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in this country. He has stepped across to the Islands of the Sea, and the hand of the Anglo-Saxon is to-day upon the East, from which he will not recede. will no longer be satisfied with his own continent and his own people, and the Anglo-Saxon race to-day in the world is nerving itself practically for the world's conquest and a contest with all nations of the earth. "One hundred years hence," says Lavelaye, “there will be two colossal powers in the world, beside which Germany, England, France, and Italy will be as pigmies -the United States and Russia." I ask if, with this marvellous future before us, we shall risk this worldconquest by an ill-attempted settlement of the question by a race admixture which may arrest the race which seems to be destined by the Almighty for the civilization of the world? The risk is too great, and the discussion seems needless.

The only plan upon which the Negro can work out his destiny is along the lines of a separate race entity. That is a practical solution of the situation. He was for 150 years a chattel and a slave, dependent entirely upon his master for everything in life; dependent for his clothes, for his medicine, for his shelter, and for his protection. Since the period of slavery was completed, he has been for over thirty years the ward of the nation. Millions of dollars have been poured out upon him. Help has been extended in every way. He was hedged about immediately after his emancipation by the victorious armies of the North. The Freedman's

Bureau, with its race of dependents, was in charge of affairs. For every morsel of food which went into his mouth, for every scrap of clothes upon his back, he was dependent upon the white race. To such an extent, in the first years of his emancipation, was this condition of dependence carried out, that to a great measure was destroyed his independence of character.

Outside of

the great Race Question, is the other great question, if the Negro expects to become a factor in the civilization of this day, he must not be a mere hanger-on to the white race. Not only race unity is absolutely necessary to him, but social race separation is as important. Mixed schools mean the white teacher in every instance; mixed churches mean the white preacher; mixed hotels mean the ownership of the property by the white man and the serving by the black man. In every instance, it means that the Negro, instead of having inculcated within him the idea of independence, of striking out for himself, of uplifting himself, will depend upon the stronger hand of the white man to guide him. Without confidence in himself, he can never become a potent factor in the civilization of this day. He can never become a missionary to other lands when he himself never preaches. He can never become a manager in the business of this day when he occupies a servile position to those who manage the affairs of to-day. As I have said before, over and above the great question of race instinct, the situation of to-day demands the absolute indepen

dence of the Negro in all of the race and social affairs of this life.

This is the question which now arises. If neither Diffusion, Colonization, nor Absorption will effect the purpose, what remedy do you propose? It seems to me that the best plan is to inaugurate the most efficient plan of industrial and general education for the Negro in all of the affairs of life, and in the meantime to restrict the suffrage to an intelligence or property basis, or a combination of both bases. The acute race troubles in the South have risen mainly from two causes, ignorance and politics. The ignorant use of his political powers has done more to keep the Negro and white man estranged than all other causes combined. There can be no practical solution of the question of the races in the South without settling the political question. When the Negro has arrived at an intelligence basis, absolutely the same to both the white and the black voter in the State in which he lives, then, and not until then, should he be entrusted with a vote. I will be excused for a discussion which is to some extent fundamental, and the discussion may seem contrary to the popular proposition that all men are free and equal. My time will allow but a glance at the general principles. It may seem to our friends in the North that we are presenting them with a club rather than an olive branch, but the doctrine that the government should be under the control of those best capable of self-government has been recognized at all times and,

with one exception, under all circumstances, as being the true idea of proper government. Wherever this fundamental principle has been departed from, governmental ruin and personal loss have surely followed. It may be inquired, if this proposition is true, and if such is the view of the Southern people, why has it not been heretofore acted upon? We reply that no opportunity has been given the South. That those governing in the South previous to the abolition of slavery were substantially the best and the most intelligent of its people, but that the voting population which has been cast en masse upon the South since the war has been to an unheard of extent ignorant and injurious to the state. The survival of the fittest and the rule of the intelligent is a law which is as inexorable as any known to students in the science of government. Place two classes of people, one intelligent and the other ignorant, in the same country, and the intelligent element will surely govern. Place two races in the same country side by side and the superior or intelligent race will as surely dominate. The illustration of Le Conte is apposite. Place upon a desert island 100 children ten years old and 100 people in fair health, strength, and age. Surely those of adult age will govern and should govern the country according to their own ideas. Take his further proposition of 1000 Australian blacks on an island and 1000 educated Caucasians living with them. The whole salvation of the government of that territory depends upon the intelligent

portion of the community controlling its affairs. I do not mean by this doctrine that the intelligent should enslave the weaker and less intelligent portion of the denizens of the country. You cannot argue a reasonable proposition to the reductio ad absurdum. The Negro in this country has the right of freedom and to the civil rights granted him by the law, and to all of the natural rights which the law and the constitution give him, but the highest and best law of self-preservation militates against the proposition that the greatest political rights of the country should be turned over to a class unfitted to exercise them. If this proposition is not carried out surely comes with it the destruction of the state. As an English statesman has said, the freeing of the blacks, the conferring upon them the franchise, was the boldest governmental experiment of modern times. The English government in all of its governing wisdom has held strictly the reins of government in its own hands in its dealings with the less intelligent races. In India, where the country swarms with a race which is certainly the equal of the Negro in intellectuality and governing capacity, the supreme rule is held tightly and closely by the English as the governing body. It is the true axiom of government that the higher or more intelligent class of people shall control. This has been the experience of 3000 years of governmental matters. In all of the history of government we have been the first people to abruptly modify this proposition. Left to the result of education alone after