PRESIDENT's ADDRESS.

Ladies and Gentlemen: You have been invited here tonight to witness the sixth triennial exercises of the College Alumni Association of Howard University. As this occasion occurs only once in three years, it has been the custom of the presiding officer to recite briefly the changes that have taken place during the interval, and to outline the hopes and aims of the association for the future.

Since we last met under these auspices, death has called our honored ex-president from labor to reward. For twelve years Dr. Wm. W. Patton managed with signal efficiency the interests of our Alma Mater. To him more than any other, Howard University owes its present measure of prosperity, and its fair rank in the sisterhood of American Colleges. No Alumni who had the good fortune to come under his immediate instruction and counsel with ever forget or outgrow the helpful influence which he exerted upon their lives and characters during the formative period. Himself a living embodiment of scholarship and character, his highest aim was to inculcate the same principles in the minds of those who came under his guidance. I am sure that through the medium of yonder portrait, so faithful to life, he looks down with smiling satisfaction upon our proceedings tonight. It is not an exaggeration of the exact merits of the case to say, that “the elements so mixed in him that nature might stand up and proclaim to all the world this was a man.”

Our own ranks have been invaded by death. Two of our oldest and most distinguished members, as well as one of our youngest and most promising ones have succumbed to the common enemy of us all. Tributes of respect and tenderness of memory are due our worthy dead from us, who, in our turn, shall follow them. But it matters little if the hero succumbs, since he falls as our comrades have done, with face fronting forward. It is not a part of the true soldier idly to bewail the loss of comrades or commander; but to 0004 4press forward with renewed vigor in the cause for which they fought and fell, encouraged by their courage, inspired by their fall. So tonight we pause, only to bid a loving farewell of our fellows, but must respond to the bugle call to duty and to action in the living present.

The management of our Alma Mater has fallen to worthy hands. He who directs her policy and shapes her destiny, is a man whose heart is at the center of gravity of his being; a man whose soul is balanced upon the pivot of loving kindness and good will to all; a man of men, whom, at long intervals of years, Providence raises up to especial service; a man whose name is known and whose songs are sung around the world; a man who is in touch with the best thought and sentiment, not only of this age, but of all ages. Under his direction our Alma Mater is assuming new life and vigor, with increasing facilities in all departments of work, and a widening range of usefulness and influence.

Among the movements that have sprung up since our last meeting, none of them are closer related to us in interest and sympathy than “The American Association for Education of Colored Youth.” This organization grew out of a suggestion originating in this body, and may be regarded as its legitimate offspring. The spirit and purpose of the association is to secure harmony of action of all those who are engaged in the same class of work. We can hardly over-estimate the importance of minimizing antagonism and friction, and thus saving the maximum component of effort to the efficiency of the work and the largeness of results. It is also a source of self congratulation that the president of this association is a member of our own body. Although this circumstance flatters, yet it does not surprise us; for wherever and whenever measures are advanced for the welfare of the people and the direction of the masses there the sons of Howard will be found in the midst of them, inspiring, encouraging, controlling.

Another movement, of opposite spirit, has sprung up since our last meeting, known as the Mohonk Conference on the negro question. The performance of the play of Hamlet, with the character of Hamlet left out, is a witticism of hackneyed recital, but a conference on the negro question with the negro left out is something new in the line of practical humor. The exclusion of the patient from consultation, when he is not only able to locate the disease, but also as skilled as any in suggesting the remedy, may be wholesome 0005 5practice in Therapeutics, but is bad principle in philanthropy. No manly man of that blood which the conference excludes can have confidence in its sincerity or work, with satisfaction, in harmony with its plans. Mohonk philanthropy, with its proscriptive policy, is a virtual surrender of the very principle for which it professes to contend. If this body has any serious interest in the welfare of that people whom it affects to serve, it should either set before them an example, by conforming its practices to the golden rule, or finding this impossible, it should hold no more sessions, destroy its records so that its proceeding might become a thing of memory and regret. We do not question the right of any man or association of men to select their guests according to any discriminating principle which their fancy may decide, and to discuss in their assemblies, topics of any range and character that suits their taste or temper, but when they impose odious distinctions and attempt to shield their indirect practices with a cloak of philanthropy, it becomes the evident duty of those who are affronted to enter their solemn protest and remonstrance. This proscriptive policy, fostered in the house of our professed friends, sanctions and furnishes excuse for every form of social and civil disadvantage under which we labor. Such philanthropists, “Damn with faint praise, assent with civil leer, Themselves not sneering, teach the rest of sneer.” The great problem of our age and country can not be solved by the supercilious disdain of class or caste, but by the exercise of brotherly sympathy and the reciprocity of christian courtesy. We are vitally concerned in this movement because it stands in direct contrast to the principle for which we stand, and in our view is “the most unkindest cut of all.” This principle will ever be distasteful to every loyal Howard man.

There is need of especial alertness to see that the seed of sound scholarship planted by our Alma Mater may spring up into abundant harvest. Against the mad rush after practical results, and the modern short cuts to culture, the friends of liberal learning need to stand steadfast and immovable. It is not ours to run after the educational heresies of the learned dreamer, or the rash plans of the pedagogical schemer, but to adhere to the orthodox standards of culture, approved by long centuries of usage. The road to true learning lies through Greece and Rome. The wonder working arts 0006 6of the nineteenth century and the fairy tales of science are indeed wonderful to contemplate, but as means of culture, they do not leave upon the mind that residiuum of beneficial effect as do the perfect forms of truth and beauty, developed under the clear skies of Greece, and transplanted to the “Lavinian shores and the walls of lofty Rome.”

It behooves our association to take some active measure concerning literary degrees. It is a notorious fact that institutions of similar order as our own are too ready to abuse their collegiate function in this respect. Men of limited opportunity and meager attainments are loaded with the highest degrees known to the literary world. This too lavish use of degrees is positively damaging to scholarly standards, and argues one of two determinate conclusions: either that their authors and givers are sadly ignorant of literary requirements, or that they are intended as a charitable compromise of the recipient's capacity. The whole subject is fast becoming a laughing stock. We are opposed to all such literary farce and intellectual sham. When one observes with what suddenness learned degrees are acquired, he can but suppose that this vast host of scholars must have sprung, like the Grecian Minerva, full fledged from the brains of Zeus. We should exert our influence to the effect that our Alma Mater confer only such degrees as represent a corresponding measure of culture and attainment; so that a Howard degree may justly entitle the holder to all the immunities, rights, privileges, honors, dignities and distinctions which belong to similar degrees throughout the civilized world.

Another subject which is coming up for attention, is the relation between the common school and the institutions of higher pretensions. In the beginning of the work, all grades of instruction were united in the same institutions. But the time has come and now is when there should be a sharp distinction and definition between the primary, intermediate and advanced schools of learning. The enlightened opinion of the best educators is fast coming to the view that it is the part of wisdom to relegate to the public schools all the work that properly belongs to them and to confine the higher institutions of learning to that grade of work which falls beyond, or at least outside of, the range of public instruction. We enter fully into this view and would gladly see our institution adopt this policy as rapidly as is consistent with her manifold interests.

We are in the midst of the celebration of the twenty-fifth anniversary 0007 7of our Alma Mater. I doubt if any other similar period in the history of the world has witnessed so wonderful a transformation of a people. Howard University has been foremost in this work. She has sent forth more than five thousand laborers into the field already ripe unto harvest. The full fledged sons of Howard are almost without exception, in their line, workmen of whom we need not be ashamed. Their record makes a favorable, nay, a flattering comparison with that of those, in similar circumstances and work, from any other school in the land, north or south. Let us hope that this quarter of a century's growth but marks the beginning of a great career, and that her prestige and pride will increase with the strength of years.

Our final boast is, that our Alma Mater offers a curriculum which for quality and variety cannot be surpassed in this country at the same cost. No poor man in search of sound learning should pass her by until he has examined her advantages, both in course and collateral.

In the midst of our congratulations, may we not pause for a reflection? No Howard man so far so reported, has yet undertaken any literary work of importance or ambition. During the last three years the market has been overrun with works of prose and fiction on current questions of vital concern to us, by authors who are evidently less well acquainted with their themes than members of this body are supposed to be. The field is rich and ripe for close study and dispassionate disquisition. Nor is there any limitation in the arena of letters except that imposed by the writers powers. All literary effort will eventually gravitate to the level of its merit. Let us hope that this reproach will soon be removed, and that our men will enter the one struggle for existence where alone there is a fair show for the survival of the fittest.

The great need of our Alma Mater is scholarships to enable her to train her younger children as she has trained their elder brothers. Our efforts should be directed to this end. It is the duty of the older children to help a struggling mother support the family. There is probably no body of men in the world, who, coming up through such antecedents, make such sacrifice for the gain such proficiency in knowledge as the under graduates of Howard University.

The location of our Alma Mater has often been a subject of remark. Planted at the National Capital, she is fortunate in collateral 0008 8advantages, and beautiful for situation. A University, like a city that is set on a hill, cannot be hid. We would create at our Alma Mater a center of influence and enthusiasm which will send its radiant beams in all directions, alluring the thirsty pilgrims for knowledge to make a great journey to Howard.

Now ladies and gentlemen, I come to the pleasant part of my task, that is, to introduce the orator of the evening. He is a well-begotten son Howard. A man of high mental qualities, and well endowed with practical force and executive energy. Our Alma Mater spreads over him her protecting wings saying “thou art my beloved son in whom I am well pleased.” I take great pleasure in introducing Prof. George William Cook, who will address you on “Our relation and duty to the problem.”

TRIENNIAL ORATION

Relation and Duty to the Problem. We are, of course, directing our remarks to the College Alumni of Howard University, but we should not have the application stop here. Our is meant to designate the intelligent and educated Negro from no school, whatever school. We are, and are classed as the victims of the conditions we desire to here comment upon. However black, however white; mulatto, octoroon, or unmixed African, we are one in this issue. United we may stand, divided we must fall. The elements are so mixed and are so direct to every man known to have even a drop of African blood in his veins that all are denied the right alike and none can win unless all win. Then to every condition of men, to every profession, to every calling, we address our words.

One might pause in undertaking to write upon any phase of the Negro Question in the United States. When so much has been said, and so masterly said, it might appear that all has been said, and to attempt the question again is but to weary the already tired ear and minister to the appetite satiated. Thoughtful attention will present reasons for keeping the matter before the general public, show a duty and drive away all hesitancy. Notwithstanding the volumes poured forth upon the question the evils at which they are all aimed are still prominently to view, have lost none of their hideousness and are as monstrously unfair as ever. It is not yet time to relegate to oblivion an agitation which has as its object the setting of things aright and breathes the proper spirit of reform, nor do we think it possible for man to remove from public consideration a discussion which has so much to do with the birth, preservation and future of the nation, without thorough reformation. The only reason for ceasing to fire is the disappearance of the enemy. The enemy has not fled. Those who claim that there is too much talk about the Negro Status either from a queer obliquity of mental perception do not discern 0010 10the true nature of the case, or are lacking in generosity and philanthropy. They must be converted, and redeemed. Their redemption will aid the cause and be a charity to them.

What nonsense to attempt to nurse into quietude the viper ever suckling our lifeblood and injecting his venom into our bodies. Are not the most dangerous practices being upheld against us by pen and voice, court and legislation? Are we not drifting to the irretrievable ocean of cast prejudice? Does it not mean a denial of rights and privileges? Does it not doom our lifeblood in the person of our offspring to perpetual inferiority before public opinion? To sit still is a virtual acknowledgment of our own unworthiness of any better things.

Doubtless to the mind of some will occur the question, Is there really a Negro Problem? There are even those who deny that there is any question before the country, perplexing the brain of the statesmen and thinkers deserving to be denominated The Negro Problem. We are not of that class. We believe, and we think upon reasonable grounds, that such a case exists and the most striking and appropriate name for the same is The Negro Problem. Not the question does not concern the White People of this land, for what is to affect the so called Negro of this country is to affect the whole body, politic and social.

IS THERE A PROBLEM?

Since the first cargo landed at Jamestown in 1619; since Whitfield defended slavery and preached it into Georgia, since the Wesleys pronounced it the sum of all villainies, since the Swedes would not permit its pollution in the settlement of Delaware, since its horrors haunted the political convictions of Thomas Jefferson and caused him to say “ I indeed tremble for my country when I reflect that God is just, that his justice cannot sleep forever.” Since it gave Washington unrest and disturbed the equanimity of Adam's mind, and disgusted Benjamin Franklin, a Negro Problem has been stalking abroad in the country as truly as is Irish Question in England or the Jewish in Russia. Did it not raise its head in the colonial legislatures and there refuse to receive its grave clothes?

Through the days of colonial simplicity, revolutionary trials, constitutional days, and national life to the present time, the Negro Problem has brought men to serious thought and violent agitation. 0011 11The nation has ever been vexed by this real and important question. There has scarcely been a measure of importance proposed which did not include some constituent growing out of the existence of Negro blood upon this continent.

No political move has been made upon the public chess board that was not influenced by reference to the Negro element in this land. At one time it is the state of New Jersey objecting to the word White in the Federal Constitution, at another it is the state of South Carolina maintaining the right of property in man and an exclusion of the Negro from the blessings guaranteed by the Declaration of Independence and the issue of the Revolution.

Again it was displayed in the struggles in the Federal Convention. The Constitution was almost lost by contest waged on account of the Negro Status. The Louisiana and Gadsden purchases are its progeny and the Missouri Compromise its truce ground. The tariffs, because of conditions following slave labor, must be sectional. It has given opportunity for trial of intellectual force in congressional debate. It has engaged the profoundest minds, the best energies and strongest endeavors of the greatest champions of the country. It has brought forth the best results in forensic battle and immortalized the nation's most lustrous stars. There never was a cause which demanded more ability to champion, or more wily cunning to oppose than The Negro Problem. It is at once a moral, intellectual and political combat. It has made good men famous; bad men notorious. While it crowns Chief Justice Jay with laurels, it dooms Justice Taney to unsavory notoriety.

Henry Clay's commanding ability was spent in maintaining this union which because of the presence of Africa blood here was trembling and falling asunder before the wonderful powers of Calhoun.

At one time the Negro is the cause of discussion as a soldier in the Revolutionary War, at another as a citizen of the union, at another as a slave, always as a victim of injustice. The early colonial records tell the fierceness of the battle. The Mexican War was one of its fiery outcomes. The great compromises of 1850 are but the antidote that soothed the patient to quiet slumbers, but did not arrest the progress of the disease. The John Brown Raid was but the bursting of the national abscess. The booming of the cannon pointed at Sumpter, the subsequent four years' glare, the devastation, ruin, the crimson blood-mark upon the nation's annals from 1861 to 1865, the midnight raid, the assassin's rifle, the KuKlux 0012 12terror, the shot gun policy and damning Lynch Law, are all in the wake of the Negro Question.

Reconstruction, constitutional amendments or elective franchise, the great center and pivot on which the agitation resolves and is determined are circumstances emanating from Negro existence in the United States. The private pen, the public press, and the publishers' table are busy at work on something affrighting the nation's quiet ude. There is not a periodical too elegant, or too commonplace to disregard the noise that is abroad. The penny-a-liner alike with the literary contributor either interrogate or attempt to answer. Not in idle jest, or sportive humor, or in caricature alone, but whether in satire, wit, ethnological insight, or scientific disquisition there is a seriousness about the discussion that bespeaks either a distrust, or a deep seated conviction. What is it? By every principle of human or divine justice, that caused men to speak out then for a change of affairs; by every sentiment or emotion that then awakened patriots and philanthropists to claim that the Negro had a right to share equally with the whites in civil and religious liberty to which they are by nature as much entitled; by the revolt in the mind at the doctrine that the Negro has no right which a white man is bound to respect, there is a question so completely involving the Negro that it may appropriately be called the Negro Problem. Let us in the light of fact and history call it The Negro Problem. When sifted of all extraneous matter, when boiled down to its true essence, when all dross is strained off, it is found to be a violation of the Golden Rule. It is the spirit of evil stalking about when and where the influences of Christ should possess the hearts of men.

No matter how important the case may be, it is yet a simple one. There are no real intricacies in it.

Men may befog the issue; dust may be thrown into the eyes of the careless, and unconcerned, but to the thinking man there is nothing more than a case of gigantic injustice. Treat the Negro with political and civil consideration characterized by justice and the whole case is settled. Try that remedy and pens now dipped in ink will never reached the paper. The national course of life will, when compared with what it will be otherwise, become monotonously quiet. Continue the present course and—well, history teaches the result. Who is the man of such mighty concern? Does he come forth with armour to affright the nations of the earth? Is he a wild man? Is his hand against every man and every man's hand against him? 0013 13Every man's hand seems to be against him. He is a man of sorrows, acquainted with grief, torn naked from his home, forced against his will to a foreign clime, enslaved, subjugated, subdued, repressed, oppressed, robbed. Of a gentle and forgiving disposition and harmless, deserving a better fate, but forever treated with injustice. This is the man who a question which interrogates the nation and the individual alike. The pulpit heareth it, and the judiciary listens to its inquiry. Legislatures stop and bend the attentive ear, and the executive weighs the case. The social, civil and political atmospheres are saturated with it. How does this human interrogation point present himself? is our question. What is his quality? is our inquiry. The other sides are disturbed about his quantity. We are satisfied with his numbers, or his ratio of increase. A good legal 3 per cent per annum simple interest; a little foreign element thrown in.

The three relations held by the Negro since this nation was born are Slave, Soldier, and Citizen. In estimating our worth one must analyze the Negro from these standpoints. Were we good Slaves? Were we good Soldiers? Are we good Citizens? As a Slave we were faithful to task and trust whenever either was imposed upon us. We did the work and protected the gathered harvest, and when the horrors which followed the Civil War assailed the old homes, we stood as the rock of defense against the wolf at the door. It is said that by one stroke for our own emancipation we could have disorganized the Confederate Army. We are sometimes criticised for not having taken that expedient. We can the better bear this taunt than the reproach that would have followed had we struck the blow. No, we were too kind to attack the women and helpless children. Kindness is a trait in Negro nature whenever found.

One of the fairest fruits of the power of the military is the establishment of this government, and its sister event is its preservation through the Civil War in which the Negro played so important a part. In both the Negro was a force effective and honorable.

What now shall be said regarding the Negro in the Civil War? At the breaking out of the Rebellion the government was able to place in the field valiant soldiers whose military education was due to existing private military organization. But in that conflict there was an honorable soldiery who sprang by one phenomenal bound to such a height of fame as to make all the world wonder. What must be said of that black soldiery, who, schooled by hardship 0014 14and opposition even from the very government for which they fought, who performed deeds of heroic bearing and hold a position at once unique and grand?

There is a combination panel picture of three parts in the Metropolitan Gallery at New York. The picture was painted by Wood and presented to the museum by Mr. Charles Smith. The first panel, the contraband, represents a full-blooded Negro with comely features, in a provost marshal's office. His attire shows his occupation that of a country life, and his countenance tells that he is only too happy to offer himself to fight for the freedom of his fellowcreatures in chains. Little does he know what he is about to encounter on the battle-field, yet he is evidently prepared to give himself to the cause. His pockets are stuffed with long leaves of tobacco, and his other small possessions are closely tied in a handkerchief which he carries on stick across his shoulder.

The second, the Volunteer, portrays him dressed in the soldier's garb, in which he looks much younger. His bent figure is not seen now; he stands erect, and seems more conscious of his undertaking. His suit is very becoming and does the artist much credit.

The last picture, the Veteran, tells its story well; he has returned from the war minus a leg, having all the appearance of the rough usage of the battle field. His features are drawn down and care-worn; his eyes no longer seem to be looking right into the future but rather say “he has finished his course” and come to rest. The picture is not a caricature of the race, but rather a truthful portrayal of the many such men who volunteered to fight in the war, and did do actual service bravely.

It is a great pleasure to behold the Negro properly portrayed in art. In these days when literature and art are arrayed against him either to ridicule or condemn, we well may accept with gratification and thank such specimens of art creation which defend us, and place in enduring and prominent expositions our honorable doings. Here is these three small pictures is a history as to past fact and future suggestion. When the brush, the pencil and the chisel along with the stage give us fair representation, until they teach an observing public the true portrait of the colored man, he will be despised.

As a soldier his credit is assured. There is now encamped upon yonder Virginia heights a troop composed entirely of colored men, brave men and tried, who are now enjoying a respite 0015 15from active field duty, after many years of continuous service, in which they won their present privileges in many a well-contested conflict. Let the official archives be searched, let reunions and reminiscences speak, let history be scanned and deeds weighed; behold Attucks at Boston and Salem at Bunker Hill. As soldiers we are always commended and never complained of. What an example of heroism and soldierly qualities exhibited by this sable militia at Olustee, Miliken's Bend, Fort Pillow, Fort Wagner, Richmond and Petersburg? When did they ever receive an inglorious defeat, and when shall their glory fade? We often complain that the colored man was refused entrance to the army when the war began. Now the colored man was refused entrance to the army when the war began. Now how much brighter does his glory shine than if he had been received earlier. To achieve success when all conditions are favorable is to have done well, but to have grasped it and held it firmly with circumstances unpropitious, opposing force raging, to have compelled all alike, friend and foe, believer and unbeliever, to accord unstinted praise, and to have forever silenced objection, not by cast iron logic of words alone, but by the unassailable potency of facts, too stubborn to be denied, is a fame undimmed by comparison and ineffaceable even by time itself.

The problem is the same as it was in 1619. But there is a new student trying to find the unknown quantity. It is the Negro as a citizen. His relation is new and most intimate to the Problem. Before the war, the Negro might be said to be the Problem and the whites the solvers. With but a few conspicuous and noble examples the Negro was a passive factor in the case. He was the zero power which equals one but has no appreciable effect upon the product. By the disenthralling power of general emancipation and constitutional enfranchisement, he has been given a new relation, and has been raised to a higher power, and to-day he is a political member of the body politic and CANNOT BE DISREGARDED. There is another Richmond in the field. He may be the veritable one to complete the solution. If there is a desire and intention to keep the Negro in a state of dependence, and I think there is, it was not an act of wisdom to liberate him. New conditions have arisen and consequently new necessities. Nature in her field of adaptation and compensation will provide new workers, and by the most direct route. The Negro is necessary to the decision in his new role, as a citizen, however, the question is settled.

Time may yet show that two hundred years after emancipation the 0016 16Negro was not the one most fatally injured in the conflict between right and wrong. It is now well established that he was not the only one hurt. He was not wrong in the combat, and to be right is an enviable position.

The same principle which brought harm to the Whites then for their evil doings, is still moving on. It is the righteousness of God as written by Moses and preached by Christ and Paul.

The deluded Whites of the South can no more rise unpolluted above the damaging scourge of slavery in thirty-five years than can the Negro do so in the same time. The serious harm done to human nature in the Whites through that national sin stands out as conspicuously as its marks show upon the Colored Man. Man can not chain his fellow man either in intellectual, or physical bondage without brutalizing his own soul. Oppression has its direful effects upon both the agent and the victim. Its baneful influence permeates every department and interest of life. It lowers the tone of family ideas, it pollutes, or prevents the development of a pure literature, it dulls inventive capability and annihilates worthy ambition. Why must the southern heavens have fewer and less magnitude stars than the northern galaxy, in either literature, art, or science. The cotton gin was invented in the South, but by a Yankee boy from Yale College. How striking is the lesson found in Henry Cabot Lodge's article, “The Distribution of Ability in the United States.”

Why does Massachusetts, if Virginia be omitted, furnish more ability than all the Southern and Western states together? Let us note that the West is yet young, but how shall we account for the fact if Virginia be omitted, Massachusetts gives to the solid progress of the nation more men of ability than the entire Southland? Massachusetts leads in Clergy, Physicians, Literature, Science, Education, Philanthropy, Inventions and Music. Those who first settled the South were not originally less strong in character than those who pioneered New England's foundation. New York leads in business, Massachusetts in philanthropy, and Virginia in pioneers and statesmen.

Why must the elements of strength which make the nation great come from the despised and wandering Pilgrim? The answer is plain. It is stamped in the two civilizations. The difference is set in the one cause, that of slavery as opposed to human freedom as written in blood lines in American History. Where in the fair Southland stand her great institutions of learning? William and Mary, 0017 17yielding to none in age in the United States, except Harvard, must take rank below younger by centuries, and less favored ones. A people's literature will be low and uninteresting, if it contain not great themes touching the national sympathy and attuned to the fork of right and ennobling thought. Men who spend all their time in watching chained humanity have no leisure for study and invention.

The almost irreparable damage done in the South to thought upon the dignity of labor ought to stand as an everlasting index to guide from the road of national folly. The evident desire and general attempt to keep the Negro from national rights and political privilege is giving the southern mind a character which may find its final outcome in horrors untold or unseen on earth before. The education of slavery taught the pernicious doctrine of property in man, inflamed and added a rashness, which at an unguarded moment made the southerner rush into devastation, bloody war, and ruin, presenting to the world the sad spectacle of supposedly intelligent presenting to the world the sad spectacle of supposedly intelligent and wise men risking all that is dear to maintain claims revolting to mankind.

The false imprisoning of Negroes in the South, the unjustifiable lynchings of untried criminals and innocent men, and the still worse connivance at such acts on the part of duly constituted authority can but give a very dangerous education to the budding mind of the southern youth, and blunt the true conception of authority and law upon which a people's safety is founded.

Call it if you please a just retribution for the crime committed, since there is no crime in the Negro category that is not flagrantly practiced by white men and since white men are not lynched for those crimes, a teaching of discrimination for selfish reasons is instilled into the moral code of the community and as the external reasons for narrowing the circle find opportunity to play their part, and as there can be no sudden change of character, and since the evils following immoral education are sure to have their play, the direful consequences are certain. “Vengeance is mine, I will repay, sayeth the Lord.” This is no new doctrine. History has taught the same old story from its dawn till now.

The French Revolution was not the work of a day, nor were its teachings dead when the blood ceased flowing and the glare of the torch died out. Napoleon's advent was but a bloody hand staying a national artery that the patient might retain strength enough to tear a wider international wound.

0018 18

As so much depends upon the teaching of the people, why will the Southerner be so blind? He claims that he desires the Negro to be better, and that his present condition is a foundation of his objections and complaints. We say to him, if you would teach the Negro to be just, be just to him. If you desire him to be faithful to trust, be faithful in your dealings with him. If you want him more chaste, show yourself a more conspicuous example of chastity than you ever have. If you desire him to be a skilled workman, throw not the stumbling block in his way. Do not strike because the proprietor makes the black boy an apprentice. If you are by education an unbeliever in his ability, show your Christian faith by your works and do something to encourage him to be a better workman. Be a good Samaritan. Follow the teachings of Christ, or confess yourself an infidel or a willful sinner condemned before God and man. You cannot have pitch tar running in your back yard with safety to your front door. Some one may unexpectedly cross the yard and be compelled to pass through that front portal. The lesson taught the Whites of the South by maintaining the abominable institution of slavery ought to have more weight than it has.

This trifling with the forces of nature is dangerous, this defying superhuman degrees both of nature and the Divine is lighting a match in a fire damp. There will be an explosion. Who can measure the damage to be done, the changes wrought, and the evils checked? What will it cost? No serious patriot can with composure view the present state of affairs and rock himself to sleep with a political lullaby. We can say with equal force with Jefferson, we “indeed tremble for our country when we reflect that God is just.” When he uttered these sentiments the form of evil was avowed ownership in man; today it is boasted superiority denying political and civil rights—an evil as sure and as strong, though in another dress.

The Negro haters of this country who are determined to retard his progress are as sure to fail as they have so far in the history of this new civilization. True, they did seem to succeed for two hundred and fifty years, spreading themselves like the green bay tree, but their institution has passed away, and lo it is not.

The power of Almighty God, as displayed in the dreadful Civil War, undid in four years two and a half centuries of human contriving. That man who reads history with a view of recognizing God therein and follows such a philosophy in his own actions, can not be very 0019 19far wrong in his results. The man who does not profit by the teachings of Paul, the mighty and unrivaled exponent of Christianity, from Mar's Hill, that God hath made of one blood all men to dwell upon earth, and the doctrine of Saint Peter that God is no respector of persons,as preached to the devout centurian, and the example of that perfect man Jesus Christ in his sermons and parables will go far from the true course and at some time, sooner or later, come into deadly conflict with natural and Divine law. For such a case the annals of time present but one lesson-sure destruction to the wrong side.

If we keep a man in a cramped condition, either bodily or mentally, he will not attain that perfection; he will when allowed the benefits of the great law of exercise, without which mental activity neither receptive nor creative can develop. It is unphilosophical and certainly illogical to claim that if there is any power in the Afro-American that the present would mark him a higher point upon the scale of material progress. Is it not a fact that nature has so established things that there must exist favorable surroundings for progress? Yes; very well it is known, for while in the dark days of slavery it was maintained that the Negro could not become intelligent, yet much time and money were spent to remove from him the opportunity. Nobody believed then that the colored man was beyond improvement, and nobody believes it now. If it is hoped to keep the Negro down he must robbed of all opportunity. That is the only way to keep him suppressed. Partial oppression though galling now, will be in the retrospect of two hundred years as only an annoyance. “For sweet are the uses of adversity.” Some sinew is being strengthened by this daily hurricane of damning outrage. The evil doer will but reach the sure consequences of his sowing; that ye sow shall ye reap; it will but make our condition better. It may make his worse. It may come in a whirlwind of pestilence, or direful war. The judgments of God are sure and His righteousness is everlasting. The eddies along the course of time do not turn the great stream. Right onward and forward all is tending; “Yet I doubt not thro' the ages one increasing purpose runs, And the thoughts of men are widen'd with the process of the sun.” It is concluded by some that the feeling in the South, per se, is more generous to the Negro than in the North. Some hold that 0020 20it is only the cold philosophy of northern intelligence which impels a white man there to accord the Negro his civil rights. Now under the two conditions, death under the cold formal justice of the North, is preferable to the life under the genial warmth of the southern regard, born of climate and bought at the expense of inalienable rights. Of what profit is a love extended to and only fit to be lavished upon an inferior and by a self-constituted arrogance which binds a slave? Extinction is more to be desired than life by favoritism. Rights are claimed, charity not asked, but justice demanded. To set man free when there is no just claim to him, is no favor. Rising above the common opinion of the vast majority and thereby showing superiority, will note the fact and proclaim the actor nature's noblest work—an honest man.

The charges made against the Afro-American as a citizen imply in his nature a lack of those essential qualities which make men strong and respected by other men. They necessarily imply a natural inferiority, and, if not refuted, apparently prove it. Now what is to be done? Prove them to be wrong, not by everlasting talk from a theoretical point of view alone. It may be unscientific to conclude that the Negro is inferior, or it may be illogical to so charge when opportunity has not been given for a test of power, but successful verbal answer cannot avail much. Time has not yet reached an end; it will avail but little to talk thus since the burden of proof is with us. The man who is prone must get up, if he would prove that he can do so. The conqueror is approved. It is the vanquished who need justifying. How then shall we do that? By a strict training and development. Let us hold one thought ever in mind, to wit: time is a very essential element in the case, and that no matter what the conditions are, the time will be proportioned to the real work of excellence done as a duty by ourselves. No amount of interest from without can solve the problem. White men may theorize and sermonize, but the Negro must do the work himself.

Any genuine aid can be thankfully received, but no amount of carrying can do the work alone. When we go to school, it must be for systematic study and mental development, with sufficient time allowed for natural and acquired maturity. Time must be given for both preparation and finishing. The notion that the colored boy should be hurried through that he may soon go into the world, and that other ruinous practice of sending him into active life fit only to 0021 21teach Negroes, are damaging in fact, pernicious in tendency and contradictory in character. When we attempt to build a house it must be by plan and specification carefully carried out. When we enter business, it must be upon those principles that make business success, with energy and practical application of right theories.

We cannot rest yet upon any victory won. We have not yet demonstrated our full worth. We have no standing in the literary world; commercially, we are not; financially, we are small though creditable; morally, we are no worse than the Whites, and, with regret I say, no better. There is no crime or misdemeanor in the category, either in fact or degree, not practiced by white men and black men alike. The difference is that the White Man, by a higher culture has eliminated to some extent, grossness of manner from his vices, and does his sinning with the elegance of the modern Parisians, or after the manner of the aesthetic Athenians.

Money does sometimes hide the enormity of his crime, but it does not lessen it. In the world's history we often find brilliant culture in close consort with deep moral degradation. Athens sank beneath such a union, and Rome fell when the same enervating influences were transferred from Attica to the banks of the Tiber. How then can America hope to profit by it.

Let the strength of the defense come from within. The patient is better cured whose constitution can throw off the disease rather than trust to the reinforcing influence of a foreign substance. He who is kept alive by medicine must always apply the antidote, or die. But he who has that physical power to withstand the dread contagion, or repel its attack, will prove the law of the survival of the fittest, and will live. It is he who must put his shoulder to the wheel and tug away at this great load. Our task is not complete in keeping the load from descending the hill, but we are to push it up. We can no longer with safety be a chock block only. We must become aggressive and energetic functions in the equation of the political, civil, and economical world. It is up-hill work, but it must be done.

Men who toil must see the results of their labors or they will become discouraged and exhausted. Have we any reason to be hopeful? Emphatically, yes, notwithstanding an apparent apathy on the part of some of the educated, there is an unmistakable increase in the number who long for the higher condition, labor, and contribute for the same. No matter how virulent the opposition may 0022 22be, and how little real honest interest is taken in the school and higher institutions of learning for the Negro in the South, they are tolerated and unmolested in any and every State in the Union. Where once the torch would have been applied all are willing that the Negro school should adorn the hill top or be sheltered in the valley. Wonderful have been the strides in advancing thought among the Southern White People. There is unmistakable progress shown in the fact that both Virginia and South Carolina refused to enact a separate car law. Mississippi's New Constitution must soon fall, and will in effect as soon as white men are injured by its objectionable clause.

THE FINANCIAL PHASE.

A review of the financial field will show much of interest; something of value when the past is contrasted with the present. When we remember that the Emancipation Proclamation found us enslaved with nothing, and turned us loose naked with no money wherewith to buy, and now behold the Negro is accredited with the possession of from 160 millions to 264 millions of dollars, is there not opportunity for congratulations upon our part, and reason for bright anticipations for the time to come? As we move along our lonely way with the waves of Teutonic avarice dashing across our path, and the sleet and rain of local and national prejudice beating in our faces, that we have not made greater progress is not the wonder; it is marvelous that we have advanced at all. Assuming that the Negro was worth ten millions when freedom greeted him on his pilgrimage, and knowing that the Whites were worth 12 billions, whose showing is the more favorable from the standpoint of percentages? We are aware that beyond a certain point averages are not reliable data, but the difference is so great that there is opportunity for thought upon the question. Man for man the whites ought to have made much more rapid strides in acquiring wealth. But they have not. The gain for the whites on assessed valuation is about 100 per cent since 1860. Upon the assumption that the Negro was worth 10 millions then, and now from 160 millions to 264 millions, his gain per cent is about from 1600 to 2600 per cent, and that too when he has a chance equal to the White Man's discounted 60 per cent. The worse element of our enemies see these advances and the great bugbear, social equality is thrown forward to induce the masses through fear to aid in checking our 0023 23progress. Hence the attempt to pass laws to relegate the Negro to physical and civil surroundings which degrade the thinking and practical living of men. On the other hand the same showing should encourage and embolden the colored man to put into operation and to a great degree those qualities which we are not willing to be denied the possession of. The Negro must get more money. He must have the benefits of labor performed and not yet expended. Money is the storehouse of past efforts. In hand it represents back achievements. It supplements present individual ability, and gives greater effectiveness; hence money is the great cry, for it brings with it convenience and gratification.

Money, money, money. That is the cry of mankind from the oriental mart to the prairie of the setting sun. Through an invention of man it has so absorbed his thoughts, and has so linked itself with his dearest interests, that through the laws of heredity it is infused into his life blood, it is transmitted to his progeny. Money is continually before our gaze. Talk of money and you arrest the attention of the hoary headed; show a shining coin and the prattling babe grasps for it. It is the desire of youth and the comfort of old age. We contemplate it with eagerness. We receive it with profound satisfaction. It is power. The power of wealth is almost absolute upon earth with man. In all times the influence of wealth has held sway among men. In ancient times, as a rule, when a man's importance in a community, was measured by wealth, or in the medieval times of the reformers, when disputation ran high and the martyr's pile burned, money made and unmade circumstances. It turns the current of legislation and gives weight to petitions. The sovereignty of money is recognized through all literature—historical, poetical, and political; scientific, sacred and profane. Yes, there is more in life than money-getting; all other things being equal, there is more in life in getting money.

Good character is a pricless jewel, but there are some jewels upon which there is a price and which money can buy. Without money any individual, class or nation lacks opportunity to do good. The great missionary work of the world must have money. Australia, Honolulu, Japan, India, Africa, and Madagascar have beheld the light of the gospel in proportion to the money expended in their missions. No nation ever was powerful without wealth. Men are not happy without shekels. Lack of money is deprivation; deprivation entails misery. Let this down-trodden and despised race in 0024 24the United States get money and conditions will materially change. We have religion, and are unanimously as faithful to the prevailing religion as any other class.

We can develop intellect as rapidly under encouraging circumstances. Oh! “there's the rub"—encouraging circumstance! They come with leisure, and leisure is the result of wealth. Break the solidity of the poverty of the Negroes of the United States with silver dollars, and you solve one of the most difficult phases of The Problem. In general there is no financial advantage to the White Man to either associate with or treat the Negro justly.

How, then, are we, with this great load of poverty, to shake off ignorance and vice? Should I say vice? Not without qualification, for vice is not cured either by money or intelligence. It may be hidden, so to speak. “Offense's gilded hand may shove by justice; And oft 'tis seen the wicked prize itself buys out the law.” It will be as just for a Negro murderer to escape the righteous penalty of the law through white silver as for the Caucasian to cheat the scaffold of its due through yellow gold.

My advice to every Negro is to get wealth. Get it for the good it will do. Use it honorably as a gift from God. Bring with it all you can. Make money and save money. Save it that you may help your father to come out of the dark alley where the surroundings are not conducive to refinement. Take care of your money that you may defend your rights, protect your health, help the needy, and command respect.

When it becomes more the rule than the exception for the Negro to provide for his family with refinement while living, and upon dying leave them with a competency, prejudices will be mitigated. When along with the request for preferment will come endowment; when the black philanthropist can with a princely gift turn an unpopulated district into a center of learning; when Negro wealth can establish a Palo Alto or a Lehigh, then honest demands will have more weight. Save money for such ennobling objects and money getting becomes a virtue sanctified by the righteousness of a noble purpose.

DUTY.

The sentiment of duty comes from the intuitive recognition of the Good. Obligation is a product of the natural bias to do what 0025 25common sense dictates to be right. In the truest sense there can be no degrees in a question of duty, but viewed from a nearer standpoint, taking into consideration the different elements which enter into any decision for action, or opinion, we may practically, though not philosophically, consider the question from a common acceptation, and allow the great moral principle of action to degenerate to that of expediency and personal interest. We put not forth such a position from dictate of conscience, but rather to see how men have, though intelligent, done the most unreasonable things.

The question arises, can a Negro under the circumstances act from the higher principle when all around him his enemies are grinding him to powder? Must he put aside the promptings of consanguinity, natural race preference, and in the full faith of the eternal principles of justice act for God and right? Can he forget how others of the human family, by riding rough shod over the dead, dying and fallen, to sure victory and race establishment, have won national and race glory? With an abiding faith in the final triumph of right, with a deep-seated belief in the justice of a wise and benevolent Creator, Preserver and Defender of mankind we can rest upon the promises of Divine Revelation and feel our security in our Lord as our strength and our shield, and our certain hope in time of trouble, and remain strong in following the path of upright principles for duty's sake alone.

A man's duty must be gauged by his ability. This ability is not necessarily the result of schooling in the regularly organized college. It may be the outcome of exceptional opportunities in the business world. It may come from a greater endowment of natural capacity for those things that are of a higher or more culturing character. It may be that you can see deeper into the “Philosophy of History,” and by happy anticipation reason out, and by prophetic foresight announce the sure results of a particular course to be pursued. Perhaps you have read the mistakes of others, and by a keen insight can prevent the like to a race. As the chief aim of education is the perfection of the individual, in as far as we have gained that perfection, in so far we have gained a self-control which will aid in selecting the wiser course when troubles not only perplex but exasperate. It is for the learned to accord reason the leadership and send selfishness to the rear. If the schooled have not, do not wonder that the unschooled have not. In his true place the educated 0026 26man is a leader. A leader should be wise and discreet. Impetuosity should not allure him to rashness, nor cold indifference make him lag behind. We should know better wherein the weaknesses of the race lie and its strength may be found. We should have learned of ourselves better than those who hold a Mohonk Conference, exclude us therefrom, and adjudge our case in our absence.

Have we studied wherein nature meant this race to excel? Have we from the dictates of conscience concluded how far self-abnegation may be just to ourselves and at the same time generous to the race? Have we consecrated ourselves to any lofty object for the benefit of the race, hence of benevolence to humanity, or do we stand yet unpledged? God forbid.

The preacher must stand in the van fighting for God and the right; he must make himself most fit to do battle by close study and earnestness of purpose. He by a study of the life of the Master whom he claims to serve has the strongest weapon man ever used in warfare. He has the power of the Decalogue and the Golden Rule to launch out with for justice. They have stood the test of ages. It is the armor used by Moses to bring him out of Egyptian bondage. It was the marrow and pith of Paul's matchless agitation, and it is what has been the shield and defense of all good causes since the world began. It broke the shackles from more limbs than the American Negro. Now is the time to fight. There is a great moral warfare in progress. There are sins to preach against and virtues to inculcate.

The colored lawyer has a duty to perform. Since there is a legal phase to the case, we want to know the law, and have a defense framed. He should be the defender. The defense should be based upon a thorough study of the history of jurisprudence and equity pleading. He should come assured with erudition, with logically trained and broadly cultured mental powers which do not ask, but, by the very sublimity of their convincing force will not only demand, but will receive a hearing.

The colored physician is a factor in the solution. There is a sanitary phase to the problem. Vital statistics should be examined and commented upon by one trained to note the character of diseases. Wrong conclusions are to be righted and damaging charges refuted. The physician should point out the fallacy of the enemy, denounce false charges from a foundation of professional 0027 27knowledge and skill with convincing effects from fact so palpaple that to deny his position would be to contradict science and bring the objector into professional disrepute. He should give hygienic advice to those needing it.

The relation expressed by “our” includes the literary student among us. He who can write from a fund of information, historical and scientific who can analyze prejudice and show its vulnerability, those conclusions can stand the test of critical scrutiny and hypercritical examination. Our includes him, who though he does not convince all, can win some, refute others, and spike the guns of the malicious maligner of the Negro in toto, and with dignity sit among the creditable. The relation includes him, for whom an aged father or a decrepid mother labored and died, toiling that he might drink invigorating draughts of knowledge, of which they heard but never tasted. It includes him who received his education through the benevolence of charity. It includes him who through his own brawn has reached the educated state. It includes him who, though born and reared in Northern States, educated there or aboard, is still a Negro, with oppression and difficulties because he is such. Considering the fact that the Negro can scarcely get a fair hearing either in public assembly or press, and the other fact that he so much needs to advocate his own because and since the poor and weak will not be so forceful in the advocacy of the victim, there is a reason that the strongest of the race throw themselves into the arena and do noble battle in the cause. The uneducated have a right to expect that those whose duty is the larger from the possession of broader attainments will do better work.

If we can permit ourselves to suggest a very probable solution to the problem, we can sum it up in one comprehensive word, which in its truest sense contains all that man ever was either in Egyptian, Jewish, Persian, Arabian, Moorish, or Christian civilization. The one word that will give the key to the unlocking of the mystery of the dead past, the living present, or the ever coming future, is education, moral—intellectual and physical.

As is the training so is the man. Education, ancestral, caste, state, theocratic, priestly, or patriarchal, as is its distinguishing character, so will be its effective influence. Then how necessary it is to see to its proper enforcement. In these times when the friends of the Freedmen are holding conferences to discuss this all important 0028 28question and denying us a voice therein; when they consider our “Ministerial Education,” and weigh “Co-education of the Races,” and almost draw the sectional lance as to “How can Northern and Southern Christians best co-operate for the Moral and Spiritual Elevation of the Negro,” and advise as to “The Industrial Future of the Negro;“ when all these things are being said and read, is it not in itself a pernicious species of education to exclude the Black Man from participation therein. Are there no colored men wise enough to grapple with these vital questions? Is Alexander Crummell dead? Is J.C. Price unworthy? Has Grimké lost his power? Has Fannie Jackson Coppin lost interest in the work? Bishop Payne still lives. Robert Purvis has not retired to the limbo of decrepitude either in interest or power. Neither age nor indifference has forced the mighty Douglas from the field.

And so I might go on, but necessity does not demand it,n” convert the rampant pro-slavery devotee into a disturber of the peace, a troubler of Israel, of the nature of Elijah of Old. It may be to show the “case in equity,” and by inherent challenge silence the oppressor, and leave him and his sins with not even a pretense of support. Then stop and think, for it is our duty.

The thought should be spent upon those things which work for the upbuilding of humanity. The kind which characterizes men's best achievements. Such as exposes fallacies and substantiates 0029 29truth. A definite aim should be ever held to view. Thought should proceed logically and in accord with the easy and natural bent of the mind. Get facts, observe their relations, ferret out causes, and formulate laws. Let the scope be as extensive as truth and as persistent as the case demands, minute in scrutiny and projective in forces, wringing from Nature what she has of benefit for man and the glory of God. With the Negro thinking thus we may expect a favorable solution of the Problem.

Now to epitomize: There is a Negro Problem; it grows out of natural class feeling and finds food to thrive upon other than upon the real condition of the colored people.

Second. Our relation to The Problem is a definite and inalienable one. We are born to it and held to our birthright by every tie known to man sanctifying an adherence to duty. A recognition of our true relation makes the duty plain, so plain that a wayfaring man, though a fool may see it.

I repeat that one who does not see a relation close and exacting is either insincere or is possessed with a moral obliquity that staggers human credulity.

Third. Duty being known and opportunity for work having been given we must not sit idly down and say: “The night hath come, it is no longer day.” “The night hath not yet come.” There are things to do and dare. “Let us then be up and doing. With a heart for any fate, Still achieving, still pursuing, Learn to labor and to wait.” Remember that— “What hath been written shall remain, Nor be erased or written o'er again. The unwritten only still belongs to thee; Take heed and ponder well what that shall be.” To say what was, is, or will be best to do, requires Omnipotence. “In vain the problem we would solve, Or keep the crown we once possessed; With Fortune's wheel we must revolve, And take our chances with the rest, Through disappointment, pain, or woe, Whatever grief the heart must feel, It is enough for us to know The hand of God is at the wheel.”