned as it is. With this conception of our task we

begin our labors.

THE INSPIRATION OF THE OPPOSITION.

It is well in every species of combat for a man to seek to know the exact

nature of the opposing force. Knowing this, one understands the better how

to gauge his efforts. With this aim in view, we shall make a reconnoitre to

discover just what is arrayed against us.

Mr. Herbert Spencer says: "It has come to be a maxim of science that in the

causes still at work, are to be identified the causes which, similarly at

work during past times, have produced the state of things now existing."

We would expect, therefore, to find the past yet affecting the Negro, and

such is indeed the case. From the year 1619 until the close of the civil

war, the white people of the South held the Negroes in slavery.

It is the habit of nature to confer upon a man those equalities that the

better fit him for his line of work. In order to successfully hold slaves,

the Southern man fostered the belief that the Negro's humanity was somehow

of a different brand from his own. Having satisfied himself that essential

differences existed between himself and the Negro, he was the better

prepared to mete out treatment which he would have deemed outrageous if

applied to himself by another.

To prevent uprisings on the part of the slaves repressive measures were

instituted, and the Southern white man became an adept in the art of

controlling others, and his nature became inured to the task. The traits of

character acquired in one generation were transmitted to succeeding

generations, so that notions of inherent superiority and the belief in the

right of repression became ingrained in Southern character.

In confirmation of this conclusion, we again quote from Mr. Herbert

Spencer, who says: "The emotional nature prompting the general mode of

conduct is derived from ancestors--is a product of all ancestral

activities. * * * The governing sentiment is, in short, mainly the

accumulated and organized sentiment of the past."

In view of the foregoing, it becomes evident that the repression which the

Negro encounters to-day is but the offspring of his repression of

yesterday.

STILL IN THE BALANCES.

In Prof. Giddings' "analysis of the population of the United States

according to race, he says that the English temperament is represented by

about 33-1/3 per cent., the prevailing Irish by about 29 per cent., and the

prevailing Scotch by about 19 per cent. The percentage, not of course

precise, is, he thinks, indicative of the influence on the American life

and character of these racial tendencies."

We are laboring to add the voice of the Negro to this national chorus. The

giving of the Negro an opportunity for untrammeled activity in the National

Government means that much of an addition to and consequent alteration of

our characteristic Americanism.

It is evident that the Negro will bring into the national spirit the

influence of his peculiar characteristics. Now this adding to and taking

from the national spirit is a most grave matter. Often the characteristic

spirit of a people is a sole remaining reliance; is often the only asset

that the fluctuations of capricious fortune has not swept away.

The great importance that attaches to the spirit that characterizes a

nation is set forth by Napoleon Bonaparte in the following words: "Had I

been in 1815 the choice of the English as I was of the French, I might have

lost the battle of Waterloo without losing a vote in the legislature or a

soldier from my ranks." Allusion is here made to that British tendency to

persist in a given course and adhere to the standards of chosen leaders in

the midst of circumstances adverse and even appalling. On the soil of

England and on many another spot where the Englishman's foot has trod, from

the dying embers, yea, the smouldering ashes of defeat, victory has so

often sprung as the result of the spirit to which Napoleon Bonaparte paid

tribute.

The English speaking race holds woman in high esteem, but she has thus far

been denied the right of suffrage because of the uncertainty as to what

would be the resultant blend arising from her more active participation in

the affairs of State.

Mr. Wm. E. Lecky, in opposing the granting of the right of suffrage to the

women of England, gave it as his opinion that the emotional element in

politics was already sufficiently great without the addition of the

strongly developed emotionalism of woman. The same sentiment of

conservatism that operates to cause woman's rejection is, beyond question,

a factor in our problem.

The Negro has but lately entered civilization's parlor. He possesses an

oriental nature called to service in an occidental civilization. Of

remarkably quiescent tendencies he must play a part in a government born of

a revolutionary spirit and so devised that revolutions may be effected

whenever desired through means of the ballot box.

The remarkable manner in which we have responded to the quickening touch of

civilization; the revelation of traits of a sublime nature unparalleled in

the world's history (witness the keen sense of honor that led us to care

for the helpless wives and children of those who were at the seat of war

fighting for our continued enslavement); the successful meeting, where

conditions were favorable, of every test that civilization has thus far

imposed--these considerations influence us to believe that the grasping of

the flagstaff by Negro hands but means that the flag will float the higher

and flutter the prouder and diffuse through the earth even greater glory

than before our coming.

Before we can take up the full place for which we aspire, we must meet and

combat the timorous conservatism that has hitherto impeded our progress.

Thus are the lines of battle drawn. On one field stands the hopeful Negro

never to be contented save with a man's place. On the opposing field stands

the Southern white man with an inherited nature and cultivated sentiments

that render the repression of the Negro a congenial task. To one side

stands the representative of civilization at large, hesitating about doing

more in our behalf until we have fully cleared our skirts of the suspicion

that attaches to a new comer into civilization. With this conception of the

influences which we are to combat, we now plan for the momentous struggle.

HE WHO HAS HITHERTO FOLLOWED CALLED UPON TO LEAD.

Napoleon has said that men of imagination rule the world. When society is

in a transitional state, men of imagination are able through clear

comprehension of the forces at work, to project themselves into the new

era, and, seeing where the movement tends, place themselves at the head of

the procession. Those deficient in this faculty cannot perceive the

ultimate goal of the processes forming before their very eyes; and, even

when new conditions have come bearing the stamp of immortality, they yet

are dreaming of a relapse into old conditions that are gone forever. They

are thus unfit for the duties of the new era, being devotees of the past.

The ruling of the world is, therefore, left, as Napoleon asserts, to men of

imagination.

The present moment is one calling for the exercise of this faculty of the

mind on the part of the Negro in the United States. Hitherto the Republican

party has been looked upon as the agency which was to solve all his

problems. This was a very natural expectation as that party has been the

agency by means of which so much tending in that direction has been

accomplished.

A political party, aspiring for control of the Government, may choose a

paramount issue, but one in power labors to take care of all interests

committed to it. Now that the Republican party has won a place in the

hearts of the American people, the business interests of the country are

insistent that they be cared for first and foremost. The nation is making

an effort to extend its commerce into all parts of the earth, and the

Republican party is implored to be the agency through which this is to be

accomplished.

In view of the many interests committed to its care, the Republican party

seems disinclined to make a specialty of the Negro Problem. While

reaffirming its old time position on that subject, it does not see its way

clear to jeopardize all other interests for the sake of that one plank of

its platform. While the friendship and moral support of that party is to be

retained, and while Negroes who sympathize with its economic policies

should abide with it, it is not wise for the race to rely upon it solely

for the proper adjustment of the Race Problem.

In fact, the hour has come when the race must take the matter of its

salvation into its own hands. In times past, when the battles of the race

were to be fought, others led and the trusting Negro followed. In this new

era the Negroes must lead, must bear the main brunt of the battle. Thus,

while estranging no friends of the past, and fully appreciating the

continued necessity of outside assistance wherever attainable, the foreword

of our new propaganda shall be Self-Reliance.

Having hitherto been concerned with the task of comprehending and imbibing

a civilization which we had no appreciable share in developing, our

passivity, quiescence, docility, the readiness to follow others, were the

characteristics which we mainly manifested.

Now that we are to cast off the role of a nursling and take our place as

co-creators of whatever the future has in store for the human race, a new

order of talents must be called into operation and a new mode of procedure

adopted.

Fortunately for us we have the incentive of a largely inglorious past to be

redeemed, and the light of all of man's past to serve as our guide.

REVISITING THE ORIENT.

To gain our first lesson in the work before us, we transport ourselves over

land and sea until, standing in the valley of the Nile, we can pause and

gaze upon the pyramids of Egypt, reminders of the day when our ancestral

home held aloft the torch of civilization. In those pyramids, we behold

that stones of enormous size and weight have been lifted to such distances

from the earth as to stagger the imagination and inspire wonder in the

hearts of all generations of all races that have seen or heard of the feat

unparalleled in ancient or modern times.

Some African genius of the long ago constructed a device, now unknown to

earth, whereby the several strengths of individuals could be conjoined and

the sum of their strengths thus obtained applied to the task of lifting the

ponderous stones. Innumerable hosts would have failed in lifting those

pyramidal stones to the positions which they occupy had it not been for the

aid of the device that enabled them to work conjointly. From these

pyramids, eloquent in their silence, persistent reminders of the departed

glory of Africa, let the scattered sons of that soil learn their first

great need--Co-operation.

Our initial step must be the creation of a device whereby the several

strengths of the millions of Negroes in the world may be harnessed to the

huge stone of a world hate, to the end that said stone shall be swung aloft

and hurled into the sea, sinking by the force of its own weight into

eternal oblivion.

CLASPING HANDS.

In view of the fact that we cannot now point to any organization capable of

amassing the full strength of the race, and as the absence of such an

organization might be construed to indicate that there is no need for such,

we now quote authorities that thoroughly demonstrate the absolute need of

co-operative effort.

Prince Kropotkin, the eminent Russian naturalist, in discussing

co-operation among lower animals, remarks:

"If we * * * * ask Nature, 'Who are the fittest: those who are continually

at war with each other, or those who support one another?' we at once see

that those animals which acquire habits of mutual aid are undoubtedly the

fittest. They have more chances to survive, and they attain, in their

respective classes, the highest development of intelligence and bodily

organization."

Darwin, giving the results of his observation among the lower animals, pays

tribute to the spirit of co-operation, when he says: "Those communities (of

animals) which included the greatest number of the most sympathetic members

would flourish best."

Ascending from the lower animals, we find that co-operation is equally as

valuable and necessary for man. In the march of humanity toward an ideal

civilization, we find those races in the van which have best acquired the

art of co-operating, while the rear is brought up by those peoples in whom

the instinct of co-operation is thus far missing or but feebly developed.

Prof. Henry Drummond remarks: "To create units in indefinite quantities and

scatter them over the world is not even to take one single step in

progress. Before any higher evolution can take place these units must by

some means be brought into relation so as not only to act together, but to

react upon each other. According to well known biological laws, it is only

in combinations, whether of atoms, cells, animals, or human beings that

individual units can make any progress, and to create such combinations is

in every case the first condition of development. Hence the first

commandment of Evolution everywhere is, 'Thou shalt mass, segregate,

combine, grow large.'"

A recent writer has expressed the thought that "neither material

prosperity, nor happiness, nor physical vigor, nor higher intelligence,"

constitute the difference between the 'higher' and the 'lower' races, but

that "those are higher in which broad social instincts and the habit of

co-operation exist."

In whatever direction we turn we find evidence of the universality of this

law. The voices of science, history and sociology in unbroken harmony sing

to the Negro of the necessity of co-operative effort. We must, therefore,

proceed at once to the formation of a racial organization truly

representative, and able to present the combined resources of the race to

the work before us. When this is done the Race Problem will at once assume

an acute phase; for the aggregate wisdom and power of the Negro none can

wisely ignore. Especially is it to be borne in mind that an aggregation of

the kind indicated is calculated to reveal, to develop, to impart added

greatness to men already peculiarly endowed with powers of aggressive

leadership. We must, then, add to the equation the enormous impetus to be

given to causes by the presence of great spirits arousing and guiding the

thoughts and energies of earnest, daring millions.

RENOVATION.

When our great organization has been effected it must proceed to the

diligent study of such traits and environing influences as have in the past

operated to impair the spirit of co-operation. Locating the weak points, we

must proceed to induce in the Negro such mental and moral characteristics,

and must so regulate his environments as to insure efficient co-operation

for all the future.

It is an evident fact that the spirit of jealousy is more prevalent in some

individuals than in others. The like may be asserted with regard to races.

Among the Negroes there appears to be an inordinate development of this

feeling of jealousy, which makes itself felt among the humblest and among

the highest. Success on the part of a Negro would appear to be a standing

invitation for the shooting of arrows into his bosom. While a strict

surveillance over leaders is highly commendable, the baneful effects of

hypercriticism and jealous intrigues are far reaching. Our racial

organization must tear up by the roots this extraordinary predisposition

toward jealousy and plant in its stead the flower of brotherly love.

During our prolonged existence in a state of individualism, each man

working for himself and by himself, there was but little to engender in a

man the spirit of sacrifice in the interest of the race as an aggregation.

When our racial organization is perfected we must write upon every man's

heart the following words, causing each one to feel in his own case: "It is

expedient for us, that one man should die for the people."

In the work of further congealing the race, of inducing in it the social

instincts so needful for efficient co-operation, we have the aid of the

scorching flames of race prejudice which flash in the faces of all Negroes

thus driving them closer together.

As the wars of David with surrounding enemies made a nation of the loose

aggregation of the twelve tribes of Israel; as the hundred years of

fighting with France effected the integration of the people of England; as

the war of the Revolution sowed the seed that enabled the American people

to form a nation out of the thirteen colonies; as the compact German

empire of to-day is the result of outside pressure; just so is American

prejudice producing a oneness of sentiment in the Negroes which inevitably

leads toward their acting as a unit in matters affecting their salvation.

Having arranged for our organization, we are now to point out the lines

along which it is to labor.

WHERE TO BEGIN.

Realizing that we must at every point demonstrate that we are intrinsically

as well as constitutionally entitled to the lofty estate of American

citizenship, our racial organization must neglect nothing needful in the

fitting of the race for the high destiny unto which it is called.

In the work of preparing the race, first and foremost, attention must be

given to character building. Any hopes founded on aught else, are illusive.

Character is the bedrock on which we must build. In describing the

successful nation, Mr. Lecky gives voice to the following sentiments unto

which we must pay utmost heed:

"Its foundation is laid in pure domestic life, in commercial integrity, in

a high standard of moral worth and of public spirit, in simple habits, in

courage, uprightness, and a certain soundness and moderation of judgment

which springs quite as much from character as from intellect. If you would

form a wise judgment of the future of a nation, observe carefully whether

these qualities are increasing or decaying. Observe especially what

qualities count for most in public life. Is character becoming of greater

or less importance? Are the men who obtain the highest posts in the nation,

men of whom in private life and irrespective of party, competent judges

speak with genuine respect? Are they of sincere convictions, consistent

lives, indisputable integrity? * * * It is by observing this moral current

that you can best cast the horoscope of a nation."

"THERE IS NO PLACE LIKE HOME."

In the matter of character building, first, attention must be paid to the

home. Prof. Henry Drummond has remarked that "the first great schoolroom of

the human race is the home." He further remarks that "It is the mature

opinion of every one who has thought upon the history of the world, that

the thing of highest importance for all times and to all nations is Family

Life."

The home life of the Negro has had to encounter many antagonistic

influences. The work of home building could not progress under the

institution of slavery. The present builders of Negro homes are, therefore,

pioneers, in the work, lacking the aptitude that would be theirs did they

inherit natures that descended from many generations of home builders.

Conditions under freedom, though an improvement on the past, have retarded

the proper development of the home life of the Negro. Often the Negro

husband, having been accustomed to seeing women labor, has no scruples as

to his wife's being a laborer, even when her home is full of children. The

Negro woman having been accustomed to work often continues to do so, after

her aid is no longer needed to help support the family.

The average home is small and housekeeping duties are not onerous. Not many

possess libraries, and reading is not much in vogue. Thus many work in

order to keep employed.

In other cases the scale of wages paid to the men is so very low that the

woman has to come to the rescue as a wage earner. This calls her from her

home and children.

It is often the case in large families that the united savings of the

husband and wife are insufficient to take care of the family wants, and

consequently the children are sent out to work.

The hours of toil for all classes of laborers are very long, so that

families are separated from early morning until after nightfall. So close

has been the confinement all the week that Sunday becomes the day for

general visiting and pleasure seeking. It is very evident that the home

life has but a fighting chance under such conditions. And yet other factors

are to be added.

The child being required to support himself early, assumes an air of

independence, and parental authority is correspondingly weakened.

The home life of the Negro is also quite largely affected by the peculiar

hold which the secret society has upon the race. The thought that he will

enter a realm where much wisdom abides operates to draw the Negro to the

secret society. Then, too, if he is a member of such a body, he has, in the

fact of membership, a passport bearing testimony as to his social standing.

Again, the aid furnished by these societies during sickness, and their

public displays upon the occasion of the burial of their members are strong

attractions for the Negroes of limited means and of little note. The Negro

not content with membership in one such organization usually joins as many

as his means will permit. The meetings of the societies are numerous and

are held at night, necessitating much absence from home on the part of both

the father and the mother. The lodge meeting also furnishes an excuse to

such husbands as may have other reasons for not spending evenings at home.

The weekly church services are held at night, calling for more time from

home. In view of all of which it is apparent that we are weak at the

foundation, the family life, and strenuous efforts are needed at this

point.

Our organization must employ an army of workers to co-operate with Negro

mothers in the work of home building. Christian institutions where Negro

boys and girls are being trained must be induced to pay especial attention

to the question of the Negro's home. The laborers' working day must be

shortened, so that they may have more time at home. The white families must

be induced to have earlier suppers, so that those who cook for them may

return to their several homes the earlier.

The scale of wages must be increased so that the mother and children may be

exempt from the task of bread winning. With an increase in wages and the

consequent ability to save a portion of his earnings for the 'rainy day,'

the lodge will not be the absolute necessity to the Negro that it now

appears to him to be. Under these improved conditions the mother and the

father can the better co-operate and make the home what it must be. Our

racial organization must bend its energies in the direction to accomplish

these results. For one thing it must link its great influence to that of

the forces laboring for the improvement of the condition of the toiling

masses.

RELIGION A FACTOR.

In his very brilliant work on "Social Evolution," Benjamin Kidd remarks

that "there is not that direct connection between social development and

high intellectual development which has hitherto been almost universally

assumed to exist," and "that the wide interval between the peoples who have

attained the highest social development and the lowest, is not mainly the

result of a difference in intellectual, but a difference in ethical

development."

He further states that the human race "would, in fact, appear to be growing

more and more religious, the winning sections being those in which,

_caeteris paribus_, this type of character is most fully developed." He is

firmly of the opinion that "the evolution which is slowly proceeding in

society is not primarily intellectual, but religious in character."

The influence of religion upon a people's life is admittedly so great that

any program looking to betterment of their condition must take note of the

prevailing religious belief. The Christian religion was ingrafted upon our

racial life in the days of slavery. As we were in an abnormal state, it

should not occasion surprise if many did not get a normal grasp upon the

Christian religion.

In the days of slavery the Negro felt that his lot in this world was a

rather hopeless one. No where could he catch a glimmer of hope. To him the

earth was without form and void. But his optimistic nature had to be fed,

and the glories of the world to come, pictured in the Bible, to him became

a living reality. Thenceforth his mind rested not on earth. The death bed,

the funeral, the grave, the world to come, received the wealth of his

spiritual energies. As a natural result the bearings of religion on this

present life were lightly passed over, lethargic conditions ensued and the

spirit of wise prevision was in large measure absent. The morbid dwelling

of the mind of the Negro on anticipated worlds must be discountenanced; a

more rounded view of religion inculcated.

Without entering into sectarianism our racial organization must foster such

conceptions of religion as will make its ethical teachings, applicable to

life in this world, more prominent. With the home life cared for and proper

religious instruction guaranteed, our racial organization will have laid

secure foundations.

TO WEAR WELL OUR CROWN.

Our racial organization must bear in mind that we are struggling for

untrammeled freedom in the greatest government that human intellect has

ever evolved. Without proper culture we cannot meet the requirements of

worthy citizenship. We must pay especial attention to our public schools,

and see to it that knowledge shall not be lacking. The value that education

will be to the citizen is admirably outlined by Thomas Jefferson, in the

following words used in setting forth the purposes of education.

Education is intended:

1. "To give every citizen the information he needs for

the transaction of his own business.

2. "To enable him to calculate for himself, and to

express and preserve his ideas, his contracts and

accounts in writing.

3. "To improve, by reading, his morals and faculties.

4. "To understand his duties to his neighbors and

country, and to discharge with competence the functions

confided to him by either.

5. "To know his rights; to exercise with order and

justice those he retains; to choose with discretion the

fiduciary of those he delegates; and to notice their

conduct with diligence, with candor and judgment. And

in general to observe with intelligence and

faithfulness all the social relations under which he

shall be placed."

In order to insure the education of the masses, the following steps must be

taken:

1. The Negroes must be stimulated to acquire taxable

values to such an extent that the Southern States shall

not administer the school funds for the Negroes with

the feeling that they are making a charitable donation

to the race.

2. Night schools must be fostered for adults.

3. Money must be provided for the lengthening of the

school term.

4. Salaries for teaching must be raised that a high

order of talent may be the more easily enlisted.

5. Books must be supplied to the children too poor to

buy.

6. Means must be instituted to prevent the too common

habit of withdrawing the Negro child from school at so

early an age to help support the family. These and such

other measures as close scrutiny may from time to time

suggest must be employed to make the public school

system among the Negroes what it ought to be.

IN THE UPPER REALMS.

It is not enough to provide elementary training for our people. The great

minds of earth choose the devious pathways to be threaded by the wavering

feet of humanity. They pass upon what is true and what is false, what is

right and what is wrong, what is expedient and what is inexpedient.

Tremendous is the influence that has been exerted on human history by the

teachings of the great.

Through the training of the intellect the Negroes must develop men capable

of interpreting and influencing world movements, men able to adjust the

race to any new conditions that may arise. We need men to do for the Negro

race what Prof. Henry Drummond sought to do for the Christian religion. In

the upper chamber of the house of human knowledge, the congress of

scientists presided over by Charles Darwin, and representing the culture of

the ages, met to promulgate a new religion; a religion that would establish

Nature as our ethical teacher, pointing with the finger of evolution, the

way for man to go. By dint of patient, faithful labor and notable

achievements in the realm of science, Prof. Drummond secured admittance

into this upper chamber and took his seat at the council table. Soon the

world heard his voice proclaiming in the tone of one speaking with

authority that the new revelations of science contained no poison for

Christianity; that the new teacher, Nature, was the friend, not the enemy,

of the old teacher, the Bible. He declared that Evolution and Christianity

have "the same author, the same end and the same spirit."

Thus Drummond was on hand to seek to stay the Darwinian hand, if, after

shattering other conceptions, it had attempted to demolish the one worship

that modern civilization has thus far failed to destroy.

To prepare Negroes for taking care of our interests in the realms of

highest thought, our racial organization must found universities, liberally

endow scholarships, provide equipments for original investigations and so

foster the cause of higher education that no race can boast of superior

intellectual attainments.

"OF MAKING MANY BOOKS THERE IS NO END."

Books are the means by which each successive generation comes into

possession of the best (of which the records have been kept) that was

wrought during all preceding generations of human endeavor. Not only does

the art of printing thus connect with all that was good in the past, but it

also affords a man the opportunity of becoming a part of all that is being

done in his day.

In view of these considerations it is evident that a race that does not

read must ever be a laggard race. Our racial organization must, therefore,

found libraries throughout the regions in which Negroes dwell, to the end

that we may have the benefit of all the elevating influences of good

literature.

Our problem is, however, deeper than the mere founding of libraries, as is

apparent from the following considerations: During their sojourn in America

the great majority of Negroes have had such work assigned to them as

required much bodily exercise. But a comparatively few have led sedentary

lives. The laboring Negroes have been accustomed to sing as they worked or

have relieved the monotony of their labors by jovial bantering. The

occupations of a race eventually make themselves felt in more or less

marked racial characteristics.

Thus, when a cotton factory was established recently to be operated by

Negro labor, it failed, the manager assigning as a partial cause thereof

the fact that the Negroes did not make the best operatives, in that sitting

still and being quiet caused them to be rather listless and sleepily

inclined. While, in other instances, tendencies in that direction have

perhaps been overcome, this one case serves to suggest that the inattention

to reading on the part of so many may be traceable to the same inherited

indisposition to sit still and be quiet, necessary concomitants of the

reading habit.

Our racial organization must not, therefore, feel that its labors are

complete when the libraries are founded. Systematic efforts must be put

forth to create in our people a thirst for reading so that they may have

ears to hear what the past and present are thundering at us.

WE EAT TO LIVE.

However brave, brilliant and resourceful a general commanding an army may

be, however loyal and enthusiastic are his soldiers, he must inevitably

fail if he neglects his commissary department. The cravings of the human

stomach must be provided for or there will be no soul left in the emaciated

body to aspire for higher things.

In arranging, therefore, for the welfare of the race our racial

organization must not neglect the material needs of our people. An

advancing army must protect at all hazzards its base of supplies. We now

outline a course of action in keeping with this thought.

The man who knows that there is a prejudice against him, owes it to himself

to so contrive that he shall be as nearly as possible independent of the

workings of this prejudice. Negroes, therefore, should, in the main, seek

those callings in which they shall be above the whims and prejudices of

men.

The land owner, the farmer, can come as near to being independent of his

fellows as a man may in these days attain. The sun, the elements, the soil,

his own strong arm, are his chief reliance and these forces are not subject

to enslavement, nor can prejudice weaken them. Nature has no favorites

among men. The rains fall upon the just and the unjust alike. Back to the

farms, therefore, should in a large measure be our cry. With a strong

agricultural backbone the position of the race is much the more secure. The

conditions that operated to cause the Negroes to so largely abandon the

farms must be studied and altered when possible.

Our racial organization shall give due recognition to the following needs,

doing all that is necessary to see that they are attained:

1. The Negro must become the owner of the soil he

tills.

2. He must be placed above the conditions of dire

necessity that causes him to resort to the credit

system of buying and the mortgaging of his crops, which

things have hitherto wrought his ruin.

3. Provisions must be made whereby he may secure modern

appliances with which to farm.

4. He must be educated so that he may know how to

obtain the best possible results from the soil.

5. He must be taught to keep fully posted upon the

important happenings in the commercial world bearing

upon his interests.

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, shiftless, more ignorant class 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 destitute 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 masses 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 accumulate 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 instituted that the

passion 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 furnishings 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 masses 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 shifting 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 shift 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

constitute 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 space 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 illustrate the ordeal through which one must pass, we cite the following

comment:

"In turning over the files of the American press, we read of Washington 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

assassin. 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 passes 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 assuredly received his full measure of blows from the hand

of America's master passion. 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 participants 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 'class' system, which is contrary to

the genius of American institutions.

There is a development that comes from the contemplation of and the

participation 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

pass 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 participation therein.

The manner of the emancipation 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 circumstances. As it is, he has been caused to feel

that he owes a debt of gratitude to one party, so great as to constitute 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 associated with his humiliation.

When our national government was but beginning its career in the family of

nations, George Washington 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 passionate

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 nobly 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.

With the adjustment of the political question will come an era of good

feeling which will operate to ameliorate other conditions.

The Negro complains that the courts of the South are arrayed against him;

that he does not receive there the treatment accorded to other citizens. So

much of this as is true is traceable to the fact that the courts are at

present sustained by the same race feeling which has for its end the

suppression of the Negro.

When the Negro again becomes a political factor and the court is made

amenable to Negro public sentiment in common with the rest of the

community, care will then be taken that evenhanded justice is meted out to

all. Under such conditions the Negroes and white men of the South will be

in a frame of mind to meet and join hands for the protection of womanhood,

for the suppression of lynching, for the extirpation of criminality in

general.

Chief among the reforms to be inaugurated will be the improvement of the

very deplorable prison systems, which being operated with a view to

producing revenue, are a blot upon our civilization.

When better feelings prevail, the laws regulating public utilities will be

such as conform to the desires of the best citizens of all races.

Thus it will be seen how many of the ills that ramified the whole of

Southern life were generated from the strife that had its origin at the

ballot box.

THE PROBLEM OF THE OTHER MAN.

With our racial organization thus laboring to prepare the race to meet the

highest requirements of civilization, the subjective phase of the problem

is provided for, and we may now direct our attention to extrinsic factors,

the forces without, that must be reckoned with.

In the midst of the study of _our_ problem, our racial organization must

bear in mind the fact that the Southern white man has _his_ problem. He is

the lineal descendant of the builders of our civilization. We are heirs

thereof by adoption; the Southern white man by birth. It must be assumed

that the instincts that make possible our civilization are more deeply

written in his nature than in that of the Negro. To him primarily,

therefore, is committed the task of preserving in the Southland

characteristic Americanism. Thus while benefiting by the many noble traits

which the Negro brings, the Southern white man must yet resist whatever

Africanizing tendencies that anywhere show themselves. Such is the Southern

white man's problem.

There are Negroes that can meet every test of civilization, while there are

others upon whom residence in America has wrought but feebly. The Southern

white man closes the door in the face of the prepared Negro, holding that

to do otherwise would mean the influx of an uncontrollable mass of the

unprepared. He also states that coercive methods are necessary to preserve

in the South the Anglo-Saxon flavor to our civilization.

The virile elements in all communities are in duty bound to draw the weaker

ones up to themselves, but indiscriminate repression and coercion are not

the proper means to be employed in these modern times. The weak are to be

elevated through the superior forces known to mind and morals.

It is far better for the South and for the nation that the shortcomings of

the Negro be conquered by excellencies, than that they should be left as a

constantly rising flood tide destined to over-leap all walls whatsoever,

carrying devastation that many generations will be taxed to repair. The

white man of the South must be aided in his work by the people of the whole

land. In view of what is required of them, the white people of the South

ought, perhaps, to be more highly and more generally educated than those of

any other section of the country, whereas the percentage of illiteracy

among them is greater than it is in any other section.

Our racial organization must encourage the philanthropists of the world to

remember the white people of the South in the distribution of their wealth

for benevolent purposes. When education is more general in the South and

the white people are conscious that as an aggregation they represent a

higher degree of power, they will feel the more inclined to abandon the

policy of force, and proceed with the work of intellectually assimilating

the Negroes whom they have hitherto thrust out. When thus equipped the good

and strong in the South will coalesce and rule by the sheer force of

superior worth, which is the only method countenanced by truly civilized

peoples.

Recognizing the fact that, in the interests of a composite American

civilization, it is desirable that the Negro be imbued with many of the

qualities of the white man, care should be taken that the Negro population

be so diffused throughout the country, that no section of the white race

shall have more work of this character than it can well perform. Our racial

organization shall therefore establish an emigration bureau, that shall

drain off unduly congested regions and locate Negroes in more desirable

localities. This lightening of the burdens of some places, coupled with the

program of more extended education, will aid the Southern white man to do

what the world expects of him, namely, preserve his own strong parts and

impart strength to, not repress, the weak.

Thus less and less grow the essential elements of the problem as the great

bulk of the Negroes measure up to the standard of the ideal citizen and the

Southern white man is the better prepared to shoulder the responsibility

that attaches to the post of seniority in the civilization under which we

live.

OUR LAST FOE.

When all essential factors in the situation have been cancelled our racial

organization will find that there remains to be overthrown pride of race,

prejudice and self-interest. The Anglo-Saxon race has so long enjoyed the

thought of superiority over the Negro, that there will be those to oppose

the unfettering of the Negro through the sheer force of race pride. There

will be others who will continue in opposition, as a result of prejudice,

for which they can assign absolutely no reason. There will still be others

who have profited by race antagonisms, who have come into place and power

by their ability to crush out Negro aspirations. An era of peace would rob

this class of an occupation, and self-interest will influence them to

oppose the untrammeling of the Negro.

Against pride of race, prejudice and selfishness, then, our racial

organization will find itself pitted in the last instance.

Here, again, we are face to face with a situation that calls for somewhat

of a change of front on the part of the Negro. In the days of slavery the

Negro who sought for freedom fixed his eye upon the "North Star" and

journeyed thitherward. When freedom at last came to the Negro in the South

it came from Northern climes. His mind has grown accustomed to looking to

forces external to the South to bring him his desires.

Enlightened communities are in great measure self-governing, and too much

reliance must not be placed on foreign forces. The Negro must more largely

seek to utilize forces present in the Southland. There are broadminded men

there that are able to rise above all considerations of pride, prejudice

and selfishness, and deal with all men according to the mandates of the

Golden Rule.

Our racial organization must form an alliance with such white

neighbors--must labor with them in matters looking to the highest interests

of our common country. As evidence that there is a possibility of such an

alliance, we quote the following from "The Washington Post," a leading

newspaper in the nation's capital, and a recognized champion of Southern

interests: "So far as we are concerned--and we believe that the best

element of the South in every State will sustain our proposition--we hold

that, as between the ignorant of the two races, the Negroes are preferable.

They are conservative; they are good citizens; they take no stock in

social schisms and vagaries; they do not consort with anarchists; they

cannot be made the tools and agents of incendiaries. * * * Their influence

in government would be infinitely more wholesome than the influence of the

white sansculotte, the riffraff, the idlers, the rowdies, and the outlaws."

MIGHTIER THAN THE SWORD.

While paying strict attention to our home influences, we must not be

unmindful of the outside world. If we can bring to bear upon the local

situation the moral support of other sections of our country and of other

civilized lands, our travel in the direction sought will be the faster. One

of the chief labors of our racial organization will be to lay the case of

the Negro upon the heart of the world and cause all humanity to lift a

voice in our behalf. As evidence that this course is pregnant with hope, we

cite the following authorities:

Herbert Spencer designates "the control exercised by public sentiment over

conduct at large" as "irresistible." He further says: "It requires only to

contemplate the social code which regulates life, down even to the color of

an evening necktie, and to note how those who dare not break this code have

no hesitation in smuggling, to see that an unwritten law enforced by

opinion, is more peremptory than a written law not so enforced. And still

more on observing that men disregard the just claims of creditors, who for

goods given cannot get the money, while they are anxious to discharge

so-called debts of honor to those who have rendered neither goods nor

services, we are shown that the control of prevailing sentiment, unenforced

by law and religion, may be more potent than law and religion together,

when they are backed by sentiment less strongly manifested. Looking at the

total activities of men, we are obliged to admit, that they are still, as

they were at the outset, guided by the aggregate feeling, past and

present."

Huxley remarks: "It is only needful to look around us to see that the

greatest restrainers of the anti-social tendencies of men is fear, not of

the law, but of the opinions of their fellows. The conventions of honor

bind men who break legal, moral and religious bonds; and while people

endure the extremity of pain rather than part with life, shame drives the

weakest to suicide."

Moses, recognizing the influence of the crowd even when in the wrong, felt

the necessity of imbedding in the Jewish code this declaration: "Thou shalt

not follow a multitude to do evil."

Jesus Christ in projecting a world-wide kingdom designates public

reprobation as the highest form of punishment to be known in his realm.

"Let him be unto thee as an heathen man and a publican."

The exponents in the Anglo-Saxon race, of justice, liberty, equality and

progress, have contended most zealously for the freedom of the press and

have evinced in every way a keen appreciation of the value of this

instrumentality developed among them for the utilization of the force of

public sentiment. In discussing the manner of effecting results in problems

of the general nature of ours, Benjamin Kidd remarks: "* * * * In like

manner the effect produced on the minds of the British people by

descriptions of the wrongs and sufferings of oppressed nationalities, has

been one of the most powerful influences affecting the foreign policy of

England throughout the nineteenth century; and any close student of our

politics during this period would have to note that this influence, so far

as the will of the people found expression through the government in power,

has been a far more potent factor in shaping that policy than any clear

conception of those far reaching political motives so often attributed to

the British nation by other countries."

Resolved upon the enlistment of the enlightened sentiment of the world, our

racial organization must utilize the talent of the race for oratory and

send able men with burning hearts to speak with flaming tongues of such

wrongs as the South wittingly or unwittingly imposes upon us. Negro

newspapers must be supported, until their unquestioned excellence makes a

way for them into homes without regard to race. Daily newspapers and

magazines, favorable to the highest interests of the race, must be

established so that the outpourings of the souls of Negro writers may have

better opportunities of reaching the world. The poem, the novel, the drama

must be pressed into service. The painter, the sculptor, the musical

composer must plead our cause in the world of aesthetics. The bird that

would live must thrill the huntsman with its song. With the sympathies of

the world thus enkindled, there are none who would wish to withhold our

rights. Even a Cain cries out against a situation in which every man's hand

would be against him. Our racial organization must gird itself for the

stupendous task of thus winning our great battle, of thus inducing the iron

hand to relax its grasp.

THE END DRAWETH NIGH.

Such is the program of endeavor to be set before our great racial

organization. Local organizations modeled after it, having in view similar

aims will be created and put in operation. It is evident that the task

before us involves the expenditure of enormous sums of money. It is true

that the organization once in operation would be cheerfully and adequately

supported by the Negroes. But the placing of it upon such a basis as will

disclose its value and secure devotion will require great sums of money.

It so happens that Africa has but recently bestowed upon me, Dorlan

Warthell, untold millions. I have no qualms of conscience in thus applying

to the Negroes of America funds derived from Africa, for I firmly believe

with Mr. Wm. T. Stead in the Americanization of the globe, and believe that

in due time the Negroes of America are to be the immediate agents of the

Americanization of Africa. Money spent in the uplift of the American Negro

is, therefore, an investment in the interests of Africa that will pay a

glorious dividend. Once established our organization shall win such a hold

on the hearts of the Negroes of the world that the poor and the rich will

give unstintedly for its maintenance. The philanthropists within the race

may be confidently relied upon to do all that may be justly expected of

them in the matter.

It only remains for me to state that I have, after a most careful search,

selected the men whose names you find appended. They constitute a

provisional congress that will superintend the formation of our permanent

organization. The men chosen are noted for their intellectual acumen,

broad grasp of affairs, judicial temperament, constructive ability, moral

probity, and their capacity for sustained endeavor. Such are the qualities

that are _known_ to characterize the men who have been chosen to groom this

infant race to march as one man to the drum beat of fate.

As I view the matter, here lies before the Negro a field of endeavor as

great as the earth affords. He is provided with a sphere of possible

activity wherein may be won on American soil, as glorious a crown as was

ever woven for human brow.

Equipped with an organization that can amass the full strength of the race;

blessed with the presence of great minds now furnished with facilities for

the attainment of great ends; cheered by a consciousness of power; aided by

the moral effect which our racial unity and our insistent attitude in the

right will produce; moving forward unfalteringly in the direction of all

that is true and good, decisive results must surely follow.

Thanks to this plan, Morlene, I can now assure you that the death knell of

the Negro's night has been rung, the stars have shrunk bashfully out of

sight, and happy fingers are even now painting the eastern sky a golden

hue, a sure sign that the dawn is here.

Yours humbly,

DORLAN WARTHELL