Page:Daniel Minort Baxter - Bishop Richard Allen and His Spirit (1923).pdf/109

Rh Show Thyself a Man Under Trials.

Strange normally strange despite the part the Negro has taken in all our country’s advancement he is still treated as a boy and a ceiling is kept over his head. Banneker proved his astronomical genius, and gave an unexcelled almanac for his day, he also helped to lay out Washington City. Frederick Douglass spoke with eloquence like Socrates and Demothenes and swayed two continents for the cause of freedom. The records for riveting ship boilers, and laying of bricks are held by Negroes while Hansom accompanied Perry to the North pole where the stars and stripes were planted on those ice capped shores. Not only has the Negro accompanied his fellow countrymen on peaceful voyages of discovery but from Boston heights to Argonne forest his breast has been bared to plant our flag in honor upon the enemy’s soil and to keep our shores sacred and involubly the land of freedom and democracy, yes we have shown ourselves men, side by side with our white fellow countrymen. We have hewn the wood, drawn the water and dug the ore, and built the rail-roads side by side with them. We have never produced a traitor nor a nihilist nor an anar-