The _Synod of Wisconsin_ has four or five ordained ministers in Alaska. THE AMERICAN NEGRO. The _American Negro_ offers to the American Christian Church one of its most pressing responsibilities. Brought to this country against his will, held for many years in slavery in which independent development was out of the question, then by political necessity given in addition to his freedom the right to help govern the country in which he had been a slave, he has furnished for himself and for the white race a problem like no other problem in the world. Before the Civil War the Christianization of the negro was carried on by pious individuals, many of them slave-holders and by various churches. There were in 1860 before the outbreak of the war about half a million negro Christians, belonging chiefly to the Baptist and Methodist churches. This number has increased until to-day a conservative estimate would fix the number of Christian negroes at seven and a half million. Another motive than the desire to win the negro for the kingdom of God has entered into much of the philanthropic work undertaken by the white race. This is the realization of the menace to the State from so large an uneducated, uncivilized and alien race within it. That the negro is capable of profiting by education and capable of becoming a valuable citizen is proved in many ways, not the least remarkable of which is his progress in religious matters. It is said that no other people give a larger percentage of their earnings to religious work. Over eight per cent of the total wealth of the negro church is vested in its church properties. Late reports mention four large publishing houses which issue only negro church literature. All the important negro churches now maintain home and foreign missionary departments, which contribute over $50,000 a year to foreign missions, over $100,000 to home missions, employ two hundred missionaries and give aid to three hundred and fifty needy churches. The conditions which make it imperative that the American should raise his negro associate are expressed by Booker Washington. “When I was a boy I was the champion fighter of my town. I used to love to hold the boys down in the ditch and hear them yell. When I grew older, I found that I could not hold another boy down in the ditch without staying there with him. Nor can any race hold another down in the ditch without staying down in the ditch with it. Those white Christians who fear the rise of the negro to intellectual and material independence may put their fear aside if they give him with education the Christian religion.” The early Lutheran pastors in America showed a practical interest in the spiritual welfare of the negroes. In 1704, the Rev. Justus Falckner baptized the daughter of negroes who were members of the first Lutheran congregation in New York. The beautiful prayer which he made upon this occasion has been recorded.