Page:The race-problem in America.djvu/21

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THE RACE-PROBLEM IN AMERICA.

as you will see, for its rhythm, melody, and withal for its—silliness! Here are two lines from it:

"Let Laws and Letters, Arts and Learning die;
But give us still our old Nobility!"

Yes, let everything go to smash; let civilization itself go to the dogs, if only an oligarchy may rule, nourish, and dominate.

We have a blatant provincialism in our own country, whose only solution of the race-problem is the eternal subjection of the Negro and the endless domination of a lawless and self-created aristocracy.

Such men forget that the democratic spirit rejects the factious barriers of caste and stimulates the lowest of the kind to the very noblest ambitions of life. They forget that nations are no longer governed by races, but by ideas. They forget that the triumphant spirit of democracy has bred an individualism which brooks not the restraints of classes and aristocracies. They forget that, regardless of "Pope, Consul, King," or oligarchy, this same spirit of democracy lifts up to place and power her own agents for the rule of the world; and brings to the front, now a Dane as King of Greece, and now a Frenchman as King of Sweden; now a Jewish D'Israeli as Prime Minister of England, and now a Gallatin and a Schurz as cabinet ministers in America. They forget that a Wamba and a Gurth in one generation, whispering angry discontent in secret places, become, by the inspiration of democracy, the outspoken Hampdens and Sydneys of another. They forget that, as letters ripen and education spreads, the "Sambos" and "Pompeys" of to-day will surely develop into the Touissants and the Christophes, the Wards and the Garnets of the morrow, champions of their race and