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FROM
Another Angle on the Negro Question.
Address before the White Baptist Ministers' Conference of
New York City, February 19, I900,
By Rev. C. T. WALKER, D. D.,
Pastor of the Mt. Olivet Baptist Church, West 53d Street, New York City.
PRESS NOTICES.
"From the New York Press.
NEGRO ON NFGRO PROBLEM.
Preacher finds much prejudice against his race here.
"Truth from Another Angle on the Negro Problem" was the subject on which the Rev.
-Dr. C. T. Walker, pastor of the Mt. Olivet Baptist Church, spoke yesterday before the Baptist
Ministers' Conference. Dr. Walker came here only recently from Augusta, Ga., and he tells
his friends that he finds Northerners much prejudiced against the Negro. He did not treat
his theme from a sectional point of view, but merely called attention to the prejudice
against the black man by the Caucasian.
He discussed the various solutions to the "Negro Problem" from the emigration to the
annihilation of the race. His conclusion was that the remedy for existing evils is to be
found in ''simple justice" toward the colored people as men and women.
Short addresses commending the spirit of Dr. Walker's remarks were made by W. D
£Tpshaw of Mercer University, Georgia, and by the Rev. Dr. O. C. Pope, President of Sim¬
mons College in Texas. Dr. Walker is a Negro.
From the Examiner, New York City.
(Notes from meeting of the Ministers' Conference. 1
The paper of the morning was presented by Rev. Dr. Charles T. Walker, pastor of the
Mount Olivet Baptist Church. He discussed his topic, "Truth from Another Angle on the
Negro Problem," with so much freshness and power that the conference requested it for
publication, and voted money to cover the cost. The distinguishing feature of the paper
was the fact that Dr. Walker ascribed the prejudice against the Negro to racial rather than
sectional antipathies. He gave an outline of Negro advancement along religious, educational
and financial lines, pleaded for simple justice for the Negro and urged that all avenues of
progress should be open to him on the simple qualifications of manhood and character. The
discussion which followed was participated in by Rev. Messrs. J. A. Francis, J. B. Simmons,
D. J)., and O. C. Pope, D. D., Rev. Mr. Klugh, of Augusta, Ga., and Secretary Jordan of the
American Union (colored). Mr. W. D. Upshaw spoke briefly commending the spirit cf the
address and the noble work which Dr. Walker did in Augusta before comin M to New York
jPLIDDK-ESS
The Negro question or Negro Problem is one of the most important
topics of the age. It is the subject of public discussion for the platform,
pulpit, press, national halls of legislature, and in all political circles.
The question is, whether a race of people once enslaved, now
emancipated, can be raised to a position of political and social equality
with other races in the land which was the theatre of his servitude and
degredation.
Some say this question will be settled by patience ; some say by
the Negro acquiring money, property, and intelligence ; others have
said industrial education will settle it; and still others have said if the ,
Negro will let politics alone, surrender his citizenship, stay away from
the polls, that will settle it.
The Negro was stolen and brought to this country against his most
positive protest. For more than 250 years he was a slave, ignoiant,
wretched, and depraved ; morality debased, ambition humiliated, family
ties sundered and disrespected, sold from the auction block as chattel;
then emancipated ; penniless, ignorant and friendlecs, he is still hated,
rejected and despised. He is the subject of criticism, ridicule and
censure. His chains have been broken but he is not yet a free man;
his privileges are limited and restricted ; he is denied liberty and justice.
Yet he is patient, long-suffering and uncomplaining. He sees his rights
and liberties taken, and is not protected by the flag he has honored and
to which he has been loyal and true. He sees his race lynched, murdered,
and burnt, and only asks the Almighty God, how long !
The Negro has made wonderful progress since his emancipation,
under adverse circumstances.
His Progress Intellectually.
By reference to preceding reports of the United States Bureau of
Education in which this subject has been treated we find that for 1897
and 1898, 916,883 Negro children in the 16 former slave states and the
District of Columbia attending school, making 60 per cent, of the
colored enrollment. There are about 180 schools in the United States
for the secondary and higher education of colored youth exclusively.
In 161 of these institutions there were employed 1808 teachers. The
total enrollment being 42,328 students. In the collegiate grades there'
were 2492 students. In the secondary grades there were 13,669 students.
In the elementary grades there were 26,167 pupils. There were 1711 ,
students in classical courses, 1200 in scientific courses, 9724 in English
courses, 244 in business courses, and 4449 in normal courses. There
were 167 graduates from college courses, 859 from normal courses, and
853 from high school courses. 1285 students in professional courses.
There were 560 students and 63 graduates in theology. 116 students
and 39lgraduates in law, 342 students and 78 graduates in medicine, 43
students and 9 graduates in dentistry, 44 students and 11 graduates in
pharmacy, and 180 graduates in nurse training. Of the 42,328 students
in the 161 schools for the colored race 14,400 were receiving industrial
training. It is shown that 1260 of these were being trained in farm or
garden work, 1804 in carpentry, 107 in bricklaying, 94 in plasteiidg,
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130 in painting, 47 in tin or sheet metal work, 274 in forging, 222 in
machine shop work, 219 in shoe making, 685 in printing, 6,923 in sew¬
ings r>922 cooking, and 2,414 in other industrial branches. These
schools had in their libraries 237,145 volumes valued at $215,908.
26,000 Negroes are engaged in teaching school. More than 15,000 young
men and women are attending our colleges, more than 50 normal schools>
more than 40 schools for secondary instruction ; 18 colleges and univer¬
sities, 45 schools of theology, 6 schools for the deaf, dumb and blind,
and several schools of law. We have a multiplicity of preachers and a
surplus of school teachers.
The Negro has made progress in science, literature and art. A
Negro was the chosen graduating orator for Harvard. They have stood
the equal of others at Yale, Brown, Colgate. Chicago University, and
other great schools. The equatorial telescope in Lawrence University
of Wisconsin, was made by Negro students. Paul Laurence Dunbar is
one of the leading literary characters of the present century. Tanner's
"Raising of Lazarus" is a proof of the Negro's ability as a painter.
Williams, Brown, DuBois and Johnson have proven their ability as
historians, T. Thomas Fortune of The; New York Age ; Cooper of
The Colored American ; Knox of The Freeman ; Mitchell of The
Planet ; G. L. P. Taliaferro of The Christian Banner ; White of
The Georgia Baptist, have settled their status as journalists.
Booker T. Washington, W. H. Council, Jones and Vassar of the
University of Virginia ; Wright, president of the State College of
Georgia; Gilbert, of Brown University and the American College at
Athens, Greece ; Scarborough, author of a Greek Text Book ; Hope and
Page from Brown University; and W. F. Holmes of Atlanta Baptist
College and Chicago University, have proven their ability to educate
their own race.
The Negro is grateful to his northern and southern friends for
assistance rendered him in the enlightenment of his race, and in re¬
moving illiteracy among the colored people. He is placed under re¬
newed obligations to northern philanthropists such as Messrs. John F.
Slater, John D. Rockefeller, Dr. Nathan Bishop, Mr. C. P. Huntington.
Colonel Clinton B Fisk, Mrs. Benedict and hundreds of others who by
their princely munificence have given largely to assist the Negro in
becoming an intelligent, respected citizen.
His Financial Progress.
The Negro is paying taxes upon more than $400,000,000 worth of
property. He no longer sings "You may have all the world and give
me Jesus.'' Being imitative of his white brother he has decided to
secure as much of the world as possible and then have a claim upon
Jesus besides, like his white brother; it took considerable time for the n egro
to learn this lesson, and before he could fully learn it he found that his
white brother had'taken him at his word and had nearly cornered and
monopolized the world not excepting parts of Africa and then secured
large interests in Christ.
It has been said that the Negro is shiftless, indolent, and a woe¬
begone class. The charge does not hold good. It may well be re¬
membered that he spent two hundred and iorty-six years of earnest,
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faithful toil for his white brother ; and guarded and defended southern
homes like faithful sentinels during the civil war. And during that
time he was faithful to the trust committed to him, and when his master
was brought home wounded and dying he wept over him as sincerely as
Jacob mourned for Joseph.
With a little more than thirty years to labor for himself he should
not be expected to measure up with his more fortunate white brother
after giving him a start of two hundred and forty-six years ; that would
argue that our white friends have not done much for themselves or, that
they expect the Negro under adverse circumstances to accomplish much
more than they have done in a much longer time, and to concede that
would be admitting negro superiority, which our white friends cannot
afford to do.
They charge that the Negro is ignorant; then it is more incumbent
upon our more fortunate friends to assist in his enlightenment.
They say he is weak and helpless ; then ye that are strong should
bear the infirmities of the weak.
Many Negroes own farms ; have their own property, conducting
banks, factories, building and loan associations, joint stock companies,
co-operative stores, coal mines, and some few of them have succeeded in
purchasing the plantation of their former masters.
His religious progress has been commensurate with his numerical
growth. The colored people are religiously inclined ; they do not have
skeptics, infidels, atheists, nor agnostics. They have very little trouble
about the higher criticism, and need no ecclesiastical courts to try men
for heresy. The majority of them believe firmly in the triple declara¬
tion, one Lord, one Faith and one Baptism; and they are no loose Bap¬
tists. they believe in the landmark doctrine, all the doctrines, and,
although they admit that there are many things in the grand old book
they cannot understand they believe it as the inspired word of God, and
hence they swallow the whole book.
We have 1,700,000 Negro Baptists formed into a National Baptist
Convention, conducting missionary work on the West Coast of Africa,
South Alrica and in Cuba ; with a national publishing house at Nash¬
ville, Tenn., publishing Negro literature and giving employment to
more than fifty men and women.
The Negro's Patriotism.
The Negro has shown his patriotism and valor in all the wars of"
this country, and by this time should be recognized as a bona fide Amer¬
ican citizen. It was a Negro who captured General Prescott in his bed.
A Negro planned the successful capture of Percy's supply train. Peter
Salem shot and killed Major Pitcairn in battle at Bunker's Hill. The
first man to lose his life for this country was a Negro, Crispus Attucks,
in the Boston massacre. In the civil war over 220,000 Negro soldiers
fought for the Union and the emancipation of their race. During the
war a white colonel delivered the flag of our country to his black color
sergeant and said to him, "Sergeant, I place in your hands this sacred
flag, fight for it, yes, die for it, but never surrender it into the hands of
the enemy." The black soldier with love of country and pride in his
heart answered, "I'll bring the flag back in honor, colonel, or report to
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God the reason why." In one battle in carrying that flag of freedom
he was stricken down, he fell with the folds of the flag wrapped about
him, bathed in his blood. He did not bring it back, but God knew
the reason why. He did -all he coiild, all that any man could, he gave
his heart's blood for the flag.
The immortal Abraha»n Lincoln said, "During the long dark night
of war not a traitor was ever found in black skin."
Negro soldiers fought bravely in the war of 1812. General Butler
said of Negro soldiers while passing before a mass of upturned faces to
the sun. wounded and dead, "Let my tongue cleave to the root of my
mouth, and my right hand forget her cunning, if I fail to remember
these men and their race for the bravery displayed this day."
In the Spanish-American war, at San Juan Hill and El Caney, the
Negro troopers marched side by side with their white comrades, ascend¬
ed the hill, cut the barbed wire fences, passed through the high grass,
prevented the Rough Riders from extermination, repulsed the enemy,
took the Spanish block houses, and helped to win the day for America
and hasten the surrender of General Torral to General Shafter, after
planting Old Glory on the ramparts of Santiago.
The Negro problem is an American problem now. The solution of
this problem is in the hands of both races : Let the white man dethrone
prejudice and enthrone reason, remove hatred and place love in its stead,
banish revenge for sympathy and charity, and every man, white and
black, help his brother on life's highway. Let the Negro have an equal
chance in the race of life, give him clear opportunities, don't shut him
out from industrial trades, encourage him to be honest, industrious,
intelligent, economizing, and self-reliant, don't teach him to destroy
manhood in order to become a beneficiary.
There is one remedy which has not yet been tried, one doctrine
which does not find many advocates. This remedy was suggested by
Senator John J. Ingalls on the floor of the United States Senate in 1890.
He said : "Four solutions of this problem have been suggested—emi¬
gration, extermination, absorption, disfranchisement; but there is still
a fifth solution which has never been tried, and that solution is justice."
I appeal to the South to try the solution of justice; stack your guns,
open your ballot boxes, register your voters, white and black ; and if
after the experiment of justice has been fairly and honestly tried, it
appears that the African is incapable of civilization; if it appears that
the complexion burnt upon him by an Indian sun is incompatible with
freedom, I'll pledge myself to consult with you about some other way to
solving the race problem. But until then, until the establishment of
justice has been justly and fairly tried, nothing can be done.
"I believe the National Assembly of France was right when a cen¬
tury ago, inspired by the same spirit which gave this nation its inde¬
pendence, it declared that the great cause of public misfortune and cor¬
ruption of government was ignorance of human rights, neglect of human
rights, or contempt of human rights. And just as the famine which
was then decimating France, the bankruptcy and corruption of her
government, the brutish degradation of her working people, and the
demoralization of her aristocracy, were directly traqeable to the denial of
the equal, natural, and inprescriptible rights of man. So now the social
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and political problems which menace the American Government spring
from the same cause. And, until the rights of man are recognized,
guaranteed and maintained, in this nation, social disorders will continue,
the gangrene of corruption will continue to gnaw at the national heart,
and the race question will not be settled. Patience will help ; modera¬
tion will help ; economy will help ; education will help ; and a hundred
other things will help ; but the race question will never be settled in
this country until we, as a nation, shall secure to every citizen beneath
the flag, full, free, exact, and entire justice. "L,et justice be done, though
the heavens fall !"
The Negro is not pleading for social equality, he is not pleading for
Negro supremacy nor domination, he asks only for simple justice and
liberty. Open to him the gates of commerce ; if he can get enough
votes to go to Congress let him go. As our American white friends
believe in the survival of the fittest, as they believe in the superiority
of their race, there ought not to be any fear of Negro supremacy nor
Negro domination. The white man can't degrade the Negro without
degrading himself. It is his duty to help the Negro as a matter of self-
defense, for if he fails to lift up his fallen brother his fallen brother will
not fail to pull him down.
The Negro is asking for the right of citizenship like other people,
not as a black man but as a man ; he wants not only to be a freedman
but a free man. He does not ask for special legislation in his case ; he
does not want the law to inquire as to his color before rendering de¬
cisions. He wants to be put upon his own merits and allowed to stand
or fall, being g|ven an equal chance in the race of life. He wants his
white brother to assist him in instructing his race in the importance and
worth of character building, of self-reliance, of christian manhood, and
of material worth; and, while he is regarded as being the white man's
burden, he wishes to have it understood that his white brother, while he
may not be his (the Negro's) burden, has placed a great many burdens
on him. Some airy, dreamy, would-be poet, has written lines like these
concerning the colored man as the white man's burden :
"A charge to keep I have,
A negro to maintain ;
A never dying thirst for power,
To bind him with a chain.
Arm me with jealous care,
To make him know his place ;
And O, thy servant, I,ord prepare,
To rule the negro race.
Help me to rob and cheat,
The negro on the sly ;
Assured if he don't vote for me.
He must forever die."
Every man should give to every other man the same rights and
liberties he claims for himself.
Sentiment with many christians has a greater influence than loyalty
to Christ. Prejudice against the brother in black cannot be eradicated
by legislative enactments, nor by constitutional amendments. Mere
form of legislation will not remove it; for in many parts of this country
the presence of a black man in a religious gathering of whites would be
regarded as disturbing public worship, and although a revival mijjht be
sweeping like a mighty tidal wave, and the showers coming down in
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their season, the very presence of the brother in black would stifle the
spiritual emotion, convert the showers of revivalism into a storm of so-
called righteous indignation.
The Negro only asks to be regarded as an American citizen, he asks
no more ; he will be satisfied with no less, Whatever is conducive to
the best interest of the white race is best also tor the Negro race. II an
overcoat will keep a white man warm it will do the same for a Negro.
I have resolved to hate no man because of the color of his skin : as a
christian I can't, as a manly man I wont. Why should I blame my
white brother because God made him white; why should my white
brother blame me because God made me black?
There is a movement organized recently in Montgomery, Ala. >
among the white citizens which has for its object the bringing about
right relations between the white and colored people. One of its pro¬
moters said recently in an address at Tuskegee Institute, that one of the
objects cf the organization would be to teach white people to recognize
individual ability and character whether it was found under white or
black skin. This is a commendable movement.
We are in the closing year of the 19th century. Greatest of all
centuries save that in which man's Redeemer came to earth ; when the
dim flickering candle of types and shadows had died out and the eternal
light was seen rising in the East.
This centnry has been remarkable for progress, invention, mental
excitement, war, expansion and imperialism, the missionary century,
the century in which slavery was blotted from the nation's escutcheon ;
and the greatest event of the century to the Negro race, and to the white
race was the liberation of 4,000,000 slaves by one stroke cf Abraham
Lincoln's pen.
The Americans will have to deal with a new Negro in the 20th cen¬
tury. It will not be the ante-bellum Negro. He will ask and contend that
justice hold an even balance ; that this country where he has helped to
clear the forests, to fell the timbers, that he has bathed with his sweat,
tears and blood, shall recognize him as being at home, as forming a part
of the body politic. He will ask that unjust discrimination cease ; that
barriers to his progress be removed; that the fatherhood of God and the
trotherhood of mankind be recognized. At present the saloons are
doing more to teach universal brotherhood than many of our churches.
I believe in the theory of the unity of the human race. When the
three sons of Noah separated in the plain of Shine, Shem went into Asia,
Japheth into Europe, and Ham into Africa. Ham built Karnac, Thebes,
and the Pyramids. The land 01 Ham was the birthplace cf the great
emancipator, leader, commander and legislator; the first man to receive
Divine credentials to represent the court of Heaven in the Egyptian
court, and minister plenipotentiary, and become the greatest human
legislator the world ever produced ; even greater than Lycurgus the
Spartan lawgiver. The land of Ham furnished a servant for jedekiah
while he reigned in Jerusalem, in the person of Ebed Melee, the Ethi.
opian Negro who interceded with the King in behalf of Jeremiah, and
obtained permission to rescue him from the dark, unhealthy dungeon.
It was an Ethiopian Negro in the army of Israel under the command of
jaob, Cushi by name, that was entrusted with a message to King David
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concerning the death ot Absalom, and although Ahimaaz, the Jewish
priest, outran Cushi and reached the King first he could not give the
desired information ; Cushi soon reached the King, and the priest was
commanded to stand back and let Cushi approach. The unique and
intelligent manner in which the brother in black informed the King
stamped him as a patriot, a diplomat and a soldier. The modern Negro
like Cushi, is a little slow sometimes in reaching his destination, but
his information is reliable when he arrives.
It was the land of Ham which furnished shelter and protection for
our Saviour when Herod sought to take his life. The same country
furnished a Simon to bear the Cross ; and the Ethiopian to whom Philip
preached and baptfzed, who carried the news of salvation to his own
people, was from that country.
The Gospel, practical religion, and the Holy Spirit, will re-unite
these divided brothers, Shem, Ham and Japheth ; brothers so long sep¬
arated by prejudice, race hatred, gradations of intellect, financial bars
and social mountains. The Gospel which is boundless in its range,
infinite in its latitude, has no geographical lines, knows no man by the
color of his skin ; it is the exponent of the principles of the Kingdom
of God ; as Rome was the exponent of imperial law. The Gospel is
charged and surcharged with electricity from the Holy Spirit's power¬
house, and has wrapped within it the dynamite of Heaven.
I believe it to be the order of Divine Providence that these three
brothers shall meet again and hold a family reunion. I do not know
when, I do not know where. It may not be until the mighty procession
shall be formed with infinite and incalculable length, in one solid
phalanx, with military precision, and shall march with bold and intrepid
step from judgment to glory. But when the reunion takes place, Shem
will be represented in the person of the despised Chinaman and Japanese;
Japheth in the person of the invincible, unconquerable, the proud and
cultured Caucasian ; Ham will be represented in the person of the de¬
spised. rejected, hated, persecuted, and greatly oppressed Negro.
At> a representative of the sons of Ham, and in behalf of 10,000,000
of my oppressed people in this country, I promise you that we shall
make a creditable showing when the reunion takes place.
' Yes, Ethiopia shall yet stretch
Her bleeding hands abroad ;
Her crying agony has reached
The burning throne of God.
Redeemed from dust and freed from chains.
Her sons shall lift their eyes
From cloud capped hills and verdant plains,
Shall shouts of triumph rise.
Hasten Lord, the glorious time,
When beneath Messiah's sway,
Every tongue of every clime,
Shall the Gospel call obey.
Then shall wars and tumults cease ;
Then be banished grief and pain ;
Righteousness, and joy, and peace
Undisturbed, shall forever reign.
Mightiest kings his power shall own ;
Heathen tribes his name adore ;
Satan and his hosts overthrown,
Bound in chains shall hurt no more."
The Christian Banner Print, 1842 T.ombard St., Philadelphia.