JDD,
        Native Americans were living on the North American continent when
the
white European colonists began pushing them from their ancestral homes.
African
Americans were brought here to serve these white masters in mastering the
New
World. Twain lived during a time when the clash between whites and Native
Americans caused atrocities on both sides. Twain may have been guilty of
believing what the press fed the public about the savages in the frontier
and
their murderous ways, but I don't buy the idea that his uncomfortable
attitudes
with Comanches makes him a racist.  Twain remarked all he needed to know
about
someone was that he was a member of the Human Race, nothing more could make
the person any worse. The charge of racism is unfounded and fostered by a
bunch of pinheads and blatherskites who would like to reduce everyone to
their
own meanspirited level. Twain championed the individual spirit and condemned
the
group that would war on its own kind. He hated man's inhumanity to man, but
he loved the person, black or white, filled with humor and humaness. Twain
had little contact with N.A. and it is difficult to understand what you do
not know
   . To
judge him by the knowledge and understanding and historical perspective of
1994 is an example of the most mush brained thinking I've ever seen. To even
address racial issues at the time he wrote shows a courage and understanding
of the American psyche that his detractors will never know in their sorry
lifetimes.
        Sorry if I seem so emotionally invested in this issue.  I don't
think
Twain was a god or without faults. This bone of debate just seems like so
much
wasted air space and such a non-issue that it galls me it keeps rearing its
pointed little head.

Alan C. Reese