The speakers, besides myself,
on Sunday evening, were Rabbi Emil G. Hirsch, Father Thomas P.
Hodnett, and Dr. John H. Barrows.
The Chicago Times-Herald, in describing the meeting, said of my
address:--
He pictured the Negro choosing slavery rather than extinction;
recalled Crispus Attucks shedding his blood at the beginning of
the American Revolution, that white Americans might be free,
while black Americans remained in slavery; rehearsed the conduct
of the Negroes with Jackson at New Orleans; drew a vivid and
pathetic picture of the Southern slaves protecting and supporting
the families of their masters while the latter were fighting to
perpetuate black slavery; recounted the bravery of coloured
troops at Port Hudson and Forts Wagner and Pillow, and praised
the heroism of the black regiments that stormed El Caney and
Santiago to give freedom to the enslaved people of Cuba,
forgetting, for the time being, the unjust discrimination that
law and custom make against them in their own country.
In all of these things, the speaker declared, his race had chosen
the better part. And then he made his eloquent appeal to the
consciences of the white Americans: "When you have gotten the
full story or the heroic conduct of the Negro in the
Spanish-American war, have heard it from the lips of Northern
soldier and Southern soldier, from ex-abolitionist and
ex-masters, then decide
within yourselves whether a race that is thus willing to die for
its country should not be given the highest opportunity to live
for its country.
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