The Monitor
A Weekly Newspaper Devoted to the Interests of the Eight Thousand Colored People
in Omaha and Vicinity, and to the Good of the Community
The Rev. JOHN ALBERT WILLIAMS, Editor
$1.00 a Year. 5c a Copy. Omaha, Nebraska, August 7, 1915 Volume I. Number 6
OUR "LEADING” UNIVERSITIES.
By William G. Haynes,
Associate Editor.
This phrase calls to mind the story
of the brave fellow who bragged that
he, single-handed and unarmed, had
made fifty men run—he ran and they
ran after him. At that, he has the
best of the “leading” universities of
the United States, for they will not
even run. A few concrete instances
will help us reach the point more
quickly.
In one of the "leading” universities
of the East, it is necessary for a
student pursuing an engineering
course to complete a full year’s prac
tical work in his chosen field before
he Is eligible for graduation. This
practical work, according to the
school catalog, is furnished by the
school and occupies as important a
place in the curriculum as mathe
matics, physics and similar studies.
The plan in this particular institu
tion is called the “co-operative plan.”
Let us follow it closely and derive
the new definition of “co-operation.”
The school, the student, and the fac
tories are supposed to co-operate in
the following way: The student at
tends school the first nine months of
his first year and then goes out to
work the next three months in the
shops of the neighboring factories
which are in the co-operative plan
with the university. In this manner
the school work and practical work
are interwoven throughout the en
tire four years. Theoretically per
fect!
Two Negroes elected to enter the
engineering school of this university
and successfully completed the first
period of their class work. They
reported for practical work. The pro
fessor in charge told them he was
very sorry, and the dean was very
sorry—in fact, the chancellor, the
faculty and all the trustees were very
sorry—but the laborers in the fac
tories didn’t want to work with an
intelligent Negro, so the university
would be unable to furnish the two
youths of color the practical work.
Now, let’s see what a wonderful
spirit of co-operation was exhibited
on the part of the university at this
critical moment! In view of the facts
that the two men had been allowed
to matriculate upon an equal plane
with all the other students; that they
had successfully completed the first
nine months’ class work; that their
tuition and fees had been accepted
in advance by the university In pay
ment of complete engineering
courses; and that the practical work
was a required subject, just as mathe
matics, physics, chemistry and graph
ics were required subjects, the uni
versity generously co-operated by al
lowing the two students the privilege
of seeking their own practical work.
What an encouraging attitude!
Did the university offer to give
them employment as student assist
ants in the school laboratories? (Such
Think on These Things
"Pluck wins! It always wins.
Though days be slow and nights be dark
Twixt days that come and go,
Still pluck will win, its average is sure;
He gains the prize who can the most endure,
Who faces issues, he who never shirks,
Who waits and watches and who always works.”
JOHN GRANT PEGG,
City Inspector Weights and Measures.
positions were available.) No, of
course not. That would not have
been "co-operation” in the modern
sense. Did It endeavor to weld a
crowbar to its backbone and go to
the factory heads and say, "You have
agreed to accept our students in your
shopB. These men are bona fide stu
dents. Accept them. Let the heads
of the plants put them to work and
give the other men the understanding
that these two men are in to stay
as long as their good conduct will
permit, and until their term of prac
tical work has expired."
Such a course was not at all feas
ible, for it would be in direct oppo
sition to all the niceties of modern
"co-operation.”
In the same school Negroes in the
medical college had the greatest dif
ficulty in obtaining their practice
work, because white patients In the
hospitals (and most of them charity
patients, at that) were not desirous
of being attended by Negro students.
Another case that is worthy of
mention is that of a young Negro in
one of the dental colleges of the mid
dle West. It was an acknowledged
fact that this young man was the
most proficient member of the class,
and yet at the last moment he was
threatened with the disgrace of be
ing refused his diploma. Why? Sim
ply because the school had failed in
its duty to give him the necessary
amount of infirmary practice. And
why had the school not fulfilled its
obligation? For the reason that
white patients seeking the charitable
aid of the Institution had chosen to
dictate to that institution to the ex
tent of saying what students they
should have as attendants and what
students they should not have.
These are but a few examples of
the conditions that exist in the “lead
ing” universities of this country.
Here, indeed, is the ideal paradox.
Leaders meekly tie themselves to
the end of a string, at the other end
of which are the followers, and allow
(Continued on Beconil
PRAISES PULLMAN PORTERS.
Noted Woman Says No Woman Has
Ever Been Insulted or Mis
treated by a Porter.
New York, July 31.—In her ad
dress Sunday afternoon at Palace Ca
sino in behalf of the Empire Friendly
Shelter, Mrs. Maud Ballington Booth,
president of the Volunteers of Amer
ica, known to thousands of prisoners
throughout the United States as the
“Little Mother," took opportunity to
pay a richly deserved compliment to
the Negro Pullman porters of the
country.
She declared that they were uni
formly courteous, obliging and hon
orable. Not one instance, she af
firmed, had ever been know where a
Pullman porter had taken advantage
of his position to insult or interfere
with women passengers entrusted to
his care, whether they traveled alone
or not. She said that for twenty-nine
years she has been traveling in all
parts of the country and her own ex
perience has been that a more cour
teous and agreeable aggregation of
employes are not to be found among
any class of people anywhere.
Mrs. Booth told of her work
throughout the country, some of the
incidents being intensely interesting.
She emphasized the need of cleans
ing the souls of the erring and un
fortunate, declaring that neither edu
cation nor health training can cure
the life twisted by sin, vice or drugs.
The soul of the prisoner or of any
other unfortunate is as precious in
God’s sight as that of the best per
son in the world, and people make a
great mistake in withholding from
the returned prisoner human sym
pathy and support. The speaker told
of many men and women restored to
splendid manhood and womanhood
after having paid the penalty for in
discretions and infractions of the law,
both human and divine.
WOMAN SUFFRAGE AND SOCIAL
REFORM.
(By Miss Anna H. Jones, Chairman
of the Department of Education,
National Association of Colored
Women.)
Of the four great institutions of hu
man uplift—the home, the school, the
church, and the state, woman has a
direct controlling force in the first
three institutions. In the state her
influence at present is indirect. Since
her control in the three is unquestion
ed, should she not have the legal
means—the ballot— to widen and
deepen her work?
In terms of today, her work Is the
conservation and improvement of the
child; child labor laws, inspection of
the health of school children, tafe
guarding the youth in the home, in
the school, in the court, in the street,
in the place of amusement. Her work
is the prevention of vice with its train
of physical and moral evils; the en
actment of laws to secure and regu
(Continued on eighth page)