Nebraska Newspapers

    _ • Omaha, -Nebraska, Saturday, January 7, 1933. Page 3_
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♦ EDITORIALS! ♦ |j
Colored Representation
* • > *braska Legislature opened Tuesday, Jan
Bar trd, the i ion. This time with Demo
v■ r in r: >nty. we have our first Colored Democrat to
; < ii;e legislature, Johnnie Owen, who made a;
.nipit -.-ion and was warmly received.
- lection of Mr. Owens on a Democratic ticket
>}-,i. s a turning point in history.
I. i though Mr. Owen stands as the lone eagle,
i . t he Colored citizens wish him all the suc
jtrusl .him as their personal watchman on the wall.
latent liiptist t hurrh,
22nd and Seward Sts..
h «!ny was indeed a banner Sun.'
da;, i-e-ng the first Sunday and the
f:r«t day of the New Year. All seeni
«. .vc been strengthened at the
Year** Ewe. watch meeting. Rev.
(. . brought two stirring nies
» . ,n the m< rning at the 11
■ >YJ . irvio! and that evening at 8
5 m. Also the Lord’s supper was ad.
mini ■ ter*-l
We invite you to be present Sun.
da>, Ji .uary 8th.- Rev. Anthony of
tL grim Baptist Church in Topeka
k . , will speak for us all day and
errs me third Sunday, January 15th,
Rev. Washington of Los Angeles,
Calif, will preach for us.
You will perhaps lie glad to know
that Mr. William Cooper has been
added to the Deacon Board. You are
alway. welcome at Salem.
Pie* .at Green Baptist 1 hurch,
T. -W. Stevenson. Pastor.
Mrs. King. Clerk,
Mrs. £*>#. Reporter. .
S. S h(,;ol, 9:30 a. at The
teach r- and scholars were very glad
t • have our same Supt. Vealand for
an.'*her year. Services were held at
11 » .* m. and at 8:30 p. m. BYPU.
: 0 ; with Supt. Milton presiding
' T5 * • . : >r a~ks that for this year
♦ I ’ members to try to attend
Prayer Services.
Zha Baptist Church,
CIS Grant St.,
C. C, Harper. Pastor,
J. R, Young. Asst. Pastor.
Shirts Finished
8c
V -a Finished out of Wet
Wmah—Thrifty—R. D.
L:au Bdles.
EVANS
LAUNDRY
Phone - JA. 0243
I. W. Green, reporter.
Sunday School, 9:30 a. m.,
H. L. Anderson, Supt.
The morning service was preached
by Rev. Young and a very large
r wd for New Years. The evening
st rvtee was preached by Rev. Will
iam Hall and a large service served by ;
lb v. J. R. Young. BYPU will be led
by Group No. 2. Mr. Crawford, cap
tain and a fine service was had New
Y ar’.« eve at the watch meeting ser
vice.
Mt. Moriah Baptist Church
2tth and Ohio Sts.,
Rev. F. P. Jones, Pastor. (
tor, Sunday was
Sunday was another great day at ’
Mt. .Moriah, beginning with the Sun.
day school which was largely attend,
eii K.tch class made their annual re- '
port which was versatisfactory, and 1
showed a marked progress in the j
work of the Sunday school. The'
V. >r.ship service at 11:00 o'clock was;
a great service. The large congre- ]
gat on demonstrated a spirit of great]
r-ioicing throughout this period. The ;
pastor preached a great*sermon, sub.
“New Experiences” The Everyloyal
Gr up rendered a very pleasing pro-,
gram at the BYPU. hour. The Quar- j
terlv Banquet w-as won by the Will-;
ing Workers’ group. The annual re
por: ;n this department also showed
a 75 per cent gain in both attendance ]
and finance. After another very ex.
c.lient sermon by the pastor. Rev. i
Jor.es. at 8:00 o’clock a very impres.
siv- communion service was held. Onj
Er day night the church. held their i
• itmual business meeting where the
r- port of the entire years work was
made by each auxiliary and the
church. These reports showed a
r: irked progress during the past
year in every department, and a great
• v for the church. In the face of
'■■r.r.ssion. and the many jobless a
. r,g the membership the goal for.
which they set out. at- the beginning
f the year was reached, and much
uise was given Rev. Jones for his •
r-h-rful management and to the
with him. On Saturday night watch
loyal membership, who cooperated
! meeting was held with e. large num.;
i her present. The evening was spent in
, song and prayer, and expression? of
gra'itude to God for His Gracious
j blessings of the past year. ;
Miss. River
Slavery 1932
i ‘‘Slavery in its most trying days was
j mild compared to the reign of terror
' inflicted upon these simple river
j folks.”—from American Federation of
Labor report published in American
I Federationist, March, 1932.
TO be sold down the river was the
most terrifying fate that could befall
! a slave before the Civil War. Down
j the river, hdpe ended. Only death of.
I fered a release from brutal mistreat
ment, brutal working conditions, and
despair of ever coming away alive.
That great river down which the
slaves were sold is the scene of a new
and terrible slavery today. The slav
ery of 1932. like that before the Civil
War, is rooted in the exploitation of
black meats labor, the mistreatment
of their bodies, and the denial to them
of the primary decencies that civiliz.
aion owes all human beings. It is
practised on work undertaken, con
trolled and financed by the United
States Government, the' Mississippi
Flood Control project* intended to
curb the devastating floods of the
Mississippi River over the adjacent
land of the Delta states.
Two investigations independently
undertaken have reported and estab
lished the facts beyond any reasonable
doubt. One of these investigations,
by representatives of the American
Federation of Labor, is quoted from
above. The other was made for the
National Association for Advance
ment of Colored People, during the
summer of 1932, by Miss Helen Board
man, a college graduate, former Red
Cross relief worker who had been in
charge of relief work in former Miss
issippi flood disasters.
What are the conditions which these
two independent investigations have
established?
The federal government has accept
ed bids of private contractors for the
levee wo'rk to j>e done. Those private
contractors, supposedly under govern
ment supervision in the conduct of
their wrork have been found guilty of
the following misdeeds:
1. OVERWORK: Negroes on levee
work in the private camps have been
worked seven days a week for as
much as 12 and in many cases 14 and !
16 hours a day, and have been worked j
at night in addition to overlong day
time hours without one cent of over
time pay.
2. UNDERPAYMENT: The rate
of pay has been as low as ten cents
an hour and even less and in a multi
tude of authenticated cases the men
have been summarily discharged
without pay; have received only a
fraction of the pay stipulated; and al
most universally have been system-,
atically robbed by charges for ice
water, cook’s charges, and forced pur- j
chases at company stores and com- j
missaries where the prices are extor
tionate. The almost invariable result j
is that they have received little or
nothing for their work. Examples of
company store extortions are as fol
lows: 12-lb. sack of flour 60 cents,
regular price 30 cents; salt pork 15
cents, regular price 6 cents; cotton
pants $2, regular price 98 cents; con
densed milk 20 cents, regular price 8
cents.
2. BEATINGS: Men and women
as wrell have been subject to brutal
beatings by overseers. Levee workers
are so terror-stricken that they would
never even tell of the levee camp hor
rors unless promised that their nam
es would be withheld. “The attitude
of many contractors toward their
labor is exceedingly reminiscent of
slavery at its worst,” says the NAA.
CP. report. Actual hunger drives hu
man beings to accept almost any bru
tality to avert starvation.
4. UNSANITARY CONDITIONS:
Crowded, floorless tents, filthy quar
ters. no garbage disposal, no screens,
in mosquito and malaria infested coun
try. “A great deal of illness was ob
served, chiefly malaria, flu and rheu
matism.”
5. OVERCHARGING: “One con
tractor expressed the attitude of all
when he said that he did not expect
to pay his labor anything above their
maintenance. The I commissary sys
tem enables them to carry this out.;
In many instances, a commissary had
no other reason for existence as there
were stores within easy distance of
the Qamps.” Trading at the comp
any.owned commissary stores has
been enforced with discharge or phys
ical violence in cases of failure to do
so. A minimum charge of $4.50 is
assessed against workers in some
camps for food, ice water, cooking,
etc. The cooks in some cases are not
.paid even after the deductions from
! the men’s wages.
INDIVIDUAL INSTANCES FROM
THE NAACP. REPORT
“The w?eek previous to this visit two
men were whipped for disobeying or
| ders.”
! “For mattreses here are piles of:
moss from the live-oaks or, in some
cases, rags. The place is indescrib
ably filthy and airless. The end of
the building is divided off by corru
gated metal and used as a pigpen.”
“The sub-contractor, engineers and
other white men on the job are arm
ed with rifles and revolvers.”
“There is no mosquito netting, no
furniture of any kind but straw is
furnished for the men to sleep on.”
"A minimum of $4 a week is taken
from their pay for the commissary
and they are -obliged to trade there.
They do not ask the prices charged for
anything and are not answered if
they ask. They get no itemized state
ment. The boss-man tells them the
amount due them in wages and the
amount of their indebtedness at the
commissary and gives them any a
mount this reckoning allows them.
One man said he received $1.50 after
working five weeks and he knew the
amount he had purchased at the com
missary could have been bought at
any store for $*3iOO.
“When the investigator asked what
they were paid the men and women in
the group laughed and finally one
man said: ‘You men what us gets'
paid or what us works for?’ ”
“On July 4th a man was knocked1
down and kicked because he had mis-!
understood an order. He was dis. I
charged and another man was dis
charged .because he said it was un
fair.”
“Whippings occur daily.”
“The week before this visit two
men were whipped for refusing night
work after working all day.”
WAR DEPARTMENT’S ATTITUDE
The War Department denied the
| charges made by the A. F. of L. and
disputed the facts presented by the
| NAACP. Upon the Association’s in
sistence that the facts be heard the
War Department appointed a hearing
in Washington for the NAACP. in
vestigator from which the press was
excluded. At this hearing questions
were asked indicating that the War
Department representative was will
ing to adopt for the Department’s
standard the slave working conditions 1
prevalent in that section.
A War Department whitewash of|
the charges was clearly indicated. A
committee appointed just before elect
ion by President Hoover to investigate
the charges, was reported one month
later as “without funds” or definite
authorization to proceed.
THE REMEDY
Senator Robert F. Wagner of New
York, informed of these atrocious
slavery and peonage conditions, prom
ised the National Association for the
Advancement of Colored People to in
troduce a resolution calling for a U. S.
Senate investigation and this resolu
tion has been introduced. The NAA
CP. has pledged 39 senators to sup
port and vote for this resolution.
You Can Help by writing to your
Senator asking him to Back Up the
W’agner Resolution, and Give It His1
Unqualified Support until these Con
ditions are Exposed and Corrected.
Moreover, the NAACP. will arrange
to have introduced in Congress bills
providing that the eight hour day and
a minimum wage scale are to be en
forced on the Mississippi levee work.
Write Your Senators and Represent
atives Urging them to Vote for such
, Measures. Get your church, lodge,
club and friends to do the same.
WE NEED HELP IN THIS FIGHT
If we can get decent wages and de
cent working hours for the Negroes
now working as virtual slaves on the
Mississippi levee under U. S. Govern
ment “supervision”, it would mean
TEN MILLION DOLLARS A YEAR
IN ADDED WAGES FOR 10 YEARS
Moreover it would strike a blow at
the peonage and slavery conditions
now still accepted as normal in the
Delta regions along the lower Miss
1 issippi River.
We need funds to carry on this
fight, We want to make more in
vestigations and pile up the evidence j
in such a way that the American peo- j
pie can no longer ignore it.
Hundreds of thousands of poor,
helpless black men and women are
now under this juggernaut of exploit
ation and brutality. This fight is
bigger than many a case where the l
victim is a single individual. Here
[ thousands upon thousands of human i
beings are involved.
A vital precedent is at stake. To
I permit exploitation of colored work
! ers by the federal government would
j encourage discrimination against
| them in state, municipal and county S
relief work projects where Negroes
are by far the most grievous suffer
ers in the terrible depression for they
are not only the last to be hired but
the first to lose thir jobs. On the
other hand to establish that colored
workers on government projects
must be and are being paid a fair
I wage and work under decent condi
i tions, will be to safeguard the color
■ ed worker’s position not alone on the
| Mississippi levee but everywhere else
in the country.
M ill you help fight the Mississippi
Slavery of 1932 and help build oppor
tunity for the Negro worker?
|- —
NAACP, P>9 Fifth Avenue,
New York, N. Y.
Here’s my contribution of
to help in this fight.
Name _
Address _
NORTH SIDE “Y” ANNOUNCES
NEW CLASSES
“Parliamentary Law Class”
Mrs. C. F. Behr, First Vice-Presi
dent, Omaha Woman’s Club, will con- '
duct a class in “Parliamentary Law”
at the North Side YWCA., beginning
Thursday evening, January 12th, at
seven-thirty o’clock. Mrs. Behr is well
prepared, having served two years as ;
head of the Parliamentary Law De
partment of the Woman’s Club.
The course is open to men and wo
men, and will be held for. six weeks.
There will be no charge.
Adult Gymn Class
Slim waistlines, trim figures for
all wh# desire to wear the new lines!
Your for the exercising at the North
Side “Y”, beginning Friday evenings,
January 13th, at seven-thirty sharp.
Wear soft-soled shoes and loose cloth
ing, suitable for gymnastic work.
This class is for women and girls only
There will be no charge! Louise Scott
Gymn teacher.
Conversational English
To express one’s self intelligently
and attractively is an art, and a nec
essity in the business and social
world today. The North Side “Y”
is offering a six week’s course in
“Conversational English”, beginning
Tuesday evening, January 10th, at
seven-thirty. Practical speaking in
everyday English will be taught! Men
and women may attend. There will
be no charge!
—
NOTE i
fell
\ ;
Washington
BELIEVED IN THE
POWER OF WANT-ADS
T’ODAY. just as In George W ssAtnyroc^i
* rime, tho sweet method of secarteg a
ranter, a buyer an employe* oe tha wrtV
f artery answer to nay other “t«l" la as
“flea public oodee" of THAT want, and
llva moot economical medium of gjrtef «W
public notice of YOUB wanU Is the Vann
WANT-AD
DEPARTMENT
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WE. 2770
Guide’s Platform
■ 1 ii m 19
Race prejudice must go. The Fatherhood of God
and the Brotherhood of Man must prevail. These are
the only principles which will stand the acid test of good
citizenship in time of peace, war and death. v
(1) We must have our pro-rata of employment in
businesses to which we give our patronage, such as groc
ery stores, laundries, furniture stores, department stores
and coal companies, in fact- every concern which we sup
port. We must give our citizens the chance to live res
pectably. We are tired of educating our children and
permitting them to remain economic slaves and enter in
to lives of shame.
(2) Our pro-rata of employment for the patronage
to our public corporations such as railroad companies,
the street car company, the Nebraska Power Company,
the Northwestern Bell Telephone Company and other
establishments which we are forced to support by right
of franchise. Also our pro-rata of employment in re
turn for the taxes we pay' in our city, county state and
federal government.
(3) To encourage the establishment of a first class
hospital that we may get the best that there is in medical
science from our doctors whom we know to be nearest us,
also to encourage a high respect of them and encourage
more of our girls to take nurse training.
(4) A one hundred per cent deportment of our cit
izens in our public or private places of business, especial
ly on street cars. If we are to be respected we must act
respectably, especially in public places where we are con
stantly before the public’s eye.
(5) A one hundred per cent membership in the Om
aha branch of the NAACP. should be had to encourage
the efforts put forth by the founders of the organization
and to assist the general office to establish a five million
dollar endowment fund to maintain operating expenses
and to further the principles of the NAACP. All peo
ple of all races must be educated up to a higher principle
and a more thorough understanding of interracial rela
tionship that our country may in reality be a government
of the people, for the people and by the people in whole
and not in part.
(6) The re-establishment of the Christian Religion
as Christ taught it, for the uplifting of mankind, elimin
ating financial and personal gain. A practical Christian
Religion, week day as well as Sunday. An attitude to
ward our fellowman as a brother in order to establish a
principle which will guide the destiny of each other’s
children; our neighbor’s children today are our children
tomorrow.
(7) Courteous treatment in all places of business
and the enforcement of the State Civil Right Law.
(8) To encourage and assist in the establishment of
the following financial institutions near 24th and Lake
Streets: A building and loan association, a state bank,
administering aid and assistance to our widows and
children.
(9) To encourage the erection of a one hundred
thousand dollar Young Men’s Christian Association
Building near 24th and Lake Streets.
(10) To enlarge the Young Women’s Christian As
sociation that it may supply sufficient dormitory accom
modations.
(11) To teach our citizens to live economically with
in their earning capacity by printing in each issue a bud
get system for various salaries.
(12) To make Omaha a better city in which to live
by inaugurating a more cosmopolitan spirit among our
American citizens.
(13 To put a stop to the Divorce Evil by passing a
State law making the mistreatment of a wife or 3 hus
band by either of them, a criminal offense to be decided
' by a jury, first offense, jail sentence of a short duration;
from one to five years in the penitentiary. This, we be
lieve will make men and women think before marrying,
second offense, one of longer duration; third offense,
(14) We must become owners of the city govern
ment by paying a seemingly higher salary to those whom
we employ to administer its affairs, a salary that will at
and, also, a first-class trust company for the purpose of
tract men of high calibre.
National
(1) Fight for a passage of the Dyer Anti-Lynch Bill
and thus stop the shamful lynching of American citizens.
(2) One of our citizens in the president’s cabinet.
(3) Federal control of the educational system that
every child must have a high school education.
(4) Assist in the furtherance of research by our
scientists and historians to prove that civilization was
first founded in Africa.
(5) Establish a political influence which will bring
about our pro-rata of higher appointments made by our
chief executives.
(6) Stop graft in politics by passing a Federal Law
making election day a legal holiday and compelling every
American citizen of voting age to vote.
(7) Prevent further wars by teaching the so-called
white race that it is high time for them to quit fooling
themselves about white supremacy with only three-tenths
of the world’s population. They must be taught that
color is due to climatic conditions. They must be taught
that seven-tenths of the world’s population is made up of
darker races. They must be taught that the rays of sun
that blaze upon the equator and turn the skin brown do
not affect the power of the brain any more than the cold
ness of icy glaciers affect the brain of the white race;
and that the darker races will not continue to be crushed
by a money mad few\ If the Fatherhood of God and the
Brotherhood of Man are not welded into the hearts of this
world’s family now, by teaching the principles laid down
by our Saviour, it will be welded into the hearts of our
; children some day soon, on the bloodiest battlefields this
j world has ever known.
(8) Cut down congressional representation from
the Southern States in proportion to the number of votes
CQSt<
The OMAHA GUIDE will put forth its best efforts
to bring about the above 22 points with the assistance of
| those who believe it is for the best interest of good Amer
ican citizenship.