_American Historical Association Report_, 1894.
[43] _American State Papers, Foreign Relations_, Vol. I, pp. 470-472.
[44] Jay to Randolph, _American State Papers_, Vol. I, p. 485.
[45] _American State Papers_, Vol. I, p. 485.
[46] _Ibid._, p. 486.
[47] _American Historical Association Report_, Vol. I, pp. 273-298.
[48] _American State Papers_, Vol. I, p. 501.
[49] _Ibid._, p. 509.
[50] _American Historical Association Report_, Vol. I, pp. 273-298.
[51] _Annals of Congress_--4th Session, 1795-96, p. 1006.
[52] Halleck, _Elements of Law_, p. 358.
[53] _Ibid._, p. 359.
[54] Wheaton's _Edition by Dana_, page 441.
[55] _American State Papers--Foreign Relations_, Vol. II, p. 46.
[56] _American State Papers--Foreign Relations_, Vol. II, p. 48.
[57] Moore, _Digest of International Law_, Vol. V, page 372.
[58] _Ibid._, page 375.
[59] _Ibid._, pp. 375-376.
[60] _American State Papers--Foreign Relations_, Vol. IV., p. 106.
[61] This proclamation was:
"Whereas it has been represented to me that many persons now
resident in the United States have expressed a desire to withdraw
therefrom, with a view of entering his Majesty's service, or of
being received as Free Settlers in some of his Majesty's colonies
"This is therefore to give notice
"That all those who may be disposed to emigrate from the United
States will with their families be received on board his Majesty's
ships or vessels of war or at the military ports that may be
established upon or near the coast of the U.S. where they will
have their choice of either entering his Majesty's sea or land
forces, or of being sent as Free Settlers to the British
possessions in North America or the West Indies where they will
meet all due encouragement.
"Given under my hand at Bermuda this 2nd day of April, 1814.
"By Command of VICE ADMIRAL WILLIAM BALHETCHET
"ALEX. COCHRANE."
_Niles Register_, Vol. VI, p. 242.
[62] Article I, Treaty of Ghent:
"There shall be a firm and universal peace between His Britannic
Majesty and the United States, and between their respective
countries, territories, cities, towns, and people, of every
degree, without exception of places or persons. All hostilities,
both by sea and land, shall cease as soon as this treaty shall
have been ratified by both parties as hereinafter mentioned. All
territory, places, and possessions whatsoever taken by either
party from the other during the war or which may be taken after
the signing of this treaty excepting only the islands hereinafter
mentioned, shall be restored without delay, and without causing
any destruction or carrying away any of the artillery or other
public property originally captured in the said forts or places
and which shall remain therein upon the exchange of the
ratifications of this treaty, or any slaves or other private
property. And all archives, records, deeds, and papers, either of
a public nature, or belonging to private persons which in the
course of the war may have fallen into the hands of the officers
of either party, shall be as far as may be practicable forthwith
restored and delivered to the proper authorities and persons to
whom they respectively belong. Such of the islands on the Bay of
Passama-Quoddy as are claimed by both parties shall remain in the
possession of the party in whose occupation they may be at the
time of the exchange of the ratifications of this treaty, until
the decision respecting the title to the said islands shall have
been made in conformity with the fourth article of this treaty. No
disposition made by this treaty as to such possession of the
islands and territories claimed by both parties, shall in any
manner whatever be construed to effect the right of either...."
[63] _American State Papers, Foreign Relations_, Vol. III, p. 750.
[64] _Ibid._, Vol. III, page 751.
[65] Moore's _International Arbitration_, page 350.
[66] _Naval Chronicle_, Vol. XXIV, page 213.
[67] Moore's _International Arbitration_, p. 352.
[68] _American State Papers_, Vol. IV, p. 105.
[69] _Ibid._, p. 108.
[70] _American State Papers_, Vol. IV, p. 126.
[71] Moore's _International Arbitration_, p. 363.
[72] _American State Papers, Foreign Relations_, Vol. V, p. 214.
[73] Maryland, 714; Va., 1721; S.C., 10; Ga., 833; La., 259; Miss.,
22; Del., 2; Ala., 18; D. C., 3--page 801, Vol. V, _American State
Papers_.
[74] Moore, _International Arbitration_, p. 377.
[75] _Ibid._, p. 377.
[76] _American State Papers, Foreign Relations_, Volume VI, page 344;
746.
[77] _Ibid._, Vol. VI, p. 746.
[78] _American State Papers, Foreign Relations_, Vol. VI, p. 348.
[79] _Ibid._, Vol. VI, p. 352.
[80] _Ibid._, Vol. VI, p. 372.
[81] _Ibid._, Vol. VI, p. 339
[82] _American State Papers, Foreign Relations_, Vol. VI, page 855.
[83] _Four Statutes at Large_, page 269.
THE NEGRO IN POLITICS[1]
A treatise on the Negro in politics since the emancipation of the race
may be divided into three periods; that of the Reconstruction, when
the Negroes in connection with the interlopers and sympathetic whites
controlled the Southern States, the one of repression following the
restoration of the radical whites to power, and the new day when the
Negro counts as a figure in politics as a result of his worth in the
community and his ability to render the parties and the government
valuable service.
While the echoes of the Civil War were dying away, the South attempted
to reduce the Negro to a position of peonage by the passage of the
black codes. Many northern men led by Sumner and Stevens, who at first
tried to secure the cooperation of the best whites, became indignant
because of this attitude of the South and were reduced to the
necessity of forcing Negro suffrage upon the South at the point of the
bayonet, believing that the only way to insure the future welfare of
the Negro was to safeguard it by giving him the ballot. Under the
protection of these military governments, the Negroes and certain more
or less fortunate whites gained political control. The southern white
men, weary and disgusted because of the outcome of their attempts at
secession, maintained an attitude of sullenness and indifference
toward the new regime and accordingly offered at first very little
opposition to the Negro control of politics. The Negroes, upon their
securing the right of suffrage, however, turned at once to their
former masters for political leadership,[2] but the majority of these
southern gentlemen refused to "lower their dignity" by political
association with the Negroes. The few southern gentlemen who did
affiliate with the Negroes were dubbed "scalawags" by their former
friends and cast out of southern society.
The Negroes were then forced, because of the lack of cooperation on
the part of the southern whites, to accept the leadership of certain
northern men who came South for the sole purpose of personal gain and
exploitation. These men were in some cases of an extremely low order
and were in a large measure responsible for the corruption of
Reconstruction days. They were contemptuously called "carpetbaggers"
by the southern whites because they were so poor that they could carry
all of their possessions in a carpet bag. Some of these white men were
conscientious, however, and served these States honorably. Most
Negroes, therefore, were under the leadership of these three elements:
southern men who were regarded by their neighbors as men of the lowest
possible order, unscrupulous adventurers from the North, and some
intelligent members of their own race like B. K. Bruce, John R. Lynch,
R. B. Elliot, and John M. Langston. This ill-assorted group of
politicians reconstructed the Southern States.
The wisdom of this policy has been widely questioned. From the point
of view of most white men studying Reconstruction history this effort
to make the Negro a factor in politics was a failure, the elimination
of the Negro from politics was just, and the rise of the Negro to
political power even today is viewed with alarm. The opinions of the
biased historians in this field will be interesting. Several writers
refer to the Negro carpet bag movement as an effort to found
commonwealths upon the votes of an ignorant Negro electorate, as
working an injustice both to the whites and the blacks in that it made
the South solidly democratic.[3] J. G. de R. Hamilton, exaggerating
the actual basis of Reconstruction in the southern commonwealths,
which were never fully controlled by the Negroes, speaks of the work
as having left as a legacy "a protest against anything that might
threaten a repetition of the past, when selfish politicians, backed up
by the Federal Government, for party purposes, attempted to Africanize
the State and deprive the people through misrule and oppression of
most that life held dear."[4] John W. Burgess calls the effort an
"extravagant humanitarianism which had developed in the minds of the
Reconstruction leaders to the point of justifying, not only the
political equality of the races but the political superiority at least
in loyalty to the Union, the constitution and republican government,
of the uncivilized Negroes of the South."[5] Burgess sees justice in
subjecting the inferior to the superior class but none in subjecting
the superior to the inferior.
Of these radical utterances historians need take but little notice.
They are of value here for the reason that they show the lack of
scientific Reconstruction history. No intelligent man who lived
through this stormy period or who has read documents bearing on its
history will contend that these commonwealths were Africanized merely
because the Negroes along with the formerly disfranchised and ignorant
poor whites were given the right of suffrage. It will be difficult to
prove that the majority of poor whites in the South were at this time
sufficiently intelligent and experienced in statecraft to give those
commonwealths a much better government than that administered by the
Negroes and "Carpet baggers"; for the South had been ruled by few
aristocratic families, most of whom because of participation in the
Civil War, could not on the cessation of hostilities be given the
reins of government. A few who had not had any such connection with
the Confederacy haughtily refused to cooperate with the Negroes in the
reconstruction of these governments, although they were persistently
invited by the Negroes who were thus advised by Thaddeus Stevens and
Charles Sumner, who showed foresight in trying to secure the
cooperation of the best white element in the South.[6] These
statesmen, however, are generally slandered by uninformed writers who
contend that Sumner and Stevens did not thus proceed. The Negroes not
only sought the leadership of the whites but showed unusual humaneness
toward their poverty-stricken former masters by passing, as they did
in South Carolina, stay laws to postpone the payment of their many war
debts secured by mortgages on their property.
Statistics show, moreover, that with the exception of South Carolina
and Mississippi, no State and not even any department of a State
government was ever dominated altogether by Negroes. The Negroes never
wanted and never had complete control in the Southern States.[7] The
most important offices were generally held by white men. Only two
Negroes ever served in the United States Senate, Hiram R. Revells and
B. K. Bruce; and only twenty ever became Representatives in the House:
and all of these did not serve at the same time, although some of them
were elected for more than one term.
The charge that the men who were elected to office by the Negroes were
always of the most debased and degenerate type is untrue. Because of
the refusal of the southern aristocracy to cooperate with them,
however, the Negroes were forced to elect such men as they were able
to secure. Numerous promising and respectable whites who were elected
to office by the Negroes, became corrupt and unprincipled on account
of the treatment tendered them by the aristocratic whites. From among
the Negroes themselves, the very best men available were chosen to
hold offices. Among these were former slaves who had been made
trustworthy servants of their masters and free Negroes who had
received some education. Some of these Negroes served in their
official capacity with honor and credit. A number of them were also
respected by certain fairminded southern whites.[8]
Numerous examples of the high regard which the whites of certain
communities had for the Negro leaders can be cited. Samuel J. Lee, of
Charleston, South Carolina, was considered by his white contemporaries
as one of the best criminal lawyers which the State had produced. At
his death all local courts were declared adjourned and the entire city
paid him homage. The late Bishop Isaac Clinton served, as Treasurer of
Orangeburg, South Carolina, for eight years. Like Mr. Lee, he was held
in high esteem by his white neighbors and upon the occasion of his
funeral, the business of the community was suspended as a mark of
respect to his memory. In certain communities, as in South Carolina,
some Negroes were retained as office holders for a number of years
after the supremacy of the Democratic party was assured. In
Georgetown, South Carolina, Mr. George Harriot was Superintendent of
Education for the county for years under the Democratic party.
Beaufort, South Carolina, retained Negroes as sheriffs and school
officials until a few years ago.[9]
J. T. White, Commissioner of Public Works and Internal Improvements in
the State of Arkansas; M. W. Gibbs, Municipal judge in Little Rock,
and J. C. Corbin, State Superintendent of Schools in the same State,
had records equally as creditable. The same may be said of F. L.
Cardoza, State Treasurer of South Carolina, Richard T. Greener, a
professor in the University of that commonwealth, Oscar Dunn,
Lieutenant-Governor of Louisiana and P.B.S. Pinchback, Acting Governor
of that State.[10] The record of Dubuclet, according to Dr. Woodson,
should receive special mention. In contradistinction to the rule of
stealing from the public treasury, this man who served as Treasurer of
the State of Louisiana even after the other departments of the
government had been taken from the Negroes, in as much as the term of
service of the Treasurer was six years rather than four, was
investigated with a view to finding out some act of misuse of the
public funds that he might be impeached and thrown out of office. The
committee, of which E.D. White, now Chief Justice of the United States
Supreme Court, was chairman, reported after much deliberation that
Dubuclet's funds had been honestly handled and that there were no
grounds on which proceedings against him could be instituted.[11]
Despite the above mentioned instances of commendable Negro officials,
however, the majority of the Negro functionaries were incompetent and
as a result these governments could but collapse. The charge of
corruption laid at the door of the Negro carpetbagger governments is
to a large extent true. The corruption resulted largely from the work
of the interlopers from the North and the "scalawags," using the
Negroes to reach their own personal ends. In some of this corruption,
however, the Negro was an apt scholar and freely participated. The
Negroes were not as a whole prepared for the political privileges
which were vouchsafed to them and they were to a large extent under
the wrong sort of leadership. It is equally true, however, that
governments were corrupt throughout the United States at this period.
The Reconstruction period was one of corruption and if the Negro
governments were of a lower order than a few others, they were not far
out of accord with the times. The white people, who assumed control of
the government on overthrowing the Reconstruction regime, instituted
in several States a rule of corruption surpassing even that of their
predecessors. Coming back into office like hungry persons who had been
exposed to the cold atmosphere of an exile, the radical whites filled
their purses from the coffers of the public treasury and defaulted to
the amount of thousands of dollars which the tax payers have had to
replace in the years thereafter.[12] The disgraces of Reconstruction,
therefore, have been exaggeratingly flaunted by the South for the same
purpose that it proclaims the widespread false charge of rape of the
present day to justify the persecution of the Negro for being
"unusually criminal."
The Negro was finally driven from southern politics through violence
and fraud. The chief agent of the southern whites in accomplishing
this was a secret organization known as the Ku Klux Klan. This
organized mob killed off or drove the leading "Carpetbaggers" out of
the South and intimidated the Negroes into submission by perpetrating
numerous outrages upon them. After the whites regained control of the
government, through their agents of terror the political ascendancy of
the Negro was at end. The unscrupulous northern friends of the Negro
having discovered that they could no longer successfully exploit them,
therefore, abandoned them in the midst of their calamity. The whites
proceeded to solidify the Democratic party and to eliminate the Negro
entirely from politics in the South.
Politically, however, Reconstruction was in several respects a
success. In the first place, the reconstructed governments were
democratic, lifting a standard that the backward commonwealths of the
South must still struggle for years to reach. In this social upheaval
the poor white man was politically emancipated by receiving the boon
of suffrage theretofore restricted to persons owning property and
given a free and open door to office holding, which, under the old
regime had been restricted to the few aristocrats dominating the
country and State governments. These Negroes gave the South its
improved judicial system and did their work so well in framing some of
the constitutions that many of them with the exception of the clauses
antagonistic to the Negro remained about as they were for many years.
Although the Democrats got control of the State in 1877, the
constitution of South Carolina of 1868 was not changed materially
until 1893.
The Negro as a factor in reconstruction, moreover, instituted
education at the expense of the public. Through the establishment of
public schools with well equipped buildings and prepared teachers they
removed from that system the stigma formerly attached to persons[13]
educating their children at public expense. They, therefore, made of
education a foundation upon which real democracy must build. It is
only short sightedness on the part of writers to infer that because
the Negro was in a few years thereafter deprived of the ballot that
the good work which was done during the years that they were permitted
to participate in the affairs of these States could be so easily
overthrown, especially so when this progressive part of the program of
the reconstructed governments which the restored whites at first
abandoned has later been taken up and carried out.
Although weakened by the reaction of the North against the methods
employed by politicians in maintaining the reconstructed governments
at the South, which moved President Hayes to withdraw the troops from
that area, the Negroes were still of some concern to the Republicans.
To retain their support the Republicans often spoke of foisting upon
the South the Force Bill to guarantee fair elections but rather
abandoned the Negro to the fate of working out his own salvation with
his oppressors. In all of the campaigns up to 1888 there was the usual
waving of the "bloody shirt" to array the Negro against the South and
of urging the Negro to vote the Republican ticket to pay the debt he
owed the party for his freedom, hypocritically threatening also to
undo many of the things which had been done to the Negro since
Reconstruction. There was no sincerity in these vote-getting
declarations, however, and the Negro in the South remained politically
doomed.
Nothing will better bring out this treatment of the Negro by the
Republican party than a study of the consideration given the race in
the various platforms of that party following the Civil war. The
Republicans in the convention of 1868 declared themselves in sympathy
with all oppressed peoples struggling for their rights and recognized
the principles laid down in the Declaration of Independence as a true
foundation of democratic government. That same year, however, the
Democratic party recognized the question of slavery and secession as
having been settled but denounced Negro supremacy.[14]
In 1872 the platform of the Republican party was somewhat more
outspoken. It carried a reference to the suppression of the rebellion,
the emancipation of four million slaves, the grant of equal
citizenship and the establishment of universal suffrage. It said,
moreover, that "neither law nor its administration should attempt any
discrimination in respect to citizens by reason of race, creed, color,
or previous condition of servitude.[15] The Liberal Republicans,
rallying in a different quarter that year, declared in their platform
their belief in the equality of all men before the law and the duty of
the government in all its dealings with the people to mete out equal
and exact justice to all of whatever nativity, race, color or
persuasion, religious or political. The Liberal Republicans pledged
themselves to maintain the union of States, emancipation, and
enfranchisement and to oppose any reopening of the questions settled
by the Thirteenth, Fourteenth and Fifteenth Amendments of the
Constitution. They advocated the removal of the disabilities of
Confederates, the establishment of civil government at the South,
universal amnesty, and impartial suffrage.[16]
In 1876 the Negro was given further mention by the various parties.
The Prohibitionists took the lead in the declaration for equal
suffrage and eligibility to office without distinction of race,
religious creed, property or sex.[17] The Republicans referred in
their platform to the permanent restoration of the southern section to
the Union and the complete protection of all citizens in the free
enjoyment of all their rights as an issue to which the Republican
party stood sacredly pledged. "The power to provide for the
enforcement of the principles embodied by the recent constitutional
amendments," continues the platform, "is vested by those amendments in
the Congress of the United States, and we declare it to be a solemn
obligation of the legislative and executive departments of government
to put into immediate and vigorous exercise all their constitutional
powers for removing any just cause of discontent on the part of any
class, and for securing to every American citizen complete liberty and
exact equality in the exercise of all civil, political, and public
rights. To this end we imperatively demand a congress and a chief
executive whose courage and fidelity to these duties are placed beyond
dispute or recall."[18]
The National Democratic platform of that year, however, spoke for the
democracy of the whole country and declared its faith in the
permanence of the Federal Union, and devotion to the Constitution of
the United States with its amendments universally accepted as a final
settlement of the controversies that engendered the Civil War; but
took a bold stand for reform as necessary to rebuild and establish in
the hearts of the whole people of the Union eleven years ago happily
rescued from the danger of a secession of States but now to be severed
from a corrupt centralism which after inflicting upon ten States the
rapacity of carpet bag tyrannies, had "honey-combed the offices of the
Federal government itself with the contagion of misrule and locked
fast the prosperity of an industrious people in the paralysis of hard
times."[19]
In 1880 The Republican party made no particular mention of the
grievances of the Negroes but recited its record in suppressing the
rebellion, reconstructing the Union with freedom instead of slavery as
its corner stone, the transformation of four million human beings from
the likeness of things to the rank of citizens and removing Congress
from the infamous work of hunting fugitive slaves and charging it to
see that slavery shall not exist. It declared, moreover, that the
South must be divided by the peaceful agencies of the ballot that all
opinions might there find free expression and to this end the honest
voter must be protected against terrorism, violence or fraud.[20]
In 1884 there was no specific reference to the Negro unless it be
found in the statement that the Republican party had gained its
strength by "quick and faithful response to the demands of the people
for the freedom and equality of all men; for a united nation, assuring
the rights of all citizens."[21] The platform of the Democratic party
carried a declaration equally as emphatic in that it said, "the
preservation of personal rights; the equality of all citizens before
the law; the reserved rights of the States and the supremacy of the
Federal government within the limits of the constitution will ever
form the true basis of our liberties." It further said; "Asserting the
equality of all men before the law, we hold that it is the duty of the
government, in its dealings with the people, to mete out equal and
exact justice to all citizens, of whatever nativity, race, color, or
persuasion, religious or political."[22]
Giving some impetus to the movement for woman suffrage which the
Republicans had by various platforms theretofore encouraged, the
Prohibitionists carried in their platform in 1888 the declaration that
the right of suffrage rests on no mere circumstance of race, color,
sex or nationality and that "where, from any cause, it has been held
from citizens who are of suitable age and mentally and morally
qualified for the exercise of an intelligent ballot, it should be
restored by the people through the legislature of the several States,
on such basis as they may deem wise.[23]
To protect the Negroes in their political rights, however, the Federal
Government as administered by the Republican party during these years
furnished little encouragement, through its much talked of enforcement
of the Fourteenth and Fifteenth Amendments. Bills providing for
adequate military protection of the Negroes at the polls were enacted
but the Supreme Court of the United States declared that the Federal
Government did not possess the authority to restrain mobs from
interfering with elections. The Supreme Court conceded that the
Fifteenth Amendment forbade the denial of the right to vote by any
State on account of race, color, or previous condition of servitude,
but easily conceded that no violation of this amendment could occur
when a hostile mob excluded Negroes from the polls. Yet although the
mob thus quickly triumphed in undoing the democratic reforms of
Reconstruction, the South hoped thereafter to reach the same end by
imposing on the Negroes a legal disability; for the Fifteenth
Amendment did not assert the right of the Negro to vote. It merely
said that suffrage could not be denied on account of race, color, or
previous condition of servitude. As the Negro was generally poor and
in the midst of the economic depression of the South too often had to
wander from place to place to seek a livelihood, he could be easily
eliminated by the poll tax, the resident requirement, and educational
tests.
Thus it happened. Mississippi under its new constitution in 1890
eliminated the Negro and in the next twenty years all of the cotton
States except Florida and Texas followed its example. Arkansas based
the franchise on a one year poll tax in 1893; South Carolina required
residence, enrollment, and poll tax in 1895; Delaware adopted an
educational test in 1897, Louisiana resorted to the same test and poll
tax in 1898 and North Carolina fell in line in 1900. Alabama
established the residence, registry and poll tax requirement in 1901;
and Virginia, Georgia and Oklahoma based suffrage on property,
literacy or poll tax in 1902, 1908, and 1910 respectively. As these
measures bore heavily also upon certain ignorant whites they were
relieved of this disability by the "Grandfather Clause" specifying
that the persons deprived by these regulations of the right to vote
might be placed upon the roll of voters if they had exercised this
privilege before the year 1867 or were descended from such voters.
This was essentially the clause adopted in North Carolina, Alabama,
Virginia, and Georgia.[24] The Supreme Court, however, has declared
the "Grandfather Clause" a violation of the Fifteenth Amendment.
During the campaigns after 1888 the Republican party made no special
mention of the Negro as it had formerly and did not show any
inclination to shoulder the grievances of the race. At this time the
Republicans were face to face with a large element of political
reformers led by the Democrats who, prior to the campaign of 1884 had
carried Pennsylvania and New York and made such other inroads in
northern strongholds as to convince the leaders of the Republican
party that the Negro issue and the "bloody shirt" would no longer
suffice to hold those voters who had been won by the intelligent
appeal for deliverance from the corrupt practices in the local and
national governments. This movement culminated in the election of
Grover Cleveland in 1884 and in his election the second time in 1892.
To attach Negroes to their cause, to be sure, the Republicans were
very deferential to them in the national conventions, where they were
of much service in naming candidates for the national ticket although
they could not vote in the South and were not sufficiently numerous in
the North to be a large factor at the polls. At the convention in
1884, the national committee had named ex-Senator Powell Clayton of
Arkansas as temporary chairman of the convention, an arrangement which
was supposed to be in the interest of Mr. Blaine. The young men of
the party led by Henry Cabot Lodge and Theodore Roosevelt effected the
nomination from the floor of John R. Lynch, a distinguished man of
color of Mississippi, and the vote by delegates elected him to the
position by 431 to 387 given to Mr. Clayton.[25] Frederick Douglass
received one vote for the nomination for President in 1888.[26]
After the complete undoing of the Reconstruction the Negroes were at a
loss politically. A number of the foremost Negro politicians, among
whom were Frederick Douglass, John R. Lynch, B. K. Bruce, John M.
Langston, John C. Dancy, and a few others, were given positions in the
service of the Federal Government of high sounding titles and little
importance, such as Registrar of the Treasury, Recorder of Deeds,
Auditor of the Navy and diplomatic posts in Negro countries. A greater
number of Negroes found an outlet in the civil service. Even up until
the present day it is an ardent desire of the Negro to obtain a civil
service appointment. In these positions the Negroes were able to earn
a comparatively easy living but were not able to do anything
constructive for the uplift of their people.
The Negroes, however, had continued to support the Republican party to
the full extent of their strength. But it soon became clear that the
support of Negro leaders was little more than an effort directed
toward obtaining a few unimportant offices. The Republicans, having
long since discovered that the Negro vote of most communities can be
changed neither to harm nor to help them, have consequently ceased to
consider the danger of losing their support of great import. The
Democratic party, moreover, has continued almost unswervingly its
attitude of aloofness from the Negro. The onesidedness of the Negro
vote has been declared by some Negroes to be the cause of its
non-importance. With this political view some few of them have allied
themselves with the Democratic party, feeling that the division of the
Negro's vote may work an improvement in his political status. Because
of ex-President Taft's attitude of indifference toward the Negroes a
number of the Negro politicians supported Roosevelt's party in 1912
and many voted for Wilson in 1916.
With the Negro in this weak position, however, there developed in the
South a movement to remove from the Republican party the stigma of its
connection with the Negro by eliminating the members of that race from
the circles of control in the South. This movement has been generally
known as a "Lily-Whiteism." For the last twenty-five years, therefore,
there have come to the National Republican Conventions from the
various Southern States contesting delegations, one white and the
other black, each one claiming to be the properly accredited
representative of the Republican party in the State concerned. In some
States the "Lily-Whites" have actually held conventions from which the
Negroes were excluded or which they were not permitted to attend.
Because of the difficulty of making good their claim as properly
accredited delegates they have abandoned this method for the
subterfuge of holding their conventions in hotels or other exclusive
places which Negroes, because of the social proscription of the race,
are prohibited from entering by an already well established unwritten
law.
As a matter of fact the Republican party in such commonwealths no
longer exists and these delegates whether white or black represent
merely rotten boroughs. As they are of use, however, in selecting the
candidate to be nominated for president, the administration has been
very reluctant to interfere with the proposed reform in these quarters
for the reason that such delegates are usually made up of persons
appointed by the President of the United States to Federal positions
in the South. As the President usually desires to be reelected and can
control such a coterie, it has been very difficult to find one with
the courage to give his influence in the direction of reform.
Early in the winter of the year when the president is to be nominated,
persons supporting the administration usually visit the South laying
plans for lining up these prospective delegates. Politicians
interested in other candidates make similar tours through the South
sometimes lavishly handling funds to the extent of buying up
delegates. As the whites are in a much better position to secure the
few Federal appointments allotted in the South, after the election,
since the abandonment of the policy of appointing Negroes to these
positions, the Negroes have usually exacted a much larger compensation
for their services in the pre-convention struggle than whites have
required, thus shamelessly disgracing themselves in the eyes of those
who would expect the leaders of the race to play a more honorable
role.
There are in certain sections of the South a number of men who devote
all of their time to electing these delegates for service in these
conventions and secure therefore adequate remuneration for a
livelihood from administration to administration. The pliant Negro
delegates at the convention in Chicago in 1908 and 1912 were unequal
to the task of nominating a progressive candidate because of their
machine like attachment to the candidacy of William Howard Taft, whom
the American people would not accept. The Negro delegates, however,
did much better in the convention of 1916 and still further improved
by the time of the conventions of 1920, when it was impossible for any
pre-convention arrangement or plan to be so carried out that any
candidate could come to the convention saying that he had the Negroes
to vote in any particular way. It is encouraging, moreover, to add
that numbers of these delegates had received no funds from any quarter
whatever, but along with white men promoting their party had
contributed to the campaign funds and had paid their own expenses to
the convention. They were, therefore, given a more dignified position
in the management of the party affairs and were in many respects shown
the same consideration as that given the white delegates, serving on
various important committees and placed in strategic positions in the
management of the campaign without regard to color.
In drawing to a close this discussion of the Negro in politics I wish
to accentuate the fact that while the Negro is at present practically
a political nonentity, he is yet potent, as is illustrated in various
parts of the country. For example, at present there are two Negro
councilmen in Chicago, two aldermen in New York, one assemblyman in
New York, two councilmen in Baltimore, three Negro members in the West
Virginia legislature, one in the California legislature, and one in
the Indiana legislature. In several of the cities of the North there
is such a large Negro population and so much appreciation among the
Negroes of their political power that they are now launching a
movement to nominate and elect members of their race to represent them
in Congress. It is likely that this may soon be effected in Chicago,
New York, and Philadelphia.
NORMAN P. ANDREWS
FOOTNOTES:
[1] This article was written under the direction of Dr. C. G. Woodson,
under whom the writer prosecuted various courses in history during the
year 1919-1920 at Howard University. The writer is indebted to him for
valuable suggestions and many important facts which Dr. Woodson
incorporated into the dissertation before publishing it. The writer
was aided too by suggestions and facts obtained from Mr. W.T. Andrews,
the editor of the _Baltimore Herald_, Professor Kelly Miller, and Mr.
A. Phillips Randolph, of New York City.
[2] _The Journal of Negro History_, Vol. V, pp. 110-111.
[3] Eckenrode, _Political History of Virginia during Reconstruction_,
pp. 127, 128, and Thompson, _Reconstruction in Georgia_, p. 400.
[4] Hamilton, _Reconstruction in North Carolina_, p. 607.
[5] Burgess, _Reconstruction and the Constitution_, p. 218.
[6] _The Journal of Negro History_, Vol. V, pp. 110-111.
[7] This statement is based on information obtained from numerous
participants in the Reconstruction of the Southern States. Among these
are John R. Lynch, Thomas E. Miller, T. T. Allain, and P. B. S.
Pinchback.
[8] This is the testimony of white persons obtained by the writer.
[9] These facts were obtained through Mr. W. T. Andrews who lived in
South Carolina.
[10] Simmons, _Men of Mark_, pp. 113, 829, 948, 1023; Woodson, _A
Century of Negro Migration_, pp. 124-125.
[11] _Report of Joint Committee to Investigate the Treasurer's Office,
State of Louisiana, to the General Assembly, 1877_, pp. 7-12.
_Majority Report; Journal of Negro History_, Vol. II, pp. 77-78.
[12] Lynch, _Facts of Reconstruction_, ch. III. _Journal of Negro
History_, Vol. II, p. 30.
[13] Garner, _Reconstruction in Mississippi_; Woodson, _The Education
of the Negro Prior to 1861_, p. 17.
[14] Stanwood, _A History of Presidential Elections_, 260.
[15] _Ibid._, 291.
[16] _Ibid._, 287.
[17] Stanwood, _A History of Presidential Elections_, 310.
[18] _Ibid._, 316, 317, 318.
[19] _Ibid._, 322.
[20] Stanwood, _A History of Presidential Elections_, 356, 359.
[21] _Ibid._, 387.
[22] _Ibid._, 393, 396.
[23] Stanwood, _A History of Presidential Elections_, 432.
[24] Thorpe, _Federal and State Constitutions_; Paxson, _The New
Nation_, p. 199.
[25] Stanwood, _A History of Presidential Elections_, pp. 385-386;
Paxson, _The New Nation_, p. 128.
[26] Stanwood, _A History of Presidential Elections_, p. 447.
HENRY BIBB, A COLONIZER
The underground railroad has been characterized by one historian of
the Negro race as a "safety valve to the institution of slavery" since
it tended to remove from the slave States those Negroes whose special
abilities and leadership might have involved them in insurrections.[1]
Their abilities frequently found an outlet in another land, under
different conditions and in an entirely orderly way. Negroes who fled
to Canada were given considerable material aid by the government of
Canada and treated with sympathy by its people. Their own leaders,
however, played no small part in the progress that they made in the
British provinces and the names of Josiah Henson, Martin R. Delany and
Henry Bibb stand for intelligence, energy and high qualities of
service on behalf of the race in Canada.
Henry Bibb, born in slavery and without more than the barest rudiments
of education, became prominent in the anti-slavery crusade, was
actively associated with the Liberty Party in the State of Michigan
during the forties and when the Fugitive Slave Bill of 1850 drove
thousands of his people out of the North and into Canada he set
himself vigorously to the task of settling them on the land, providing
schools and churches, and through his paper, _The Voice of the
Fugitive_, exercised a good influence upon them at a time when their
minds might be expected to be unsettled. Garrison and others who were
active in the anti-slavery movement paid tribute to his services in
that cause.
Bibb's career in slavery is told in his narrative published in New
York in 1849.[2] He was born in Shelby county, Kentucky, in May,
1815, the son of a slave mother and a white father, and his childhood
he sums up by saying that he was "educated in the school of adversity,
whips and chains." Of his early life he writes:
"I was a wretched slave, compelled to work under the lash without
wages and often without clothes enough to hide my nakedness. I
have often worked without half enough to eat, both late and
early, by day and by night. I have often laid my wearied limbs
down at night to rest upon a dirt floor, or a bench without any
covering at all, because I had nowhere else to rest my wearied
body, after having worked hard all the day. I have been compelled
in early life to go at the bidding of a tyrant through all kinds
of weather, hot and cold, wet or dry, and without shoes
frequently until the month of December, with my bare feet on the
cold frosty ground, cracked open and bleeding as I walked."
From the slaveholder's standpoint he was a most unsatisfactory
servant, being an incorrigible runaway, a blemish on his moral
character which probably accounted for the frequency with which he
changed owners, six separate sales being recorded at prices ranging
from $850 to $1200. The plantation punishments had no effect upon him
save to increase his desire for freedom.
As with many another slave the very evils of the system served a
purpose in Bibb's life. Denied education of a normal kind he became
observant and his mind was enlightened by what he saw and heard.
"Among other good trades," he says, "I learned the art of running away
to perfection. I made a regular business of it and never gave it up
until I had broken the bonds of slavery and landed myself in Canada
where I was regarded as a man and not a thing."
Ill treatment was the incentive to the first attempt of Bibb to secure
his freedom. This was in 1835 and the next few years were occupied
with repeated unsuccessful efforts to get away and to take his wife
and child with him. He had heard of Canada and his thoughts ever
turned in that direction. On several occasions his flights led him as
far as the Ohio River, the boundary of freedom, but some force seemed
always at hand to drag him back. At the end of 1837 he managed to
reach Cincinnati and spent that winter at Perrysburg with a community
of Negroes settled there. The next summer he risked his freedom in
attempting to bring his wife North, was captured, lodged in jail at
Louisville, and managed to escape within a few hours after being
locked up. A year later he renewed the attempt, was again captured,
and this time was sold, together with his wife, to a trader who dealt
in the New Orleans market. It was in the fall of 1839 that the man and
wife were exposed for sale in a slave yard on St. Joseph Street and in
the narrative there is an interesting account of the trade in this
southern city. Newly arrived blacks were taken before a city official
who inspected their backs to see if they were scarred and also
examined their limbs to see if they were sound. To determine their age
the teeth were examined and the skin pinched on the back of the hand.
In the case of old slaves the pucker would remain for some seconds.
There was also rigorous examination as to mental capacity. Slaves who
displayed unusual intelligence, who could read or write or who had
been to Canada were not wanted. Bibb notes that practically every
buyer asked him if he could read or write and if he had ever run away.
Of the slave yard itself he writes:
"All classes of slaves were kept there for sale, to be sold in
private or public--young or old, males or females, children or
parents, husbands or wives. Every day, at ten o'clock, they were
exposed for sale. They had to be in trim for showing themselves
to the public for sale. Everyone's head had to be combed and
their faces washed, and those who were inclined to look dark and
rough were compelled to wash in greasy dish water in order to
make them look slick and lively. When spectators would come in
the yard the slaves were ordered out to form a line. They were
made to stand up straight and look as sprightly as they could;
and when they were asked a question they had to answer it as
promptly as they could, and try to induce the spectator to buy
them. If they failed to do this they were severely paddled after
the spectators were gone. The object for using the paddle in the
place of a lash was to conceal the marks which would be made by a
flogging. And the object for flogging under such circumstances is
to make the slave anxious to be sold."[3]
The Bibbs were eventually sold to a Red River planter with whom they
had a most miserable existence. For attending without leave a
religious meeting on a neighboring plantation Bibb was ordered to
receive five hundred lashes. To avoid this he took his wife and child
and they hid in a swamp. Dogs tracked them down and every slave on the
plantation witnessed the punishment that was given. Shortly afterwards
the planter sold Bibb to a party of southern sportsmen but refused to
sell the wife whom Bibb never saw again. The new owners quickly resold
him to an Indian from whom he managed to escape and successfully made
his way through the Indian Territory, Missouri and Ohio to Michigan
and Detroit.[4] He was never in the South again.
Bibb's arrival in Detroit came at what proved for him a most opportune
time, since it gave scope for his abilities to be utilized in the
anti-slavery cause, particularly in the State of Michigan. The Detroit
Anti-Slavery Society had been formed in 1837 and by the end of 1840
there were similar societies all over the State. Michigan, at this
time, was probably better organized and more united in sentiment than
any other of the Northwestern States. It was the era of the Liberty
Party whose platform "asserted the overmastering importance of the one
question of the existence of slavery, and the necessity of bringing
about a separation of the national government from all connection with
the institution." This third party was facing in 1844 a crisis over
the question of the annexation of Texas for which the South was a unit
and on which the political organizations of the North were divided.
Bibb had attended a convention of free colored people held in Detroit
in 1843 and the next year he began to give addresses throughout the
State in the interests of Liberty Party candidates, a full ticket for
both Congress and the State legislature having been nominated. It was
a bitter contest in which he engaged. The Whigs pointed out that they
were standing out against the annexation of Texas, a slave empire in
itself, and that votes for a third party would but pave the way for a
Democratic victory. This is exactly what happened. In Michigan the
Liberty Party polled six and a half per cent of the votes, but even
this added to the Whig vote would not have brought victory.[5] Bibb
continued to work for the Liberty Party during 1844 and 1845, going
also into Ohio with Samuel Brooks and Amos Dresser. They were more
than once mobbed and their meetings broken up by rowdies. Of their
work Bibb writes:
"Our meetings were generally appointed in small log cabins,
schoolhouses, among the farmers, which were sometimes crowded
full; and where they had no horse teams it was often the case
that there would be four or five ox teams come, loaded down with
men, women and children to attend our meetings. The people were
generally poor and in many places not able to give us a decent
night's lodgings. We generally carried with us a few pounds of
candles to light up the houses wherein we held our meetings after
night; for in many places they had neither candles nor
candlesticks. After meeting was out we have frequently gone
three to eight miles to get lodgings, through the dark forest
where there was scarcely any road for a wagon to run on. I have
travelled for miles over swamps where the roads were covered with
logs without any dirt over them, which has sometimes shook and
jostled the wagon to pieces where we could find no shop or place
to mend it. We would have to tie it up with bark, or take the
lines to tie it with and lead the horse by the bridle. At other
times we were in mud up to the hubs of the wheels."
Bibb found his real work when, with the passing of the Fugitive Slave
Law in 1850, there began a trek of colored people out of the Northern
States into Canada.[6] Before the end of 1850 several thousand of
these people had crossed the border and the situation was one that
called not only for the aid of generous Canadians but for all that
leaders among their own people could do for them. It was Henry Bibb's
belief that the future of the people of color in Canada depended upon
getting them settled on the land and his mind turned to the
possibilities of establishing a distinctly Negro colony on land that
might be secured as a grant from the Canadian government or, if
necessary, purchased from the government as had been done in the case
of the Buxton settlement established by Rev. William King in what is
now Southwestern Ontario. Bibb succeeded in organizing his
colonization society, its object being "to assist the refugees from
American slavery to obtain permanent homes and to promote their
social, moral, physical and intellectual development." It was proposed
that 50,000 acres of land should be purchased from the government at
an estimated cost of about two dollars an acre, the purchase money to
be derived partly from contributions and partly from the sale of the
land. Each family settling was to receive 25 acres, five acres to be
free of cost provided they cleared and cultivated it within three
years from the time of occupation. The remaining twenty acres was to
be paid for in nine annual installments. Only landless refugees were
to receive grants, transfer except after fifteen years occupation was
forbidden and all lands vacated by removal or extinction of families
were to revert to the parent society. Money returned to the society
was to be spent on schools, for payment of teachers and for the
purchase of new land. The whole business of the organization was to be
in the hands of a board of trustees.[7]
At the beginning of 1851 Bibb had established a little newspaper,
published bi-monthly and known as _The Voice of the Fugitive_. In the
issue of March 12, 1851, he raises the question as to what the
fugitives stand most in need of and holds that charity is but a
handicap to their progress and that they must work for their own
support, preferably on the land. The recommendation of a recent
convention at Sandwich is quoted to the effect that the refugees
should go into agriculture, and that to this end an effort should be
made to secure a grant of land from the Canadian government, this land
to be disposed of in 25-acre plots. Bibb suggested that there should
be at least 20,000 acres secured at once.
To aid in forwarding the plans Bibb enlisted the support of a number
of Michigan people and at a meeting held in Detroit on May 21, 1851,
the Refugee's Home Society was organized with the following officers:
president, Deacon E. Fish, Birmingham; vice-president, Robert Garner;
secretary, Rev. E. E. Kirkland, Colchester; assistant secretary,
William Newman. It was decided that an effort should be made to secure
50,000 acres of land. New officers appear to have been elected almost
immediately after the society had started operations, the new
executives being as follows: president: J. Stone, Detroit;
vice-president, A. L. Power, Farmington; secretary, E. P. Benham,
Farmington; treasurer, Horace Hallock, Detroit.[8] The whole movement
was heartily approved at a convention of colored people held at
Sandwich on May 26, 1851. The Canada Land Company offered to sell
large blocks of land to the Society at from two to four dollars an
acre but no large purchases were immediately made. Instead, the
society began a canvass for funds, sending out Charles C. Foote of
Commerce and E. P. Benham of Farmington for this purpose. A letter
from Foote in _The Voice of the Fugitive_ of July 30, 1851, says "The
plan seems popular and he looks forward to the day when the colored
people will nestle in the mane of the British lion." In the latter
part of 1851 a purchase of land was made from the Canada Company and a
contract was entered into for further purchases as soon as the funds
should be available.
At the meeting of the Society held in Farmington on January 29, 1852,
the following officers were elected: president, Nathan Stone, Detroit;
vice-president, A. L. Power, Farmington; treasurer, Horace Hallock,
Detroit; recording secretary, E. P. Benham, Livonia; corresponding
secretary, Mrs. Mary Bibb, Windsor; Executive William Lolason,
Detroit; Colman Freeman, Windsor; Elisha Vanzant, Detroit; David
Hotchkiss, Amherstburg; and Henry Bibb, Windsor, Vanzant and Bibb were
appointed trustees, the latter reporting the purchase of 200 acres of
land at three dollars an acre. It was decided to reserve ten acres for
school purposes, to send out J. F. Dolbeare as agent to collect funds
and to make Bibb's newspaper the official organ of the society.[10]
The second annual report of the Anti-Slavery Society of Canada (1853)
reported that at that time the Refugee's Home Society had purchased
1328 acres of land of which 600 acres had been taken up by settlers.
The scheme was considered a good one but it was emphasized that good
management would be needed. The progress of the Elgin or Buxton
settlement showed that success was possible.
When Benjamin Drew visited Canada in 1854 he found that the Society
had purchased nearly 2,000 acres of land, that forty of the 25-acre
plots had been taken up and that there were 20 families located. A
school was being maintained during three-fourths of the year,
intoxicating liquors had been completely banned and a society known as
the True Band had been organized to look after the best moral and
educational interests of the colony.[11] The colony was fortunate in
the first teacher that was engaged for the school. This was Mrs. Laura
S. Haviland, who came in the fall of 1852 and began her work in the
frame building which had been erected for general meeting purposes. So
great was the interest in her Bible classes that even aged people
would come many miles to attend. Similar success attended her
experiment of an unsectarian church. In her autobiography she tells
something of the conditions in the colony while she was there. In
their clearings the settlers raised corn, potatoes and other
vegetables while a few had put in two or three acres of wheat. Mrs.
Haviland's account of the colony is much more favorable than some of
the adverse stories that were sent abroad regarding it.[12]
Rev. W. M. Mitchell, who was a Negro missionary among his own people
in Toronto, makes the following reference to the colony in his
"Underground Railroad":
"About ten miles from Windsor there is a settlement of 5000 acres
which extends over a large part of Essex county. It is called the
Fugitives' Home. Several years ago a very enterprising and
intelligent fugitive slave ... bought land from the government,
divided it into 20-acre plots and sold it to other fugitives,
giving them five to ten years for payments. Emigrants settled
here in such large numbers that it is called the Fugitives' Home.
The larger portion of the land is still uncultivated, a great
deal is highly cultivated and many are doing well."
The writer goes on to point out the evidences of the material
advancement of the colony. There were two schools, the government
paying half the salary of the teacher and the other half being
collected from the parents. The school he found was also used for the
church services, though the spirituality of the people seemed low.[13]
The record of Henry Bibb's activities in Canada show that he took a
broad view of the refugee question. He associated himself actively
with the Anti-Slavery Society of Canada at its formation in 1851 and
at the first annual meeting held in Toronto in 1852 was elected one of
the vice-presidents. In the reports of this organization will be found
several references to his work. He was also the first president of the
Windsor branch of the Anti-Slavery Society and made several tours
through the western end of Upper Canada visiting the Negro communities
and speaking on the slavery issue. In his newspaper, _The Voice of the
Fugitive_, he chronicled every movement that would aid in the uplift
of his people and set forth their needs in an admirable way. Its
columns give a large amount of information concerning the fugitives in
Canada after 1850.
Bibb's colonization plan was a well-meant effort to improve the status
of the Negro in Canada. While it lacked the permanence of the Elgin
settlement, which even today preserves its character, it opened the
way for a certain number of the refugees to provide for their own
needs and it lessened to some extent the congestion of refugees in
border towns like Windsor and Sandwich. It is a debatable question
whether segregation of these people was wise or not. At that time it
seemed almost the only solution of the very pressing problem. After
the Civil war many of the Negroes in Canada returned to the United
States and those who remained found conditions easier. There was
usually work for any man who was willing to labor and it is a
well-recorded fact that many of the fugitives, entering the country
under the most adverse of circumstances, succeeded in getting ahead
and gathering together property. Benjamin Drew's picture of the
Canadian Negroes as he found them in the middle of the fifties is
favorable and when Dr. Samuel G. Howe investigated the Canadian
situation on behalf of the Freedmen's Inquiry Commission in 1863[14]
he was able to report:
"The refugees in Canada earn a living, and gather property; they
marry and respect women; they build churches and send their
children to schools; they improve in manners and morals--not
because they are picked men but simply because they are free men.
Each of them may say, as millions will soon say, 'When I was a
slave, I spake as a slave, I understood as a slave, I thought as
a slave; but when I became a free man I put away slavish
things.'"
FRED LANDON
FOOTNOTES:
[1] Williams, G. W., _History of the Negro Race in America_, N. Y.,
1883, Vol. II, p. 58.
[2] See _The Narrative of the Life and Adventures of Henry Bibb, an
American Slave, written by himself, with an introduction by Lucius
Matlack_, New York, 1849. I am indebted to the Brooklyn Public Library
for the loan of this book.
[3] Compare with this description of a New Orleans slave pen the
descriptions of Richmond auctions by W. H. Russell, _My Diary North
and South_, N. Y., 1863, page 68, and William Chambers, _Things as
they are in America_, London, 1854, pages 273-286.
[4] He says that his object in going to Detroit was to get some
schooling. He was unable to meet the expense, however, and as he puts
it: "I graduated in three weeks and this was all the schooling I ever
had in my life." His teacher for this brief period was W. C. Monroe
who afterwards presided at John Brown's Chatham Convention in May,
1858.
[5] See Smith, _Liberty and Free Soil Parties in the Northwest_, New
York, 1897.
[6] See _The Journal of Negro History_, Vol. V, No. 1, January, 1920,
pp. 22-36.
[7] This plan was recommended by a convention of colored people held
at Sandwich, C. W., early in 1851. See _The Voice of the Fugitive_,
March 12, 1851. A file of this paper for 1851-2 is in the library of
the University of Michigan at Ann Arbor.
[8] _The Voice of the Fugitive_, June 4, 1851.
[9] _The Voice of the Fugitive_, Nov. 19, 1851.
[10] _Ibid._, Jan. 29, 1852. See also _The Liberator_, June 11, 1852.
[11] _Ibid._, _The Refugee, or the Narratives of Fugitive Slaves in
Canada related by themselves_, Boston. 1856, pp. 323-326.
[12] Hairland, _A Woman's Life Work_, Grand Rapids, 1881, p. 192.
[13] Mitchell, _Underground Railroad_, London, 1860, pp. 142-149.
[14] Howe, _The Refugees from Slavery in Canada West, Report to the
Freedmen's Inquiry Commission_, Boston, 1864. The Freedmen's Inquiry
Commission was instituted by Stanton in 1863 to consider what should
be done for slaves already freed. The members of the Commission were
Dr. Samuel G. Howe, Robert Dale Owen and James Mackay.
MYRTILLA MINER
A century ago it was generally conceded that a person unfitted for any
other occupation either public or private could at least be a teacher,
for many teachers of the colonies were felons and convicts brought to
America to serve as indentured servants. This egregious error,
however, was discovered by the pioneers of the new era in education,
who saw clearly enough that the strength of the nation depended upon
the _professional_ as well as the academic equipment of its teachers
and thus the training school for teachers had its birth. Its influence
has been most significant in raising the standards of efficiency in
the elementary schools and equally significant is its need in the high
schools and colleges of this country.
No one in the District of Columbia can think of the benefits derived
from the professional teacher training without immediate recollection
and sacred memory of its pioneer and benefactress, Myrtilla Miner. For
her noble character, her high ideals, her progressive methods in
education, her struggles against opposition in the pursuit of her
Godgiven task, her lasting contribution of an organized institution
for the training of teachers in the spirit of the Master to serve all
humanity, the citizens of the District of Columbia and especially the
people of color must ever revere her memory.[1]
On the 4th of March, 1815, in Brookfield, Madison County, New York,
Myrtilla Miner, of poor and humble, yet of industrious parentage, was
born. As a child, though frail of physique and deprived of
opportunity, her indomitable will enabled her to overcome the
obstacles of poverty and superstition as well as poor health. Wading
through them all she earned enough by arduous labor in the hopfields
near her home to purchase books for her further enlightenment. These
struggles against fate, however, were the rocks upon which her noble
character was built. Here were sown the seed of sympathy for the weak,
appreciation for the struggling, and respect for the ambitious.
After a year's training at Clinton, Oneida County, New York, where she
obtained the elements of education under the most adverse
circumstances of ill health and lack of funds, Miss Miner accepted a
call to teach in Mississippi in order to pay the debts incurred for
the training she had already received. Her experience in Mississippi
was indeed invaluable, for there she learned through horrible
experiences the evils of the institution of slavery. She boldly
protested against the cruelties of the slaveholders and the
institution in general. She innocently requested permission to teach
the slaves of the planter whose daughters she was then instructing.
When told that such was a criminal offense against the laws of
Mississippi and that she should "go North and teach the 'Niggers,'"
Miss Miner with an intrepid spirit resolved then and there that she
_would_ go North and teach them. Out of this unpleasant experience
developed the determination to found a Normal School for girls of
color in the city of Washington.
Returning North, Miss Miner found other difficulties than poor health
confronting her in her efforts to establish a school for the Negro
youth in the District of Columbia. Funds had to be raised, pro-slavery
opposition had to be overcome, and public sentiment had to be changed
at least to indifference. Each of these in itself was sufficiently
colossal to try the strength, physical and moral, of the ablest
anti-slavery agitators of that day. It was at the time of the passage
of that infamous Fugitive Slave Law, when freedmen and runaways like
William Parker, Jerry McHenry and Joshua Glover were knocked down,
beaten, bound and cast into prison; when abolitionists were
incarcerated for their anti-slavery propaganda and giving aid to the
fugitives; when even our valiant Frederick Douglass admitted himself
too timid to support any such project as that undertaken by Miss Miner
in the city of Washington.[2] It was in times such as these that this
fearless and resolute little woman, with an enthusiasm that seemingly
glistened in her penetrating eyes, determined to give her life to the
cause of alleviating suffering, dispelling ignorance, and liberating
the oppressed Americans in body and mind.
With the small sum of one hundred dollars that she had secured from
Mrs. Ednah Thomas,[3] of Philadelphia, a member of the Society of
Friends, Miss Miner started out upon her great work in behalf of the
Negro children of the District of Columbia. Her thrift prompted her to
solicit funds of various and peculiar sorts. Donations of old papers,
books, weights, measures and other castaway material were transformed
by this real teacher into valuable material for the instruction of her
undeveloped pupils.
Funds of the material sort were not the only difficulties that beset
her road of progress, for pro-slavery opposition assailed Miss Miner
from every side.[4] Such propaganda as the following appeared in the
_National Intelligencer_, a Washington newspaper of pro-slavery
sentiments and was spread far and wide. (1) The school would attract
free colored people from the adjoining States, (2) it was proposed to
give them an education far beyond what their political and social
condition would justify, (3) the school would be a center of
influence directed against the existence of slavery in the District of
Columbia, and (4) it might endanger the institution of slavery and
even rend asunder the Union itself.[5]
The truth of some parts of this declaration was quite evident and
irrefutable, for education, as Miss Miner understood it, was destined
to make every slave a man and every man free. This, of course,
increased the difficulty of Miss Miner's task but her faith was
abiding and her courage unabated. Miss Miner realized fully that the
lot of the eight thousand free people of color of the District of
Columbia was but little better than that of the 3,000 slaves, for the
former, though free according to the letter of the law, in actual life
had no rights that a white man was compelled to respect. They were not
admitted to public institutions, could not attend the city schools,
could not testify against a white man in court, and could not travel
without a pass without running the risk of being cast into prison.
Amidst it all, on the 6th day of December 1851, in a rented room about
fourteen feet square, in the frame house on Eleventh Street near New
York Avenue then owned and occupied as a dwelling by Edward C.
Younger,[6] a Negro, Myrtilla Miner with six pupils established as a
private institution for the education of girls of color the first
Normal School in the District of Columbia and the fourth one in the
United States. Increase of enrollment soon forced her to secure
accommodations and within two months she had moved into a house on the
north side of F Street between Eighteenth and Nineteenth, near the
house then occupied by William T. Carroll and Charles H. Winder. This
house furnished her a very comfortable room for her growing school of
well-behaved girls, from the best Negro families of the District of
Columbia. Threats on the part of white neighbors to set fire to the
house forced her to leave the home of the Negro family with whom she
had stayed but one month and to seek quarters elsewhere. Miss Miner
then succeeded in getting accommodations in the dwelling-house of a
German family on K Street, near the K Street market. After tarrying a
few months there, she moved to L Street into a room in the building
known as the "The Two Sisters," then occupied by a white family. But
the inconvenience of holding school in rented quarters of private
dwellings proved a very unpleasant one indeed; for not only did she
suffer the lack of comfort which such quarters naturally could not
offer, but found herself constantly harassed by the necessity of
moving to escape the enmity and persecution of her white neighbors.
A new day, however, was to dawn. With the aid of Harriet Beecher
Stowe, Dr. Gamaliel Bailey and a few such faithful Philadelphia
friends as Thomas Williamson, Samuel Rhoads, Benjamin Tatham, Jasper
Cope and Catherine Morris, enough funds were raised to purchase a site
of three acres or more for a permanent home on a lot near N Street and
New Hampshire Avenue, between Nineteenth and Twentieth Streets,
Northwest. Though the environment of this new home was most pleasing
and beautiful, being surrounded with flowers and fruit trees, the
enmity of the white hoodlums still followed her. She and her pupils
were frequently assailed with torrents of stones and other missiles.
Once threatened by mob violence, Miss Miner bravely and defiantly
exclaimed, "Mob my school! You dare not! If you tear it down over my
head I shall get another house. There is no law to prevent my teaching
these people and I shall teach them even unto death!" Testimony of
some of Miss Miner's former pupils upholds such a defiance as truly
descriptive of her fearless nature.
In its earlier days the Miner Normal School was supported by private
funds and directed by a board of trustees consisting of Benjamin
Tatham and H. W. Bellows of New York; Samuel M. Janney of Virginia;
Johns Hopkins of Baltimore; Samuel Rhoads and Thomas Williamson of
Philadelphia; G. Bailey and L. D. Gale of Washington; C. E. Stowe of
Andover; H. W. Beecher of Brooklyn, together with an executive
committee consisting of S. J. Bowen, J. M. Wilson and L. D. Gale of
Washington; Miss Miner, principal and William H. Beecher, secretary.
The curriculum of the school then embraced boarding, domestic economy,
teachers' training course and the primary departments. It is
interesting to note that some of the advanced ideas in education
today, such as student self-government, vitalized teaching, socialized
recitation, and civic as well as personal hygiene, were taught and
practiced by Miss Miner during the fifties of the last century.
As an illustration of pupil self-government, I quote the following
from the _Memoir of M. Miner_ by Mrs. Ellen M. O'Connor, concerning a
visit made by Miss Margaret Robinson of Philadelphia to Miss Miner's
school: "In the winter of 1853 accompanied by a friend, I visited the
school of Myrtilla Miner, under circumstances of peculiar interest.
Arriving about ten A. M., we learned from a pupil at the door that the
teacher was absent on business of importance to the school. We were
not a little disappointed, supposing all recitations would await her
coming. What was our surprise on entering to find every girl in her
place, closely occupied with her studies. We seated ourselves by
polite invitation; soon a class read; then one in mental arithmetic
exercised itself, the more advanced pupils acting as monitors; all was
done without confusion. When the teacher entered she expressed no
surprise, but took up the business where she found it and went on." On
one occasion, being obliged to leave for several days, Miss Miner
propounded to the pupils the question, whether the school should be
closed, or they should continue their exercises without her? They
chose the latter. On her return she found all doing well, not the
least disorder having occurred.
As to vitalized teaching, Matilda Jones Madden, one of Miss Miner's
pupils, wrote the following: "She gave special attention to the proper
writing of letters and induced a varied correspondence between many
prominent persons and her pupils, thus in a practical way bringing her
school into larger notice with many of its patrons and friends and
vastly increasing the experience of her pupils."
Mrs. John F. N. Wilkinson, a former pupil of Miss Miner, of
Washington, D. C., states that Miss Miner held classes in astronomy
with the larger girls who were required to meet at the school in the
evenings to study their lessons from nature. Mrs. Amelia E. Wormley,
the mother of the writer, residing in Washington, also a pupil of Miss
Miner, recalls vividly the emphasis which Miss Miner placed upon the
teaching of physical culture and the tenderness with which she handled
the younger children of her school.[7]
The school increased in usefulness and importance. As a result of
this, on March 3, 1863, the Senate and House of Representatives passed
an act to incorporate this institution for the education of girls of
color in the District of Columbia. By the act William H. Channing,
George J. Abbot, Miss Miner, and others, their associate and
successors were constituted and declared a body politic and corporate
by the name and title of "The Institution for the Education of Colored
Youth," to be located in the District of Columbia. Though this act of
Congress legalized the institution, the school appears to have lapsed
into inactivity from 1863 to 1871 because of the absence of its
guiding spirit, Miss Miner. On account of ill health she was
compelled to give up the work, and the strain and stress of civil
affairs reduced national interest and support to a minimum. After a
sojourn of three years in California in search of renewed energy and
more funds for the fulfillment of her plans and the consummation of
her ideals, Miss Miner departed from this life at the home of Mrs.
Nancy M. Johnson of Washington, D. C., on the 17th of December 1864.
In 1871 the work of the school was resumed in connection with Howard
University. A preparatory and Normal Department was opened and
controlled by this institution but supported by the Miner Funds. The
school existed in this connection until September 13, 1876, when it
began a separate and independent existence which lasted until 1879
when it was taken over by the school system of the District of
Columbia. From 1879 to 1887 the Miner Normal School was jointly
controlled by the Board[8] of Trustees of the Public Schools of the
District and the Miner Board of Trustees, the principal's salary being
paid by the Miner Board to which she made her reports while the
obligation of keeping up the enrollment of the school was assumed by
the Trustees representing the District Government.
In 1887 the Trustees of the District assumed full charge of the school
thus centralizing authority and management. The unification of the
dual management under District authority added keener interest on the
part of the citizenship of the community and a deeper feeling of
responsibility on the part of the faculty. Fortunately for the
institution, moreover, the women who succeeded Miss Miner as the heads
of this institution caught the great spirit of their predecessor and
in their efforts to continue the useful work which she had done,
followed so closely in the path which she had trodden as to assure
success and preclude any necessity for general reorganization.
The first of these women to take up the work of Miss Miner, was Miss
Mary B. Smith, of Beverly, Massachusetts, who was assisted by her
sister Miss Sarah R. Smith. These two worthy ladies were succeeded by
Miss Martha Briggs who is characterized by Dr. W. S. Montgomery in his
_Historical Sketch on Education for the Colored Race in the District
of Columbia, 1807-1905_, "as a born teacher whose work showed those
qualities of head and heart that have made her name famous in the
annals of education in the character of the graduates. The student
teachers caught her missionary spirit and went forth from her presence
stronger souls, full of sympathy to magnify the teacher's vocation and
to inspire the learner. Many of the women who sat at her feet are
laboring in the schools here now, filling the highest positions and in
beauty and richness of character running like a thread of gold through
the teaching corps."
Miss Briggs was succeeded in 1883 by Dr. Lucy E. Moten, who after
faithful and successful service for thirty-seven years, retired June
20, 1920. As principal of the Miner Normal School, Dr. Moten graduated
the majority of the teachers now employed in the public schools of the
District. She saw the Normal course lengthened from a one year course
to that of a two year course, offering greater opportunity for broader
professional equipment of the student teachers, the results of which
are manifest in the Washington Public Schools today. This school,
however, is destined in the near future to undergo other changes in
the line of progress. It may be the extension of the course to three
years or the development of a Teacher's college of four years which
will offer courses leading to a degree. With an enthusiastic
whole-hearted response of the teaching corps of Washington, D. C., to
the slogan of the new Superintendent, Dr. Frank Washington
Ballou--"Hats off to the past and coats off to the future," The Miner
Normal School will reach higher in its aim to serve and realize the
ideals of its noble founder and benefactress, whose struggles and
sacrifices are sacred in the memory of every teacher of color in the
District of Columbia.
G. SMITH WORMLEY.
FOOTNOTES:
[1] The facts set forth in this sketch were obtained largely from
Ellen M. O'Connor's _Myrtilla Miner, A Memoir_; W. S. Montgomery's
_Historical Sketch of the Education for the Colored Race in the
District of Columbia, 1807-1905_; and _The Special Report of the
Commissioner of Education_ on the condition and improvement of the
Public Schools in the District of Columbia, submitted to the Senate
June 1868 and the House, with additions, June 17, 1870-1871. Some
valuable facts were also obtained from former pupils of Miss Myrtilla
Miner now residing in the District of Columbia and from public
spirited citizens who cooperated with her.
[2] O'Connor, _Memoir of Myrtilla Miner, Letter of Frederick
Douglass_, p. 23.
[3] _Special Report of Commissioner of Education_, Washington, D.C.,
Henry Barnard, 1868, p. 207.
[4] She had some friends, however, as the following shows:
"There are in the United States 500,000 free people of color.
They are generally, although subject to taxation, excluded by law
or prejudice from schools of every grade. Their case becomes at
once an object of charity which rises infinitely above all party
or sectional lines. This charity we are gratified in being able
to state has already been inaugurated, through the devoted labors
of an excellent young lady from Western New York by the name of
Miss Myrtilla Miner who has established and maintained for the
past four years in the city of Washington a school for the
education of free colored youth. This school is placed there
because it is national ground, and the nation is responsible for
the well-being of its population; because there are there 11,000
of this suffering people excluded by law from schools and
destitute of instruction; because there are in the adjoining
States of Maryland and Virginia 130,000 equally destitute, who
can be reached in no other way; and because it is hoped through
this means to reach a class of girls of peculiar interest, often
the most beautiful and intelligent, and yet the most hopelessly
wretched, and who are often objects of strong paternal affection.
The slaveholder would gladly educate and save these children, but
domestic peace drives them from his hearth; he cannot emancipate
them to be victims of violence or lust; he cannot send them to
Northern schools, where prejudice would brand them, and it is
proposed to open an asylum near them, where they may be brought,
emancipated, educated and taught housewifery as well as science,
and thus be prepared to become teachers among their own mixed
race.
"In its present condition this school embraces boarding, domestic
economy, normal teachers and primary departments, and is placed
under the care of an association consisting of the following
trustees: Benjamin Tatham, New York; Samuel M. Janney, Loudoun
County, Virginia; Johns Hopkins, Baltimore; Samuel Rhoads and
Thomas Williamson, Philadelphia; G. Bailey and L. D. Gale,
Washington; H. W. Bellows, New York; C. E. Stowe, Andover; H. W.
Beecher, Brooklyn, together with an executive committee
consisting of S. J. Bowen, J. M. Wilson and L. D. Gale, of
Washington; and M. Miner, Principal, and William H. Beecher, of
Reading, Secretary.
"The trustees state that a very eligible site of three acres,
within the city limits of Washington, of the northwest, has
already been purchased, paid for and secured to the trustees, and
that all which is now wanted is $20,000 wherewith to erect a
larger and more suitable edifice for the reception of the
applicants pressing upon it from the numerous free colored blacks
in the District and adjacent States. The proposed edifice is
designed to accommodate 150 scholars and to furnish homes for the
teachers and pupils from a distance. The enlarged school will
include the higher branches in its system of instruction.
"There was a meeting yesterday afternoon, in an ante-room of
Tremont Temple, of gentlemen called together to listen to the
statements of the Secretary of the Association regarding this
school. The meeting was small, but embraced such gentlemen as
Hon. George S. Hillard, Rev. Dr. Lathrop, Rev. C. E. Hale, and
Deacon Greele, all of whom are deeply interested in the project.
"The meeting decided to draw up and circulate a subscription
paper, and counted upon receiving $10,000 for the purpose in this
city. The pastors of several churches in New York had pledged
their churches in the sum of a thousand dollars each. Mr. Beecher
will solicit subscriptions in most of the principal towns of
Massachusetts. The designs and benefits of the project will be
fully set forth at a public meeting in this city in the course of
a fortnight."--_The Boston Journal_, April 18, 1857.
[5] An extract from Walter Lenox's article opposing Miss Miner's
School, follows:
"With justice we can say to the advocate of this measure, you are
not competent to decide this question: your habits of thought,
your ignorance of our true relations to the colored population,
prevent you from making a full and candid examination of its
merits, and, above all, the temper of the public mind is
inauspicious, even for its consideration. If your humanity
demands this particular sphere for its action, and if, to use
your own language, prejudice would brand them at your northern
schools, establish institutions in the free States, dispense your
money there abundantly as your charity will supply, draw to them
the unfortunate at your own door, or from abroad, and in all
respects gratify the largest impulses of your philanthropy; but
do not seek to impose upon us a system contrary to our wishes and
interests, and for the further reason that by so doing you injure
the cause of those whom you express a wish to serve."--_National
Intelligencer_, May 6, 1857.
[6] _Special Report_, Commissioner of Education, Washington, D. C.,
1868, p. 207.
[7] This statement is based on information obtained from Mrs. John F.
N. Wilkinson and Mrs. Amelia E. Wormley, who were pupils of Myrtilla
Miner.
[8] _Report of Board of Education_, Dr. John Smith, Statistician.
COMMUNICATIONS
During the last five years a number of valuable facts have come to the
office of the editor in various communications from persons interested
in the work which the Association has been promoting. While these
communications do not as a whole bear upon any particular phase of
Negro history, they will certainly be valuable to one making
researches in the general field. Some of these follow.
A SUGGESTION
WASHINGTON, D. C., Dec. 23, 1916.
CARTER G. WOODSON,
_My Dear Sir:_ I notice by the press your Connection with the
"Douglass" celebration. It might interest you to receive the
enclosed from a rank abolitionist of the John Brown School. After
service in Kansas with the Brown element, then in open rebellion
against the United States, as typified in men like Judge Taney,
who decided that the black man had no rights the white man was
bound to respect, I entered the Union army and served in it as a
private in the 5th Wis. Infy and as Adjt. of the 7th Eastern
Shore Md. Infy--3 years and 6 mos.... I wish some of your
influential men would start a movement to erect a monument here
for old John Brown, who gave his life to free the country from
the great curse of slavery.
Cordially,
(Signed) JOHN E. RASTALL.
SOME INTERESTING FACTS
MARION, ALABAMA
July 7th 1916
DR. C. G. WOODSON
_Dear Sir:_
Absence from home has prevented my replying to your request
sooner.
The majority of masters in this section of the country were kind
to their slaves. They gave them plenty of good wholesome food,
good clothes, (warm ones in winter) comfortable homes and
attention from Doctors when sick. There were churches on nearly
every plantation and ministers provided to preach to them. The
_only very cruel_ masters were _Northern men_ who treated their
slaves like _beasts_. For many years it was against the law to
teach negroes to read or write because some of them would read
things from the North that made them dissatisfied but our family
owned such good negroes, who had principle like white people we
did not think it could hurt them, and we taught them to read and
write. There has always been a kind feeling between the whites
and slaves in this country. The young ones were our playmates in
childhood. The older ones our nurses and cooks who petted us and
loved us as their own color. They were faithful during the War
when our protectors were in the Army, and now altho' it is fifty
years since they were freed, many of them are our best
friends.--I do not know of anything else you wanted to know or I
would gladly write you. In some sections of the South there may
have been cruel treatment but it was generally from the overseers
who were ignorant men and took advantage of their position to
give license to their cruel natures.
James Childs and all of his family and many of his relatives
belonged to my mother, and there still exists a kind feeling
between us that will only be severed by Death. I would like to
hear from him. I am nearly 75 years old and cannot be here much
longer but want to do all the good I can before I am called.
Respectfully
(Signed) MRS. JAS. A. SMITH,
Marion
Alabama