The
Negro fell face forward in the scorching sand for his honor's sake, and
for the honor of all America. He knew that his real enemy was not the
Mexican, but the German who had furnished Mexico the means and the will
to create disturbance on this side of the Atlantic.

It was not until April, 1917, that President Wilson proclaimed in
Congress a state of war existing between the United States of America
and the Imperial German Government. At the call for volunteers, Negro
regiments of guard, who had served in Mexico, were found at war strength
and ready to double themselves overnight. These guard regiments
represented the cosmopolitan Negro populations of New York, Chicago,
Washington, Baltimore and the State of Ohio. Everywhere the Negro
dropped the mattock, left the ploughshare, poised himself at erect
stature, passionately saluted Old Glory, answered "Here am I!"--counted
fours, and away! Pro-German cried: "White man's war!" Propagandist
yelled: "Cannon fodder!" Reactionary declared: "It must not be." The
Negro burst the gate and entered the arena of combat in spite of all
opposition to his service in honorable capacity under the United States
government.

The honesty of his purpose was discredited. The Anglo-Saxon mind could
not conceive any more than could the German why a man downtrodden as the
Negro should rush to arms, save as a baser means of eking out a
livelihood better than his civilian state. The Anglo-Saxon little
dreamed that the Negro approached the war not only to uphold his
cherished tradition, but also with definite ideas of honor, recognition
and equality as its outcome. Or rather the Anglo-Saxon was too busy with
his own affairs to ascertain the reason why.

His loyalty impugned by those who did not wish to see him uniformed, his
fidelity the subject of bitter sarcasm, his trustworthiness disputed,
the Negro for once kept his own counsel. German agents were in his
midst. They came to his table. They mingled with him in all social
intercourse. They brought forward business propositions to seek to make
the interests of Negro and German one. Southerners, noting this
unaccustomed intimacy of black and white, announced that the Negro had
gone over to the enemy. But the Negro kept his own counsel. He called
upon the nation to investigate him. And when his loyalty was found
untarnished, he called upon the nation to investigate itself. It was
through the influence of Robert R. Moton, of Tuskegee, that,