468                 A. M. E. REVIEW.

the Church.  It is not right that we should do the work of
the State, but when all other hope of advancement is cut off
and we can confer a real and lasting benefit, it is wisdom to
do so.  The majority of the colored population of Maryland,
outside of Baltimore city live in southern Maryland and on
the Eastern Shore.  On account of their numbers and al-
leged ignorance they have become the bone of contention in
politics.  They have been grossly misrepresented and belit-
tled in two heated campaigns; and within the last eight
years their school facilities have been very much abridged.
In some of the counties the schools are opened for colored
children only four or five months; in a rural district where
the whole force of the family is employed in picking and
saving the crop, together with weather conditions, this
means only two or three months schooling for the colored
youth. Add to these conditions the poor teaching force of
some of the schools, and you can readily see in what a lam-
entable condition our people are. The boys and girls of
those sections are reaching manhood and womanhood with
little or no education. A Normal School with industrial
features, centrally located with a capable, energetic, and
wide-awake principal, would attract to it three or four hun-
dred young men and women.  It would be an inspiration to
the whole section, and would lift our church out of obscurity
and give it great prestige, if not a controlling influence. But
in our present financial condition the probability of such a
school is very remote; yet we should take a deeper interest
in the public schools.  Every Negro boy and girl should
have a common school education. The presiding elders and
ministers of those counties should impress upon their people
the absolute necessity of sending their children to school,
and keeping them there as long as the term lasts and to
make some pecuniary effort to lengthen the school year.
  Great importance should be attached to the kind of train-
ing we give in our schools of high grade; for we have
reached that stage in racial-training development where




			

OHS/National Afro-American Museum & Cultural Center Serial Collection

African Methodist Episcopal Church Review, Vol. 28, Num. 1

Volume:  28
Issue Number:  01
Date:  07/1911