_Dear Sir:_
It was very good of you to mail me a copy of the Journal of Negro History.
I had seen a copy of this publication, I believe, at the library of the
Institute of Jamaica. The second number is certainly an impressive issue
indicative of the changed point of view. The so-called literature on
slavery and the negro is, in the main, rather a hindrance than a help. The
expression of mere personal opinion is of exceedingly slight value in the
furtherance of any good cause. What the world needs is not mere knowledge
but a better understanding of the facts and experience already available.
When a race has reached a point where it realizes its own place in history,
and the value of a critical analysis of its historical experience, a
measurable advance has been made towards the attainment of a genuine
progress. All values are relative. True history concerns itself with any
and all achievements and not merely with political changes or military
events. Most of the so-called historical disquisitions delivered annually
before the American Historical Association fall seriously short in this
respect. Ever since Green wrote his first real history of the English
people the old-time historian has lost caste among men who are seriously
concerned with the urgent solution of present-day problems. Unquestionably,
a true political history is of real value, but the social history of
mankind is infinitely more important.
The Journal of Negro History seems to meet the foregoing requirements for a
social history of the negro race rather than a mere increase in the already
voluminous so-called history of the political aspects of slavery
reconstruction or reorganization during recent times. The article on the
negro soldier in the American revolution is excellent. The prerequisite for
a genuine race progress is race pride. For this reason the past
achievements of the negro in this or any other country, individually or
collectively, are of the utmost teaching value. It is a far cry,
apparently, from the very recent high and well deserved promotion of a
negro to a commanding position in the army, back to the days of the service
rendered by negro soldiers in the Revolution, but in its final analysis it
is all a chain of connected events. Where so much has been done and is
being achieved the outlook for the future must needs be encouraging.
Progress is only made by struggling, and the best results are those
achieved against apparently insuperable difficulties. Race progress and
race pride are practically equivalent terms. Individuals and races fail in
proportion as they permit discouraging circumstances or conditions to
control their destinies. A true philosophy of history never fails to bring
home the conviction that lasting success is attained only through the ages
by persistent effort in the right direction. The negro race has reason to
be proud of its achievements, but I am sure that the future progress will
rest largely upon a better understanding of the negro's place in history.
Just as in the case of individuals, so in the case of races, it is, first
and last, a question of finding our place in the world. Variation in type
is absolutely essential to the highest development of the human species. It
is not, therefore, the duty of any one race to follow blindly in the
footsteps of another. It is for each race to seek for the best traits
peculiarly its own, and to leave absolutely nothing undone, in season and
out, to develop those particular traits to the highest possible degree. In
other words, it is not for the negro to try to be as near as he can to a
white man, even in his innermost thoughts and aspirations, but to interpret
the lessons of his own life through the philosophy of negro history and to
be true to the moral and spiritual ideals of his race and his ancestors, be
they what they may.
Very truly yours,
F. L. HOFFMAN,
_Statistician_.
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