“The riot was made possible by the worthlessness of the police and judiciary. As usual in a place of such sudden rise to greatness as Tulsa, the vicious elements have entirely too large a control of the municipal authorities. The houses of ill-fame, gambling joints, bootleggers, and other criminals have too much to say as to the selection of officials. For 14 years Tulsa has been in the absolute control of this element. The better class of people were too much absorbed making the easy money possible there to bother themselves and give up any time to politics.
“Quite a number of negroes have made fortunes in Tulsa and they became the special objects of the mob. One colored man owned and operated a printing plant with $25,000 of printing machinery in it. It was assailed and burned to the ground by a mob led by a man who had been working a linotype at a salary of $48 a week. Of course, this linotype man professed to be a “perfect Southern gentleman” and superior to a negro, although he degraded himself by working for him at good wages. Dr. A. C. Jackson, a colored physician, who was called by competent authorities the most able negro surgeon in America, was marked for the wrath of the mob because he owned $100,000 worth of property. He tried to fight against the mob and surrendered under a pledge of protection, but was murdered on his way to jail.” ...
The above are but a few of the many such editorials that have recently come under the notice of the writer, and if white editors who run out such editorials could just mingle among the masses of both races where their papers are read and listen to the comments being made, they would be amazed to note the influence for good that such writings are exerting. And if now in this critical period of racial unrest, the majority of white editors through this land together with the white clergy will take such stands for law and order, the race prejudice in this country will be checked before its barbarism pulls the United States down, down, down to the very lowest and most despised race among all nations and countries—civilized and uncivilized. For this unjust public sentiment can only be checked and changed by the right kind of influences starting from the white pulpits and printing rooms. The frequent clashings of swords cannot force about such a change, but the constant exchange of reasoning sermons and editorials can persuade such a change to come about.
If it is the fear of losing their congregations and churches that prevents so many white ministers from taking such a stand; then the way to be outspoken (instead of silent) against mob sins and crimes, and still keep “Mrs. Wolf” from grinning at them through their parsonage windows, is for all of them to become outspoken. And as their people must continue to have churches and be preached to, those ministers would still hold their pulpits as they would then be the only kind of preachers (outspoken) to listen to.
If it is the fear of losing their subscribers and seeing their papers go into the waste baskets that keeps so many white editors from taking such a rightful stand; then the way to keep and increase their subscribers and at the same time keep “Mr. Wolf” from sniffing around the kitchen doors, is for all editors to begin to use the “Golden (printer’s guiding) Rule” to measure out their editorials on the Race questions. As their people must have newspapers in order to learn what is going on in the world, rather than get no papers they would buy the only kind (the fair and just) that would then be printed. And in using the above methods in bringing about brotherhood and Christlike feelings between the two races, no one would be the loser, but all would be the gainers.
As another witness and proof that courageously standing for right and fearlessly denouncing wrong through their convincing columns does not weaken but eventually strengthens and increases the influence of such white periodicals; the writer quotes below in part an editorial that appeared in the September 14, 1921 issue of The Nation, a world-famed white magazine that has been successfully published in New York for over fifty years during all which time its publication has continued to grow and spread as the results of just such Golden Rule editorials as the following:
“The daughter of Mr. J. B. Webb, “prominent in financial and social circles,” chose to marry a groom, her sister having previously married a policeman.... The newspapers sent around special reporters in battalions. Then up spoke Mr. Webb: “It’s rotten, that’s what I call it—rotten! To tear a person’s life to shreds like this, and bring up for the public eye the affairs of one poor little girl.” To which we say a hearty Amen. But more rotten than this outrageous violation of individual rights by the press is the careless or malicious zest with which certain papers, especially in the South, publish stories from depraved or irresponsible white women accusing some black man of a more or less grave offense against them. Every newspaperman knows that just such a story started the Tulsa riots, as well as those in Washington and in Omaha. Yet here we find on the front pages of the Memphis Commercial Appeal two circumstantial stories of attack by Negroes on white women. Both of them were false, as the newspaper itself admitted less conspicuously next day. This sort of thing is all too common and not every city has a paper as bold as the Memphis Press in denouncing it. It is high time for a renascence of ethical standards in newsgathering.”
In Magazine Writing
Just as Dr. W. E. B. DuBois is recognized as the foremost magazine writer in the Negro race, not only in America but throughout the world; it is said he has also made The Crisis Magazine, of which he is editor-in-chief, the widest read Colored magazine of its kind not only in the Western but also in the Eastern Hemisphere. It is estimated that this magazine is read each month by nearly four hundred thousand people.
Among lettered Colored women, Miss Jessie R. Fauset, a graduate of Cornell where she was made a member of the Phi Betta Kappa Fraternity, later becoming a teacher of French and Latin in the M Street High School, Washington, D.C., and at present Literary Editor of the The Crisis Magazine, is today recognized by the best critics as a leading and most versatile magazine writer.