| The Omaha Guide I
i + A WEEKLY NEWSPAPER JL 1
i Published Every Saturday at 2420 Grant Street
) OMAHA, NEBRASKA—PHONE HA- 0800
L Entered as Second Class Matter March 15. 1927 ;
I'at the Post Office at Omaha, Nebraska, under
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The Road to Damascus
by RUTH TAYLOR
Centuris ago a proud, ambitious man walked along the
Damascus Road, dowii that great caravan trail which cut
through the Middle East like a brown ribbon,'winding over
hills and down into valleys, through desert land into fertile
oases, on its way to that walled city of antiquity, in whose
bazaars could be found men from all the far places and of
all races.
That journey on the Damascus Road marked a crucial
date in history for all of us, for it was on that robber-men
aced road that the light came to Saul and changed him into
the Paul who gave his life for the welfare of the world. On
that road there came upon him the light that stripped him
of self-pride and hatred, to clothe him in the robes of hu
mility and love.
W e, as a nation, are today plodding along the Road to
Damascus. As we follow in Saul’s footsetps, let us also
follow in Paul’s. Let us pray, too, to see the light at all
times and to follow where it leads-the light of the spirit of
brotherhood, the light of the spirit of sacrifice, the light of
the spirit of devotion to what we know to be the right.
W e, as individuals, must today more than ever, put away
the trappings of self-will and personal ambition. The su
preme heroism will be called from us before these coming
months are past. We cannot meet the challenge of the
times if our interests are vested in ourselves alone, if we
are weighed down under the burden of old prejudices,
hatreds and desires. We, too, must see the light on the
road to Damascus and follow the command of that other
traveler along the road who said:
“Put on the armour of God, that ye may be able stand a
gainst the wiles of the devil. For we wrestle not against
flesh and blood, but against principalities, against powers,
against the rulers of the darkness of this world, against
spiitual rwickedness in high places. Wherefore take unto
you the whol armour of God, that ye may be able to with
stand in the evil day, and having done all to stand.”
THE COMMON DEFENSE . .
ON OUR SIDE
(by Mrs. Mildred H. Mahoney, Executive Secretary,
Governor's Committee for Racial and Religious Under
standing, Commonwealth of Massachusetts.
On our side (in the fight against racial and religious
bate) we have most powerful allies: w-e have God and the
Government. All religions of our western world teach love
of God as the first commandment and as the second, love of
our fellow men. You can’t obey those commandments and
expect things for yourself that you deny to any other hu
man. It is just as simple as that; if only people would live
by it.
We have Government on our side. If you doubt it, re
read the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution
of the United States.
We have science on our side. Science proves in its own'
way that all men are brothers in that they are all memli -rt
of the human family. There are individual differences,
bf course due to heredity and environment, but in any
group there are th brilliant, the average, and the slow—and
all the gradations of character as well. So science is on our
side, and pride of intellect should be on our side, too, and
that is a common trait that it is convenient to have with you
rather than against you.
If people think straight, they know they cannot indulge
in generalizations because every group is made up of indiv
iduals. People cannot indulge in scapegoating because
that is a sure sign of not thinking bu< rather succumbing
to the temptation to blame some other group for a bad sit
uation. The most appalling instance of scapegoating in
all history every one of us has lived through. How long
■will it take the world to recover from Hitler’s terrible sad
istic scapegoating spree!
And we have on our side all the warm hearted, balanced,
secure personalities. You can’t make a good hater our of
such a person.
The happy wholesome person is by nature democratical
ly inclined because democracy and fraternity are so ident
Share Your Easter Joy!
Buy and Use Easter Seals!
[| CRIPPLED
CHILDREN
Editorial: ' 'The Enemy of American Ideals ’9
V HE'S GOING yTOGETHER - V
I TO ATTACK US7 WE MUST ,,
f y\ DEsTROYHlMj^y
ical in their meaning. It is fun to like people, all people,
unless you have real reason to dislike them and then only
on an individual basis and for cause. So—there is real
reason, I believe, for feeling that we’re on our way to a hap
pier country and a happier world.
PLAIN TALK by John M. Lee
Race Relations, Big Business Now
Negro Problem Pays Off Well
The most highly organized activity in the United States is
the business of building better race relations. Lumping
the sincere reformer, the idealist, the agitator, and the ever
present racketeer together, you get the greatest mass of in
dividuals occupied in the promotion of a single idea that
can be found in any single pursuit. Ostensibly preoccup
ied with the same program, it will be difficult to find any
two agreeing on methods of procedure or a ifnal satisfact
ory goal.
Appearing on the surface to be a self-sacrificing camp
aign of human and social justice, the promotion of better
race relations concerns itself with millions of dollars every
year, most of it coming in from good will offerings of
small amounts, and annual dues paid to one or more of the
many rganizations in the field. Much of the money is
spent for investigations and propaganda, but a good slice
of it pays the salaries of executives and field directors, and
other personnel.
Because good race relations is a commodity that can not
be taken home and put on the pantry shelf, no one can sav
just what it is we buy when we contribute our pennies, dim
es and dollars; one thing is certain, the need for improving
race relations is greater today than eevr, and new organiz
ations with that objective are springing up almost daily.
The confusion that exists in this field indicates that it is
a healthy cow that everyone wants a crack at milking. The
bitterness that results when two different schools of thought
tackle the same problem proves that no one is as much in
terested in getting the whole probilem solved as he is in get
ting credit for straightening out a fractional part of it.
Negro America is the fertile field where most of the seed
is planted. American Negroes are bing promoted into e
quality from the left, and they are being elevated into equal
ity fror the right, but no one has gone into business to show
him how to walk into equality on his own by hard work,
serious study, and great preparation. The essence of this
thought is that the Negro of today must build himself into
a better man so that the next generation will have better
stock on which to build. It is a slow process, but it offers
more in the long run than does sitting down waiting for
someone else to do YOUR job.
How much dishonesty there is concealed in the motives
of some of the organized groups working for a better place
in the sun for the Negro, it is hard to say, but events have
proven time and again that there is far too much for com
fort. It has often been said that the Negro is the most, if
not the best, organized group in the world. For anyone
who has in mind the purpose of creating mass unrest and
disorder, this is the pot to stir.
Recently, in Montgomery, Alabama, the president of the
Chamber of Commerce told me that they, (meaning the
ruling whites), could work out their problem with the Ne
groes very well if the Yankees, .black and white), would
stop interfering. Here again was someone representing a
group who had a plan for the salvation of the Negro, and
make no mistake about it, he had plenty of followers. The
southern plan, as outlined to me by this southern business
man doesn’t cost the Negro one penny. All he has to do is
stay in his place and don’t ask too many questions about his
wages. In return he is allowed to exist in a condition one
step removed from squalor, and he can look forward to a
decent burial when he dies. - ^
aradoxically, the Negro is told on the one hand not to be
too nationalistic in his attitudes, while on the other hand,
every organization pressing his case treats of him and his
problem on a highly nationalistic basis. Even the leader
t ®hip of his own organizations sometimes finds it necessary
to remind him that he is an underprivileged Negro, by plac
ing so-called “White Negroes,” in the forefront of the organ
ization.
Organized race relations among Negroes, are ■ by and
large, a racket, with the very nicest connotation that the |
word can imply. Now this does not mean that the people
l *
who carry on the work are racketeers, Heaven forbid! What
it does mean is that the field is so beautifully organized,
and the experts are so highly skilled, if you will look close
ly you will see a very scientific andcooperative process at
work; let a little tolerance dribble through the gate today;
let a little intoelrance dribble through tomorrow. That
way everybody is pleased, nobody gains or loses too much,
and the job becomes a sinecure, to have and to hold, ’til
death do us part.
One of the chief objections to organized race relations is
the inference it creates that individual Negroes are lazy in
comptent fellows who can’t qualify, so they band together
to raise hell for their rights. Of course this is over sim
plification, but what keeps running through my mind is the
thought that the Negro has not tried to help himself one
half as much as he believes. Perhaps the very human
tendency to search for, or wait for a panacea rather than
a slow cure is as excusable here as it is in the rest of man
kind, but we must remember that this old world is dying
fast and everybody is scrambling for his own security.
Just how long the experts would continue in the field if
it were purely voluntary without salary, is a matter open to
debate and conjecture. The machinery set up for the
work has now become little more than a device. It could
be overhauled for more useful service, it should not be a
bandoned at this time, but some of the profit certainly
should be taken out of race relations work.
THE NEGRO IN LATIN AMERICA by Harold Preece
Latin America vs Byrnes & Churchill
Our country is making no friends and millions of enem
ies down in Latin America by its “get tough” poiicy with
Russia.
I’m not stating any personal opinions but hard facts
which stare us in the face as Jimmie Byrnes rattles the at
om bomb like a gangster rattling a pair of brass knuckles.
. The Negro-Indian peoples of Latin America, remembering
how U. S. Marines burnt down the thatched villages of peas
ants in Haiti and Nicaragua, feel that Churchill and Byrnes
are ganged up together to build an “Anglo-Saxon alliance”
to rule nd rob that great majority of the worlds people
which is colored.
And they don’t like it.
Millions of Latin Americans are mad at what happened
to Luis Quintanilla, one of their distinguished leaders and
foes of imeprialism and racism when he criticized the
speech calling for an Anglo-American gang-up against
Russia delivered at jim crow Westminister College in Ful
ton, Mo. Quintanilla, Mexican ambassador to the Pan A
merican Union has been called back home by his govern
ment to explain a column entitled “Anglo-American Axis”
which he wrote in the Washington Post after Churchill,
discredited and defeated in his own country, had stood on
the sanfc platform with President Truman to echo Bilbo’s
mouthings about “white supremacy.”
Churchill—Friend of Mussolini '
. . Luis Quintanilla is a white man but he is a . worthy . suc
cessor of Mexico’s two great Negro liberators, Jose Maria
Morelos and Vicente Ramon Guerrero.. He wrote bluntly
and to the point that the proposed alliance of )“the English
speaking nations” would affect the destinies of all the non
English speaking Latin American republics.” .He recalled
that Churchill had always been an enemy .of .Russia .and
cism, Benito Mussolini.
. .“On March 8,” Quintanila .wrote, .‘Winston .Churchill
came out in no uncerttdn terms for an eventual .‘merging’
of the political interests of the British Empire and the Uni
ted States, so as to establish a mighty Anglo-American, anti
Soviet coalition.. . Latin American democrats (meaning all
believers in democracy) will firmly reject the formation of
any anti-Soviet bloc of nations, which in the . last . analysis,
would be nothing more than a ghastly resurrection of . the
first anti-Comintern.axis (the alliance of Germany, Japan,
and Italy against Russia) defeated in World War II.”.
. .‘The step advocated by Mr. Churchill is unacceptable on
moral as well as historical grounds.”.
. .Mr. Quintanilla was one of the Mexican delegates to the
first United Nations conference, held shortly after the death
of President Roosevelt, in San Francisco.. He . .supported
the resolution sponsored by Russia and Haiti to outlaw rac
ial discrimination throughout the world and also .offered
the resolution to bar fascist Spain from the UNO..
DO’S AND DONrS:
m
Do look at your own faults bfore you criticize others.
Drama critics are not the most hated people in the world,
you know.
^ l===rrr]D[^^nr====inL^^-jar===iat===]ni-inr=inr=
17. S. Prestige Drops
“We feel that it was American influence on the Mexican
government which is responsible for this attempt to gag Mr
Quintanilla,” a distinguished Cuban journalist, now living
in the United States told me. “But this doesn’t mean that
the majority of Latin Americans do not think he was right.
For it must be said that the prestige of Russia is going up
in Latin America and that of the United States and Great
Britain is dropping.”
“The very concept of an “Anglo-Saxon alliance” to con
trol the world offends us who believe that all races are
equal and that all nations should have the chance to deve -
op their own lives and their own economic set-up. The
majority of the people of Latin America are dark skinned
people and they will no more fight Russia than will the
dark skinned peoples of India and Indonesia and China.”
My friend told me that Latin Americans had not forgot
ten the statement of Churchill, made during the W orld War
when he was questioned about freedom for the peoples of
Africa. That statement made by the then British prime
minister was, “I have not been called upon to preside over
the liquidation of His Majesty’s Empire.”
Neither, he said, had they forgotten what Secretary of
State Jimmie Byrnes had said on the floor of Congress
when a member of the U. S. Senate from poll tax South
Carolina uttered the following:
“As to social equality, God Almighty never intended that
a white race and a black race should live on terms of social
equality; and that which the Creator did not Intend, man
cannot make possible.”
My friend guessed that the United States will wind up
fighting the rest of the world all by her lonesome if she
fights Russia which has outlawed Jim Crow and sends any
body to prison for trying to practice it. “All of us” he
said, “may fare better if we stop listening to Churchill and
Byrnes about Russia and start listening to the colored peo
ples.”
Adventures In Business
cBy Nichols Field Wilson
The "Square Deal” Works
. ROBERT H. ROLFS
In the neighborly Wisconsin
town of West Bend, on Sep
tember 20, 1915, a young man
named Robert H. Rolfs set
himself up in the business of
manufacturing fine personal
leather goods. He was equipped
' with a sound background of
experience but the start was
necessarily humble because
capital was lacking. small
back room on the second floor
of Peters’ store on Main Street
constituted the entire factory,
office and headquarters. Rolfs
made all of the necessary
benches and other equipment
himself with the aid of his one
employee.
A native of Milwaukee, where
he was born February 27,
1888, he began his formal edu
cation in graded school in
West Bend. An industrious
and more than ordinarily am
bitious spirit characterized
him at an age when most boys
are preoccupied with just hav
ing fun. ^
J Following his graduation
from high school, he started
his ^business career with a
leather goods manufacturing4
concern. Here he found his
vocation in life, his one con
suming interest — the making
of fine personal leather goods
— and he started at the bot
tom. His first job bore the
humble title of “billing clerk”
but his industry and initiative
gained recognition and ad
vancement within a relatively
swift period of time — book
keeper to traveling salesman,
to secretary of the company to
assistant general manager.
With this background of
practical experience he started
in business for himself—man-*
ufacturing the famous AMITY
line of personal leather goods.
By early 1917, the growing
popularity of Amity forced _
Rolfs to quit the “small room
over Peters’ store” for larger
quarters. The staff of em
ployees had increased from one
to fifteen craftsmen. Step by
step Rolfs has seen his busi
ness grow to be the largest
personal leather goods factory
in the world.
One of the key reasons for
the phenomenal and continued
growth of his company is the
keen awareness which Rolfs
has possessed from the outset
regarding the importance of
happy workers, rj
Public spirited and civic
minded, Rolfs has ever shown
the deepest appreciation of
the duties and obligations of
citizenship. He has served the
nation with great distinction in
war and peace—both person
ally and as a producer of es
sential commodities,
Man has no greater asset
than;, his good name.—
Socrates.
fine Quality-Personalized
PRINTING
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