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Bilbo, Gordon & Co. would have the U. S. wangle 400,000 square African miles from Great Britain and France, accepting it as part payment on their War debts, later would buy supplies for the colony in the same way. The U. S. Treasury would put up $1,000,000,000 and guarantee the colony's bonds. Negro labor battalions would be paid U. S. Army wages ($21 to $30 per month) to prepare the land under U. S. engineers. Senator Bilbo vows that 8,000,000 of the 12,000,000 U. S. Negroes would hop at the chance to escape the white man's yoke, live on the white man's subsidies until they establish farms and businesses. They would progress from a military government to a territorial commonwealth, finally to an independent republic. Their promised land would adjoin little Liberia, which a U. S. society set up for Negro freedmen in 1822.
Many a reputable Negro leader distrusts The Man Bilbo, who was once accused of muzzling Negro pickers in his pecan grove. He tickles the poor-white vote with his back-to-Africa talk, but he appeals to many a poor black as well. Last week he flourished a letter from Harlem: ". . . I, Mack Royal . . . seartnley will go at the word—I and my whole famley. . . . Sir, please inrole my name; please do this with fail. ..."