had already decided and carefully planned to gather and form some kind
of a national body among themselves, they were indeed suddenly inspired
to whole-heartedly and fearlessly carry out those plans immediately,
when a prejudiced white editor of a village paper in the United States
published an open letter in which he accused alike all American Colored
women as being without moral characters and uplifting principles.
Not only the educated, refined and moral Colored women resented and
challenged that poisoned-pen letter that had lied on and slandered a
whole race of their sisters, but the largest nationally known white
newspapers of large cities in both America and Europe came out in
broad-minded editorials verbally chastising and denouncing without
mercy that editor of their race who stained his profession and shamed
his race by stooping so low in unsuccessfully using that narrow-minded
and short-sighted means of gaining subscriptions for his failing paper
and fame for his unheard of name.
As a result of the above plans and decisions nearly a dozen States
sent upward of a hundred leading and representative Colored women
who met in July 1895 in Boston, Mass., where the first National
Convention of Colored Women was formed, with Mrs. Josephine St. Pierre
Ruffin as president, Mrs. Booker T. Washington and Mrs. Helen Cook as
Vice-Presidents and Miss Elizabeth C. Carter as secretary. During the
meeting that convention was given the name of “The National Association
of Colored Women.” This body became affiliated with The National
Council of Women in 1900 and was incorporated in 1904. At different
times it has had as its presidents; Mrs. Mary Church Terrell, A. M.,
Washington, D.C., Mrs. Booker T. Washington, Tuskegee Institute, Ala.,
Miss Elizabeth C. Carter, New Bedford, Mass., Mrs. Mary B. Talbert,
Buffalo, N. Y. and Miss Hallie Q. Brown, Wilberforce, Ohio, who is
its present presiding officer. Those who are Miss Brown’s closest
assistants in helping to carry on this noble work are named as follows:
Mrs. Janie Porter Barrett, Peake, Va., Mrs. Ruth L. Bennett, Chester,
Pa., Mrs. Alice Cary, Atlanta, Ga., Mrs. Charlotte Dett, Niagara Falls,
N. Y., Mrs. Addie W. Dickerson, Phila., Pa., Mrs. C. L. Hamilton,
Indianola, Ill., Mrs. C. R. McDowell, Hannibal, Mo., Mrs. J. C. Napier,
Nashville, Tenn., Miss Georgia A. Nugent, Louisville, Ky., Mrs. Minnie
Scott, Toledo, Ohio, Mrs. E. J. N. Simms, Spokane, Wash., Mrs. Mamie E.
Steward, Louisville, Ky., Mrs. Marion Wilkerson, Orangeburg, S. C. and
Mrs. W. T. B. Williams, Tuskegee Institute, Ala.
In regard to the relations of this association with the International
Council of Women, several Colored women have attended different
European meetings as representatives from the United States. Foremost
among such women are Miss Hallie Q. Brown, Mrs. Mary Church Terrell,
Mrs. Mary B. Talbert and Dr. Mary F. Waring. The following is an
extract from the July 1921 issue of The Crisis:
“The Committee on International Relations--the highest committee of
women in personnel of representatives in the League of Nations--has
chosen Mrs. Mary B. Talbert as a member. Mrs. Talbert was the first
accredited Negro delegate to sit in the International Council of women
and one of five American women to speak for the National Council of
Women of the United States of America in the House of Parliament at
Norway.”
The quotation below is taken from the February 1921 issue of The
Favorite Magazine. “Dr. Mary F. Waring, recently returned from a trip
through eleven European countries, and one of twenty American women to
represent the United States at the International Council of Women in
Norway. She had the distinction of being the only woman commissioner of
the Lincoln Jubilee in 1915 and the organizer of the Red Cross units
Canteen and Home Nursing classes during the World War. After the war
the Community Service appointed her as a national organizer for girls’
work.”
Some of the national leading and most prominent Colored women before
the public today who as workers in this association or along other
elevating lines have encouraged, inspired and helped thousands of
American Colored girls to move out of Nobody’s Alley and live on
Somebody’s Avenue are Miss Mary M. Bethune, Daytona, Fla., Miss Eva D.
Bowles, New York City, N. Y., Miss Hallie Q. Brown, Wilberforce, O.,
Miss Nannie H. Burroughs, Washington, D.C., Madame E. Azalia Hackley,
Detroit, Mich., Mrs. Addie W. Hunton, New York City, N. Y., Miss Jane
E. Hunter, Cleveland, O., Miss Lucey Laney, Augusta, Ga., Mrs. S. W.
Layton, Phila., Pa., Mrs. R. R. Moton, Tuskegee, Ala., Mrs. Alice
Dunbar Nelson, Wilmington, Del., Mrs. Mary B. Talbert, Buffalo, N. Y.,
Mrs. Florence C. Talbert, Detroit, Mich., Mrs. Mary Church Terrell,
Washington, D. C., Mrs. Maggie L. Walker, Richmond, Va., Dr. Mary F.
Waring, Chicago., Ill., Mrs. Booker T. Washington, Tuskegee Institute,
Ala. and Mrs. Butler R. Wilson, Boston, Mass.
[Illustration]
National Uplift Organization founded and run by Negroes
The National Negro Business League
In 1900 the late Dr. Booker T. Washington, founder of Tuskegee
Institute, organized in Boston, Mass. The National Negro Business
League, which is now under the forceful and energetic leadership of
Dr. Robert R. Moton. Such nationally known men as Chas. Banks, J. C.
Napier and Emmett J. Scott are among those who are closely allied with
the president of this League in so widely spreading its influences of
encouragement, inspiration and business knowledge.
As a description of the workings of this organization, the writer gives
below some extracts from an article written for the August 13, 1921
issue of The Chicago Defender by E. Davidson Washington, son of the
late Dr. Booker T. Washington.
“While the Business League has a distinctive purpose (that of promoting
the commercial and financial development of our Race,) it does not
attempt to prescribe for every racial endeavor; yet it is a significant
fact that through the instrumentality of this the national body and
its more than 600 local branches or local leagues scattered throughout
the country a very large part of the progress made by the Race in the
direction of home and farm ownership, banking, insurance, manufacturing
and mercantile enterprises has been achieved since the organization of
the Business League.
“Among the many subjects discussed are such as: “Making Farming Pay,”
“Building a Negro Town,” “The Relation of Education to Business,”
“Conducting a Grocery Store,” “Editing a Newspaper” and many others
which space will not permit me to mention here. Questions are asked,
and in that way those who did not come up to their expectations the
previous year try, when they return to their various communities, as
far as possible, to put into practice what they have gained through the
league.
“The symposiums conducted in the main convention by the following
organizations are highly interesting and instructive: The National
Negro Bankers’ Association, the National Negro Funeral Directors’
Association, the National Negro Press, the National Negro Bar
Association and the National Negro Insurance Men.
“Finally, as a Race we must not be discouraged. There will come to us,
as to all races, seasons of depression and gloom. Once in a while even
those in high places may seem to seek to insult, humiliate and harass
us, but they cannot last. “The morning cometh.” Those who treat us
unjustly are losing more than we are. Above all, we must not lose faith
in ourselves nor in our Race. We must be as proud of being Negroes as
a Japanese is of being a Japanese. It is through such meetings as the
National Negro Business League that the Negro is encouraged and made
to look upon the brighter side of life and with more optimism for the
future than ever before.”
Association For The Study of Negro Life and History
American school white boys and girls get the larger part of their
inspirations to become great men and women mostly from what they read
in the public school United States Histories about big things members
of their race have done. As white authors in writing such histories saw
fit to leave out of them all references (with the exception of slavery)
to the parts the American Colored people have had in helping to make
American history, public school Colored boys and girls get no racial
encouragements nor inspirations from such histories.
The Association for the Study of Negro Life and History, organized in
1915, is doing a grand work in helping to supply the American Colored
youth with the desired encouraging and inspiring information relating
to Negro historical achievements in the United States. The president of
this organ, R. E. Park is ably assisted in this work by such scholars
as Drs. J. E. Mooreland and C. G. Woodson.
The National Equal Rights League
The National Equal Rights League was started in 1910 and one of its
chief purposes is contending for and securing in peaceful but firm
ways the same equal rights in the United States for American Colored
citizens as those so generously given to members of other races,
especially many foreigners in this country who do not understand the
laws, cannot speak the language and have no intentions of becoming
naturalized. The president of this organization is N. S. Taylor, who is
loyally assisted by such race leaders as Wm. Monroe Trotter, and B. N.
Murrell.
The Lincoln League of America
The Lincoln League of America is an organization that was started in
1919, and one of its main objects is to instil race pride on a broader
scale among Colored people and at the same time encourage them along
all lines of citizenship privileges and advancement. Roscoe C. Simmons
is president of this body and is nobly aided in this work by such
national figures as Henry Lincoln Johnson and Walter Cohen.
National Association of Teachers for Colored Schools
The National Association of Teachers for Colored Schools is under
the scholarly and experienced leadership of Prof. J. M. Gandy. It is
due mostly to this organization that the managements and sentiments
of the different Southern Colored colleges and schools have come to
better understand each other and thereby work in closer conjunction and
harmony for the broadest and most practical development of Negro youths
in both industrial and higher education. Other officials who have
helped to bring about such good feelings are S. X. Floyd and W. H. A.
Howard.
Negro Organization Society
Although it has not yet developed into a national organization, the
Negro Organization Society of Virginia is making rapid strides in that
direction. It was organized several years ago, at the wise suggestion
of the late Dr. H. B. Frissell, by Major R. R. Moton, who with the
valuable assistance of Captain Allen Washington, Profs. J. M. Gandy,
T. C. Erwin, Rev. A. A. Graham, Lawyer T. C. Walker, Hon. Robert.
E. Clay and others soon made it a leading source of encouragement
and helpfulness throughout the entire State. While its purpose is to
unite into one large solid body for more mutual understandings all
the church, fraternal and social organizations and societies, big and
little, in the State; it has no desires nor intentions whatever of
selfishly absorbing within itself or taking away the individuality of
any organized body that comes under its advice and help.
One of the chief objects of this society is to gather all such
organizations in the state under its guiding wisdom and sheltering arms
into one big congenial family, whose members may then be constantly
taught how best to work in helpful understandings and harmony among
themselves and in brotherhood co-operations with their white neighbors
in order to secure “better health, better schools, better homes and
better farms” for the Colored people. These efforts have proven so
fruitful that this society has already overflown its Virginian cup of
uplift influence that is now running and dripping over the sides into
surrounding states. And under the continued successful “Whooping-up”
campaigns of its present leader, Major Allen Washington, this organ is
destined some day to become one of the most helpful national movements
in America in aiding to bring about stronger and broader good-will
feelings between the two races and at the same time more friendly
and solidly uniting all Colored organizations for a more rapid and
all-round advancement of the Negro Race.
THE PAN-AFRICAN CONGRESS
On February 19, 1919, Dr. W. E. B. DuBois, editor of The Crisis,
called a meeting known as The Pan-African Congress that held three
days’ session in the Grand Hotel, Paris, France. It was attended by
fifty-eight delegates representing sixteen different Negro groups, who
passed resolutions of which two of the most important paragraphs are
quoted below as follows:
“Whenever persons of African descent are civilized and able to meet the
tests of surrounding culture, they shall be accorded the same rights as
their fellow citizens: they shall not be denied on account of race or
color a voice in their own Government, justice before the courts and
economic and social equality according to ability and desert.
“Whenever it is proven that African natives are not receiving just
treatment at the hands of any State or that any State deliberately
excludes its civilized citizens or subjects of Negro descent from
its body politic and cultural, it shall be the duty of the League of
Nations to bring the matter to the attention of the civilized world.”
Along with Dr. DuBois, some of the other internationally known persons
who attended that first Congress were Boisneuf, Deputy from Guadaloupe;
Captain Boutte; Canadace, French Deputy from Guadaloupe; Mme Chapoteau;
Mrs. Helen M. Curtis; Diagne, French Deputy from Senegal; Grossilliere,
Deputy from Martinique; Mrs. Ida Gibbs Hunt; Mrs. Addie W. Hunton; Dr.
John Hope; President King, Peace Delegate from Liberia; B. F. Seldon
and Roscoe C. Simmons.
The Pan-African Congress plans to hold its second meeting in Europe
in 1921 and hold sessions in four different countries as follows: in
London, England on August 28th and 29th; in Brussels, Belgium on August
31st, September 1st and 2nd; in Paris, France on September 4th and
5th, and a “Special Committee to visit the Assembly of the League of
Nations, Geneva, Switzerland, after September 6th.”
In brief (according to the July 1921 issue of The Crisis) the chief
working plans mapped out on the practical progress of this Congress
are as follows: to satisfy the urgent need of securing first-hand
information “about Africa’s physical, climatic and commercial
conditions, as well as the attitude of the natives and the European
governments”; to thresh such newly gained knowledge and put it into
the form of a statement, presenting the main social problems which
face the Negros of the world; to enable the leaders of the different
Negro groups the world over to become acquainted; to get in touch
with and put before those persons, groups, nations and organizations
of various races who either do sympathize with the peoples of Africa
and their descendants or who would sympathize with them if they knew
the fundamental characteristics, needs and deserts of the black man all
over the globe; to have the Pan-African Congress finally evolved into
one permanent body that welds the Negro people and their friends for
the emancipation of the race.
“For his services in originating and conducting in Paris the
Pan-African Congress”, Dr. DuBois was presented with the Spingarn
Medal. And this Pan-African Congress, “in the judgment of President
Hope of Morehouse College”, “made the Negro representatives from
seventeen countries discover that the problems of colored people the
world over are the same.” The origin and purpose of the above mentioned
Spingarn Medal is explained in the following quotation:
“A few years ago Dr. J. E. Spingarn of New York decided that he would
offer each year a gold medal to be awarded to the man or woman of
African descent who had rendered valuable, though perhaps somewhat
inconspicuous, service to his race and to modern civilization.
Dr. Spingarn had very clearly in his mind the “for merit” type of
decoration. This idea has always been kept before the committee on
award”. (Ref. July 1920 issue of the Southern Workman).
A complete list of those who have been awarded the Spingarn Medal since
1915, when it was first presented, up to the present date is as follows:
1915, Dr. Ernest E. Just, Scholar-Scientist.
1916, Colonel Chas. Young, United States Army.
1917, Harry T. Burleigh, Singer-Composer.
1918, Wm. Stanley Braithwaite, Poet-Critic.
1919, Archibald H. Grimke, Author-Orator.
1920, Dr. W. E. B. DuBoise, Sociologist-Author.
1921, Charles E. Gilpin, Celebrated Actor.
MARCUS GARVEY
Whatever may be their private thoughts and judgements as to the
methods, purposes and final results of his efforts; the one conclusion
at which close observing Colored and white people alike have
unanimously arrived and publically admitted is that the Negro, Marcus
Garvey (who is estimated to have united more than a million of his Race
people into different organizations) has unquestionably become “The
World’s Greatest Group Organizer” of today.
Relative to the Race interests, efforts and leaderships of Dr. DuBois
and Mr. Garvey, the writer quotes below the very logical and impartial
editorial that appeared in Editor J. Finley Wilson’s “Washington Eagle”
that was published September 17, 1921, in Washington, D.C.
“WORLD LEAGUE OF THE AFRICAN RACES NECESSARY”
“We are very much in favor of the Pan-African movement which Dr.
W. E. B. DuBois has in charge and is trying to make a success of.
The race needs an international organization which will gather
representatives of the African peoples of the world, where their
rights and wrongs may be registered and looked after, and where,
annually, they may gather in an open congress or a discussion and
agreement upon questions affecting them. The question is a broad
one, race-embracing, and should be considered from that viewpoint.
“On the other hand, we are very much in favor of the movement
fostered by Mr. Marcus Garvey, the provisional president of Africa,
to create a sentiment in Africa in favor of a oneness of sentiment
among Africans themselves and the building up of African States
for Africans. Mr. Garvey has been pointing out, recently, and very
wisely, we think, that the time may come when Afro-Americans who
are dissatisfied with their conditions in States of the United
States may desire to go to Africa, and to a State in Africa
governed by Africans. This is reasonable foresight.
“There are millions of Jews working hard for the rehabilitation of
Palestine who have no desire to make it their home, as they are
satisfied in the States where they are, but there are millions
who are not satisfied, as in Turkey and Russia, who would go
to Palestine and build its waste places while repatriating it.
It is in the same way that we regard the building of a strong
African State as a sufficient asylum of those of the race who are
persecuted anywhere on the globe that they may be.
“Mr. Garvey is as much of a prophet in his way as Dr. DuBois, and
we should be willing to hold up the hands of both of them in any
plans they may advance which seems possible of working out for the
good of the race. Both of them have ideas and methods we do not
approve, but that would be the case with any movement whatsoever,
that may be started, on a large or small scale, by any man or group
of men of the race, but it should not prevent us from encouraging
them in any idea or plan which appears reasonable and possible of
resulting in good for the race.
“A World League of African People is necessary. An Independent
African State in Africa is necessary. We already have Liberia and
Abyssinia, but we need more than these, and stronger than both of
them.”
ON THE FARM
EDUCATION THE NEGRO NEEDS ALL
Wild men first learned to scratch the ground:--Agricultural Education
In building caves first trades they found: --Industrial Education
Then exchange of hides made business boom, --Commercial Education
And science was born gazing stars and moon --University Education
--_Harrison._
Since the raising of tobacco, cotton, corn, sugar cane and other farm
products had been the main reason for starting slavery in America, it
is plainly seen that farming was the chief work of the Colored people
until they were set free. And it is quite natural that they took a
great dislike to a work that they had been compelled to do against
their wills for over two hundred years. So at the close of the Civil
War when they were free to choose their own work, the majority of
ex-slaves were willing to do any kind of labor under the sun (or over
the sun for that matter) but work on the farm. Such a state of affairs
continued for a number of years and caused much of the rich fertile
lands in the South to go unfarmed, neglected and runned-down, but after
some years away from the only kind of work they knew the most about,
their dislike to farming began to lessen and they gradually drifted
back to work patches of land on shares with their former owners who
had survived the war. And their return to the bosom of nature rapidly
increased as the ex-slaves saw how it would enable them to make a
living and save money to buy land for themselves.
As a result of that movement back to the farms which continued to
increase, there were, according to the 1910 census, over two hundred
thousand farms or twenty-one million acres of land owned in the United
States by Colored people. Negroes in the South alone own more than
two hundred thousand of those farms that are valued at more than four
hundred million dollars. Just in the state of Virginia Colored people
own over one million acres of land that are valued at over ten million
dollars. The following named are just a handful of the Colored farmers
throughout the South and West who own and cultivate farms ranging in
size from 500 to 3,000 acres of land; J. N. Brown, Tenn.,; J. Collins,
S. C.; Robt. Chatman, Texas; Wash Dillard, Texas; Lewis Dolphin,
Okla.; J. G. Groves, Kan.; Wiley Hinds’ family, Cal.; J. A. Hickey, G.
N. Humphries, Texas; Howard Jackson, Ala.; Chas. Jackson, La.; Deal
Jackson, Ga.; Y. U. Jones, Texas; John Lyttle, N. C.; J. H. McDuffy,
Fla.; Wm. Mazy, John F. McGowon, L. A. Nash, Lance Parker, Dennis
Pollard, H. Penneth, Jack Taylor, Texas; Jake Simmons, Okla.; R. L.
Smith, Newton Smith, La.; A. W. Taylor, Texas; J. Thompson, Ga.; W. B.
Turner, Va., and Frank Wallace, Texas.
Through the encouragement and helpfulness of such farming agencies
as the Smith-Lever Funds for Agricultural Extension Education, the
Smith-Hughes Funds for Vocational Education, The Federal Farm Loans and
the Farmers’ Co-operative Demonstration Work, a new interest, rekindled
enthusiasm and extra efforts have been aroused among Colored farmers in
all parts of the country. They have at last been made to plainly see
and fully understand that it is always to their seemingly dull country
barnyard gates that the boiled-shirt, stiff-collared and learned
business and college men of the cities must sooner of later turn for
their ham and eggs, steak and chops, bread and butter and different
vegetables. These same farmers manfully realize that they or others
can only produce such necessities of life by daily mingling among the
neighing horses, the mooing cows, the grunting pigs, the bleating
sheep, the cackling hens and the crowing roosters. They are the people
who with rolled-up sleeves cheerfully feel they must be stained with
the earth’s sweet dirt (for what is so fragrant, so refreshing and so
sweet as the smell of newly plowed furrows on an early spring morn,
when crows overhead fly with taunting caws and robins scratch the sods
for a wormy cause?) or the city folks for want of life-giving foods
would soon die of starvation.