The Lutheran Pioneer St. Louis — 1919, Page 36

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36 The Lutheran Pioneer.

We hope that the Stockbridge Indian Mission,
so signally blessed in the past, may not be checked
in its progress because of the lack of the necessary
funds to erect another building so necessary to
carry on the good work. Bevel la

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A Challenge.

10,

In our last number we spoke of the colored in-
yasion of the North, and called attention to the
great Negro population of some Northern cities.
The New York Evening Post’ of February 22
brought an interesting story of the large Negro
settlement occupying fifty-two blocks in the heart
of New York City and having a population of no
less than 100,000 persons. Here, in a district vir-
tually comprising a city within a city, there live in
voluntary segregation enough Negroes to populate
two cities the size of Montgomery, Ala., or three
cities like Fort Smith, Ark. Less than twenty years
ago the first Negro family moved into this district,
and only a few years ago the colored population
was quite small. To-day every line of business is
conducted in this district by Negroes, and six weekly
newspapers and three magazines are owned and pub-
lished by them. The community has twenty Negro
“physicians, twenty-five colored lawyers, about fifty
trained nurses, eight dentists, four registered phar-
macists, and two architects. It is the intention to
organize a Board of Trade among the Negro busi-
ness men of the district, and at present plans are
under way to purchase land along the Harlem River
where Negro factories may be established.

From other larger cities of the North comes
information which clearly indicates that these recent
colored immigrants have no intention of returning
to the South, even though strenuous efforts are made
by Southern States to induce. them to go back to
the land of their birth. The social and business
advantages found in the North are more than
enough to stifle every sigh that. might arise in their
hearts for the sugar fields of Louisiana and the
rice lands of Texas. ‘The industrial advantages
found in the factories of the North and the educa-
tional advantages offered the children in Northern
schools will keep them in the shadow of Northern
smokestacks, and help them to overcome their long-
ings for the pure air of their former rural homes.

True, Southern communities are trying to repair
damage that has been done. Atlanta, Ga., where

Negro children have no public school facilities be-
yond the seventh grade, has promised its colored
population a high school, and it is eyen possible
that it will establish a library for the Negro resi-
dents of the city, who haye for years helped to keep
up the free libraries of the city, but never were
permitted to make use of them! Representatives
of the colored people haye met with the Chambers
of Commerce in many parts of Georgia in recent

years to talk over the situation and to find-means

of lessening the friction between the two races,
But all this has come too late to bring back those
who have left for Northern industrial centers, and
have there enjoyed the high wages that are being
paid unskilled and semiskilled labor. On the other
hand, it will probably be a means of holding those
that have not yet left their native heaths and fields.

But while the South has lost thousands upon
thousands of Negroes because it did not provide
them with what they had a right to expect, is the
North now doing the proper thing by the immi-
grant? Is there not something besides work, good
wages, and educational facilities that the North is
in duty bound to give the Negro who has come to
live among us? Is the North doing its duty by the
immigrant Negro after his working-hours? He has
come to us because he can get work and big wages
here; but shall we be satisfied when these things
have been provided for him? It is after working-
hours, and especially on Sunday, that the newcomer
needs friendly advice and assistance. The immi-
grant has moral and religious wants; what are the
Northern Christians doing to supply them? Let us
begin to realize before it is too late that the Negro,

. 4 a
newly arrived from the South, cut loose from all

home-ties, and a stranger among strangers, is pass-
ing through a great crisis. He needs Christian
friends and champions as he never did before. His
colored brethren and sisters should give him the
glad hand of welcome, and kind hearts should be
ready to warn him against the morel pitfalls that
beset his path. What is our Church doing in this
respect? «Are we doing all we can for the Negro
in our large industrial centers? Many a Negro has
come from one or the other of our Southern con-
gregations to make for himself a new home in some
large Northern city; have we in every case taken
care of him as we should, and guarded his interests ?

Bi. Lt

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We cannot serve God and Mammon, but we can
serve God with Mammon.