The Athenaeum. (Atlanta, GA) 1898-1925, February 01, 1925, Image 19

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THE ATHENAEUM 161 “That the truth concerning the present racial situation is system atically kept from Fisk students as well as truth concerning the great liberal movements of the world. “That the colored world of Nashville is entirely out of sympathy and out of touch with Fisk University: that it is straining every effort to attract Southern white people and is segregating and insulting colored auditors.” Shortly after the participants of the demonstration had retired President McKenzie sent in a riot call. In less time that it takes to tell fifty typical Southern policemen were going through the rooms of boys and girls alike, bullying, insulting, and in many cases mal treating our finest and most cultured sons and daughters- Five were jailed, fined $50 each, and expelled. The exact number of students who have departed could not be determined. A large number have taken the train and a larger number is in Nashville awaiting the action of the board of trustees which is meeting in New York. Fisk and the cause of higher education has sustained a blovi that it will take years to efface. GARVEY—The incarceration of Marcus Garvey, erstwhile Pro visional President of Africa and President-General of the Universal Negro Improvement Association, was, in the eyes of thousands of black folks a martyrdom. That is the calamity of it. He stirred up race pride by promise of a mammoth racial enterprise and the re- demption of Africa from European land-grabbers. Hundreds gave their (€HtTre barnirigsJ thousandai&e^g^ihemselvesjnot only of life’s comforts' blit many of its^bare necessmS»*that the man in whom they believed might bring about their salvation. To them he was a reli gion, almost a God. In simple trusting faith they felt out for that which might better their condition, remove them from the bane of prejudice and persecution induced by prejudice. They groped blindly for the ever-recedeing boon. In Garvey perhaps lay the fulfilment. They clutched madly for that which offered brilliant promise, nearly a million dollars trickled in from the sweat of Ethiopia’s brow. Be hold! the greatest opportunity since the sailing of that “Dutch Trad ing Vessel.” God, for a man. Reverberating chaos! Confidence a- gain misplaced! O Lord! how long! STANDARD LIFE—Calamities thick and fast! When it rains it gushes. A decade of hard but glorious toil had brought Standard into the limelight. A truly great racial enterprise hove into view. A bee-hive of industry, an opening for Negroes of caliber! Into the whirlpool, the swirling votrex ***** * ** * We can not go on, the burden of three misfortunes oppresses us, FISK, GARVEY, STANDARD. What can be the answer. Read the next issue. ( 0 Honesty, thou art a jewel!