A MAN OF THE NATION.

                       CONCLUDED.
  III. The territory of the Negro is National.  The Nation
opened it up to him despite the fact of some uncleared obsta-
cles, hindrances and such like, to his "pursuit of happiness"
and progressive movement; therefore, let him have the civic
consciousness of his enlarged boundaries. To narrow his
compass of movement by pleading special race privileges
he must inevitably assume one of three hardly tenable
positions, any one of which would immediately involve him
in dispute, upon declaration, and provoke a relentless an-
tagonism: viz-
1. His superiority to all other people,
2. His equality to any people,
3.  His inferiority to all other people.
  (We mean in its economic, political sense).
  For him to assert superiority, which he cannot prove,
would bring upon him contempt and persecution; to assert
his equality in affairs and accomplishments as a people,
would draw the challenge for proofs and exhibits which
every far-seeing Negro would not attempt, as our people
have just emerged from a long period of bondage and degra-
dation and, as yet, are not ready for any such a competi-
tive contest, whatever individuals among us may have
been enabled to accomplish; and, lastly, so far as an ac-
knowledgment of inferiority to the rest of the human
family is concerned, this he indignantly denies, and in his
own defense demands "a man's chance," in just contradic-
tion and reflection of so vile a slander upon his being.
  But, though he would not make any one of the foregoing
claims, there is one other position which the Nation recog-
                         (403)




			

African Methodist Episcopal Church Review, Vol. 25, Num. 4

Man of the Nation

R.

Volume:  25
Issue Number:  04
Page Number:  403
Date:  04/1909