telligent and self-respecting man or woman can be conceived than the treatment to which the better class of negroes in the South are subjected in this ruthless enforcement of the mortifying regulations for the separation of the races. Yet all protest is unavailing. The laws which accomplish this degrading discrimination against the black man are denounced by the enlightened members of his race, but have been steadily upheld by the courts and sanctioned by the Interstate Commerce Commission as constituting proper and reasonable regulations of travel. The negro asserts that these unjust laws result in the dwarfing of the manhood and womanhood of his people, and bitterly denounces the practice of exacting payment for first-class accommodations and then compelling the members of his race, theoretically equal before the law, to submit themselves to such obnoxious requirements.

The Bishops of the African Methodist Episcopal Church, in session at Washington, have joined in a complaint to the Interstate Commerce Commission against the unjust discrimination and unlawful treatment meted out to the members of their church by the various railways of the Southern States. Their complaint will be heard, gravely considered, and the action of the railway companies approved upon the theory that if equal accommodations are furnished there is no illegal discrimination. It cannot be otherwise. The fundamental racial instinct for separation is too strong. Never in this country will the whites and the blacks be found enjoying public accommodations upon a plane of equality, where the members of the latter class are sufficiently numerous to make separation feasible.

Closing the chapter with these striking illustrations of the impossibility of harmonizing the relations of the two antagonistic races in our country, we will proceed to consider another and equally interesting phase of the problem.

CHAPTER VI

WHY ATTEMPT TO SOLVE THE PROBLEM AT ALL?

Any degree of departure from sound basic principles is as dangerous in governmental affairs as in the exact sciences, and when the departure has gone so far as to demonstrate the error, only the foolish will continue to propagate it. So, when a political error, fundamental in character, has been so far pursued as to demonstrate its certain evil tendency the time is at hand to heroically apply the remedy and avert the impending certain disaster by returning to sound principles. - Congressman J. WARREN KEIFER, of Ohio. Speech in House of Representatives, March 15, 1906.

"BUT," says the reader, “why concern ourselves with

any solution of the problem? Our efforts in the past to bring about a settlement of the question cannot be regarded with unalloyed satisfaction. Where we have meddled and interfered and theorized we have generally gone wrong. Why not leave the problem to work itself out? It is not pressing in the North and the South seems to be willing to take care of it." "What harm," says my friend to me, "is the negro doing anyhow? If you leave him alone he does not interfere with you, and he certainly is entitled to live and work and to fashion his own destiny. Why all this turmoil, this magazine writing, this persistent discussion up and down the land of the negro problem? Why not leave it alone and let it work itself out?"

Well, in the first place, we simply cannot leave it alone. The fact of the continuance of this interminable discussion, the constant output of books, newspaper editorials and

magazine articles, the negro educational conferences and violent Congressional debates, all indicate that the problem is acute in the public mind and persistently demanding solution.

And so this constant sense of unrest on the subject of the negro denotes the presence of a growing social disease. The really healthy man is not concerned about his health. The organs of his body perform their natural functions so harmoniously as not to attract his attention in the slightest degree. An analogous law prevails in the spiritual world. The man whose life is based upon truth, and whose conduct stands square with principles of rectitude, exhibits no apprehension as to his future spiritual condition. Only when this nation adopts some rational theory for the solution of this apparently inscrutable problem and bends its energies to effect its execution will the present disagreeable and dangerous discussion of the subject cease.

As a matter of fact, in our treatment of the question we have pursued the laissez-faire policy from the beginning, and with one exception hereinafter noted no definite national policy has ever been proposed upon the Solution. subject. We have simply drifted and temporized,

Need of a

Definite

suffered and sacrificed on account of the negro, theorized without acting, until we find ourselves to-day afloat upon the same current of uncertainty, unknowing in what direction we are going or what unforeseen consequences may follow our neglect.

Nothing is more certain than that if this nation is to achieve a destiny commensurate with its illustrious past, some adequate solution of the negro problem must be effected without delay. By postponement, paltering, and disagreement, we but prolong the evil and increase the difficulty of applying the remedy. Such has been our policy, or rather lack of policy, in the past that unless a decided change for the better

be made in this regard nothing but the most disastrous results can be expected to follow our exhibition of optimistic fatalism.

The status of the negro problem at the present time bears great resemblance to that of the question of slavery in the years preceding the Civil War. North and South, radical and conservative, slaveholder and non-slaveholder, fireeater and abolitionist, differed and wrangled for decades as to the course to be pursued in regard to that institution, the result being that the problem year by year darkened and became more difficult of peaceful solution, until war as the inevitable result was invoked to effect a separation of irreconcilable interests. Under this impracticable, vacillating policy, settlement after settlement was announced, each one intended finally to dispose of the vexatious subject. Compromises, constitutional and unconstitutional, political and non-political, were effected, each believed to be the veritable burial-place of the question. And yet, after each settlement, the irrepressible conflict between freedom and slavery broke out in fiercer form, and after each compromise all parties found that inconvenience had been endured and rights had been bartered away, only to leave the final adjustment of the problem more pressing than ever and the possibility of peaceful solution more remote.

And so will it be with this problem which is the subject of our thought. We need but to turn back to the literature of the period succeeding the war and there to read the hopeful prognostications of the leaders of political thought of that era, to see how little of their hope has been realized and how much of unexpected disappointment has occurred, and to appreciate that whatever apparent progress has been made towards the amelioration of the condition of the negro but little progress has been made in the direction of a solution of the problem. On this subject our thoughts are

disorganized, disagreeing, ineffectual, chaotic. No adequate plan has been formed for the solution of the problem, and yet we simply cannot leave the question alone.

Urgent
Reasons.

Now, secondly, even if we could leave the problem alone, it is our duty to ourselves and to the negro race to take immediate steps to remedy the present situation. The presence of a great number of people of the negro race in this country, living under the conditions depicted in the foregoing chapters and under other conditions, social and political, to be discussed in following pages, is a continual detriment to the nation and a drawback to its development.

First: To begin with, physically the negro is an injurious element in the state. Living, as he ordinarily does, a debased life, usually in degrading surroundings, he is a persistent breeder of disease and is in many ways instrumental in lowering our physical condition. The negroes in the South wash the clothing of the whites and prepare their food, and in this way tuberculosis and other contagious diseases are frequently transmitted. To quote from the essay of Dr. Bean on the training of the negro:

They tend our children, and not only convey the great white plague, but worse still, by intimate contact they affect the morals of the young. As washerwomen they contaminate our clothes. They are foci of infection in any community.

And to any discerning mind it must be apparent beyond question that the presence of so many individuals living under inferior physical conditions cannot but be detrimental to the welfare of the nation.

Beyond the physical effects, wherever they are found in great numbers they constitute an injury to the property interests of the section. So much so is this the case that in many Western towns and cities, notably in Indiana, Illinois,