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[152a]

Memorial to the President of the United States and the People thereof.

To the President, Woodrow Wilson,
White House, Washington, D. C.

Sir.

When this Europoen war began the world involuntarily speculated
whether the Irish would be loyal and the Russian Jews, because of
the denial of home rule by England, and of civil and political rights
by Russia. As the United States of America enters this awful war
the world speculates whether Americans of color will be loyal
because of the denial of rights to a majority of them.

Since Colored Americans in the past have offered their lives
in every war for the country, if Germany is seeking to induce them
to revolt, it but proves how notorious is their proscription. If
this nation, knowing the active loyalty of the Americans in the
past, believes this alleged plotting could succeed, it shows that
the government and people believe that Colored Americans are most
unjustly treated.

The Boston Branch of the National Equal Rights League,
meeting when the country is at war, realizing its responsibility
as a branch of the only nation-wide organization formed by and of
and led by Colored citizens to oppose race and color discrimination,
declares false all charges of disloyalty.

Colored Americans would be less than human if they did not
feel bitterly every bar from employment, from public accommodation
because of our race and color. Deep is the resentment against
saidd segregation by city, state, or the federal goverment

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