Microfilm Reel 229, File 152, "African Americans"

#425 Schiller Avenue.

Trenton, N. J. April 16, 1913.

[STAMP= W.F.J. APR 17 1913 ACK'D]

Hon. Joseph P. Tumulty, Executive Department. Washington, D. C.

Dear Sir:-

1 see by the Washington dispatches that the President’s policy in reference to the appointment of colored men to office,--that the President will not appoint colored men to any office where race antagonism will be aroused.

I am exceedingly pleased with this policy because I believe it to be the right one to be pursued for the colored people. In the first place, it removes from them a false hope that their advancement lay in holding a certain class of offices which would arouse race feeling, and in many instances, among some of the Negroes’ best friends. Secondly, it leaves

the door of opportunity open to foster an honest and sympathetic way to help and encourage the Negroes to work out their own problem. Along this line, the President's policy is a new era and it will make many friends for the Negro all over the country, and will enable him to adjust himself to a policy that will make for his benefit.

I believe the more thoughtful Negroes throughout the country agree with me in accepting the President's policy as being the proper course to be pursued for the Negro. It seems to me that what my race needs is an honest and fair policy

83438

Hon. Joseph P. Tumulty--2.

promulgated in their interest.

The President has my thanks and appreciation for his position so early in his administration. He reaffirms my very great conviction and faith in him that the Negroes have a friend in him.

Yours very truly.

IWLR/Dic.

83439

F.W.P Ranalie,

152

1420 Swann St., Washington D.C. April 17113.

[stamp: W.F.J APR 21 193 ACK'D]

[stamp: THE WHITE HOUSE APR 10 1913 RECEIVED]

Mr. Joseph Tumulty WhiTe House.

My dear Mr. Tumulty:

Will you grant me an audience some day next week? I am an applicant for membership on the Excise Board for the District of Columbia.

Was introduced to you by letter from Mr Wyvell for Mr Bryan.

Very respectfully

W. [?] Ferguson

83440

1251. South 18th Street April 19, 1913.

President Woodrow Wilson The White House

Dear Mr President:-

I enclose a series of editorials on the Negro question which have been running in the Philadelphia Public Ledger every day since Monday, April 14th, and shall continue for two or three days next week. You are doubtless familiar enough with the peculiar work which I have long been attempting on this question to recognise before reading many of the editorials that their central purpose was to center public attention on our specific efforts. Indeed, it was by the direct personal request of some of the foremost white clergymen of this city that The Ledger was induced to take up this matter.

The Ledger, as you know, owned as it is by the Curtis Publishing Company, publishers of the Saturday Evening Post, the Ladies Home Journal, etc., is one of the most powerful and infiuential news papers in this country, and the significance of its thus opening its editorial columns to the cause of the Negro is, therefore, apparent. But, in long personal interviews with the proprietors of this paper, they agreed with the delegation that called on them that the movement which we represent is one that embraces boundless possibilities in righteously adjusting relations between the races; and they assured us that we will have their hearty co-operation in making it a complete success. The unprecedented series of editorials which, they are running (and which far transcend our most sanguine hopes) are sufficient evidence of their sincerity.

I scarcely need to tell you that the ideas gradually unfolded by these editorials represent what it has taken me nearly twenty years to evolve, and what every open-minded person who examines them agree embrace an imediately operative, harmonious and thoroughly practical solution to every many of the most vexatious- di differences between the races. Knowing your deep interest in this entire question, I shall take the liberty to send you the renainder of this series of editorials when they appear.

Your humble servant,

J.T. Semons Field Secretary.

83441

[stamp: THE WHITE HOUSE APR 23, 1913 RECEIVED]

File

1251 South 18th Street, April 22, 1913,

President Woodrow Wilson, The White House.

Dear Mr. President:-

[floating text: 152]

I enclose you two more Philadelphia Ledger editorials on the Negro question. That of Monday is an unqualified endorsement of the work of our organtzation, with a most earnest appeal for funds to promote the name. Tuesday's editorial is a most convincing reply to a letter from Mr. Booker T. Washington in which he falls into the common error of assuming that whatever industrial disadvantages may be suffered by Negroes of the North are to be overcome by their own initiative rather than by a change in the attitude of the white man toward him. The Ledger, owned and controlled by one of the richest white concerns in the country, makes it clear that it regards it as the absolute duty of the white man to give the Negro a fair chance to earn an honest living.

The Ledger is going to a most remarkable extent in thus fighting the battles of the colored man, and at a time when the heel of almost every man seems to be against him. It would be a most helpful thing to the race, and perhaps mark a turning point in the attitude of the public press toward them, if every friend of humanity would at least write the Ledger thanking and encourging it for its noble stand, whether they care to endorse the specific efforts of our Organization or not. These editorials are not yet concluded, and, unless I hear from you to the reverse, I shall send you the others as they appear.

Faithfully yours, J. S. Stemons 83442