_Subject._ Social Conditions.
_Gist._ "Immorality is a race trait."[48]
RELIGION AND EDUCATION.
Under the sub-heads of religion and education statistics are presented
showing the progress of the race along these lines. A total church
membership of 2,673,977 shows that there is one communicant to every
2.79 of the Negro population, against one in every 3.04 for the whites.
There were 1,288,736 pupils in the common schools and 34,129 in the
higher schools, colleges, and universities. Ordinarily these facts are
regarded as the most wonderful evidences of progress which the world has
ever witnessed on the part of a backward people. But not so with Mr.
Hoffman; the necessities of his theories compel him to explain away
every apparent advantage in favor of the Negro. The author announces
with an implied negative response to the suppressed question: "It
remains to be shown whether the educational process which the race has
undergone during the past quarter of a century and the additional
efforts and opportunities for religious instruction have materially
raised the race from its low social and economic condition at the time
of emancipation."[49]
This statement needs no refutation, for it will fall beneath the
ponderous weight of its own absurdity.
CRIMINAL RECORD.
The following table, if unexplained, tells a startling tale of the
Negro's criminal propensity:
_Prisoners in the United States, 1890._[50]
Total. Male. Female.
White 58,052 53,519 4,433
Colored 24,277 22,305 1,972
Male, Female,
per cent. per cent.
Proportion of Negro criminals to total (over 15) 29.38 30.79
Proportion of Negro population to total (over 15) 10.20 11.09
The Negro element, which constitutes only 12 per cent of the population,
commits 30 per cent of the crimes. Before concluding that this
preponderance of crime is due to "race traits," let us examine more
closely into the circumstances of the case. The discrepancy in the
administration of the law in the South has undoubtedly some effect upon
this relative showing. In order to escape the charge of slander, I will
use the words of a distinguished Virginian who boasts of "my southern
ancestry, birth, rearing, residence and interest."
"And is not the law the same for all, and does it make any distinction
between rich and poor, white and black? Literally, the law is the same
for all. Then what more can be desired? The trouble is not that the laws
are partial, through some of its enactments, namely, the whipping-post,
chain-gang, and poll-tax laws, were aimed principally against the Negro;
but the trouble is with the interpretation of the laws by the juries,
who merely voice the public sentiment, which is superior to the law
itself. The average jury is a whimsical creature, subject to all kinds
of influences, though mostly of a sentimental character. In criminal
matters where whites are concerned, it seems ever to lean to the
defense; and the strongest arguments of the prosecution are easily
offset and upset by appeals on behalf of youth, family, station,
respectability, etc.; or, perhaps the whole family, weeping, is placed
in full view of the jury, and the susceptible jury, sure at least in
such cases to weep with them that weep, speedily brings in a verdict of
acquittal where guilt is clearly manifest; or it says jail where it
ought to say penitentiary; or one year where it ought to say ten; and
ten years where it ought to pronounce death. But the Negro has none of
these sentimental advantages. Too poor to employ competent counsel, his
liberty and life are necessarily committed to incompetent hands, when
the proverb of 'poor pay, poor preach' becomes reality ... But are
Negroes treated unfairly by juries and public opinion? Yes, and the
experience and observation of every fair-minded man will confirm the
assertion. One cardinal proof is that a white man seldom receives
punishment for assault, however brutal, however unprovoked, however
cowardly, be it maiming, homicide, or murder upon a Negro unless,
forsooth, the assailant be some degraded creature, disowned by his own
caste. Of the numberless instances--running into the thousands--during
the past twenty-three years, of homicide and murder of blacks by whites,
there is no single instance of capital punishment, and few, very few,
instances of imprisonment beyond a few months in jail, or a slight fine.
The fact is the juries, which are the sole judges of the evidence, will
accept testimony against a Negro that they would reject in the case of
whites; and on the other hand they will frequently reject, or at least
discredit, testimony of the Negro against the white man, however well
supported it may be. But to compound for sins we are inclined to by
damning those we have no mind to, in case of any difficulty between
white and black, and the former is injured or loses his life, lucky is
the latter if the homicide is not declared murder--when courts of
justice, though sure to inflict the highest penalty in his case, are
found to be too slow, and he is dragged forth and slain, unshrived and
unshriven, as if he were a monstrous wild beast of whose presence earth
could not be rid too quickly."[51]
The social degradation of the Negro is the greatest factor contributive
to this high criminal record. We naturally associate poverty,
ignorance, and crime as being indissolubly connected. The Negroes
represent the stratum of society which commits the bulk of crime the
world over. If we exchange places the same story would be narrated of
the whites. The census records nowhere show that there is any connection
between crime and race, but between crime and condition.
The Negro has a higher criminal record than the Caucasian, it is true,
but so has the foreigner a greater average than the native whites. The
strongest possible argument in this connection rests upon the fact that
the presence of a large number of Negroes in any community does not
increase its total criminal average. The North Atlantic division,
including the states of Maine, New Hampshire, Vermont, Massachusetts,
Rhode Island, Connecticut, New York, New Jersey, and Pennsylvania, has a
criminal record of 833.1 to the million, while the South Atlantic
division, including the states of the Southern Atlantic coast shows a
record of 831.7. The Western division has an average of 1300. The
section that has the fewest Negroes has the highest average, and the
states that have the largest quota of blacks show the lowest criminal
rates. If we compare state with state the same interesting results are
revealed. The criminal record of New York (million basis) is 1369, of
South Carolina 702.6, of California 1703, of Alabama 720.1.
But, says the objector, a difference in the rigidity of the enforcement
of the law may account in some measure for this disparity. Let us then
take the city of Washington, one-third of whose population are Negroes,
and compare its police reports with those of Boston, whose Negro element
is a negligible fraction. It will be conceded, I think, that the
enforcement of law in both cities is rigid. The major of police for the
District of Columbia, in his last report remarks: "Those familiar with
the conduct of police affairs in this country generally contend that
there is a constant increase of crime; that it keeps pace with the
growing population. While such may be true of the principal cities of
the United States, facts and figures support the claim of this
department that in this respect the District of Columbia occupies a
distinct standing of its own. Its comprehensive moral status is above
that of most communities. Were it not for the depredations chargeable to
theft, there would be comparatively little crime to chronicle. This
offense must always exist here, unless through some unexpected agency a
complete change should be effected in the social conditions which
prevail. The abiding place of a large class of idle, illiterate, and
consequently vicious persons, it is but reasonable that the respectable
element should be preyed upon to a considerable extent."[52]
The percentage of arrests for Boston during 1896 was 9.37, whereas for
Washington it was only 8 and a fraction. These facts would seem to
furnish sufficient evidence that crime adheres to circumstances and
condition and not to race and color.
But, says the author, in the North (where legal processes are
acknowledgly fair so far as the Negro is concerned) the race shows a
criminal record which is out of all proportion to its numerical
strength. In Pennsylvania 2.23 per cent of its population commit 16.16
per cent of the crimes; in Chicago 1.30 of the population are
responsible for 9.84 of the offenses, and so for other Northern
communities. The Negro's criminal status is from six to eight times
greater than his numerical weight. It has been shown in another place
that from a social and economic standpoint the Northern Negro is
completely submerged. The criminal outbreak under the circumstances is
only natural.
It is also true that where numbers are small proportions are high. The
startling criminal showing of the Northern Negro can be accounted for
largely on this principle. Suppose that there were but one Chinaman in a
community, and coming, as he naturally would, into hostile contact with
a wide area, he should be arrested and convicted. The criminal records
of that community would show that one hundred per cent of the Chinese
population belonged to the criminal class.
I append the following table, extracted from the census of 1880, to
establish this principle. The Negro in the country at large shows a much
higher criminal rate than the foreign whites, but if we limit our
inquiry to those states where the foreign population is small, the
conditions will be reversed.
_Number of prisoners in several southern states (to the million
of population.)_
State. Foreign white. Colored.
Florida 2,624 1,797
Georgia 2,272 2,181
Louisiana 1,810 1,728
Mississippi 2,498 1,783
If, on the other hand, we select those states in which the Negro element
is small and the foreign element large the result is very decidedly to
the disadvantage of the Negro.
The Northern Negro has a criminal record which is not only out of all
proportion to his numerical strength, but is two or three times as great
as that of his black brothers in the South. It is hard to see how "race
traits" could account for this discrepancy.
RAPE AND LYNCHING.
The attempts at rape and the consequent lynchings are also offered in
evidence of the evil propensity of the race. It is undoubtedly true that
the alleged assaults upon white women by colored men have done more than
all other causes combined to give the race an evil reputation and make
it loathsome in the eyes of mankind. "It throws over every colored man a
mantle of odium and sets upon him a mark for popular hate more
distressing than the mark set upon the first murderer ... It has cooled
our friends and heated our enemies."[53]
The alleged culprit in such cases, especially if he be a colored man and
the victim a white woman, is almost certain to die without due process
of law. The native, savage furor of human nature asserts itself in the
presence of such dastardly outrages, and neither legal enactments nor
moral codes nor religious sanction can restrain it. The perpetrators
cannot be defended or pitied. It is a waste of sympathy to wail over the
deep damnation of their taking off. And yet we must remember that when
the two races are concerned rape has a larger definition than is set
down in the dictionaries. There can be no doubt that there have been
many lynchings chargeable to rape, when the true cause should be
designated by a different, though an ugly name.
Let us not forget, also, that not more than one-third of the lynchings
are even chargeable to rape. The causes include the whole catalogue of
offenses, serious and trifling, from the committal of murder to jostling
against a white man on the street. The attempt to show that lynching and
rape are coextensive is misleading and unjust.
So the effort to show that rapeful assaults are due to "race traits"
can, I think, be clearly disproved. In a pamphlet which is certainly
not flattering to the Negro, a learned medical authority tells us: "I
might remark in passing that, notwithstanding the horrible crimes
perpetrated under the influence of the _furor sexualis_ by the Negro, I
believe that he compares quite favorably as regards sexual
impulses--taking all abnormalities into consideration--with the white
race. The more I see of white men in so-called refined society, the more
contempt have I for quite a large proportion of male humanity."[54]
To summarize the points of the argument, showing that rape is not
peculiarly characteristic of the Negro:
1. Rape has been practiced among all races and nations.
2. The committal of rape by white men is by no means an infrequent
occurrence. Two instances of white men committing heinous assaults upon
white children occurred in Washington during the preparation of this
article.
3. In Africa rape is so severely punished that it is comparatively
unknown.
4. In the British Islands and in South America where the Negroes live in
greatest relative abundance, the crime is unheard of.
5. When the care and safety of the white women of the South were
entrusted to the keeping of the slaves, they returned inviolable all
that had been entrusted to their hands.
6. Of the hundreds of lady missionaries of the North who have trusted
their lives and virtue to the emancipated race whom they came to uplift,
not a single case of violation has been reported to their friends at the
North.
SOCIAL MORALITY.
The present state of social morality is mirrored in the number of
illegitimate offsprings. The figures which show that the rate of
illegitimacy among Negroes in Washington has increased from 17.60 per
cent of total births in 1879 to 26.46 per cent in 1894 have been widely
quoted and remarked upon. These are facts of record and cannot be
gainsaid or denied. According to the opinion of medical men and others
in positions to observe, these figures if anything fall short of the
truth. It is also probable that the other large cities of the country,
if as closely studied, would make as startling a showing. The only
alarming feature of the situation is the constant _increase_ in the
illegitimate rates. That twenty-five per cent of the births among
Negroes are illegitimate will not alarm anyone where it is considered
that even this low moral status represents a gain of seventy-five per
cent over the conditions prevailing under slavery.
Mr. Hoffman having on hand a theory, was spared the pains of inquiring
further into the causes which led to this deplorable state of things.
The reviewer suggests that this increase in social immorality among the
Negroes of Washington is due to the great rush of ignorant, purposeless
colored people to the national capital, a condition of things which
always leads, in its first effect, to social looseness and impurity. The
very late marriages among the better element of the colored people also
help to account for this awful state of things. But perhaps a greater
than any cause yet assigned as leading to the social degradation of
Negroes in cities is the excess of the female over the male element of
the population. On account of the importance of this subject, I append a
table showing this excess for the cities whose colored population is
over 20,000.
_Colored population._
Number of
Colored Colored Excess of females to
City. males. females. females. every 100
males.
Baltimore 29,165 38,131 8,966 131
Richmond 14,216 18,138 3,922 128
Atlanta 12,400 15,717 3,317 127
Washington 33,831 41,866 8,035 123
New Orleans 28,936 35,727 6,791 123
Nashville 13,334 16,061 2,727 120
Charleston 14,187 16,849 2,662 119
Savannah 10,493 12,485 1,992 119
Memphis 13,333 15,396 2,063 115
Louisville 13,348 15,324 1,976 115
Philadelphia 18,960 21,414 2,454 113
St. Louis 13,247 13,819 572 104
New York 12,649 13,025 376 103
------ ------ ------ ---
Total 228,099 273,952 45,875 120
Such a disproportion between the sexes can forbode no good to society.
In the West, where the male element predominates over the female among
the white population, the evil effect on society is painfully apparent.
If every colored man in Washington were married and every male minor had
a mate selected for him, there would still be left Negro females enough
to form a manless community larger than Annapolis, Md. Now, no one
should wonder at the moral corruption under these circumstances. These
8000 females, for whom marriage is impossible, be it remembered, are not
restrained by the inhibitory influence of pride, station, and
self-esteem. This is no doubt the greatest evil which threatens the
social integrity of Negro life, and forms the most serious and
perplexing of our city problems.
As startling as the records of crime and immorality are, they are only
the outgrowth of circumstances and conditions. Human nature at best is
weak, and under fostering circumstances has always yielded to the power
of sin and uncleanliness. The author tells us that immorality is a race
trait. This is sadly too true, but it is a human race trait, and is
limited to no particular variety thereof.