In the Southwest are over eighteen hundred miles of boundary line
between ourselves and the people of Mexico. I know that I am expressing
for my colleagues of the Ku Klux Klan who dwell along that eighteen
hundred miles of boundary line their inmost thought, when I say that
they wish only peace and fellowship and mutual aid and generosity to
mark all our relations with the simple and kindly people of Mexico.
But we are here marshalling the facts--the staggering facts which
the American people must know and ponder well to-day. Nearly half a
million Mexicans, speaking various dialects of the Spanish and Indian
languages, have recently come across our Southwestern boundary line.
Surely it is not with any ill will in our hearts that we say with all
the power we have that these thousands can not share our American
democracy with us in this generation. In Mexico these people can be
ruled in such a way and take such measures of progress as may befit
them. Granted time and they may evolve a successful democracy all
their own. But in this generation they will make democracy impossible
wherever large numbers of them settle among us. If immigration
continues through the next generation THEY WILL FOREVER ENCROACH UPON
AND OCCUPY OUR SOUTHWEST. The native-born, white American will either
become a small ruling class, or fade from sight altogether. There are
factories in Texas with practically none but Mexicans employed. There
are sections of the Southwest where, in town and on the countryside,
there are many Negroes, Mexicans and Japanese, few Americans.
Finally, we come to the South. Leaving the burden of this argument to
future chapters, we can here take but a rapid glance at the inexorable
problem of the Southland. May Providence give to us men and women of
the South the power we need to place our problem before our fellow
citizens in other sections in such a way as to win their minds and
hearts by the goodness of our cause. If I but could, I would move my
hand along that ancient and deadly line which separates us from our
country-men and wipe it out forever. Our problem of the Negro, men and
women of the North, is your problem. If we fail, you fail. We plead
with you to join with us in freeing all our minds from bigotry, all
our hearts from unworthy passions, and all our thoughts from sectional
misunderstanding.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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