Cayton's Weekly (Seattle, Wash.)
February 14, 1920

Page 1

@agtfch& PRICE FIVE CENTS CAYTON'S WEEKLY Published every Saturday at Seattle, Washington. U. S. A. Subscription $2 per year in advance. HORACE ROSCOE CATTON. .Editor and Publisher Entred as second class matter, August 18, 1918, at the post office at Seattle, Wash., under the Act of March 3rd, 1916. TELEPHONE: BEACON 3579 Office 317 22nd Aye. South RE-ELECT FITZGERALD There is no doubt as to where Mayor Fitzgerald stands on the municipal owner ship of the street railway system and its his ambition to make of it a gigantic suc cess. If he is re-elected he will continue to keep men at the head of the system, who will be just as enthusiastic of its success as is the mayor. Mayor Fitzgerald favors the municipal ownership of public utilities and has proven his worth along those lines, the years he has served the city as council man and mayor. The voters know exactly where he stands on the subject and are tak ing no chances in voting for his re-election. Speaking further concerning the street railway system, as has been previously pointed out in these columns, the City of Seattle still enjoys a five cent fare while other cities are charging from six to eight cents fare Let's grant for the sake of ar gument that the street car system of Se attle ;s losing $4,000 per month which amounts to $48,000 per year. Now, to off set that loss the street car patrons save in the course of a year in the neighborhood of two mililon dollars by paying a five cent instead of a six or seven cent fare. To invest $48,000 and make a million dollars from the investment seems to US to be a magnificent business proposition. "With C. B. Fitzgerald continued as mayor of Se attle this million dolar saving Avill be of an annual occurrence to the street car pat rons. But no figures have as yet been sub mitted proving that the system is losing $48,000 or any dollars per year, yea, not only not losing, but the system is making more than $10,000 per year after every item of expense has been counted off. And again, do not overlook the fact that the street car employes of Seattle are being paid the highest wages of any street car employes of any city in the United States and perhaps the entire world. Suppose you beat Mr. Fitzgerald for the nomination, then you will of course have for your next mayor Hugh M. CaldAvell. who is not quite certain of what course he will persue with the street railway system, lie may place a man at its head who will begin at once to systematically disrupt it and soon have it in about the same condition as did Super intendent Arms have the city electric light plant, and to save it from total destruction Mayor (Jill was recalled and Geo. Dilling elected, who immediately removed Arms and appointed Ross, who has perfected the plant and made of it a financial success. Seattle does not want to be forced to re call Hugh Caldwell to save the street ear system from being financially Avrecked and therefore you and each of you, who are (nullified. voters, should vote for the re-elec tion of C. B. Fitzgerald for mayor of Se attle. During the present municipal campaign Huyh M. Caldwell has attacked about every person of any public prominence, who is supporting Fitzgerald for mayor, which re minds us of the poisonous snakes of the South, that go blind every year from the SEATTLE, WASHINGTON, SATURDAY, FEBRUARY 14, 1920. first to the eighth of August, and in that blind condition they strike ;it every move ment that comes near them. Now it ap pears to us that Major Caldwell has gone blind on the subject of being mayor of Se attle and is striking at every body, who does not believe, as he does, as to his fitness for the place. EDITORIAL PARAGRAPHS AVhile Hoover, like Barkus, is willing, but he feels too big to be either one. When you think you know the political game then you are just beginning to learn it. Even the Democrats give evidence of hav ing too much Woodrow Wilson. May perhaps man descended from monk eys, but if lie did he has not gotten very far from his point of beginning. Caldwell says/'Duncan is Red," but when he said it he was on the other side of the barn door. Despite the bickering of capital and labor, yet they are pulling together, and as a con sumer, "don't I know it"? That Kentucky colored prisoner may have gotten his swift, but his would-be lynchers got theirs far more so. "Charity begins at home," is an old ad dage, but now it is to begin at the Re publican Club meetings. Woodrow Wilson didn't keep us out of Avar, but he did keep us out of sugar and almost every other necessity of life. Bill Kaiser has been frequently reported dead, but he seems to be still sawing wood, the reports to the contrary notwithstanding. A page from the bloody days of tyrany common to the middle ages would be no more gruesome than Graham's sedition bill. As to the coming national election, a great many voters are saying, "I do not know, what in the hell to do." Because one can take away the bacon it does not necessarily follow that he can bring home the bacon, which difficulty Hoover may yet experience. If some plan is devised to prevent auto mobile drivers from running down and kill ing pedestrians then another step will be taken, to take all the joy out of life. When more persons take the trouble to thank others, who do them personal kind nesses, then will we be nearer the period of the promised millenium dawn. It is hoped by John Barleycorn that the fiext Congress will vote to wet this country, and if it does, it will have to be washed out in blood. If Poindexter can not use the Washington delegation to the National Republican Con vention to any advantage then we suggest that he turn it over to Lowden of Illinois. We are not prepared to say, George Van devere is an T. W. W., but he certainly seems to be double doubling the states attorney in the Centralia trial. Little Red School House may be an ex cellent antidote for the Russian Red, but hot lead works quicker and we have our sus picions just a bit more effective. CURRENT COMMENT. The authorities found it necessary to pul the City of Lexington, Ky., under martial law in order preserve peace and order. An at tempt was made to lynch a colored num. Wil liam Lockett, who confessed to the murder of a ten year old white girl, and troops were called out to protect tile prisoner, but the enraged whites 4,000 strong were determined to inflict summary punishment on the man and refuse to heed the warning of the militia to fall hack, which resulted in five of the mob being instantly killed and fifteen wounded, all of which so enraged the whites that, a local uprising was threatened, hence the general order for martial law. According to the traffic report of Seattle seven persona were killed outrgiht from auto mobile accidents and 184 injured, all of which is an awful toll as a result of more or less wreckless and careless driving. The aver age person driving a machine seems to he come go faster mad and they step on the gas until they almost fly through space and of course sooner or later they are in a serious smash up. Many persons have discussed the diamond holdup in Seattle one day this week and o1 one, so far as we have heard, has expressed any sympathy for the losers of the valuable jewels, not that they really wanted the own ers to lose what they had paid their hard money for, but because they were parading such valuable jewelry at such an hour of the night and at a time when hold ups are as common as the fleas on a dogs back. Plashing costly jewels in the faces of those they come in contact with from time to time seems to be a weakness of many persons, and the wonder is that more of them are not held up. The man of the bunch, which was held up, is a. hard head business man, and yet he was in discrete enough to let the fact get out that he frequently took large sums of money at a late hour of the night to his home for safe keeping and it was but by a mere chance he did not do so on the night he was held up and his jewels taken. Do not be over anxious to let the world know of your wealth as it will find it out sooner or later. Eleven alleged leading business men of the Northwest have been indicted by a Feder al grand jury, each charged with having de frauded the government. What a sad com mentary on this civilization of ours, that a man is no sooner placed in positions of trust than he starts to stealing everything Ik; thinks he can get away with. Perhaps none of these accused persons are actually guilty, but where there is so much smoke there is bound to be some fire. For the past two years it has been bruted about the streets that some mighty stealing was going on in high official circles. Whether acquired honestly or otherwise it is a fact that there are men in Seattle today rated as multi millionaires, who, prior to the war, were men of but moderate circumstances, and the most of them, according to Maddam Rumor, acquired their fortunes by bilking the government. It is hardly fair to try any ones case in the columns of the newspapers, but a grand jury would hardly have return ed an indictment against a prominent man of any community on mere suspicion and heresay testimony. VOL. IV., No. 35

Page 2

WHAT'S UP YOUR SLEEVE? For nearly a century organized labor in the United States has combatted every ef fort of the colored man to break into, not only the skilled labor of the country, but yea verily even into the ordinary labor, save thai of the cotton fields of the South, Iml when it found the colored man was successfully filling the strikers' places then the whole craft took alarm and began to devise ways and means to pacify the al ready outraged black man, and many amends have been recently made to heal over the breaches of the past. We are not rejecting these overtures and know''it's bet ter late than never,"but we are timid about accepting the right hand of fellowship from life long enemies, suddenly converted to the teachings of, "all men are born equal." A few days ago we (Hit from the Union Record of Setatle the excerpt below, and while we hate to impugn the motives of any man, yet coming at this particular time we read the article with a grain of salt. However we are very much in the same state of mind as was the old woman who was overheard by a bunch of bad boys fervently praying for bread. The boys saw an opportunity for a bit, of fun at the old woman's expense, and they purchased the bread and threw it into the room. Suspecting the source of the answered prayer, she concluded, "I thank you, Lord, its good even if the devil brought it." The article is as follows: The Negro and the White Man's Conscience The governor of North Carolina, Thomas W. Bickett, according to the Christian Sci ence Monitor, lias been giving the Negroes a bit of advice in a speech at Tuskegee, Booker T. Washington's famous school. The goveror urged the Negroes to be pa tient, saying that "the one safe path for the Negro to follow is the path that leads straight to the door of the white man's con science—and in lime every plea born of jus tice and wisdom will be allowed." That the Negro has been patient, no one denies. That he has found much redress for his wrongs at the door of the white man's conscience may be doubted. The white man's conscience lias not re sponded very vigorously in India, in Egypt, in Middle and South Africa, in the United States, to the betterment of black men. Our advice to the Negro is to help himself for, according to an old saw, such people get tlic help of God. Economic power, created by the Negro himself, has done more than the white man's conscience. The trouble with the governor is that he starts wrong, although he takes a position held by many Anglo-Saxons. He starts in with the idea that the white man is a supe rior being, and that ''justice" to Negroes is something to be "allowed" by white men. The position contradicts the latest history, the newest thought and the true interpreta tion of mankind. No race dare any longer hold itself to be master of other races. No race possesses a conscience to which any other race should come and make its plea. Justice is not some thing to be "allowed" by one race to an other race. The demand today is that the white man (or a man of any other color) should cut out his "airs," should see that the whole human family is one, socially, industrially, econom ically. The sensible thing for the Negro, or any other race, is to go ahead with the assump tion that he is an equal and honorable mem ber of the human family,—to agitate, to edu cate, to organize—and keep on sawing wood. llis destiny is in his own hands —not in the white man's conscience. The white man's conscience will be sufficiently taxed to carry Ilu> burdens of the white race. Let the Negro agitate and educate and organize—econom ically and politically—and the land of free dom and justice will be near. A. LOU COHEN Is a candidate for the nomination of one of the three year terms for City Councilman Primaries next Tuesday. Vote for three, but let Cohen be one. (Paid Advertisement) R. SARTORI Seeks the nomination for one of the three year terms for City Councilman Primaries next Tuesday and Remember R. SARTORI (Paid Advertisement) Reform Democrats, it is claimed, have cap tured the state government of Louisiana. Of course there is such a thing as a reform Democrat, but he is a dead Democrat. Efforts are being made to raise ten million dollars in this country by the prospective Irish Republic and the deed is nearly done. We are surely a liberal and warm hearted people. Politically speaking we will be able to say of Hugh M. Caldwell after next Tues day's election, after his three weeks fitful fever, "he is now eking out a miserable ex istence at the law business." Taxes in King County may have climbed mountain high, but, if reports be true, Lau rence Colman, the Seattle multo millionaire, will make a cool million bucks on account of it. As dear as it is to us, English is a rather limited language in the world and it is often poorly spoken even in the United States, and from our view point rotten in England. Then, under such circumstances, how can it ever become the universal language? Tf the colored citizens of Seattle put forth a hundredth part as much energy in establish ing small business concerns as they do to establishing a political record they would stand higher in both the business and the political world. The railway employes have set February 17th for a general strike unless the railroad administration accedes to the demand for higher wages. There has been more or less contention over wages for the past year and unless one or the other side weakens before the final day the railway systems under gov ernment control will be more or less demor alized. Our citizens are admonished by the editor ial paragcaphers to raise something besides Cain and yet if more cane was raised there would be no shortage of sugar. For the government to make one work when he or she does not want to work, un less the worker stands convicted of crime, seems to us would be nothing short of rul ing anarchy and for working persons to try to force other men to quit work because they will not work seems to us Anarchy among working persons. There is or should be no remedy to prevent persons emplyoed by another from either striking or working as they see fit. PURELY PERSONAL President Winston reports an enthusiastic meeting of the Seattle Branch of the Na tional Association last Monday evening. Mr. Harold F. Mitchell and Miss Anna Earles were married last Wednesday. Both of the contracting parties were high school pupils. Mr. Russell Smith left for San Diego, California, Friday night where he will re main until he fully recovers from a recent attack of the flu. Candidate T.r-Election Primary Feb. 17, 1920 Election March 2, 1920 (Paid Advertisement) COUNCILMAN W. D. LANE

Page 3

THE PASSING THRONG. While Seattle has a great many more or less important female personages, yet, to my mind, none of them have reached that pin aele of importance as did Mrs. Frank Me- Dermott, who passed to the great beyond last Saturday. I have often heard it said of men, who attained great prominence in the affairs of the country, in which they lived, "he was a man among men," but of Mrs. McDermott it can be truly said, she was a woman, not only among women, but a woman among men. In the business world she reach ed the zenith, not by leaps and bounds, but step by step. When I first came to Seattle, some thirty years ago, Mrs. McDermott, who was then Mrs. Nordhoff, in conjunction with her husband .was operating a baby Bon Marche in Belltown, a Seattle suburb, and they always had Saturday sales, and multipli ed hundreds of persons with limited means would walk miles to get to those sales, and I followed the crowd. I would stand and watch Mrs. Nordhoff serve her customers, and I said to myself, that woman will make a fortune for herself, and husband," and she certainly did. It gave me much pain to read of her seemingly untimely death, not that I was so Well acquainted with her, but because I had seen the establishment, in which her whole soul seemed to be wrapped, grow frQin an almost infinitismal nothing to the most gigantic dry goods emporium in the West. Prom a business stand point, I know her to have been a jewel not only to her husband, but to Greater Seattle, and, I repeat, it gave me much pain to hear of her demise. In the early history of the Bon Marche it Avas the only establishment that gave employment to many colored persons and that too may have had something to do with my sympathies for her. While the later day Bon Marche does not emply a single colored person, so far as I know, yet I do not believe it was the wish of Mrs. McDermott. Her remains were laid to rest last Tuesday and Seattle halted for a spell to drop a tear of regret at her bier. The meeting of the King County Colored Republican Club, must have been a special "special" one as some unusual things came before it. The first very remarkable thing to be acted upon by the Club, not in keeping with the call, was to name a committee to in vestigate the refusal of the school board to appoint a young colored lady to a position in the public schools. However, w rorthy the cause, it was in the right church, but the Avrong pew. The committee was finally in structed to act in conjunction with the Seat tle Branch of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People, pro viding it decided to look into the matter and if meritorious espouse her cause. Prior to the conclusion of the meeting, P. S. Barnett rose to a question of person privilege and appeal^ ed to the members of the Club to financially assist the brass band, with which he is con nected, and in order to kill two birds with one stone, he appealed to the members and their friends to subscribe for a local "weak ly" paper, and the band and the paper would sliare the spoils. Which of the two most need ed the hoped for contribution, he did not say, and I therefore surmise it was a case of "I tickle you and you tickle me." Noth ing politically, however, was acomplished.

I said to you last week that I had reached and passed my sixty-first mile stone—way on the shady side of life—and since that time I have occasionally thought of myself and like wise my fellowman. Though loaded to the You Are Welcome GREAT NORTHERN POOL AND BILLIARD HALL Cigars, Tobacco and Soft Drinks. BOYD WILLIAMS, Props. 1032 Jackson St. very guards with years of human life, yet my struggle for a mere existence is just as great and my concern for the necessities of life for the future is just as acute as it was forty years ago, and, as with me, so with an overwhelming majority of the men of this land of sun shine and plenty. Many, yes the most of us. are industrious and thrifty, and we try to husband our earnings but at that we make haste slowly, if at all. In that life beyond are we to become stronger person ages on account of our life struggles in this world? is a question that comes to many of us. but without an answer. I, like other men, look at my family and see each of them lack ing, not for the luxuries, but the necessities of life, and sometimes feel almost like say ing, most of the human family has been curs ed with poverty, but I soon recover from such a state of pessimism, and take up the cudgel of reaching the goal of gold with as much determination as I did the day after I had passed my twenty-first mile stone, and as I do so do the great majority of the hu man family. We live on hope. "Owing to the fact that I have colored blood in me, I find it ut terly impossible to get office rooms in any of the prominent buildings of Seattle," and he was a well appearing man and at first glance would be taken for anything but a man of African descendants, all of which is more or less remarkable to me, and to my mind shows the inconsistency of the white man of this country, and the unreasonable ex tent he permits his antipathies to the colored folks of this country to take him. In one of the most prominent office buildings of Seat tle, the owner of which says he is a Chris tian gentleman, which no one, who has had business dealings with him, believes for a minute, the owner turned a colored dentist out of offices he had occupied for a number of years, as soon as he acquired the property, this dentist was a returned soldier, and of official ranks. The owner of the build ing is worth ten million dollars, if a cent, and yet he did this on the grounds that, the presence of a colored man in the building jeopardized the success of his business, but this self same Christian patriot has scores of Japanese business men as his tenants, none of whom, in times of national trouble, would he trust as far as he could throw a ten year old bull by the tail, but he would be patting the colored man on the back telling him all about his 100 per cent Americanism. But the actions of the above Christian gentleman differs in no wise from the actions of the most of the Christian white men of Seattle, as they all bow and crutch to the Japanese; in order to get his money. In other w rords, the white man is simply money mad. But the laugh of this whole situation is that every colored man running a barber shop for "white men only" bows and apes to the Japanese customer, but frowns and scowls at the colored customer. He, however, does not do this because he loves the colored man less, but because he knows it pleases the white man. What fools w re mortals be. County Commissioner Claude C. Ramsay returned to Seattle a few days ago, after a couple of months visit in the East. While away he visited with relatives in his native state. North Carolina, and he is well pleased with the outlook of the affairs of that state. While North Carolina is classed as a Denur oratic strong hold in national elections, yet he seems to be of the opinion now, that it will be in the Republican column next Novem ber. Mr. Ramsay said he was proud of the stand the state of Kentucky recently took in preventing a. colored prisoner from being lynched and further said, Kentucky is but following in the wake of North Carolina and Tennessee, whose governors have gone on rec ord as saying, lynchings in those states must stop. The Governor of every state in the South must eventually come to the same con clusion or God knows what will happen. Mr. Ramsay at once plunged into his accumulat ed work and during the past week has had but little time to greet his scores of friends. I heard Lou Cohen talk at a public meet- ing not long since and I was deeply inter ested in the brief speech he made, because lie said more, at least from my view point, in a minute than all of the other candidates combined, and as I though in this so did the'most of those to whom he was address ing. I want to see men elected to office, who stand firmly on the broad platform of the fatherhood of God and the brotherhood of man without regard to race, color, con dition or religious beliefs. I have no use for anyone who seeks to decry some one else because the other fellow In some way differs from himself. So far as I am per sonally concerned I mean to give Lou Cohen my vote for councilman and all because he is for the human race without any whys or wherefores. Editorial Warblings. CALD WELL'S FAREWELL ADDRESS I am the swell guy Hugh C aid well, and represeni the "golden bell", and to correct ly cast your vote, hear ye well my royal note. I am a high-bred aristocrat and once a southern Democrat, and men like this are always wise as to the wants of working guys. I've figured out just what you need to keep Seattle in the lead, a first class Tenneseian gent, who to common people never bent; that has a wise and royal mind, the product of an old Virginia line; for two years more to be your mayor and keep the city all in gear. Policies I have none to tell, in ME you know that all is well. You need but hear that. I'm the man, who wish the office of mayor to can and then you vote and vote like hell, for Seattle's swell guy Hugh Caldwell. So far as Fitzgerald is concerned, nothing has he got but what he earned, but he's of common working stock, and he to ME should be no block, because a horse of royal blood must always lead the common stud. Now men with wisdom just like me, you must always vote to be, the leaders of the surging throng, to which the poor men all belong. As to Duncan nothing yet have I to say, as I may need his work ing "hay". But listen folks you take the tip, I have Seattle on my hip, and me she surely will elect or she will yet a rotten spect. I warn you well and warn you all in this my final farewell call, to vote the swell guy, Hush Caldwell, or be prepared to go to hell. ROBERT B. HESKETH MERRY-MAKERS PLEASURE CLUB Will Give a Plain, Fancy Dress and Masquerade Ball Celebrating Washington's Birthday Monday Eve., Feb. 23, 1920—A1l Night at Washington Hall, 14th and Fir Prizes for Ladies and Gentlemen COMMITTEE—James Titus Dial, Chairman; F. M. Gordon, Jerome Cov ington, W. Sanders, A. Piirnell, T. Taylor; Leroy Bundy, Floor Manager. Music by Mrs. Smith's full Orchestra Subscription 50c ATLAS POOL HALL Under New Management Wishes You a Happy New Year FELIX CRANE, Manager 1212 Main Street Seattle Your upport Solicited For Re-Election as COUNCILMAN (Three Year Term) Primary Feb. 17 Service—Satisfaction Co-Operation (Paid Advertisement)