Freedom's Day

Monday was emancipation day, and jetwin cities celebrated it as they had Eever done before. From earlymorning tillnoon, visiting delegations continued tosrrive from Battle Creek.Kalaruazoo, Jackson, Detroit, Tole;! , Lansing,Ypsianti and smaller placea Both women snd children of African rxtraction tbroaged the main businets streets. The American flag floated gaily on the wurt house and city hall, and the national colors were seen on every side. Shortly after eleven o'clock the procession Btarted from the court house square, headed by the marshal, H. Johnson, and the Ypsilanti colored band. After them carne a wagon contsining forty-four little misses, who represented the various states. The speakers of the day followed in hacks isd a long line of carriages constituted the remainder of the procession. AT RELIEF PARK. Here a gay sight was presented. Refreshment booths, hammocks, the dance hall and the speaker's platform all contributed to the enjoyment of those present. At half past eleven Kayor Doty was introduced by t he chairman. Said he, "On the twenty-second day of June, 1772, Lord Chief Justice Jlansfield, speaking for the entire bench, pronounced the memorable decisión which established the principie of English lawthat "the air of England is too pure for any slave to breathe." Ihis wide departure from established precedent, which reversed what had been the law and custom of England, lince the time of York and Talbot in 1729, gave freedom to every slave who stepped his shackled foot upon the soil of the British isles. Sixty-six years afterward, on the first day of August, 1838, seven hundred thousand of our fellow men reaped the ripe fruition of this principie of English liberty, when the Act of Emancipation made all the British colonies as free of slavery's :aint as was the mother isle herself. "Thus the day we now commemorate marks the splendid conclusión of that mighty strupgle which, from its, beginning in 1772, to its end, for England, in 1838, was a moral revolution, a victory of our poer humanity over its baser and its lower self. It stands alone in history a monument, not as of the dead at Thermopylae, not as of the yeomen at Runnymede, not of as of the declaration of '76 nor the fall of the terrible Bastile, for there our fellow men stood for their own liberties against the oppreseors. Here the oppressors stood for the liberty of their fellow men. "To you, fellow-citizens, this day is peculiarly sacred and to all humanity it is peculiarly significant, for that act of emancipation for the British West Indies lighted the fires of liberty, cast' the full flood of their radiance across the waste of waters and on other and foreign shores kindled theglowing embers to all-absorbing, all-consuming flame. Incited by that example, the philanthropy of France was roused toa:tion and in 1848 the provisional government decreed the immediate emancipation of slaves. Portugal followed in 1858, Holland in 1S63, and in 1864 an amen d ment to the constitution abolished and forever prohibited slavHy in these United States. "And so today as American citizens, 'ast and latest to our shame be it said, W appropriate to ourselves that maxm of English law. At the frightful sacrifice of precious blood, the nation's purest and its best, at the enormous cost of uncounted treasure and the 'oeeunending of fratricidal strife, we 'aise our heads from the ashes of our homiliation and humbly and reverently "y, 'the air of free America is too Pare for any slave to breathe.' "How prophetic were the words oi 'he immortal Jefferson, standing in 'hepresence of the baleful institution of human slavery, 'I tremble for my country when I remember that God is JUfit.' "This one thought I wish to cali to ÏOUi attention, ' nature saves not by cDipassion, she saves by power. You "e free men, endowed and invested ith all the liberties, all the privileges, a''the immunities of the law. Work oul "W the salvation of your race, where"Wo the God of Nature has given you 'iebrains, the hands and the ability Wording to His will. Be masters ovfcr J"rselves. Think out and do as beWtnesyour manhood. Make yoursel: ln(!'spensable adjuncts of a new civil■ in which you may'quit your3 men.'" The mayor concludec "'s ddress with a few words af welcoine. A YOUKG COLORED ORATOR. At two o'clock the exercises, interrupted by dinner, were resumed. Prayer was offered by Rev. Max Smith, of Richmond, Ind., and music was rendered by the band. The flrst speaker was Fred A. Merchant, of Ypsilanti. He proved to be a fervent and effective orator and carried the audience away by storm. The red man, said he in beginning, have been cut down and the yellow men have been shut out, because they have hindered the progress of the whites. Not so the black men. They have been clothed with every privilege of government. They will always exist in this country side by side w:th the white men. .Mr. Merchant traced the history of American slavery and the movements to abolish it. It seemsstrange, said he, that any people shon'.d have prayed to God to preserve an institution that enabled them to eat bread by the sweat of a slave's brow. And since the war, when the rights of suffrage were conferred, a vile poison of prejudice has hindered the progress of the south. The colored men have not been allowed to vote, they have been forced to ride in "Jim Crow" cars and have even been shoved off the sidewalks. A better government is needed before the south can even hope for that development which its great resources warrant. Mr. Merchant urged the colored people to go ahead. Let them make the north redeem the promises it bas never kept, until ballots are fairly counted and the right to vote is shorn of restrictions which do not apply to the whites. The black men, urged the speaker, must be er.lightened and the moral qualities must be strengthened. To elévate the race is the highest work the social state can perform. If they will, they can rise. It is their duty to máke themselves worthy of free institutions. IION. E. P. ALLEN. who was the next speaker on the program, said that he had once lived in a household where a convenient cubbyhole was kept for the purpose of assisting a fugitive slave to spend the night in safety. He had been taught that oppression is wrong. He had seen the negroes in the field, in the camp, in battle and had watched them since the war. He conld testify tha! they had taken advantage of their opportunities and had taken decided steps forward. Twenty-five years ago the negro did not own the shirt on his back. Last year he was taxed on $400,000,000 of property. Twenty-five years ago, not one in a thousand could read or write; the census of 1890 showed that leas than fifty per cent. are now illiterate. He is sometimes accused of being less obedient to law than his white neighbor. On June lst, of the 378 prisoners in Michigan jails, only sixteen were colored men. People of all parties are agreed that the rights granted by the constitution must somehow be kept. Even men who once held negroes as chattels are coming to recognize this fact. Mr. Allen traced the early history of the war, and shpwed that until the government had the courage to free the blaves, its armies met with continual failures, while, on the other hand, its fortunes began at once to brighten after thattime. Many inen.even then, looked upon the colonilation of negroes as the best remedy for the race difficulties. But so fast were the negro babies born, that all the American and English shijis together could not carry away one year's increase. After a eulogy on Abraham Lincoln, the speaker drew to his conclusión. He urged the colored people to cherish high aspirations and to countenance no public wrong. They should not give up until the right to vote was everywhere absolutely free. RBV. PB. GOLDRICK, of Northfield, was introdueed by the chairman. His remarks were both witty and forcible. Said he, in introduction, "My being among you to-day reminds me of the story of the Irishman from the west of Ireland and the colored man. The Irishman was from the province of Conaught, and when he landed in Castle Garden, he soon ran across a colored man, and immediately asked, 'What country-man are you, sor?' The response cama, 'I'm a colored man.' The Irishman, misjudging the sound of the word, exclaimed, 'Shake hands; by the good sticks, I'm a Conaught man meself.' " The speaker enlarged upon the idea of liberty.of which the emancipation proclamation was the embodiment, paid a high tribute to Abraham Lincoln and enlarged upon the services of negro soldiers in the war. He referred to the recent emancipation in Brazil and added, "Today there is not a human being in the broad and long expanse of America, north, south or central, but can say, 'My soul is my own; mychild will notbe torn from me and sold Uke an animal. No more has the poor colored man, as the Sad song tells us, to watch the hours till eleven or twelve o'clock, while hislittle babe is dying, bereft of mother through '.he foul chattel sale, and plaintively cry, 'If there's any place in Heaven fur poor black slaves, I pray Thee, let my baby die and go.'" "Be up and doing. Be faithful, sober and industrious citizens of a republic which has liberated you, which has fought and bied for you and which offers you a home and guarantees you respect abroad. The colored man is no longer a chattel, but a free agent owing no support to any party other than the one which will serve, in hishonest conviction, the best interestsof the people. He is an intelligent being and cannot afford to be made a tooi in the hands of selflsh and designing politicians. The colored people, religiously, are a reverential people. Physically, they are a well developed race and, with the educational advantages at their doors, will soon show the high standard of their intelligence. Be not disheartened at the petty race prejudice and other unpleasantness you may now and then encounter from those so-called Americana who seemingly forget the golden motto, 'liberty to conscience and equal rights to men' that is emblazoned on the ampie folds of the star-spangled banner." CONCLUDING SPEECHES Joseph Beard, a youns? and gifted orator from Adrián, was the next speaker. Many of his thoughts had previously been, jtouched upon. He demanded that the negro's rights be recognized and strongly deprecated a cringing policy. If right could not prevail by legislation, then it must prevail by the shot-gun. The necessity of education was cogently argued. P. G. Suekey, upon nvitation, made a few extemporaneous remarks. He found that the principies of liberty were held in America but that the facts did not always accord. He also saw the need of education.