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About The monitor. (Omaha, Neb.) 1915-1928 | View Entire Issue (July 11, 1924)
T H E M O N ITOR ° * '"li:TIv OT A NATIONAL WEEKLY NEWSPAPER DEVOTED TO THE INTERESTS OF COLORED AMERICANS £ THE REV. JOHN ALBERT WILLIAMS, Editor $2.00 a Year. 5c i f py OMAHA, NEBRASKA, JULY II, 1924 Whole Number 470 Vol. X—No. 2 IGNORE PARTY LINES National Conference of Social Workers Elect Negro Worker an Officer . 1 . — ■ — ■ --- --- - - - PRESSING PROBLEM BEFORE AMERICAN NEGRO IS BALLOT National Advancement Association Issues Important Address to Members of Race. PARTISANSHIP IS SECOHDARY Organization Urges Scrutiny of Can didates and Intelligent Discrim ination in Their Support at Election. Philadelphia, Pa., July 11.—The N. A. A. C. P. in Fifteenth Annual Con ference has made public the follow ing message to the American people: The National Association for the Advancement of Colored People in f ifteenth Annual Conference, assem bled believes that the pressing prob lem before the American Negro today is the use of his vote in the approach ing election. Republican Parly We face the two old parties and a possible third party movement. The republican party, which has always 1 commanded the great majority of our 1 votes, has, during the last two ad- 1 ministrations, recognized our right to ! a voice in the party counsels and ’ made some effort to carry out our 1 wishes in legislation and administra- ' tion; nevertheless, although in power ' in all branches of the government, it ' has specifically failed to pass the Dyer Anti-Lynching Hill, to abolish * segregation in the government of- 1 fires at Washington, to take any ac- f tion with regard to "Jim Crow" cars 1 in interstate travel, to withdraw our c military forces from Haiti, and to * make a loan to Liberia. Democratic Party s The Democratic Party appears to us in two distinct parts. The north ern wing of the party has recognized ** our demands in many states and treated us with great fairness. Hut this northern wing is at the absolute " mercy of the "solid South” with its 1 “rotten borough” system depending 1 upon the disfranchisement of the Ne- ‘ gro; with its segregation and “Jim a Crow” legislation, its mob law and d lynching, and its denial of proper ! education to Negro children. The Klan Denounced Both parties are catering to the Ku n Klux Klan, that secret fomenter of religious intolerance, race hate and ^ midnight murder, whose spread is the ^ grcate-t proof of national decadence and the greatest menace to demo- ( cracy. The Negro Vote It is manifestly impossible that un- . ler these circumstances the enfran- ^ chised Negroes of the United States should vote a straight ticket for either 1 of these parties. Our voting must be primarily a matter of individual can- " didates for office. In order to vote KLAN BIGGEST POLITICAL ISSUE FOR NEGROES, SAYS MR. JOHNSON James Weldon Johnson, secretary of the National Association for the Ad vancement of Colored People, In an ad dress at the Sunday afternoon mass meeting of the Fifteenth Annual Con ference of the Association held In tbo Metropolitan Opera House, urged Ne groes in the United States to make the Ku Klux Klan tile main issue in the coming election. Mr. Johnson said: “The most imminent question before the American Negro at the present time Is that of his political responslb itfes and opportunities. The biggest, single political issue before him is that of the Ku Klux Klan. Colored Amerl - cans should not be lulled into a feel ing of security by the fact that the Klan is seemingly no longer anti-Ne gro. The Klan is as much anti-Negro now as it was the day it was organ ized. At present it is not spending much time in tarring and feathering or branding or mobbing Individual Negroes. It is devoting its energies to a bigger Job, the Job of gaining polit ical power, of gaining control of gov ernment. When It has done this, If it succeeds, it will again turn its atten tion to the Negro and it will then ex ecute its policies not upon Individual Negroes but upon the race as a whole. “If the Klan gains the power which it contemplates it will at once begin to take from the Negro his guarantees and even his claims to the common rights of citizenship. Ttiat Is one of its deepest laid plans. It Is, therefore, ihe duty of Negro citizens in states where the Klan is cn issue and where the votes of Negroes count and are counted, to discard sentimental polit ical allegiance to any party and vote against candidates who are named or supported by the Klan. "The situation lii Indiana is a case , in point. There the republican nom inee for governor has the open en dorsement of tho Klan, an endorse ment which he has fully accepted. In that state the republican senator, James K. Watson, who stands high in administration circles, openly confers and consorts with Klan leaders. It has been left for the democrats in that state to denounce and disvow the Klan. It is, therefore, the plain duty of all colored voters In Indiana to vote against the republican candidate for governor and against every other re publican candidate in that state who is touched with the tar brush of the Ku Klux Klan. "In Hie states ot tne north and the northwest, where tho vote is close and where the Negro holds what may he the balance of power, we must use our votes In a manner which is demanded not only by common sense but by safe ty. We must make men and measures and not party labels the deciding fac tor In casting our votes In the coining elections.” _ effectively vve must know the records >f such candidates. We must demand :>f them clear statements as to their ! attitude toward matters of vital in terest to us. We must remember that we are electing in the approaching election and other near elections not simply the President of the United States, out members of Congress and of the State Legislatures, state officials,; judges, members of school boards and j ether local officials. We must espe-1 dally keep in mind the fact that the emancipation of the Negro today is more largely a matter of state law and local ordinance than of national i enactment and that the interpreeta- [ Jon of the law by the courts and the I administration of the law by officials , are just as important and often far j more important than its actual con-: tent. We need, therefore, to redouble our | lgitation and our effort in court ac- j Jon and law administration, and we: leed especially to use our ballot in irder to reward our friends and to junish our enemies. We must utter y ignore party labels and vote for he man who will best serve us and >ur country. Education The need for such determination is ihown in many ways but perhaps note especially by the continued at itude of this nation toward the educu ion of Negro children. We have no tdequate common school facilities and ve have continually put forward by Jnited States government, state and oral undemocratic segregation in duration, but the astonishingly un emocratic doctrine that Negroes hould have no voice in the educa ion of their own children but that heir schools and colleges should be ominated by their e lemies. We have epeatedly asked federal aid for edu ation and in answer we have now a ill before Congress which seeks to rant it but which is a travesty on jstiee and would perpetuate in local rhool systems these very discrimina ons against which we vigorously rotest. Third Party Nothing will more quickly bring the Id parties to a clear realization of leir obligations to us anti the nation lan a vigorous third party movement, uch a movement may save us from choice between half-hearted friends ml half-concealed enemies or from le necessity of voting for the same ppression under different party ames. Such a movement may give le American Negro and other sub lerged classes a chance to vote more irectly for economic emancipation •om monopoly and privilege and a lirer chance to work according to bility and share more equitably in ip social income. Migration Finally, may we remind the new nmigrants to the North as well as legroes living there that the great 4 significance of this migration is le increased political power of black len in America. Wo have at last (Continued on Page Three ) BISHOP I,. .1. COPPIN HURIED FROM MOTHER BETHEL Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, July 11. -—One of the largest funerals held in Philadelphia for many a year was that of Bishop L. J. Coppin, who was buried from Bethel Church on Tuesday of last week. On Monday night the body lay in state in Bethel Church and services were conducted by the Masonic frater nity. A large crowd of friends of Bis hop Coppin viewed for the last time his body as it rested in the shadow of the pulpit from which he had preached so many years. Long before the time for the service on Tuesday morning at ten o’clock the church was crowded, j Hundreds of people had to be turned j away and many reluctantly stood on the outside of the church paying their last tribute of respect to Bishop Cop pin. The funeral was attended by all the bishops of the A. M. E. church, ex cept Bishops W. A. Chappelle, W. A. Fountain and J. 9- Flipper. Bishop J. S. Caldwell of the A. M. E. Zion church and representatives from all of the other churches of the race were present. Men came from long dis tances to pay this las! tribute of re spect. Bishop John Hurst preached the ser mon from the text, ‘‘And the king said to his servants, know ye not that there is a prince and a great man fallen this day in Israel?” (2 Sam. 3:38). Bishop Hurst Yeviewed the life of Bishop Cop pin and pointed out how his life should he a benediction to the generations which follow him. He reviewed his life as a school teacher, as a minister, as an editor and general officer of the A. M. E. church, as a bishop of South Africa, as a bishop of America, as a friend, and as a husband and father and public spirited man. . u I “THE NEGRO’S PLACE” I By ERNEST FREMONT LITTLE f n miniimiiiimiimiiimiiimm ... "1 remember reading some time ago a statement made by I’rof. Commons Of the University of Wisconsin to the effect that the Teutonic race, until 500. ye is after Christ, were exceedingly primitive in their civilization, yet hail mental qualities which made it pos sible fur them to absorb the highest Roman civilization. And I was par ticularly impressed with his assertion that, ‘Could their babies have been taken nu* of the forest 2,000 years ago and transplanted to the homes and schools of modern America, they would have covered in one generation the progress of twenty centuries.’ “Well, you say, that may have been possible in the ease of the Teutonic race, but It Is by no means possible In the case of the Negro race. You might say so If you did not know Iilooah. “('.lancing through a pamphlet pub lished by Garret Biblical Institute, I read with great surprise that the father of one of its students had been i ‘village warrior.’ 1 learned later that this student was a young African, mined Iilooah; and that he had a per ’ectly fascinating lecture entitled ‘From Cocoantit Tree to College,'’ and i .hat this lecture was the perfectly rue story of his own life. For he ivas, quite literally, up In a cocoanut ree when he caught sight of the first vhite man whom either he or any I nember of his tribe had ever seen; ind today he is doing post-graduate vork in an American theological i ichool. “Blooah, a native African, as black < .. "The United States Patent Office has I granted fifty-seven patents to Elijah I .McCoy, a Negro. “And there is Scott, the mural paint er of religious subjects; and Charles \V. Chestnut, the novelist; and W. E. Burghardt DuBois, the brilliant sa vant; :.nd William Stanley Barthwaite, the widely read literary critic; and Paul Lauranee Dunbar, the poet whose Day me down beneaf de willers in the grass, Whah de hranch’ll go a singin’ as it pass, An’ when I’s layin’ low, I kin hyeah it as it go Singin' ’sleep, my honey, tek yo’ res’ at las!’ has made the whole world of sensitive spirits his debtor. “What then is the Negro’s PLACE? “We men and women of the white race have treated the Negro badly inough, God knows. We have laid vio lent hands upon him and taken him from his home in Africa to serve us ts a hewer of wood and a drawer of water in America. We have debauched lis women folk and then branded him is immoral. We have, in many in dances, kept him in ignorance and :hen pronounced him as hopelessly itupid. President Moton of Tuskegee s authority for the statement that for 1,000,000 Negro children in the United States, there are even yet, no educa ion facilities provided. We have rented the Negro badly endugh. Has lot the time now come for us to give iini a fair chance? LOOKING BACKWARDS July—The Vear of IM My Robert Maris Edwards for the As sociated Negro Press. New York—-Dr. !(• R. Moton, presi dent nf the National Negro Business League complimented Harlem busi ness men on tile fact that 75% of the real estate occupied by Negroes In Harlem is owned by them. Richmond—The 10th anniversary of the Interstate Deni el Association was held at Buckroe Bi.h, Hampton, Vir ginia. Toronto, Can.—The Coleridge-Tay lor chorus, Robert P. Edwards, con ductor, was voted a special resolution of commendation and thanks by the directors of the Can dlan National Ex hibition on their performance on Mu sic Day, it being the first time colored talents had ever participated in that event during its 45 years of existence. Chicago, 111.—The Binga State Bank has bought property at the center of the world (35th ami State Sts.) and is preparing to erect an ercluslve hank building costing $20",000. Philadelphia — The Northeastern Federation of Women's Clubs, com prising Btates from Maine to District of Columbia, and representing 20,000 colored women held its 27th annual conference in the new A’. M. C. A. BISHOP BROOKS ON WOMEN’S PROGRAM Chicago, III., July 11.—(By the As sociated Negro Press.)—Bishop S. W. Brooks, of the African Methodist Episcopal church, will be one of the principal speakers on the program of the National Federation of Colored Women’s clubs at the biennial conven tion to be held here in August. Others whose names have been announced as being on the program are Mrs. Luke Johnson, Georgia; Mrs. Booker T. Washington, Dr. Sara Brown, Mrs. Julia Lathrop and Franklin Nichols. Miss Pauline Lee, president of the National University of Music, will direct the musical program. A. H. E. BISHOPS ASSIGN CHICAGO DISTRICT (By The Associated Negro Press) Philadelphia, Pa., July 11.—The death of Bishop Levi J. Coppln so soon after the general conference left the important 4th district embracing Chi cago without an episcopal head. The entire Chicago and Illinois delegation attended the Coppin funeral here and the Bishops council later presented a petition that Bishop A. J. Carey be as signed to the 4th district. Bishop Cop pin's last letter is said to have con tained this same request. Owing to the heavy demands of the important work with which Bishop Carey has been intrusted by the council he de clined the nomination, retaining the 5th district. The 4t4h district was divided between Bishop A. L. Gaines and Bishop Vernon, the former taking the Chicago and Northern Illinois and the latter the Southern Illinois and Indiana districts. COLORED BOY ADDRESSES BAR ASSOCIATION Terre Haute, Indiana, July 11.— (By the Associated Negro Press.)— The joint meeting of the Illinois and Indiana State Bar Associations in session here had has their special guests the winners of the two states in the recent nation-wide high school oratorical contest. Archibald Carey Jr., who won in Illinois and Miss Margaret Jenkins (white) of Indi anapolis, Indiana victor, were the two who attended the banquet and spoke. Young Carey who was presented by Hon. Roger Sherman, president of the Illinois State Bar Association, chose as his subject “The Constitution”. Federal Judge James H. Wilkerson delivered the principal address. When a child dies in some parts of Greenland, the natives bury a live dog with it, the dog to be used by the child as a guide to the other world. When questioned in regard to this peculiar superstition, the natives will only answer, “A dog can find his way anywhere.” DELEGATES CHEER HAITI'S |*|,EA FOR freedom (By The Associated Negro Press) Lyons, France, July 11.—At the dose or a brilliant address by Dantes Sellegarde, the Haitian leader and del egate to the League of Nations In ses sion here, the members of the I/eague irose enmass and cheered him for sev eral minutes. Delegate Bellegarue nude a plea for “Justice and libera ion” directed at the United States which is now occupying his country jy force. It wes very evident that the »ntire assembly was in sympathy with ihe views as expressed by Haiti's rep resentative. C. A. Duniway, white American, agreed after the debate to the resolution on ihe subject which was passed unanimously by the con gress. The resolution expressed the satisfaction of Ihe federation at the fact that the secretary of state of the Unled States had declared the inten tion of the government to withdraw from Haiti as soon as possible. rKACHERS TO HOLD SESSIONS AT DALLAS Dallas, Tex., July 11.—(By the As sociated Negro Press.)—The twenty 'irst annual session of the National Association of Teachers in Colored 3chools will be held here for three lays, beginning July 30. Mrs. Mary McLeod Bethune, president, has ar ranged for an original American Ne uro music night at which time R. Nathaniel Dett, composer, will be one if the chief contributors to the pro gram. Mrs. Portia Washington Pitt man of this city will have general ■harge of the musical program. St. Benedict, the Moor, is one of the first colored men canonized by the Roman Catholic church. He was born at San Fradella, Messina, Sicily, in 1526, of African parents, who had migrated from Ethiopia to Sicily. He was superior of the monastery of Santa Maria de Jesus a Palermo and ruled until his death in 1537. mi.. iiimnimiiiiiimiiiimm (In Rocky Mountain News) as midnight, has actually done what Prof. Commons conjectured the na tives of the Teutonic race might have done had they been taken out of the forest 2,000 years ago and trans planted to the homes and schools of modern America. He has actually covered in one generation the prog ress of twenty centuries. “How impatient we are with the Ne gro. Only sixty years out of slavery; yet we pxpect htm to measure up to the very highest standard of white world culture. And because he some times fails to do this, we Jump to the '(inclusion that he is an inherently, ind therefore permanently, inferior icing who may he tolerated only if he KEEPS HIS PI*ACE,’ What is the Negro's ‘PLACE?’ “The youngest student ever to re vive the degree of Ph. I). from the ‘Diversity of Pennsylvania was Harris i\ Blackstone, a Negro. “In 1922, second on the list of 200 ,'oung medical students examined for nternships at Cook County Hospital vas Dr. Walter S. (Iran;, a Negro. “In 1922, as the result of four years itudy, Smith College granted both the B. and M. A. degrees to Miss Eunice j Linton, a Negro. “In 1921, the prize for the best french novel for the year was granted o Rene Maran, a Negro. “In 1921, the Drama League of Vmerica elected as one of the ten per ions who during the year had contrib ited most to the art of the Iheatre, ’harles S. Gilpin, a Negro. EUGENE K1NCKLE JONES ELECTED TO EXECUTIVE HOARD OF SOCIAL WORK At the fifty-first annual session of the National Conference of Social Work held in Toronto, Canada, June 26th to July 2nd, Eugene Kinckle Jones, executive secretary of the Na tional Urban league was elected to the executive committee. This was the first time in the history of that organization that, the confer ence at large, consisting of nearly 6,000 persons—3500 delegates present —has voted a colered person into this office. As evidence of the fact that Mr. Jones was a popular choice, the audience applauded vigorously when the announcement was made by the president at the general sessionon on Tuesday night. There were thirteen candidates for the five positions on the executive board that were open— Mr. Jones standing third on the-list of candidates. The other persons elected to the board were Edith Ab bott, dean of the School of Social Ad ministration of the Chicago Univer sity: James F. Jackson, chairman of the section on Family Welfare of the Cleveland Council of Social Agencies; Julia C. Uathrop and Robert A. Woods, former presidents of the National Con ference of Social Work. At this conference there were some forty colored delegates. There were nineteen places on the program at which the Negro was discussed in some form and fourteen of the speak ers were colored. This recognition of the problems among Negroes and the part which Negro social w-orkers are playing in efforts to improve the community life ! of the nation is considered most sig- ! nlflcant by students of inter-racial problems—it being considered that this conference group made up of the I leading and most active social work-1 os of the United States and Canada is lie most liberal and democratic of the ! ■rganizations interested in human bet-I erment. Mr. Jones who served this rear on the Committee of Time and Place was elected for a term of three 1 ,'ears. IVIL It E R FO RC E UNIVERSITY HONORS PROMINENT COLORED WOMAN At the commencement of Wilber brce University held June 11-18, the legree of Doctor of Divinity was con erre upon Miss Mary G. Evans, prom nent minister and evangelist of the A. VI. E. Church. Miss Evans is an alum ina of Wilberforce, having received ter B.D. degree from there in 1914. the has since then pursued her theo ogical studies in Union Theological Seminary and Columbia University. She is now pastor of St. John A. M. E. ’hureh, Indianapolis, Ind., and is con sidered one of the most prominent jvangelists in the country. She is one >f the 24 trustees of Wilberforce Uni versity, and a woman of rare talent. It is generally conceded that she will Ire one ot the first women delegates to the next General Conference, African Methodist Episcopal Church. SAYS RESIDENTIAL SEGREGATION VIOLATION OF D. S. CONSTITUTION openning at a mass meeting of the Mational Association for the Advance ment of Colored People at its Fif teenth Annual Conference in Philadel phia, James A. Cobb, former assist ant U. S. attorney for the District if Columbia, declared that residential mgregation of colored people was a violation of the federal constitution. Mr. Cobb said in part: “Several years ago there sprung up i veritable epidemic of city ordi lances passed to accomplish the pur pose of racial discrimination and segregation in the matter of occup mey of homes. Atlanta, Ga.; I^uis dlle, Ky.; Richmond, Va.; Baltimore, Vfd., and Raleigh, N. C., may be men ioned as typical of the cities which , attempted to pass such laws. So flagrant was this attempt to defeat ;he constitutional rights of citizens hat the courts even of some of the Southern states put themselves on record as definitely opposing such egislation. “Mr. Justice Day, delivering the opinion of the Supreme Court of the United States, in the well considered •ase of Buchanan vs. Warley (known »s the Louisville Segregation Case) laid in part: ‘That there exists a seri aus and difficult problem, arising from a feeling of race hostility which the law is powerless to control, and to which it must give a. measure of consideration may be freely admitted. But its solution cannot be promoted by depriving citizens of their con stitutional lights and privileges.’ Anil further on In the same opinion, he said: ‘We think that this attempt to prevent the alienation of the proper ty in question to a person of color was not a legitimate exercise of the police power of the state, and is m direct violation of the fundamental law enacted in the Fourteenth Amend ment of the Constitution, preventing state intereference with property rights except by due process of law.’ “Certainly this would appear to Ire the last word on this question of segregated housing. But now the in dividual fiat of a group of people, en tering into a mutual covenant not to dispose of their land to people of the Negro race or descent, is chosen as a means of doing what the Constitu tion of the United States, and the interpretation by the Supreme Court of the United States, has indicated definitely cannot legally be done. “If the Constitution does not pro tect the rights of all citizens, it does not protect the rights of any, since it knows no distinction of race or color.” SPEAKER OPPOSES SEGREGATE OF SCHOOL CHILDREH Philadelphia Presbyterian Pastor Pre sents Phenomena Promoting Separate Schools in North. MIGRATION PLAYS BIG PART Southern Sentiment and Propaganda Have Far-Reaching Influence— Advancement Association for American Ideal. Philadelphia, July 11.—Dr. William Lloyd lines, pastor of Central Pres byterian church of Philadelphia, speaking at the mass meeting of the Fifteenth Annual Conference of the National Association for the Advance ment of Colored People, in the Union Baptist church, Nineteenth and Fitz water streets, Friday night, June 27, declared his opposition to segregation of colored children in public schools of the North. Dr. Imes said, in part: “Racial segregation of Negro chil dren in schools of the North is con nected with two phenomena; first, the migration northward of colored peo ple especially during the five years following the World War and, sec ond, a feeling among white people that the Southern way of dealing with the so-called ‘Negro Problem’ is the best. “Colored people of the North are themselves divided on this question. One group believe racial separation to be hurtful to the welfare of Amer ica and are wiling to struggle for full interracial fellowship in all pub lic and civic institutions. The other group believe the easiest way lies in submitting to a color line drawn by the dominant race. “There are, of course, other shades of opinion, such as the extremists on both sides and those who favor com plete separation not because they wish to submit to a dominant hostile group, but because they wish to be rid of that group’s prejudice “Thus, although it is clear that the apposed forces are not divided along the color line, since there are both white and colored segregationists and inti-segregationists, yet it is regret tably true that the greater part of the segregationist group is composed if white people. “Now children do not naturally hate each other. But segregation in fects them with the hatreds of adult life. Such separation has been car ried on steadily in the border states of Pennsylvania, Ohio, New Jersey, to name only the most important bat tle grounds of this controversy. Such Ohio cities as Cincinnati, Portsmouth and such Pennsylvania cities as Har risburg, Chester and Philadelphia to gether with Jersey cities like Atlantic City, Trenton, Camden, Asbury Park, all have separated schools in which only colored children attend and col ored teachers instruct. To save the pride of the dominant race, the idea is that colored teachers shall not be (Continued on Page Three)