So the cause of the Negro’s failure to secure a reasonable share of wealth is not lack of opportunity,—for (at least, in the South) he has every opportunity that he could wish in order to do so,—but rather to his racial traits or characteristics,—some of which are: a happy-go-lucky disposition, indolence, shiftlessness, laziness, indifference, lack of mental stamina and ambition, and strong criminal tendencies. FOOTNOTES: [123:1] _Baltimore Sun_, Dec. 18, 1909. [124:2] _Liberator_, Jan. 20, 1854, and Nov. 9, 1860. [124:3] _Ibid._, May 11, 1860; E. Collins, “Memories of the Southern States,” p. 44. [125:4] _Liberator_, March 18, 1859. Also, Olmsted, “Seaboard Slave States,” pp. 633-640. [128:5] The _Chicago Tribune_, Dec. 30, 1916, gives a list of gifts to charity during 1916 as near $1,000,000,000. [129:6] According to the census, “The average value of farm property per acre was $27.01 for farms operated by Negroes in 1910 as compared with $13.08 for 1900, and $47.72 for farms operated by whites in 1910.” There was no indication whether all land or merely arable land is meant. About three-fourths of the farms operated by Negroes are rented. Observation convinces me that farms owned by Negroes are not more than half so valuable an acre on the average as the land rented by them, for from necessity they buy the least valuable land. This being true, Negro lands in 1900 could not have been worth more than $6.00 an acre and about $13.00 in 1910. However, in making any calculations as to the value of Negro lands and property, I will take the Negro Year Book estimate and apply it to all Negro land. [130:7] Scott and Stowe, “Booker T. Washington,” p. 171. [131:8] The estimate of $7.98 an acre in 1900, and $17.40 an acre in 1910, according to the “Negro Year Book” mentioned above, is undoubtedly too high by at least one-third, but I use it so as to give them the advantage rather than otherwise. I know a body of 1,300 acres of land in my own county, Dorchester, Md., consisting of some cleared land, woodland and brushland, which a real estate man told me could be bought at five dollars an acre. This is such land as the Negro usually buys. Only a short distance from the body of land mentioned in this note land is valued at from twenty-five to one hundred dollars an acre. [131:9] Among the Negro business interests are 64 banks which are often mentioned in Negro speeches. It seems, however, that two of them have failed. The total capital of these banks is said to be $1,500,000. In striking contrast are the 27,000 white banks with $2,162,900,000 capital. Petersburg, Negro settlement in Md., mentioned above, has two Negro stores with hardly $100 worth of goods, each. [133:10] I make no mention of the little personal property often not taxed many poorer Negroes possess, for the reason that usually such Negroes owe retail store keepers even more than their little property would sell for. [135:11] _New York Tribune_, Jan. 25, 1917.