Northern publications were more willing to note the breakdown of law, but many attributed it to the backward mindset in the South. The "New York Call," a socialist newspaper, remarked "how astonishingly little cultural progress has been made in some parts of the world", while the "Nashville Banner" compared the events in Rosewood to recent race riots in Northern cities, but characterized the entire event as "deplorable". A three-day conference in Atlanta organized by the Southern Methodist Church released a statement that similarly condemned the chaotic week in Rosewood. It concluded, "No family and no race rises higher than womanhood. Hence, the intelligence of women must be cultivated and the purity and dignity of womanhood must be protected by the maintenance of a single standard of morals for both races."