of manhood among men by yielding up that right which even a singed cat will not yield up—the right to defend their lives. If The Age knows of any instance to the contrary in the history of the past seven thousand years, let it mention that instance. But The Age may ask:

“What will self defense accomplish?” Let us see first what the absence of self-defense accomplishes. In its news account of the St. Louis massacre, the Amsterdam News shows that whenever the white mobs found a group of Negroes organized and armed, they turned back; while The Age itself had this significant and pathetic sentence:

CONTENTS

Since the massacre, which will go down in history alongside the atrocities committed in Brussels and Rheims, a delegation of Negroes has held a conference with Governor Lowden at Springfield, but the outcome of this meeting will not bring back the lives of those who, for no valid reason, were struck down and murdered in cold blood.

Taking the two things together the answer seems clear enough. When murder is cheap murder is indulged in recklessly; when it is likely to be costly it is not so readily indulged in. Will The Age venture to deny this? No? Then we say, let Negroes help to make murder costly, for by so doing they will aid the officers of the city, state and nation in instilling respect for law and order into the minds of the worst and lowest elements of our American cities. And we go further: We say that it is not alone the brutality of the whites—it is also the cowardice of Negroes and the lickspittle leadership of the last two decades which, like The Age, told us to “take it all lying down”—it is this which has been the main reason for our “bein’ so aisily lynched,” as Mr. Dooley puts it.

Whatever The Age may say, Negroes will fight back as they are already fighting back. And they will be more highly regarded—as are the Irish—because of fighting back.

We are aiming at the white man’s respect—not at his sympathy. We cannot win that respect by any conspicuous and contemptible cowardice; the only kind of sympathy which we may win by that is the kind of sympathy which men feel for a well-kicked dog which cringes while they kick it.

“Rights are to be won by those who are ready and willing to fight, if necessary, to have those rights respected.”

Who says this? Theodore Roosevelt. So does President Wilson. So does the U. S. Government. That is why we went to war with 

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