The determination of the white people now is to dominate predominately, and in all human probability this determination is to become intensely more fixed, even at the cost of their lives, their fortunes and their honor; while the Negroes will be equally determined, after equal fitness with the white man for the performance of the duties of citizenship, so determined that no power on earth or Heaven except extermination shall deny them certain inalienable rights which all instruction teaches them are cheap at any sacrifice. They will never assimilate Patrick Henry’s great speech until they are ready to act it. They can never act it until they are ready to accept death rather than slavery. Without the patriotism and love of liberty inspiring this immortal Virginian they can never develop the ideal that is in them.
Who would smother the ideals and aspirations of any race does so at the expense of their immortal souls. God could not be just unless He protected the emotions of human beings with the same degree of efficiency with which He protected the organs within them. Protecting the brain is a mass of bone and fiber; in front and behind the heart and lungs, are breastworks of superior construction, and around the longings and aspirations of the human heart are the bulwarks of self-condemnation and eternal damnation for any man or race of men who desecrate those sacred chambers by closing the opportunities for their development.
It may be argued that if this psychological law is true in practice the necessity for segregation exists in the imagination only—that the Race Problem will solve itself on the principle of self preservation and self interest if let alone and given time. The trouble with this argument is that it fails to take into account the value of the most effective means of preserving the integrity of both races. If God in His wisdom contemplated the commingling of races never before in physical touch it was for a temporary period only, each race, in the meantime, being endowed with reason sufficient to find a common solution for the evils which the Creator knew physical contact would produce.
That solution is segregation. It offers intact all the advantages which the opportunities of life among a highly civilized race create without the demoralizing and humiliating influences at work on account of race prejudice. It frees the whites and Negroes alike and enlarges the opportunities for the development of each race, under a common flag, that will no longer be under the necessity of polluting the pure air of Heaven by withholding its protection from among even the humblest of its citizens.
We often hear it said that the Negro is not yet ready for self-government, that he has not the fitness yet to govern under a territorial form of government; but less intelligent and far inferior races are at this time governing themselves. Were the Cubans as capable of self-government as the Negroes are now when the government of Cuba was assumed by them? Did not the United States Government entrust the Indians with a measure of self-government when the Indian territory was created and this race was settled in the West? There is no nation south of the United States with the possible exception of Brazil whose citizens have the intelligence and efficiency of the Negroes of North America for self-government. Besides, under the plan for segregation a territorial form of government is proposed until such time as statehood is more desirable. While the Negroes are being prepared for controlling their own affairs government under territorial laws would make life safe and insure equal rights to all. At least, the government of the territory, it is safe to say, would not be worse than the government obtained in the Southern States today.
But the Negro race is entirely capable at this time of managing its own affairs, supervised by a wise and just administration at Washington.
CHAPTER XVI.
Efficiency of Negro.
The records of the conduct of Negroes in office, with the exception of the rascality of those in power in the South during the Reconstruction Period, are creditable indeed, to the race from which they sprang. Responsibility for the scandals attaching to the rule of the race in some of the Southern States directly after the war are chargeable not to the Negro but to the corruption of the white men who imposed on the Negro by taking advantage of his ignorance and making him the cat’s paw with which they attempted to extricate themselves from many difficulties without the stain of dishonor.
The first Negroes to become members of the legislature of any State in the Union were Edward G. Walker and Charles L. Mitchell of Massachusetts in 1866. The records show they discharged their duties with intelligence and honor.