into a flame that spread throughout the world.
The fifteenth century saw the dawn of a new
day break upon the nations, and dispel the long
night of a thousand years.
Columbus, crossing the awful sea about which
had gathered the fear and superstition of four
thousand years, threw open the gates of a new
Eden.
The sixteenth century felt the world tremble
under the colossal tread of the Reformation.
The nineteenth century has been crowded with
circumstances of great moment; unprecedented has
been the progress of science; discovery and inven-
22 WINNING ORATIONS
tion have belted the globe; vast empires have fallen
and mightier ones arisen; and now to close this
golden era, a fitting crown for such an age, comes
its grandest event; penetrated is the heart of Africa,
and Henry M. Stanley opens to development a
new colossal realm.
Westward the mighty waves of emigration that
have swept over the old world since man began his
march around the globe, seem ever to have rolled;
surging past dark Africa, on toward the settting
sun.
The vast hordes that have swarmed back and
forth across Europe, touched the north of the con-
tinent only, and left unknown this land of eternal
summer, this far-off sunny clime.
In the brilliant days of the old Augustan age,
the Roman generals led their unconquered phalanx
across the Mediterranean to subdue the great un-
known, but reaching the desert they were dis-
heartened by the burning waste that lay before
them, and returning erected here and there massive
structures, which stand today as monuments of the
tremendous failure.
Thus one after another the ancient and mediae-
val nations feebly essayed to penetrate the mys-
teries that shrouded the Ethiopian kingdom, until
at last the daring Portugese circumnavigated Africa
and fixed is boundaries.
This stupendous task accomplished, explorers
flocked on every side, like a vast army surrounding
a fortress, and the attack on the center was begun.
From the west, Park explored the wonderful
region of the Niger, and in attempting to follow its
terrible flood to the sea, lost his life.
Lacreda, striking at the southeastern forests,
cut his way in to the capital of the African King,
where disease struck him down.
SOUTH DAKOTA 23
Thus, from time to time, these great discoverers
attacked the impregnable battlements of the un-
known land on every side, and died while bravely
pushing on to open to the world the unseen treas-
ures that lay hidden in its heart.
'Twas in the midst of these uncertainties and
discouragements that Stanley began his work, and
opened one of the grandest campaigns known to
history.
The immortal Livingstone had discovered the
great lacustrine system whose outlet is the Lualaba;
a tremendous flood that every second pours a hun-
dred thousand cubic feet of water into something?
Stanley was determined to find out what; and re-
solved to follow it to whatever sea or ocean it
might lead.
The storied voyages of Marquette and Joliet on
the Mississippi, and of Orellana on the Amazon,
sink into insignificance, when compared with this
herculean task.
On through the treacherous whirlpools and
over the roaring cataracts of the great stream;
often compelled to hew their way through the dense
forests that bounded them like a wall on either
hand; through showers of poisoned arrows; through
disease, through death; for a thousand days save
one, the heroic little army wandered in the heart
of the unknown land; the sparkling waters beckon-
ing on they knew not where. No sound came to
betray the name of this vast shining river whose
roaring torrents bore them on.
Discouraged, reduced in numbers, the little band
would fain have turned back. But one dark day
the old Arab chief, recognizing some landmark, re-
turned the answer, "Ikuta ya Kongo."
Never did "Vive '1 Empereur" more inspire
Napoleon's glittering troops than did this trium-
24 WINNING ORATIONS
phant shout thrill the hearts of these weary pil-
grims alone in the Dark Continent's heart. Press-
ing on, they safely reached the sea. Livingstone's
Lualaba was connected with Tuckey's Congo, and
the shout of the old Mohammedan chief rang
throughout the civilized world.
Far to the south of the well-nigh boundless
Congo forests lies a lovely land, with a sky as soft
and a climate as perfect as balmy Italy. Vast
fields of gold and diamonds glitter in the tropic
sun.
"Whatever fruits in different climes are found,
That proudly rise or humbly court the ground,
Whatever sweets salute the northern sky.
With vernal lives that blossom but to die;
These here disporting own the kindred soil,
Nor ask luxuriance from the planter's toil,
Yes, vernal beauty reigns supreme."
But why has the creator for centuries concealed
this beautiful garden in the heart of a hidden realm;
withholding it from the sight of enlightened man!
'Twas the hand of the Omnipotent, working
out a mighty problem that it took four hundred
years to solve.
For centuries explorers nibbled, as it were, at
the coast of Africa. For centuries the nations
hurled their forces on its impregnable sides.
Hundreds of brave adventurers vainly essayed
to solve its mysteries, and left their bones to bleach
upon its burning sands.
But you ask, if this was the hand of God, why
did he permit this sacrifice? For answer, why did
he permit his chosen people to languish under the
lash of Egyptian bondage for four hundred years?
Why did he not send the Christ in the brilliant days
of the Babylonian kingdom; or later in the golden
age of Greece? The fullness of time was not yet
SOUTH DAKOTA 2&
come. God was not ready and the world must
wait.
Going back along the path of history to the
close of the ' Middle Ages, we see the Portugese
throwing the inhabitants of western Africa into
slavery, and later selling them to the pioneers of
our own country, by whom they were held in servi-
tude until their emancipation in 1863.
We as Americans look upon these three centur-
ies as a dark period in the history of the Negro;
and yet 'twas the dawn of his day. For, had not
the African been taken from his southern shore,
he would have been as savage as his brethren in the
Dark Continent are today; and if taken from his
native wildness and brought to the land of civiliza-
tion, he must be controlled before he could be
taught.
You say America has cursed the black man;
but show me a nation that has done more for his
race than has she. The centuries of servitude that
the African has endured have transformed him
from savage to man. Brought in contact with civil-
ization, the light of reason slowly dawned upon his
slumbering intellect, and as the years wore on, he
gradually became, as far as circumstances would
permit, the equal of his master. In 1860 the people
of the north, recognizing his right, turned and with
one terrible blow, shattered his fetters and made
him free.
Investing the slave with every right that was
his master's, gave rise to a jealousy and hatred be-
tween the races, which we first see in the Ku Klux;
sitting like a spectre in the moonlight before some
lonely cabin, while the horrified Negro looks upon
him as the Celestial looks upon his god; or, we see
him creeping upon the home of some unionist, like
a fox upon his prey; dragging him from his couch
26 WINNING ORATIONS
and leaving him bound and bleeding with none but
the stars to watch his suffering.
Though the iron hand of the law could check
such deeds as these, it could not quench the fire of
hatred between the races, and the terrible strife
has been growing ever since the emancipation of
the slaves. The color of the Negro's skin is an
eternal bar from the society of the whites; murder
and outrage stalk abroad in our land today as a
result of this unnatural mingling, and at last the
people in their despair cry out, "the race problem
must be solved."
Right here is the grandest coincidence in the
history of nations. Just at this crisis Almighty
God solves the problem; throws open the portals
of the wonderland in Africa that have been sealed
since the beginning of time; discloses a colossal
realm where roam a hundred million souls, shrouded
in the darkness of barbarism. The Dark Continent
must have light, and here in America he has been
preparing eight million tutors of their own blood
to civilize and Christianize this savage horde.
Call it circumstance; a mere coincidence; call
it what you will. I believe it the design of the
Omniscient one that in the year of our Lord, 1890,
Africa should burst her iron doors and send forth
to the world an appeal for help for her people in
darkness. That in this same year the crisis should
be reached in the race war, and America send her
eight million Negroes back to their native shore to
impart to their brethren the light for which they
plead.
You say the cost will be enormous. Will you
pay it from the overflowing coffers of your treasury,
or will you pay the price in blood?
Eight million Negroes inhabit your land today,
invested with every right that you enjoy, yet barred
SOUTH DAKOTA 27
forever from your society by the blood that courses
through their veins. Their number is increasing
year by year. Must a crisis be reached where the
sword shall take the place of the dagger, and our
fair land be convulsed by a war with the race for
whose freedom we have just sacrificed three hundred
thousand lives?
The amalgamation of the races is a solution
than which nothing can be more horrible. It will
elevate the Negro, but it will debase the race that
has made the world progressive and glorious. This
natural distinction between the Anglo-Saxon and
the African is divinely drawn. God and nature de-
mand that it be kept inviolate; and yet amalgama-
tion is the only road to peace save colonization.
When this migration of the black man to his
native land shall be accomplished, Africa will pour
her riches into the markets of the world; these
savage races shall be elevated to the plain of civil-
ized nations; the worship of the Fetich shall be
superseded by the worship of the true God; and
God shall have justified his ways to man.
Then this stupendous question with which
America grapples today shall be settled, settled right
and settled forever.
Through the mists of strife that envelope us
we shall see the dawn of a better day. When the
southern zephyrs shall bring a cry for light from
the Dark Continent, America shall send back the
answer, sweeping like a mighty wave across the
28 WINNING ORATIONS
Atlantic, "We are coming, 'nighted brethren, eight
thousand thousand strong." America will be free,
and Africa saved. And the shout shall ring through-
out the nations to the uttermost parts of the earth;
and the listening angel shall bear the glad news
upward where unnumbered millions sing in realms
of endless bliss, and the mighty chorus shall echo
'round the throne of God, from which shall shine
the light to illumine the path to freedom for a
hundred million souls.
FOURTH CONTEST (1891)
THE INDIAN PROBLEM
(A. C. SHEPHERD, DAKOTA UNIVERSITY)
History, with its mystic charms and charming
mysteries, reveals to us the treasures of the past.
It enables us to glance back through the dim mists
of vanished ages and behold many scenes which dis-
close the actuating motives of the world's great
actors. Piercing the dark clouds which enshroud
the pathway o'er which progress has traveled, we
enter in thought the vale of long ago.
It is the historic day when the little island,
San Salvador, was first seen by that illustrious
voyager whose name is now immortal. As he views
enraptured the scene before him, the dusky, stal-
wart natives swarm down from the flower-decked
hillsides and emerge from sylvan forests. They
gaze in profound awe and ignorance at the strange
pale-faces whom they enthrone in their credulous
imaginations as fair gods from the far-off spirit
world. Little did the untutored Indian dream that
these pale-faces would soon dispossess him of his
native land and confine him upon some narrow sec-
tion of this wide, colossal realm. Ignorant, simple,
and savage, little did he know that the advance of
civilization meant death to many of the non-pro-
gressive Indians themselves.
The Indian has sometimes been pictured as a
noble hero. He has been idealized by the fervid
fancy of genius, his praises sounded in sweet strains
of poesy and song; but such characters as the im-
mortal Hiawatha lived only in the dream of the poet,
for the naturally honest, industrious, and moral
Indian is a mythical being, created by fancy, the
30 WINNING ORATIONS
unseen hero of fictitious tales. The Indian has his
ideals, admires his heroes, worships the Great
Spirit, and hopes at last to enter the happy hunting-
grounds of his future Elysian home. But his ideals
are ignoble for his nature is untamed and base; his
heroes are reverenced, not for deeds of love and
self-sacrifice, but for those of cruelty and revenge;
the Great Spirit is a solemn, mysterious, unknow-
able something, worshiped in fear and superstition;
the happy hunting-ground is a consummation of his
earthly ambitions, hopes and joys. Thus history
portrays him by removing four hundred years from
the vista of the past.
But the Indian is not a being of the past. In
spite of the conquering armies that have swept over
his territory, in spite of disease, famine, and wars,
he exists today, and although four centuries have
passed since the light of civilization first broke
through the gloom that o'ershadowed his race
centuries in which the greatest triumphs of genius
have been achieved he exists today as he has
existed from time immemorial. True, there may
be a few notable exceptions, but almost universally
the same impulses animate his being, the same de-
sires and longings characterize his nature. Amid
unprecedented prosperity and progress he has lived,
not aiding in its development, nor participating in
its joys, not even sharing in its rich fruitions.
The record of events, the Indian's determined
opposition to culture and refinement, and above all,
the recent threatening outbreak lead us to believe
that however successful civilization may have been
in art, science, and invention, in elevating the Indian
it has signally failed.
When wars between civilized powers arise, we
calmly and dispassionately consider the causes and
then exonerate or condemn the belligerent nations.
SOUTH DAKOTA 31
Yet scarcely do we realize how many and how great
the provocations which have led the Indian to take
up arms against the intruders upon the soil which
he claims as an hereditary possession, and which
claim our government has fully recognized, as seen
by the treaties it has made. Thus it is that often
the savage warrior who is reprobated by public
opinion would be readily acquitted if tried before
a less prejudiced tribunal.
The story of the Red Man awakens feelings of
tenderest pathos as well as sternest condemnation.
It is a story of hopes blasted and confidence be-
trayed, though placed in the representatives of the
most glorious civilization known to the world. Study
his history, throw aside all prejudice, and can you
then deny that he has been wronged? He has often
been made the victim of the cupidity and dishonesty
of his white brother and as a natural result he
has vented his outraged feelings and wreaked his
merciless vengeance in atrocious massacres. Actu-
ated by no law, human or divine, save the law of
revenge, and having no redress for wrongs, but re-
taliation, and no recourse in retaliation save war,
can we blame him alone that he has caused fields to
run red with blood.
Within our own state, recently occurred an out-
break which, General Miles affirms, at one time
threatened to be the most terrible recorded on the
pages of Indian warfare. Along the Missouri dwells
the same tribe that instigated the awful massacre in
the early days of Minnesota. Upon the rolling
prairies of that frontier state was enacted one of
the saddest tragedies the historian has ever
chronicled. While the people were anxiously await-
ing the result of the strife between the North and
the South, the Sioux Nation, believing the govern-
ment was weakened by the war, in open defiance of
32 WINNING ORATIONS
civil authority, sought to avenge themselves of
wrongs endured.
It is the fault of the Indian's gross ignorance
that he does not discriminate between unoffending
citizens and corrupt government officers. Hence it
was that the unsuspecting settler fell a hapless
victim before the destructive tomahawk, and prairies
and dales were crimsoned with the blood of guile-
less innocence, and the grassy plains were dotted
with the nameless unmarked graves of brave, de-
fenseless pioneers.
But it was not wanton cruelty. It was an ap-
peal, not to feelings of right and justice, but to
arms, his last untried resort. It was war, honorable
and fair, as his savage mind had been taught to
appreciate honor and fairness. He had demanded
his rights, he had appealed to the sympathy and
humanity of those in authority. His demands were
unheeded; his pitiful appeals touched no responsive
chord in the unfeeling heart of enthroned villainy;
then in one final, desperate struggle he attempted
to assert his unrecognized rights.
"For nearly a thousand thousand acres of the
most fertile soil in the Mississippi Valley, he had
received," says Bishop Whipple, "not a farthing."
In the light of this fact, we are led to believe that
it was his manhood, his sense of injured rights that
impelled him to seek redress in the only way re-
maining, but it was ignorance and a savage nature
into which had been inculcated from earliest days
a love for the infliction of torture, that provoked
those murders, the most cruel of which human mind
can conceive, the most fiendish of which savage brain
is the author.
Yet the government did not learn, even at the
cost of a thousand lives, that it is economy as well
as humanity to treat these nomadic tribes with the
SOUTH DAKOTA 33
same fairness with which it treats its own constitu-
ents, and causes similar to those which resulted
in the Minnesota outbreak have occasioned the late
Sioux War. Pledges violated and obligations unper-
formed have cost the government two million
dollars. The supplies promised were given only in
part and, with a scarcity of food and an insufficiency
of clothing, the Indian felt that there was no pitying
eye to see, no sympathizing heart to appreciate his
condition.
At this juncture came a wonderful story of
hope. Messengers from the Rockies carried the
glad tidings of deliverance. A Messiah was coming.
The Indian was to be liberated from his foes who
were to be swept from the earth. His former hunt-
ing-grounds would be restored and he, in unre-
stricted freedom, would engage in hunt and chase,
unmolested and unrestrained. And what he holds
most sacred, his departed friends, dear to him by a
thousand ties of affection as strong as those which
bind you, Christian, these friends were to be
resurrected and together, reinstated in the scenes
of happier days, they were to dwell in the land where
their fathers had dwelt and know no sorrow nor care.
Thus the brightest picture that hope could
paint upon the sky of promise was disclosed to his
delighted eyes. Imagine yourself in the same
position, surrounded by the same conditions, and as
firmly believing that some supernatural power was
about to bring release and that your supremest ideal
of perfect happiness was just within your reach.
Think you that you would idly stand and not im-
plore that omnipotent power to grant the joys
dearest to your heart?
The unfortunate Indian was soon brought to see
the mightiness of his foe; the excitement was
quelled; the Indian subdued. His fond dream is
34 WINNING ORATIONS
gone. The bright picture of joys restored has faded
from the sky of hope and the Indian still remains
almost an emblem of despair.
What shall we do with his race that we may
perform our duty to him, to our government and
to our God? It has been said that the only road to
peace is through extermination and, as the chosen
people of God were commanded to slay the heathen
nations in the ancient land of Canaan, so are we, in
this enlightened age, privileged to strike from off
the earth these human beings created in the image
of God, the work of His own hands. But we live
not under the dispensation of six thousand years
ago, for those mysterious ways were changed when
that forgiving, sinless Son of God gave the divine
command, "Go preach the gospel to every creature."
Two things are necessary for the elevation of
the Indian Education and Evangelization. These
are the mighty factors, used as agencies in the
hands of the Divine, for the uplifting and upbuild-
ing of humanity. These benignant forces will ulti-
mately triumph over every superstition, transform
the nature of the savage and gladly proclaim to
every man beneath the stars sweet tidings of uni-
versal peace and love. Then not with the flaming
sword, but with glad news of intellectual emancipa-
tion, and with messages of a dying Savior's love
are we to win the confidence of this race and lead
them from the darkness of savagery into the glori-
ous light of civilization.
Educated and Christianized, the Indian, no
longer a dependent ward upon the government, be-
comes a man with all the boundless possibilities of
a noble manhood. Then let the government enact
just laws to ameliorate the unhappy condition of this
unhappy race. Let the church promulgate the true
gospel and thus create comfort and gladness and
SOUTH DAKOTA 35
blessing where now is darkness and despondency and
gloom.
Then in this Republic all kindred tribes of the
globe shall be comprehended within the bonds of
brotherhood. For the people shall know that God
has made of one blood all nations of the earth.
Then the starry flag of the Union, unfurling its
silken folds in the balmy sunshine of freedom, will
inspire the same patriotic emotions of pride and
love in the heart of the Red Man that swell in the
hearts of the sons and daughters of those who
fought and died to keep it floating there. Then the
grateful prayer of thanksgiving from this race, re-
deemed from savagery, shall be borne on the wings
of faith, up through boundless ether to the throne
of him who is the God of nations and the God of
love.
FIFTH CONTEST (1892)
THE NATIONAL PROBLEM
(J. W. HARRINGTON, REDFEELD COLLEGE)
A year ago Italians assassinated the Chief -of-
Police at New Orleans. A criminal offense and but
one of a thousand yet it serves a purpose; it
carries with it a message of truth and a lesson of
national importance. To the statesman, to the
student, to every individual whose interest goes be-
yond self, this occurrence brings into prominence
a social problem of highest moment. Discussed in
the weekly press and solid review; noted in the plat-
forms of political parties, investigated by the "Ford
Committee;" pondered over by congressmen and
senators; carefully measured by the philanthropist's
eye; agitated as a party issue; weighed in the bal-
ance of legislation, but not yet solved the immi-
gration problem.
We have welcomed the European immigrants
as does a mother her beloved child. Twas well.
They have tilled our land, built our railways, and
fought our battles. The English, the Irish, the
Germans, the Scandinavians eliminate their work,
forget their deeds, and you have not an American
Republic but an English colony. The ruddy glow
on the cheeks of their children is your heritage.
Their strong arms which make factories resound
and cities rise are your safety. Condemn not their
labors. Give them credit for a noble work.
But alas! The laws of a progressive people
must ever change. Conditions and circumstances
shift as the winds. Come with me to Castle Garden.
What alien faces now cross the gang-way? Not
Germans, not Irish; but the forbidding hosts so
38 WINNING ORATIONS
familiar in south and central Europe Italians,
Hungarians, and Poles men and women born of
poverty, fed with crime, dwarfed in body and soul.
This unwelcome throng doubles in a single year,
while the more desirable classes from northern
Europe steadily decrease. Mark well the contrast.
No longer come great numbers from intellectual
Europe, but the undesirable classes from the south,
encouraged as they are by glowing promises of
steamship companies or driven from their home
lands by want and taxation, rush into our borders
like so many sheep set free from the fold. Despite