University of Virginia Library

How the Colored People Can Affect the Situation

Let us now take note of the serious manner in which the colored people of the United States have exacted a telling influence upon American life even though in the minority. The world has gone forward through the breaking of precedents regarded as sacred. The removal of the authority of the King of England from America and the substitution of a presidency constituted the breaking of a precedent. In 1912 the white people of the United States seemed to be about ready to break a precedent to give a third term in the presidency to that great character, the late Theodore Roosevelt. There were approximately 7,609,942 members of the Republican" party. Of this number a majority of 643,309 deduct that Colonel Roosevelt be given a third term as President of the United States, as shown by the election ret turns. A minority of the white members of this party desired for Wm. H. Taft to have the nomination. In the convention that did the nominating this white minority joined hands with a majority of the Negro delegates to the convention and nominated Taft. The white majority did not respect this action, disrupted the party and brought about the overwhelming defeat of Taft. William Jennings Bryan lacked but about six percent

of being elected to the presidency of the United States. The colored people constitute about ten per cent of the nation's population, and they were almost solidly against Bryan's election. It may be, then, that the majority sense of the white people favored Bryan for the presidency.

Again, the white children of the South in their most impressionable period have had to press up through Negro social heredity. In view of the manner in which the lives of the two races were entwined in the South during slavery it is no surprise that two hundred and fifty years of such contact gave the white people of the South the divisive attitude which resulted in the Civil War, predominately an effort at division.

We now cite a possibility. Texas is the largest state in the world's greatest nation. Something wonderful can come out of this great aggregation if it maintains unity. It is possible for it to divide and become five different states. When Texas was admitted to the Union it was granted that power. The unity of the State, therefore, depends solely upon the spirit of unity of the people. The Negro Baptists of the State some years ago had one state convention. It later broke into five fragments. If allowed free expression in the life of the State, would the Negro Baptists of Texas tend to split it?

Every night the American people have an example of the possibilities growing out of contact with Negro attitudes. In a sketch of Amos and Andy we have this statement, "Freeman F. Gosden comes direct from the South and has a natural Southern accent." He was reared with a Negro lad who was taken into his home. This lad, Snowball, succeeded in injecting some of his traits into his white companion. Mr. Gosden's biographer says of him, "We even find Snowball's traits in

Amos himself." Mr. Gosden, who is Amos, is not only acting the part of a Negro, but has had the traits of his Negro companion imbedded in his nature, which in this case has proven to be a fine and profitable thing.