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| Photograph by Hitchler | Photograph by Pach Bros. |
| JAMES H. DILLARD of New Orleans, President Jeanes Fund Board. | EDWIN A. ALDERMAN President of the University of Virginia. |
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| Photograph by The Elliotts | |
| A. M. SOULE President Georgia State College of Agriculture. | D. F. HOUSTON President of the University of Texas. |
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| Photograph by Pach Bros. | Photograph by Knafft & Bro. |
| GEORGE FOSTER PEABODY of New York, member of the Southern Education and Jeanes Fund Boards. | P. P. CLAXTON of the University of Tennessee, leader of the educational campaign in Tennessee. |
The condition in the South may be likened to a battle in which the contestants, weary of profitless and wordy warfare, are turning homeward to gather up new ammunition. Each side is passionately getting education, acquiring land, developing wealth and industry, preparing for the struggles of the future. And it is a fine and wholesome tendency. In a large sense, indeed, this movement typifies the progressive thought of the entire country for it means a sincere attempt to change the plane of battle (for battle there must be) from one of crude, primitive force, whether physical, political, or, indeed, industrial, to one of intellectual efficiency or usefulness to society.
And these working idealists of both races understand one another better than most people think. Dr. Mitchell and President Alderman understand Booker T. Washington, and he understands them. This is not saying that they agree. But agreement upon every abstract principle is not necessary where both parties are hard at work at practical, definite, and immediate tasks.
Self-Criticism in the South
The new Southern statesmanship began (as all new movements begin) with self-criticism. Henry W. Grady, a real statesman, by criticising the old order of things, announced the beginning of the “New South”—an active, working, hopeful South.
He saw the faults of the old exclusive agricultural life and the danger of low-class, uneducated labour, and he urged industrial development and a better school system. R. H. Edmonds of Baltimore, through the Manufacturers’ Record, and many other able business leaders have done much to bring about the new industrial order: the day of new railroads, cotton-mills, and coal-mines; the day of cities.
But it is in the educational field that the development of the new statesmanship has been most remarkable. Although it was unfortunate in one way that so much of the political leadership of the South should have fallen to men of the type of Vardaman, Jeff Davis, and Heflin, it is highly fortunate in another way. For it has driven the broadest and ablest minds in the South to seek expression in other lines of activity, in industry and in the church, but particularly in educational leadership. It is not without profound significance that the great American, General Lee, turned his attention and gave his highest energies after Appomattox, not to politics, but to education. The South to-day has a group of schoolmen who are leaders of extraordinary force and courage. The ministry has also attained an influence in the South which it does not possess in most parts of the North. The influence of Bishop Galloway of Mississippi, Dr. John E. White and Dr. C. B. Wilmer of Atlanta, and many others has been notable.
For many years after the war the South was passive with exhaustion. Young men, who were not afraid, had to grow up to the task of reconstruction. And no one who has not traced the history of the South since the war can form any conception of the magnitude of that task. It was essentially the building of a new civilisation. The leaders were compelled not only to face abject poverty, but they have had to deal constantly with the problem of a labouring class just released from slavery. At every turn, in politics, in industry, in education, they were confronted with the Negro and the problem of what to do with him. Where one school-house would do in the North, they were compelled to build two school-houses, one for white children, one for black. It took from twenty-five to forty years of hard work after the war before the valuation of wealth in the South had again reached the figures of 1860. The valuations in the year 1890 for several of the states were less than in 1860. South Carolina in 1900—forty years after the beginning of the war—had only just caught up with the record of 1860. Since 1890, however, the increase everywhere has been swift and sure.
Courage and Vision of New Leaders
Well, it required courage and vision in the earlier days to go before a poverty-stricken people, who had not yet enough means for living comfortably, and to demand of them that they build up and support two systems of education in the South. And yet that was exactly the task of the educational pioneers. Statesmanship, as I have said, begins with self-criticism. While the mere politician is flattering his followers and confirming them in their errors, the true statesman is criticising them and spurring them to new beliefs and stronger activities. While the politician is pleading rights, the statesman also dares to emphasise duties. While the politicians in the South (not all, but many of them) have been harping on race prejudice and getting themselves elected to office by reviving ancient hatred, these new statesmen have been facing courageously forward, telling the people boldly of the conditions of illiteracy which surround them, and demanding that schools be built and every child, white and black, be educated. In many cases they have had to overcome a settled prejudice against education, especially education of Negroes; and after that was overcome they have had to build up a sense of social responsibility for universal education before they could count on getting the money they needed for their work.