A NEGRO UTOPIA.

Star (Christchurch), Issue 19848, 17 January 1920, Page 8

A NEGRO UTOPIA.

“PROMISED LAND” OF SOUTHERN NEGRO. (" New York Herald.”) MEMPHIS, Tenn.—The "promised land” for the Southern negro is in n 35,000-acre tract in Lonoke County, Arkansas, where a new idea negro community is being built and for which a set of laws has been laid down that forbids almost every kind of amusement «avo “ huntin’ ’possum ” and whose code is "work,” on the theory that idleness is tho worst enemy of tho negro, the old saw about "all work and no play ” to tho contrary notwithstanding. There will be no dancing, no card playing, no loafing, no fighting. About the only thing that this new and fast growing community will ho permitted to do is hunt. Not even baseball is admitted within the limits of lawful amusements. And tho chief aim is the establishment of' a big factory to turn out high quality and artistic coffins. Tho “promised land” surrounds the community centre that has been named Allport and to which SGB families hare gone, each to take up and improve forty acres of land. Next year all business, most of which now is conducted by whites, will ho taken over by negroes, and one year from now tho" whole community's law and order, religion, administration and any other work that may fall under these 'general headings, will ho in the hands exclusively of negroes who live in tho community. The "bad nigger” is barred. ’ It takes a first rate “character” to gain a place in the community. And no northern negroes, or negroes who have cone to the north from tho south, can nope to find a haven in or near Allport. The lines are closely drawn and there are no exceptions. The moving spirit for this Utopia for negroes, and the one who is responsible for most of tho ideas that are being worked out, for the enforcement of its laws and for most of the other things that pertain to living and learning and prospering, is the Ror R. Amos, ne*ro “elder,” as he calls himself, who has been a leader of his race in Arkansas for a good many years. At this particular time, however, ho is going through tho State conducting meetings for the particular purpose of striking down what he terms "vicious propaganda” aimed to create discord botween"negroes and whites.