CHAPTER XIV.

THE SHAW MONUMENT SPEECH, THE VISIT OF SECRETARY JAMES WILSON, AND THE LETTER TO THE LOUISIANA CONVENTION.

Author Invited to Make an Address at the Dedication in Boston of a Monument to Col. Robert Gould Shaw and Regiment--He Accepts and Delivered the Address--The Speech in Full--Impressions of this Speech as Told by the Boston Transcript and Other Papers--The Thrilling Incident of Sergeant Carney, the Color-Bearer for the Old Fifty-Fourth Massachusetts During the Dedicatory Exercises--The Visit of Secretary of Agriculture, Hon. James Wilson, and Other Prominent Statesmen and Educators at the Dedication of the Agricultural Building--Something of the Agricultural Department at Tuskegee--An Open Letter to the Louisiana State Constitutional Convention--In this Letter Author Pleads that More of a Christian Spirit Should Animate the Races in their Dealings with each Other--That Negroes be not Treated as Aliens--That if Ballot Restrictions be Necessary, any Law Passed on the Subject Ought to Apply Alike to Whites and Blacks--That in the Same Degree the Ballot Box is Closed to the Negro, the Public Schools be Opened to Him--The Letter in Full--Author’s Position Endorsed by the Leading Democratic Papers in New Orleans--Author Delivers an Address Before the Regents of the University of New York in June, 1898.