“Before concluding, I wish to ask Jean Gordon just why it is she and the women of the South are so bitterly opposed to giving suffrage to Negro women? Do they fear us? Yea, they need to fear us, for we have made up our minds that we are going to help our men of the South get their rights, and Jean Gordon, being a woman, is fully aware that when a woman wills a thing, it is as good as done. The Negro men are going to come out on top, and their women are going to see to it. The Negro men are going to learn to protect their women from the snares of white men, and their women are going to help them do this, too.... No longer does a Negro woman consider it an honor to have a white man for a ‘friend’—a lover; gradually have we made her understand that it is an insult, and she now tells her father, brother, or husband, as the case may be, and it is up to this man to defend the virtue of his female relative, in the _same way_ the white man defends his. No more do we hear nice-looking colored boys bragging that such and such a white woman is quite crazy for him, for we have shown him that her affection for him is likely to lead him into trouble, so, having quite a variety of colors to choose from in the women of his own race (thanks to the white man for that), the Negro boy runs along with the kind of girl who pleases him, and keeps out of trouble. Very often, though, the White does not let him stay out of trouble—there are so many ways devised by these nice white people to hurt the Negro who is peaceably bent. The Negro has been patient, true, but we all know there is an end to all patience. I hope the time has come when the Whites of this section will take up more time in improving themselves and less time in seeing the error of our ways. We both of us have much to do, but we Negroes are aware of it, and are anxious to improve ourselves, but we are unable to take pattern after those who are more in need of lessons than we. The Negro is bound to come out on top—even though he is in a hopeless minority. Right will ever and always crush Might; for reference, see William Hohenzollern!” * * * * * By this sulphurous little smoke one may know of subterranean fire. When the earthquake comes the Jean Gordons will fall down and the new Negro woman will stand forth. White society in places like New Orleans may one day be overthrown unless it can live for ideals and reform its institutions. Much depends on the law which is corrupted and much on the churches now in decay. Literature in New Orleans is nigh dead, so I will not mention that. XII THE NEW MIND OF THE NEGRO Resentment is the main characteristic of the Negro forward movement. In endeavoring to understand the Negro mind a maximum is gained by answering the question: _What does it mean to have been a slave?_ Analysis of racial consciousness at once brings to light in the case of the Negro a slave mentality. He has been pre-dispositioned by slavery.