The Monitor
voV**
A National W** . spaper Devoted to the Interests of the Colored
&.V*' ^ericans of Nebraska and the West
THE REV. JOHN ALBERT WILLIAMS, Editor
$1.50 a Year. 5c a Copy Omaha, Nebraska, March 31, 1917 Vol. II. No. 39 (Whole No. 91)
Lincoln Conference
Notable Gathering
Program as Published in Last Week’s
Monitor Successfully Carried
Through.
EMINENT RELIGIOUS LEADERS
Mayor of Boley, Oklahoma, One of the
Few Exclusively Negro Towns of
the Country, Lay Delegate.
The Lincoln Annual Conference
which will conclude its sessions at
Grove Methodist Episcopal Church
with the announcement of appoint
ments Monday morning has carried
through a most successful program,
which will leave its inspirational im
press upon the religious life of the
city and send the delegates enheart
ened by a larger vision back to their
respective fields of work.
Bishop Stuntz’ opening charge
showed him to be a man of broad sym
pathies and deeply interested in all
departments of work under his care.
The conference sermon Thursday
by the Rev. C. N. Dawson, from I
Timothy, 1:15, was a forceful presen
tation of Christ’s mission of salva
tion to the world, and the challenge
to His disciples to carry on His work
in the same broad spirit of love.
Among the prominent members of the
denomination present at this service
were the Rev. Dr. David G. Downey,
of The Methodist Book Concern, New
York, and the Rev. Dr. George Heber
Jones of New York, who had been a
missionary in Corea for twenty years.
The lectures by Dr. J. C. Sherrill
and the Rev. Dr. E. D. Hull on
“Twelve Years in Africa” and “That
Boy," delivered on Monday and Tues
day night, respectively, drew appre
ciative audiences which were well re
paid for their attendance.
Tomorrow at 11 o’clock will be or
dination services with a sermon by
Bishop Stuntz. Home Missions will
be considered at 3 o’clock, the Rev.
Dr. Dean of Philadelphia, being the
speaker. At 4 o’clock will be the
financial rally, at which time it is
hoped to raise the $1,000 debt remain
ing on the property. The rally will
be conducted by Bishop Stuntz. At
P p. m. the Rev. Dr. Jones of New
Orleans will preach.
In connection with the financial
rally it should be known that when
the Rev. Dr. Logan took charge of
Grove Church, three years ago, the
indebtedness, mortgaged and float
ing, was $3,200. He has succeeded in
reducing this to $1,000 by great per
sonal sacrifice, his salary being a
beggarly pittance, hardly enough to
keep body and soul together, while he
was struggling to reduce this debt.
He has said nothing about this, but
it has been known by one or two of
his close personal friends. The Mon
itor believes this fact should be known.
It believes also that it should be
known that while the church has
raised nearly $1,800 this year, this
(Continued on Page 7)
OUR ANSWER
From Audrey Bowser’s Poem,
“The Brown and The Blue.”
Old Glory’s stripes are shining red
With our good soldiers’ gore,
Since Attucks fell and Salem bled,
Clack fighters ’neath its folds have
led
The fight in every war.
At Pillow and Wagner’s hellish fray
,On San Juan’s blazing hill;
And the blood that flowed at El Caney
Has drenched it deeper still.
What though an envious hate and
' pride
Upon us fix their bans?
What though our birthright be de
nied?
One glory they can never hide—
We are Americans!
And when the dangers darkly reach
Across the nation’s sky,
We hurl our lives into the breach
To suffer, bleed and die.
WHEN OUR COUNTRY CALLS
The war clouds are crowding upon
the horizon of peace and tranquility
is about to pass from us. What of
the Colored American? Where does
he stand on the question of preserv
ing the national honor? The Presi
dent does not want him as a volunteer,
the War Department does not want
him as a regular, the Navy does not
want him as a seaman. It seems that
nobody wants him and that his race
a race that doesn’t count. Rather
queer, too, isn’t it? He fought in
the Revolution, died in the War of
1812, bled in the Mexican fight, saved
the North in the Civil War, and
fought the Don gloriously in the
Spanish conflict. His escutcheon is
as spotless as new fallen snow and
he never was a traitor. He of all men
has the greatest right to question
whether our flag really stands for
freedom, our country for justice and
our ideals for righteousness—yet he
has never questioned them when the
country called. He is the bravest of
the brave, the loyalist of the loyal,
the truest of the true. Yet he does
not count. He is without the pale.
No, we are not wanted. The Pres
ident forgets us, the Army does not
need us and the Navy scorns us; but
we are loyal still. Above President
and Army anl Navy is the Country
and the Fiag and when they need us
and call us, nothing can hold back
our hands or stifle our courage.
Their 'deals are ours and as long as
a black man has blood to shed the
ideal of a government of the people,
by the people and for the people shall
not per.'Sh from the earth.
“SPRING DRIVE” STARTED
From all sources the war in Europe
is assigned as the first cause of the
Negro migration, in so much as it has
employed all of Europe’s able bodied
at home, and allowed but few to come
to the United States. The passage of
the new immigration act by congress
over the veto of the president indi
cates that even when it is over, for
eign laborers will be prevented by the
literacy clause from entering in as
large numbers as formerly. Without
the new law with its literacy clause,
it appears that the frightful casual
ties upon the battlefields will make
impossible any overflow of men from
Europe to America for at least five
years.
All of these facts point to the same
thing. The North in field and factory
is going to be shorthanded for some
time to come, and until the supply of
laborers become steady again, will
draw on the South with its superabun
dance of workers for several hundred
thousand more hands. Philadelphia,
Pennsylvania, Traveler’s Aid Associa
tion estimates that as many as 25,000
Southern Negroes, lured by higher
wages, have flocked into the city dur
ing the past few weeks. Most of these
men are working in the munitions
factories. Massachusetts and other
Northern states are short of farm la
borers. Hampden county is willing to
solve the problem by bringing in intel
ligent Negro workers from the South,
and the Improvement Leagues of that
place have put the question up to the
farmers of that vicinity.
Tuskegee resolutions to the con
trary, it looks as if the “Spring
Drive” of Colored workers from the
South will exceed in size and import
ance any similar movement since the
opening up of the great Western
plains for settlement in the middle of
the last century. It is a good thing
for the Colored man, and a good thing
for the country.—The Baltimore
Afro-American.
Saturday Evening Po&
Condemns Lynching
Magazine Reaching Millions of Read
ers Speaks In No Uncertain
Terms Against Barbarism.
LYNCHERS ARE BARBARIANS
It is seldom indeed that the Satur
day Evening Post has ever come out
in its pages to condemn any of the
injustices practiced against the Col
ored race in America, but the follow
ing is perhaps as calm and dispassion
ate an article as has ever been writ
ten. When it is remembered that
The Post is read in over two million
of homes throughout the United
States, the moral effect of such an
article must carry great weight:
American Barbarism.
There is now a more powerful re
action against lynching—that abom
inable disgrace to the United States
—than ever before. It is more gen
erally realized that lynchers, what
ever positions they may hold in soci
ety, are essentially stupid barbarians,
whose anarchism brings into question
all social security and order. It is
plain enough that no man’s life can
really be safe in a community given
to lynching. There will probably be,
at first, the extreme provocation of
assault upon a woman. The record
shows that, having yielded to that
provocation, yielding to lesser ones
becomes increasingly easy; and finally
a mob will as readily slake its blood
thirst by murdering a white man as
Colored one.
Because lynching has been more
common in the South, the South is
especially interested in discouraging
it. The intelligent Southern opinion,
which must finally prevail, is insisting
upon the only remedy—conviction and
punishment of mob murderers. When
dominant opinion recognizes lynching
for what it is—a detestable crime
against society far more dangerous
socially than any individual murder—
lynching will disappear. Only the
criminal sanction or tolerance of mis
guided opinion keeps it alive. Mobs
never lynch except when they think
it perfectly safe. As soon as they
have to expect not sanction or toler
ance, but genuine prosecution, they
will leave the repression of crime to
orderly processes of law.
It is altogether a question of pub
lic opinion. To strengthen the right
opinion is a plain duty of every on*
who wants that opinion to prevail.
NEW HOSPITAL OPENS
Newport News, Va.—The Whittaker
Memorial Hospital was formally
opened this week with appropriate
exercises, which were held Monday
and Tuesday.
The Colored members now have a
hospital where members of the race
when sick may be admitted as pa
tients and given the best of medical
treatment.