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Show 124 125 the growing altruism and the more and more retined ethical per- ceptions and sensibilities of the world. This is altogether a triumph of morals and religion. There has been no other achievingr power save conscience. This alone we have might have been gained without injustice, is shown by the present greatness of the commonwealth of Pennsylvania, secured by the just and peaceful negotiations of William Penn with the lndians. With our moral growth have come juster meth- ods with the Indians and. in consequence, friendlier feeling. This is leadingr the people to seek redress through the open doors of the temple of justice rather than through those of janus. lint when the consummation shall be attained, will that alone bring peace to our homes and prosperity to our hearths? No. Shall we have banished that equally brutal but more subtle specter from our land-race contlict and race hatred? No. When Latin state and Teuton nation shall no longer strive. shall Latin or Teuton nation be at peace with itself? No. \Vhat then? This is the next mirk-intranational peace. We must learn to love, respect, help and encourage every class. clan and color of men; to believe in the equal rights of all men, without pliy sical qualification as to races any more than as to men of the same race. WM WMH Ilium Men are more alike than they look. Most race problems are things of surface, convention or cultivation. llate is no more innate than love; neither (‘Xi>t.\‘ till it has been given beginning. Radical religious differences intensify race problems. With these. as Well as race variations, lingland, Russia. Turkey and other Luropcan governments have to deal. We in America are larqelv spared that element of discord and that simplifies our problem mightily. \VC find our situation as to the Negro race element caused by" the initial inconsistency of engrafting slavery upon free institu- tions. and of framing a constitution recognizing human servitude in the face of a declaration that all men are entitled to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. 4 The way out is by retracing our steps, and this we have begun; indeed, we have gone a long way on the backward track already and are now ready to start right once more. By general education and the doctrine of human brotherhood we shall arrive. Lanyards there may he and reluctant travelers in the way, but our guides are true and the lettering is plain: "This way out." Our Indian problems are the heritage of our early violence with the native American. The moral development of those early days made any means seem right in attaining what was plainly'a desrrable end; but that this reasoning was at fault, and that all nation, now in flux, must become continent in the common patri0t« ismy common interests, common aims, common ideals and inter- dependence of all its units, racial and sectional. Americans all, we must learn to give. as well as take: con- cede as well as claim; delimit boundaries as well as extend them; nor should it be in the heart of any to see any man fixed in an inferiority that is removable. I see increasing evidence of this desirable change in the American mind every day, and I believe much of it comes as a plain corollary to the proposition that justice. with peace. should rule out strife and bloodshed among nations. Righteousness is the basis of the international Peace Movement; it is no less the basis of the. inter~racial peace movement. Under this beneficent principle there are no w >ak and no strong: only the right and the wrong. Righteousness is fundamental, ultimate and knows no moods. It is as indivi. ble as an atom. No nation can consistently take a righteous attitude towards another without also tak- ing it towards all parts of its own. The, common sense of the American people sees this and their Conscience approves it; hence it is that this international movement has been the mightiest moral force of the century for domestic peace also. It has come by induction, and it appeals to men by easy suggestion. Is there any t idence, you ask, that an awakened conscience is makingY for racial peace within the nations? 1 think so. it was the sense of our inconsistency in foundingr a land of liberty and then binding millions to slavery in it that brought emancipation; it was the standing rebuke, of our Declaration of independence to the prevailing‘r thought that some men had no rights that others were. bound to respect. that enacted laws respectingr those rights, In our own day we see the workings of the world's conscience in many ways. The Congo Free State atrocities are everywhere denounced: there is a growing boldness in denouncingr internal lawlessness in any country; a greater \\'illing‘ness to educate. the under man |
