The Mcdowell Times

Chairman Martin Makes Important Speech On West Coast to Group
Los Angeles. Cal. - Calling for an end to discrimination against Negroes. Representative Joseph W. Martin Jr., the Chairman of the Republican National Committee and Republican leader of the House of Representatives, addressed the Women's Political Study club of California. Wednesday evening. September 21.

The Republican Chairman's visit to Los Angeles was one of a series he is making in various parts of the country to meet with party leaders and workers for the purpose of launching a nation-wide movement to vitalize the Republican party for next year's congressional elections.

The Women's Political Study Clubs of California, composed of outstanding colored women, with an organized program in every important city and hamlet of the state is sponsoring a movement of great educational value and importance.

Extracts from Address

I am speaking here after the 79th anniversary of the issuance of the Emancipation Proclamation by the immortal Abraham Lincoln patron saint of the Republican party.

That great Charter of Freedom, together with the Constitution of the United States, and the three great Civil War Amendments. have forever banished from our shores, the shackles which were for nearly 300 years, the badges of involuntary servitude.

Under the Magna Carta of our liberties, our Federal Constitution, we are all American citizens in this country of ours: without racial or class distinction. because of this. and because I believe so heartily in these fundamental principles. I have come today to meet and greet you-not as a special group, not as a so-called minority group but as American citizens.

CHAIRMAN MARTIN'S
WEST COAST SPEECH
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The basis of freedom is equal treatment for all, for it is as true today as ever it was, that what effects the Liberty and Freedom of one effects the Liberty and Freedom of all of us.

Work to be Done
There is work for you to do. You are interested in the preservation of the great principles which have brought the American people more happiness, more liberty and greater progress and security than has ever been enjoyed by the people of any other land.

You have a preeminent stake in all of his. The progress you have made has justified the faith of Abraham Lincoln, and those Republican Congresses which put upon the statute books of the United States those guarantees which assured your freedom, and wrote into permanent law the citizenship of the colored people of the United States.

You will cherish this freedom and these liberties They are precious. They mark the greatest milestone in your long life and history on this continent.

I have said you have a stake in the preservation of our country and our pattern of life as designed by the founders of our government.

You will, I am sure, continue to live up to the ideals of your race and preserve those virtues which have enabled you to make enduring contributions to the progress of this nation.

You have helped to build this America of ours. You have helped to clear its forests. You have helped to rear our cities with pillars of stone, marble and of steel. You have tilled the soil, and made many waste places blossom and bloom.

A Triumph Over Wrong and Injustice
You have endured many trials and tribulations discriminations and prejudices, but your faith in God and your own sturdy efforts have brought you to high levels of citizenship, and enabled you to triumph over wrongs and injustices.

That faith that moves mountains is still yours. I urge you to keep it, to strengthen it, and eternally to trust in its efficacy.

You will need all of this faith and trust in the days immediately ahead of us. We are facing tragic days that shall call for courage and for a determination to exert every possible effort to see that the sacred rights of free America shall not be menaced by forces seeking a change in our form of government. That responsibility is yours and every other American's.

The war emergency is the cloak under which these changes are now being sought. Private enterprise in our country, whose foundations have been steadily sapped and undermined in the past nine years, is face to face with real danger of extinction.

Threats to Government Real
I am not an alarmist, but these threats are real and I believe it is my duty to point them out to you and all others whom I can reach before it is too late.

Only through a courage strong enough to speak out frankly even at risk of persecution and abuse, can we attain the American way of life.

Whenever any administration can silence criticism, crush opposition and refuse to be accountable to the minority and the people for its acts, free government in the United States is dead and the American way is done. Even in war-torn England they respect the right and necessity of constructive criticism. We should be willing to grant as much to the people of America.

The problems of unemployment, relief agriculture, of a rapidly rising national debt, increasing state debts, sectional and class divisions, stimulated in a measure by the government itself--these are subjects of importance to you. They are assuming grave proportions. The lust of men for conquest and power is ever with us.

Another problem - that of the efforts of some to strangle our American system of bi-party government and to substitute therefor a one party system, a political monopoly-was challenging our attention when the tragic affairs abroad provided a diversion.

Conclusion
I have referred to the trials and tribulations which you face as a group. I know something of the wrongs and injustices you have suffered. Last March, at the meeting of the Republican National Committee held in the city of Washington, I spoke of these disabilities, and called on Republicans everywhere, in industry and in politics, to widen opportunities for the employment of colored men and women without discrimination, and to provide greater opportunities for them in public service.

Practically every week since, from our Headquarters, we have pursued a constant campaign, and largely through an intelligently directed program we have led the colored people to center their attack upon those discriminatory government policies which have brought them so much humiliation and discouragement.

Also, as Chairman of the Republican National Committee, I have appointed a Committee on Negro Activities for the purpose of making a fact-finding survey for the purpose of more definitely outlining a program whereby we may provide for larger recognition of colored voters particularly in the set-up of the machinery of organization at
National headquarters:

Bureau of Negro Affairs
In the meantime, I am glad to report, as you probably are already advised, we have made some progress. During the past 27 months; for the first time in the history of the Republican National Committee, we have had what we may refer to as a Bureau of Negro Affairs, integrated with National Headquarters in a most dignified relationship.

It has been a mutually helpful arrangement. Undoubtedly, as a study of the situation proceeds, we shall hope to strengthen this Bureau and make it an even more effective instrument of service.

I am glad to see you organizing for the battle For good government and the preservation of human rights.

In 1942, will come the first chance to make certain that the liberties of the American people shall continue to be secure. This will come through the election of a Republican House of Representatives

Elect a Republican House and the vast powers which have been stripped of Congress will be restored at the end of the emergency. Elect a Republican House and sanity and efficiency will be restored to government.

The Battle of America will be to keep this nation an American republic. This is a cause every good American should be proud to enlist to fight for. It is an appeal which should be irresistible for every red-blooded American of the type of yourselves.

America with a clarion voice calls upon you to thrust aside selfishness and aloofness in public affairs. The time has come for unselfish service. You must not fail to heed the call.