the dream and picture of German mastery and dominion in the political and economic conquest of the world.

With their mammouth wealth of billions of dollars, the acquisition of these German colonies by the Allies pre-supposes some kind of a division among the conquering powers, and presents to us the question of The New Partition of West Africa.

As interested as we are in The New Partition of West Africa, because of its ultimate influence upon the relations between the lighter and darker worlds, we are particularly concerned here in how far this new partition will effect the great mission and destiny of the Liberian Republic, which holds out to the millions of the African races the high hopes of self-discipline, self-government and Christian civilization.

The importance and significance of this question is disclosed in a glance at the ideals for which the Liberian nation stands and the hitherto European colonial attitude not only toward Liberia, but toward American and democratic principles for West Africa.

WEST AFRICAN COLONIAL GOVERNMENT

The form of political machinery for social control employed by the different European powers in their various West African colonies, in a general way, is very similar. The colonial government is administered by a governor and his council. Each colony is divided up into what are called commissioner-districts and are presided over by a district commissioner. The authority of the governor is enforced by the usual civil officers and courts, with a reserve force of soldiers thought to be sufficiently numerous to suppress any uprising among the Native Africans. The district commissioners are distributed through the hinterlands and each usually has at his command a detachment from the colonial frontier force and in many instances exercises judicial functions with certain Native chiefs when not sitting alone. The governor and council make the laws and are clothed with great political power. In some of the colonies the Native races have representation on the Council and in others none.

EARLY COLONIAL ATTITUDE TOWARD NATIVE RACES

Early West African colonial governments seem to have been based upon the principle that the Native races had little or no rights other than to obey. The Africans were given little or no participation in the governments. They were taxed to maintain a political system of high salaried and in many instances overpaid officials from Europe who believe religiously in the right of the few to govern the many In the interest of the former. African institutions were regarded as mere superstitions to be inconsiderately and ruthlessly destroyed.

The West African colonial governments were not only characterized by the race prejudice which too often attends and marks the political and social intercourse between the white and darker races; but they were charged in addition with the class feeling which pervades the political institutions and social structure of European governments and society. Europeans resident temporarily in West Africa seemed possessed by an absorbing passion to make their fortunes and return to Europe as soon as possible. It was very evident that the white races were in West Africa, braving the dangers of the climate only for the supreme purpose of wealth making in trade or in fortune finding. The colonial governments gave them such ardent assistance as to make the shameful neglect of the interest of the great masses of Native peoples stand out in the boldest relief.

One of the results was that the colonial governments and administrations were attended with all kinds of friction with Native tribes, which were not adjusted to their sudden subjection to the arbitrary political authority of alien races, who were not hesitating to abrogate African laws and customs; violate the African's rights; destroy without understanding them African political and social institutions; and were compelling Africans in their own native land to submit to taxation without representation or consent, and obey a government whose officials and administrators were too largely saturated with the double prejudice of race and class, while the wealth of African forests, fields and mountains were being transported in millions to Europe.

In the various African colonies the tribes at different times made such resistance as they could against the encroachments of European colonial governments, but to no avail; and one punitive expedition after another was sent against them. Tribe after tribe was convulsed, butchered and dissevered; African towns one after another were burned and destroyed; African women and children by the thousands were subjected to all the horrors and cruelties of punitive and exterminating wars. And although all West Africans were completely suppressed and many of their chiefs and kings deported, exiled or executed; yet, in the process white officials and colonial governments were thrown under the psychological influence of a fear of Native uprisings which lingers with many of them still. The fear was so great in Sierra Leone that West Indian soldiers under white officers are to this day stationed at Freetown, the chief center of this British colony. The bravery and heroism displayed by many of the African leaders and people in defense of their liberties and their lands, as in Ashanti, contain materials for the most thrilling stories in romance and in fiction,

REFORM IN WEST AFRICAN COLONIAL ADMINISTRATION

But there came a better era in West African colonial administration. The wholesale slaughter of Africans, attending the subjection of West Africans and the administration of so many of the colonial governments, touched the heart of humanity and met with increasing disfavor in Europe. The nature and character of African institutions, from a scientific standpoint, aroused the interest of scholars and competent African resident students, and gradually the African began to be disclosed to the world in his intellectual, religious, moral and social conditions, in aspects something like he really is.

It was during this time that the immortal Mary H. Kingsley travelled in West Africa, studied the African in his own home and the varied phases of his tropic life, and through her works entitled, Travels in West Africa and Studies in West Africa, not only profoundly influenced all colonial governments on the West Coast, but changed and

altered fundamentally the attitude of all Europe toward Africa and its races.

Dealing with the aspects and conditions of different tribes there followed many valuable contributions in the classic works of Sir Harry H. Johnston, John Sarbah, Sir A. B. Ellis, Casley Hayford, and other noted writers; but above the influence of them all was the voice and pen of West Africa's most noted and distinguished writer and scholar, Dr. Edward W. Blyden, lately deceased, pleading before the bar of Europe for political and social justice for Africa and for Africans.

In honor and memory of Mary H. Kingsley,—who truly gave her life to redeem Africans from the injustice and tyranny of European colonial governments, the African Society of London was founded and organised for the purpose of studying African Native institutions and conditions in the interest of the truth, for the guidance and information of Europe and colonial administration in Africa. Elsewhere other societies with similar purposes came into existence. Mr. E. D. Morel, author of Affairs of West Africa, editor of The West African Mail, a weekly publication, and other notable works, threw himself with remarkable zeal and ability into this new movement toward the African races and their control. There flourished for a time a noted publication in London entitled West Africa, which with The West African Mail were in daily and sympathetic communion with the different sections of West Africa and which set forth weekly the truth in the interest of justice and a square Ideal to all West Africans.

In Germany, France, Great Britain, and even in Belgium, some of the most prominent names in Europe are now identified with the much needed work of reform in European colonial administration in Africa. So that the colonial administrations in West Africa have been compelled to modify and change their attitude toward the Native races, still they are far from what they should be. In German West Africa the local government is still very rigid and prejudiced toward the Native Africans. In the vast territories controlled by Great Britain more consideration is given to the rights and

institutions of Africans than in former times, but "the man on the spot," like the white man of the Southern American states, is pleading to the higher home government to be let alone on the ground that he has special knowledge on the Native situation, and therefore knows best what to do. The attitude of the colonial government in the Congo toward the Natives remains, after the most searching international exposure, a sad reflection upon the government of the adVance nations of the backward ones. And unfortunately "the man on the spot" is permitted still to exercise too much authority and power over the Native Africans.

M. Du Ponty, governor general of French West Africa at Dakar, informed the writer at different times of the very agreeable manner in which the French colonial governments are now getting along with their Native subjects and of the number that were being educated in the colonies and in France, and of the increasing extent to which the Natives were permitted to participate in the colonial government.

DEVELOPMENT OF RESOURCES TO NEGLECT OF NATIVE
RACES

While the colonial governments in West Africa from an American standpoint are open to some criticism in the broad human interest of the Native races and future general welfare, still too much praise cannot be bestowed upon the courage and industry of Europeans in all the West Af tican colonies, in blotting out the slave traffic with all its cruelty and degradation in abolishing barbarous practices among certain tribes, in assistance and education given in individual cases to Native Africans, in establishing improved methods of sanitation, in railroad construction in facilities for telegraphic and wireless communication? and in the exploration and development of all material interests of the continent, to enable Europeans to live longer in Africa and to enable Europe to secure more wealth from the commerce and resources of the African races.

The thought above all others to be emphasized is that in this great process of African material development, there is

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