Cadiz (OH) Sentinel, "Negrophobia in Greene County, Ohio," August 11, 1858

   Negrophobia in Greene County, 

                 Ohio.

 The Torch Light, a strong republican paper of Xenia, Greene county, Ohio, in its issue of July 28, has a leader on what the Editor is placed to term Negrophobia, a disease that has lately made its appearance in that region. That our readers may have some idea of the cause of the disease, which it seems is now affecting all classes of the white community of one of our populous counties, we will transcribe from the Torch Light:

    "Something has been said on the streets about the origin of this dark streak of luck which has befallen Greene county, but in our opinion no one has placed the responsibility where it rightfully belongs. Until the purchase of Tawawa an the opening of Wilberforce University, it was seldom that a family of negroes from the South found their way into Greene County, but with the opening of that institution and the spreading abroad of the information that here was to be found a school which offered the opportunity of an education to the colored population, with all the prestige of a collegiate course and degrees, commenced the settlement of blacks in the country around that immediate locality. Those who first came induced, by their representations, others to come, and finally the attention of the slave holder was called to the fact that here was furnished the field, not only to educate his half-breed children, but to locate them where they would be likely to find society of their own color and grade. This was the germ from which has sprung the whole evil which just now makes 'nine day's wonder' of the town. We do not question the philanthropic motives of those who originated this institution and have thus far sustained it; nor do we question the propriety of endeavoring by education to elevate the black man, but we do not say that the outside results of that experiment have not been pleasant to the SUPERIOR race among which it has been the sole originating cause of planting numerous families of an inferior race."

   So much on the cause of what the Torch Light is pleased to term the Necrophobia, how rife in the old Republican County of Greene. 

   Doctors after settling the cause of the diseases, we believe, next go to work to ascertain what they call the Pathology, or exact nature of the disease––in other words what organ or tissue is affected  The Torch Light has given the cause as we have no doubt, rightly enough; now we will hear him on the Pathology or nature of the trouble.

   "This unpleasantness" (alluding to the presence of the Wilberforce University, for the education of negroes) "may be set down to the score of PREJUDICE or whatever else the reader pleases to call it; but it exists, always has existed, will exist, irradically and fixed. it is the mind of the white child, with his first idea and first look into the face of the black man––it lives through his whole life, and dies only when he dies."

   Doctors have told us that causes of disease may be ascertained and the exact nature of the disease appreciated, but it is not always easy to find a remedy. Here is the rule. Many a poor fellow has lost his life when the wits of the doctor got stranded on this shoal. Let us hear from the Torch Light again. He seems to have had good service from his philosophy in divining causes, pathology, &c. Let us see if he is equally happy in his wits at remedies. The disease we would remind the reader is Negrophobia, it was produced as the Torch Light says by getting up a college in the country for the education of negroes, which had caused a general stampede of negroes to this county; its nature is an ineradicable prejudice on the part of the superior to the inferior race, "that always has existed and always will exist." Here is what the Torch Light has to propose then in the way of a remedy:

   "Men swear about them, (the negroes) and then sell to them––talk about a "ruined community," and then trade with them and seek their trade. Now let us stop the traffic, and thus put an end to the influx, or stop the talk and hide the inconsistency. We prefer the former. 

   How is this? It strikes us as rather a severe kind of remedy. The Torch Light has for years been feeding the negroes with sugar plumbs, has been expitiating earnestly on negro rights and the propriety of enfranchising the negro and placing him on an equality with the whites; has taken lately ana active part in an attempt to obstruct the operations of National law for the recovery of fugitive slaves; has given countenance and support to the feeling by which an educational institution for the negro has been located in the neighborhood of Xenia, and from which circumstance large numbers of this population have been induced to go there and purchase property, with the intention of making it their permanent homes. We inquire again, who is that with such antecedents, the Torch Light could find it in his heart to propose starvation of the whole African population as a remedy for the Negrophobia that now prevails among the white race?

   This case looks to us like a pretty fair experiment with the negroes. Here in Greene County, they have been in the "hands of their friends." The negro here has been caressed, and schools and all other facilities provided for him, in the expectation that he could be elevated to an equality with the whites. But all at once Negrophobia breaks out among the whites. It is discovered that a "prejudice" exists, ineradicable in its nature. And that what was once once one of the finest communities in the West, is about to be ruined by the presence of an overstock of negroes. Tempora mutanter.––Statesman.