CHAPTER IV

RELIGION IN THE SOUTH

It is often a nice question as to which is of greater importance among

a people--the way in which they earn their living, or their attitude

toward life. As a matter of fact these two things are but two sides of

the same problem, for nothing so reveals the attitude of a people

toward life as the manner in which they earn their living; and on the

other hand the earning of a living depends in the last analysis upon

one's estimate of what life really is. So that these two questions

that I am discussing with regard to the South are intimately bound up

with each other.

If we have studied the economic development of the South carefully,

then we have already seen something of its attitude toward life; the

history of religion in the South means a study of these same facts

over which we have gone, from a different point of view. Moreover, as

the economic history of the South is in effect the economics of

slavery and the Negro problem, so the essence of a study of religion

in the South is a study of the ethics of slavery and emancipation.

It is very difficult of course for one who has not seen the practical

difficulties that surround a people at any particular time in their

battle with the hard facts of this world, to interpret with sympathy

their ideals of life; and this is especially difficult when the

economic life of a nation has been expressed by such a discredited

word as slavery. If, then, we are to study the history of religion in

the South, we must first of all divest ourselves of prejudice, pro and

con; we must try to put ourselves in the place of those who are

seeking to read the riddle of life and grant to them about the same

general charity and the same general desire to do right that we find

in the average human being. On the other hand, we must not, in

striving to be charitable, be false to truth and right. Slavery in the

United States was an economic mistake and a moral crime. This we

cannot forget. Yet it had its excuses and mitigations. These we must

remember.

When in the seventeenth century there grew up in the New World a

system of human slavery, it was not by any means a new thing. There

were slaves and slavery in Europe, not, to be sure, to a great extent,

but none the less real. The Christian religion, however, had come to

regard it as wrong and unjust that those who partook of the privileges

and hopes and aspirations of that religion should oppress each other

to the extent of actual enslavement. The idea of human brotherhood in

the seventeenth century was of a brotherhood of co-religionists. When

it came to the dealing of Christian with heathen, however, the

century saw nothing wrong in slavery; rather, theoretically, they saw

a chance for a great act of humanity and religion. The slaves were to

be brought from heathenism to Christianity, and through slavery the

benighted Indian and African were to find their passport into the

kingdom of God. This theory of human slavery was held by Spaniards,

French, and English. It was New England in the early days that put the

echo of it in her codes (see Note 18) and recognition of it can be

seen in most of the colonies.

But no sooner had people adopted this theory than there came the

insistent and perplexing question as to what the status of the heathen

slave was to be after he was Christianized and baptized; and even more

pressing, what was to be the status of his children?

It took a great deal of bitter heart searching for the conscientious

early slave-holders to settle this question. The obvious state of

things was that the new convert awoke immediately to the freedom of

Christ and became a freeman. But while this was the theoretical,

religious answer, and indeed the answer which was given in several

instances, the practice soon came into direct and perplexing conflict

with the grim facts of economic life.

Here was a man who had invested his money and his labor in slaves; he

had done it with dependence on the institution of property. Could he

be deprived of his property simply because his slaves were baptized

afterward into a Christian church? Very soon such economic reasoning

swept away the theological dogma and it was expressly declared in

colony after colony that baptism did not free the slaves (see Note

19). This, of course, put an end to the old doctrine of the heathen

slave and it was necessary for the church to arrange for itself a new

theory by which it could ameliorate, if not excuse, the position of

the slave. The next question was naturally that of the children of

slaves born in Christianity and the church for a time hedged

unworthily on the subject by consigning to perpetual slavery the

children of heathen but not those born of Christian parents; this was

satisfactory for the first generation but it fell short of the logic

of slavery later, and a new adjustment was demanded.

Here again this was not found difficult. In Virginia there had been

built up the beginnings of a feudal aristocracy. Men saw nothing wrong

or unthinkable in the situation as it began to develop, but rather

something familiar. At the head of the feudal manor was the lord, or

master, beneath him the under-lord or overseers and then the artisans,

retainers, the free working men and lastly the serfs, slaves or

servants as they were called. The servant was not free and yet he was

not theoretically exactly a slave, and the laws of Virginia were

rather careful to speak very little of slaves.

Serfdom in America as in Europe was to be a matter of status or

position and not of race or blood, and the law of the South in the

seventeenth and early eighteenth centuries made little or no

distinction between black and white bondservants save in the time of

their service. The idea, felt rather than expressed, was that here in

America we were to have a new feudalism suited to the new country. At

the top was the governor of the colony representing the majesty of the

English king, at the bottom the serfs or slaves, some white, most of

them black.

Slavery therefore was gradually transformed in the seventeenth and

eighteenth centuries into a social status out of which a man, even a

black man, could escape and did escape; and, no matter what his color

was, when he became free, he became free in the same sense that other

people were. Thus it was that there were free black voters in the

southern colonies (Virginia and the Carolinas) in the early days

concerning whose right to vote there was less question than there is

concerning my right to vote now in Georgia (see Note 20).

The church recognized the situation and the Episcopal church

especially gave itself easily to this new conception. This church

recognized the social gradation of men; all souls were equal in the

sight of God, but there were differences in worldly consideration and

respect, and consequently it was perfectly natural that there should

be an aristocracy at the top and a group of serfs at the bottom.

Meantime, however, America began to be stirred by a new democratic

ideal; there came the reign of that ruler of men, Andrew Jackson;

there came the spread of the democratic churches, Methodist and

Baptist, and the democratization of other churches. Now when America

became to be looked upon more and more as the dwelling place of free

and equal men and when the Methodist and, particularly, the Baptist

churches went down into the fields and proselyted among the slaves, a

thing which the more aristocratic Episcopal church had never done (see

Note 21), there came new questions and new heart-searchings among

those who wanted to explain the difficulties and to think and speak

clearly in the midst of their religious convictions.

As such people began to look round them the condition of the slaves

appalled them. The Presbyterian Synod of South Carolina and Georgia

declared in 1833: "There are over two millions of human beings in the

condition of heathen and some of them in a worse condition. They may

be justly considered the heathen of this country, and will bear a

comparison with heathen in any country in the world. The Negroes are

destitute of the gospel, and ever will be under the present state of

things. In the vast field extending from an entire state beyond the

Potomac [_i.e._, Maryland] to the Sabine River [at the time our

southwestern boundary] and from the Atlantic to the Ohio, there are,

to the best of our knowledge, not twelve men exclusively devoted to

the religious instruction of the Negroes. In the present state of

feeling in the South, a ministry of their own color could neither be

obtained nor tolerated.

"But do not the Negroes have access to the gospel through the stated

ministry of the whites? We answer, no. The Negroes have no regular and

efficient ministry; as a matter of course, no churches; neither is

there sufficient room in the white churches for their accommodation.

We know of but five churches in the slave-holding states built

expressly for their use. These are all in the state of Georgia. We may

now inquire whether they enjoy the privileges of the gospel in their

own houses, and on our plantations? Again we return a negative answer.

They have no Bibles to read by their own firesides. They have no

family altars; and when in affliction, sickness, or death, they have

no minister to address to them the consolations of the gospel, nor to

bury them with appropriate services."

The same synod said in 1834: "The gospel, as things now are, can never

be preached to the two classes (whites and blacks) successfully in

conjunction. The galleries or back seats on the lower floor of white

churches are generally appropriated to the Negroes, when it can be

done without inconvenience to the whites. When it cannot be done

conveniently, the Negroes must catch the gospel as it escapes through

the doors and windows. If the master is pious, the house servants

alone attend family worship, and frequently few of them, while the

field hands have no attention at all. So far as masters are engaged in

the work [of religious instruction of slaves], an almost unbroken

silence reigns on this vast field."

The Rev. C.C. Jones, a Georgian and ardent defender of slavery (see

Note 22) says of the period 1790-1820: "It is not too much to say that

the religious and physical condition of the Negroes were both improved

during this period. Their increase was natural and regular, ranging

every ten years between thirty-four and thirty-six per cent. As the

old stock from Africa died out of the country, the grosser customs,

ignorance, and paganism of Africa died with them. Their descendants,

the country-born, were better looking, more intelligent, more

civilized, more susceptible of religious impressions.

"On the whole, however, but a minority of the Negroes, and that a

small one, attended regularly the house of God, and taking them as a

class, their religious instruction was extensively and most seriously

neglected."

And of the decade 1830-40, he insists: "We cannot cry out against the

Papists for withholding the Scriptures from the common people and

keeping them in ignorance of the way of life, for we withhold the

Bible from our servants, and keep them in ignorance of it, while we

will not use the means to have it read and explained to them."

Such condition stirred the more radical-minded toward abolition

sentiments and the more conservative toward renewed effort to

evangelize and better the condition of the slaves. This condition was

deplorable as Jones pictures it. "Persons live and die in the midst of

Negroes and know comparatively little of their real character. They

have not the immediate management of them. They have to do with them

in the ordinary discharge of their duty as servants, further than this

they institute no inquiries; they give themselves no trouble.

"The Negroes are a distinct class in the community, and keep

themselves very much to themselves. They are one thing before the

whites and another before their own color. Deception before the former

is characteristic of them, whether bond or free, throughout the whole

United States. It is habit, a long established custom, which descends

from generation to generation. There is an upper and an under current.

Some are contented with the appearance on the surface; others dive

beneath. Hence the diversity of impressions and representations of the

moral and religious condition of the Negroes. Hence the disposition of

some to deny the darker pictures of their more searching and knowing

friends."

He then enumerates the vice of the slaves: "The divine institution of

marriage depends for its perpetuity, sacredness, and value, largely

upon the protection given it by the law of the land. Negro marriages

are neither recognized nor protected by law. The Negroes receive no

instruction on the nature, sacredness, and perpetuity of the

institution; at any rate they are far from being duly impressed with

these things. They are not required to be married in any particular

form, nor by any particular persons."

He continues: "Hence, as may well be imagined, the marriage relation

loses much of the sacredness and perpetuity of its character. It is a

contract of convenience, profit, or pleasure, that may be entered into

and dissolved at the will of the parties, and that without heinous

sin, or the injury of the property or interests of any one. That which

they possess in common is speedily divided, and the support of the

wife and children falls not upon the husband, but upon the master.

Protracted sickness, want of industrial habits, of congeniality of

disposition, or disparity of age, are sufficient grounds for a

separation."

Under such circumstances, "polygamy is practiced both secretly and

openly." Un-cleanness, infanticide, theft, lying, quarreling, and

fighting are noted, and the words of Charles Cotesworth Pinckney in

1829 are recalled: "There needs no stronger illustration of the

doctrine of human depravity than the state of morals on plantations in

general. Besides the mischievous tendency of bad example in parents

and elders, the little Negro is often taught by these natural

instructors that he may commit any vice that he can conceal from his

superiors, and thus falsehood and deception are among the earliest

lessons they imbibe. Their advance in years is but a progression to

the higher grades of iniquity. The violation of the Seventh

Commandment is viewed in a more venial light than in fashionable

European circles. Their depredations of rice have been estimated to

amount to twenty-five per cent. of the gross average of crops."

John Randolph of Roanoke once visited a lady and "found her surrounded

with her seamstresses, making up a quantity of clothing. 'What work

have you in hand?' 'O sir, I am preparing this clothing to send to the

poor Greeks.' On taking leave at the steps of her mansion, he saw

some of her servants in need of the very clothing which their

tender-hearted mistress was sending abroad. He exclaimed, 'Madam,

madam, the Greeks are at your door!'"

One natural solution of this difficulty was to train teachers and

preachers for the slaves from among their own number. The old Voodoo

priests were passing away and already here and there new spiritual

leaders of the Negroes began to arise. Accounts of several of these,

taken from "The Negro Church," will be given.

Among the earliest was Harry Hosier who traveled with the Methodist

Bishop Asbury and often filled appointments for him. George Leile and

Andrew Bryan were preachers whose life history is of intense interest.

"George Leile or Lisle, sometimes called George Sharp, was born in

Virginia about 1750. His master (Mr. Sharp) some time before the

American war removed and settled in Burke County, Georgia. Mr. Sharp

was a Baptist and a deacon in a Baptist church, of which Rev. Matthew

Moore was pastor. George was converted and baptized under Mr. Moore's

ministry. The church gave him liberty to preach.

"About nine months after George Leile left Georgia, Andrew, surnamed

Bryan, a man of good sense, great zeal, and some natural elocution,

began to exhort his black brethren and friends. He and his followers

were reprimanded and forbidden to engage further in religious

exercises. He would, however, pray, sing, and encourage his fellow

worshipers to seek the Lord.

"Their persecution was carried to an inhuman extent. Their evening

assemblies were broken up and those found present were punished with

stripes. Andrew Bryan and Sampson, his brother, converted about a year

after him, were twice imprisoned, and they with about fifty others

were whipped. When publicly whipped, and bleeding under his wounds,

Andrew declared that he not only rejoiced to be whipped, but would

gladly suffer death for the cause of Jesus Christ, and that while he

had life and opportunity he would continue to preach Christ. He was

faithful to his vow and, by patient continuance in well-doing, he put

to silence and shamed his adversaries, and influential advocates and

patrons were raised up for him. Liberty was given Andrew by the civil

authority to continue his religious meetings under certain

regulations. His master gave him the use of his barn at Brampton,

three miles from Savannah, where he preached for two years with little

interruption."

Lott Carey a free Virginia Negro "was evidently a man of superior

intellect and force of character, as is evidenced from the fact that

his reading took a wide range--from political economy, in Adam Smith's

'Wealth of Nations,' to the voyage of Captain Cook. That he was a

worker as well as a preacher is true, for when he decided to go to

Africa his employers offered to raise his salary from $800 to $1,000 a

year. Remember that this was over eighty years ago. Carey was not

seduced by such a flattering offer, for he was determined.

"His last sermon in the old First Church in Richmond must have been

exceedingly powerful, for it was compared by an eye-witness, a

resident of another state, to the burning, eloquent appeals of George

Whitfield. Fancy him as he stands there in that historic building

ringing the changes on the word 'freely,' depicting the willingness

with which he was ready to give up his life for service in Africa.

"He, as you may already know, was the leader of the pioneer colony to

Liberia, where he arrived even before the agent of the Colonization

Society. In his new home his abilities were recognized, for he was

made vice governor, and became governor in fact while Governor Ashmun

was absent from the colony in this country. Carey did not allow his

position to betray the cause of his people, for he did not hesitate to

expose the duplicity of the Colonization Society and even to defy

their authority, it would seem, in the interests of the people.

"While casting cartridges to defend the colonists against the natives

in 1828, the accidental upsetting of a candle caused an explosion that

resulted in his death.

"Carey is described as a typical Negro, six feet in height, of massive

and erect frame, with the sinews of a Titan. He had a square face,

keen eyes, and a grave countenance. His movements were measured; in

short, he had all the bearing and dignity of a prince of the blood."

John Chavis was a full-blooded Negro, born in Granville County, N.C.,

near Oxford, in 1763. He was born free and was sent to Princeton,

studying privately under Dr. Witherspoon, where he did well. He went

to Virginia to preach to Negroes. In 1802, in the county court, his

freedom and character were certified to and it was declared that he

had passed "through a regular course of academic studies" at what is

now Washington and Lee University. In 1805 he returned to North

Carolina, where in 1809 he was made a licentiate in the Presbyterian

Church and allowed to preach. His English was remarkably pure, his

manner impressive, his explanations clear and concise.

For a long time he taught school and had the best whites as pupils--a

United States senator, the sons of a chief justice of North Carolina,

a governor of the state and many others. Some of his pupils boarded in

the family, and his school was regarded as the best in the State. "All

accounts agree that John Chavis was a gentleman," and he was received

socially among the best whites and asked to table. In 1830 he was

stopped from preaching by the law. Afterward he taught a school for

free Negroes in Raleigh.

Henry Evans was a full-blooded Virginia free Negro, and was the

pioneer of Methodism in Fayetteville, N.C. He found the Negroes there,

about 1800, without any religious instruction. He began preaching and

the town council ordered him away; he continued and whites came to

hear him. Finally the white auditors outnumbered the blacks and sheds

were erected for Negroes at the side of the church. The gathering

became a regular Methodist Church, with a white and Negro membership,

but Evans continued to preach. He exhibited "rare self-control before

the most wretched of castes! Henry Evans did much good, but he would

have done more good had his spirit been untrammeled by this sense of

inferiority."

His dying words uttered as he stood, aged and bent beside his pulpit,

are of singular pathos: "I have come to say my last word to you. It

is this: None but Christ. Three times have I had my life in jeopardy

for preaching the gospel to you. Three times I have broken ice on the

edge of the water and swam across the Cape Fear to preach the gospel

to you; and, if in my last hour I could trust to that, or anything but

Christ crucified, for my salvation, all should be lost and my soul

perish forever."

Early in the nineteenth century Ralph Freeman was a slave in Anson

County, N.C. He was a full-blooded Negro, and was ordained and became

an able Baptist preacher. He baptized and administered communion, and

was greatly respected. When the Baptists split on the question of

missions he sided with the anti-mission side. Finally the law forbade

him to preach.

Lunsford Lane was a Negro who bought his freedom in Raleigh, N.C., by

the manufacture of smoking tobacco. He later became a minister of the

gospel, and had the confidence of many of the best people.

The story of Jack of Virginia is best told in the words of a Southern

writer:

"Probably the most interesting case in the whole South is that of an

African preacher of Nottoway County, popularly known as 'Uncle Jack,'

whose services to white and black were so valuable that a

distinguished minister of the Southern Presbyterian Church felt called

upon to memorialize his work in a biography.

"Kidnapped from his idolatrous parents in Africa, he was brought over

in one of the last cargoes of slaves admitted to Virginia and sold to

a remote and obscure planter in Nottoway County, a region at that time

in the backwoods and destitute particularly as to religious life and

instruction. He was converted under the occasional preaching of Rev.

Dr. John Blair Smith, president of Hampden-Sidney College, and of Dr.

William Hill and Dr. Archibald Alexander of Princeton, then young

theologues, and by hearing the Scriptures read.

"Taught by his master's children to read, he became so full of the

spirit and knowledge of the Bible that he was recognized among the

whites as a powerful expounder of Christian doctrine, was licensed to

preach by the Baptist Church, and preached from plantation to

plantation within a radius of thirty miles, as he was invited by

overseers or masters. His freedom was purchased by a subscription of

whites, and he was given a home and tract of land for his support. He

organized a large and orderly Negro church, and exercised such a

wonderful controlling influence over the private morals of his flock

that masters, instead of punishing their slaves, often referred them

to the discipline of their pastor, which they dreaded far more.

"He stopped a heresy among the Negroes of Southern Virginia, defeating

in open argument a famous fanatical Negro preacher named Campbell, who

advocated noise and 'the spirit' against the Bible, and winning over

Campbell's adherents in a body. For over forty years, and until he was

nearly a hundred years of age, he labored successfully in public and

private among black and whites, voluntarily giving up his preaching in

obedience to the law of 1832, the result of 'Old Nat's war.'

"The most refined and aristocratic people paid tribute to him, and he

was instrumental in the conversion of many whites. Says his

biographer, Rev. Dr. William S. White: 'He was invited into their

houses, sat with their families, took part in their social worship,

sometimes leading the prayer at the family altar. Many of the most

intelligent people attended upon his ministry and listened to his

sermons with great delight. Indeed, previous to the year 1825, he was

considered by the best judges to be the best preacher in that county.

His opinions were respected, his advice followed, and yet he never

betrayed the least symptoms of arrogance or self-conceit.

"'His dwelling was a rude log cabin, his apparel of the plainest and

coarsest materials.' This was because he wanted to be fully identified

with his class. He refused gifts of better clothing, saying 'These

clothes are a great deal better than are generally worn by people of

my color, and besides if I wear finer ones I find I shall be obliged

to think about them even at meeting.'"

Thus slowly, surely, the slave, in the persons of such exceptional

men, appearing here and there at rare intervals, was persistently

stretching upward. The Negroes bade fair in time to have their

leaders. The new democratic evangelism began to encourage this, and

then came the difficulty--the inevitable ethical paradox.

The good men of the South recognized the needs of the slaves. Here and

there Negro ministers were arising. What now should be the policy? On

the part of the best thinkers it seemed as if men might strive here,

in spite of slavery, after brotherhood; that the slaves should be

proselyted, taught religion, admitted to the churches, and,

notwithstanding their civil station, looked upon as the spiritual

brothers of the white communicants. Much was done to make this true.

The conditions improved in a great many respects, but no sooner was

there a systematic effort to teach the slaves, even though that

teaching was confined to elementary religion, than the various things

followed that must follow all intellectual awakenings.

We have had the same thing in our day. A few Negroes of the South have

been taught, they consequently have begun to think, they have begun to

assert themselves, and suddenly men are face to face with the fact

that either one of two things must happen--either they must stop

teaching or these people are going to be men, not serfs or slaves. Not

only that, but to seek to put an awakening people back to sleep means

revolt. It meant revolt in the eighteenth century, when a series of

insurrections and disturbances frightened the South tremendously, not

so much by their actual extent as by the possibilities they suggested.

It was noticeable that many of these revolts were led by preachers.

The revolution in Hayti greatly stirred the South and induced South

Carolina to declare in 1800:

"It shall not be lawful for any number of slaves, free Negroes,

mulattoes, or mestizoes, even in company with white persons, to meet

together and assemble for the purpose of mental instruction or

religious worship either before the rising of the sun or after the

going down of the same. And all magistrates, sheriffs, militia

officers, etc., etc., are hereby vested with power, etc., for

dispersing such assemblies."

On petition of the white churches the rigor of this law was slightly

abated in 1803 by a modification which forbade any person, before nine

o'clock in the evening, "to break into a place of meeting wherein

shall be assembled the members of any religious society in this State,

provided a majority of them shall be white persons, or otherwise to

disturb their devotions unless such persons, etc., so entering said

place (of worship) shall first have obtained from some magistrate,

etc., a warrant, etc., in case a magistrate shall be then actually

within a distance of three miles from such place of meeting; otherwise

the provisions, etc. (of the Act of 1800) to remain in full force."

So, too, in Virginia the Haytian revolt and the attempted insurrection

under Gabriel in 1800 led to the Act of 1804, which forbade all

evening meetings of slaves. This was modified in 1805 so as to allow a

slave, in company with a white person, to listen to a white minister

in the evening. A master was "allowed" to employ a religious teacher

for his slaves. Mississippi passed similar restrictions.

By 1822 the rigor of the South Carolina laws in regard to Negro

meetings had abated, especially in a city like Charleston, and one of

the results was the Vesey plot.

"The sundry religious classes or congregations, with Negro leaders or

local preachers, into which were formed the Negro members of the

various churches of Charleston, furnished Vesey with the first

rudiments of an organization, and at the same time with a singularly

safe medium for conducting his underground agitation. It was

customary, at that time, for these Negro congregations to meet for

purposes of worship entirely free from the presence of whites. Such

meetings were afterward forbidden to be held except in the presence of

at least one representative of the dominant race, but during the three

or four years prior to the year 1822 they certainly offered Denmark

Vesey regular, easy, and safe opportunity for preaching his gospel of

liberty and hate. And we are left in no doubt whatever in regard to

the uses to which he put those gatherings of blacks.

"Like many of his race, he possessed the gift of gab, as the silver in

the tongue and the gold in the full or thick-lipped mouth are

oftentimes contemptuously characterized. And, like many of his race,

he was a devoted student of the Bible, to whose interpretation he

brought, like many other Bible students not confined to the Negro

race, a good deal of imagination and not a little of superstition,

which, with some natures, is perhaps but another name for the desires

of the heart.

"Thus equipped, it is no wonder that Vesey, as he pored over the Old

Testament scriptures, found many points of similitude in the history

of the Jews and that of the slaves in the United States. They were

both peculiar peoples. They were both Jehovah's peculiar peoples, one

in the past, the other in the present. And it seemed to him that as

Jehovah bent His ear, and bared His arm once in behalf of the one, so

would He do the same for the other. It was all vividly real to his

thought, I believe, for to his mind thus had said the Lord.

"He ransacked the Bible for apposite and terrible texts whose commands

in the olden times, to the olden people, were no less imperative upon

the new times and the new people. This new people were also commanded

to arise and destroy their enemies and the city in which they dwelt,

'both man and woman, young and old, with the edge of the sword.'

Believing superstitiously as he did in the stern and Nemesis-like God

of the Old Testament he looked confidently for a day of vengeance and

retribution for the blacks. He felt, I doubt not, something peculiarly

applicable to his enterprise and intensely personal to himself in the

stern and exultant prophecy of Zachariah, fierce and sanguinary words,

which were constantly in his mouth: 'Then shall the Lord go forth and

fight against those nations as when He fought in the day of battle.'

According to Vesey's lurid exegesis 'those nations' in the text meant

beyond peradventure the cruel masters, and Jehovah was to go forth to

fight them for the poor slaves and on whichever side fought that day

the Almighty God on that side would assuredly rest victory and

deliverance.

"It will not be denied that Vesey's plan contemplated the total

annihilation of the white population of Charleston. Nursing for many

dark years the bitter wrongs of himself and race had filled him

without doubt with a mad spirit of revenge and had given to him a

decided predilection for shedding the blood of his oppressors. But if

he intended to kill them to satisfy a desire for vengeance he intended

to do so also on broader ground. The conspirators, he argued, had no

choice in the matter, but were compelled to adopt a policy of

extermination by the necessity of their position. The liberty of the

blacks was in the balance of fate against the lives of the whites. He

could strike that balance in favor of the blacks only by the total

destruction of the whites. Therefore the whites, men, women, and

children, were doomed to death."[1]

Vesey's plot was well laid, but the conspirators were betrayed.

Less than ten years after this plot was discovered and Vesey and his

associates hanged, there broke out the Nat Turner insurrection in

Virginia. Turner was himself a preacher.

"He was a Christian and a man. He was conscious that he was a Man and

not a 'thing'; therefore, driven by religious fanaticism, he undertook

a difficult and bloody task. Nathaniel Turner was born in Southampton

County, Virginia, October 2, 1800. His master was one Benjamin Turner,

a very wealthy and aristocratic man. He owned many slaves, and was a

cruel and exacting master. Young 'Nat' was born of slave parents, and

carried to his grave many of the superstitions and traits of his

father and mother. The former was a preacher, the latter a 'mother in

Israel.' Both were unlettered but, nevertheless, very pious people.

"The mother began when Nat was quite young to teach him that he was

born, like Moses, to be the deliverer of his race. She would sing to

him snatches of wild, rapturous songs and repeat portions of prophecy

she had learned from the preachers of those times. Nat listened with

reverence and awe, and believed everything his mother said. He imbibed

the deep religious character of his parents, and soon manifested a

desire to preach. He was solemnly set apart to 'the gospel ministry'

by his father, the church, and visiting preachers. He was quite low in

stature, dark, and had the genuine African features. His eyes were

small but sharp, and gleamed like fire when he was talking about his

'mission' or preaching from some prophetic passage of scripture. It is

said that he never laughed. He was a dreamy sort of a man, and avoided

the crowd.

"Like Moses he lived in the solitudes of the mountains and brooded

over the condition of his people. There was something grand to him in

the rugged scenery that nature had surrounded him with. He believed

that he was a prophet, a leader raised up by God to burst the bolts of

the prison-house and set the oppressed free. The thunder, the hail,

the storm-cloud, the air, the earth, the stars, at which he would sit

and gaze half the night all spake the language of the God of the

oppressed. He was seldom seen in a large company, and never drank a

drop of ardent spirits. Like John the Baptist, when he had delivered

his message, he would retire to the fastness of the mountain or seek

the desert, where he could meditate upon his great work."

In the impression of the Richmond _Enquirer_ of the 30th of August,

1831, the first editorial or leader is under the caption of "The

Banditte." The editor says:

"They remind one of a parcel of blood-thirsty wolves rushing down from

the Alps; or, rather, like a former incursion of the Indians upon the

white settlements. Nothing is spared; neither age nor sex

respected--the helplessness of women and children pleads in vain for

mercy.... The case of Nat Turner warns us. No black man ought to be

permitted to turn preacher through the country. The law must be

enforced, or the tragedy of Southampton appeals to us in vain."

Mr. Gray, the man to whom Turner made his confession before dying,

said:

"It has been said that he was ignorant and cowardly and that his

object was to murder and rob for the purpose of obtaining money to

make his escape. It is notorious that he was never known to have a

dollar in his life, to swear an oath, or drink a drop of spirits. As

to his ignorance, he certainly never had the advantages of an

education, but he can read and write, and for natural intelligence and

quickness of apprehension is surpassed by few men I have ever seen. As

to his being a coward, his reason as given for not resisting Mr.

Phipps, shows the decision of his character. When he saw Mr. Phipps

present his gun, he said he knew it was impossible for him to escape

as the woods were full of men. He, therefore, thought it was better

for him to surrender and trust to fortune for his escape.

"He is a complete fanatic or plays his part most admirably. On other

subjects he possesses an uncommon share of intelligence, with a mind

capable of attaining anything, but warped and perverted by the

influence of early impressions. He is below the ordinary stature,

though strong and active, having the true Negro face, every feature of

which is strongly marked.

"I shall not attempt to describe the effect of his narrative, as told

and commented on by himself, in the condemned hole of the prison; the

calm deliberate composure with which he spoke of his late deeds and

intentions; the expression of his fiend-like face when excited by

enthusiasm, still bearing the stains of the blood of the helpless

innocence about him, clothed with rags and covered with chains, yet

daring to raise his manacled hand to Heaven, with a spirit soaring

above the attributes of man. I looked on him and the blood curdled in

my veins."[2]

The Turner insurrection is so connected with the economic revolution

which enthroned cotton that it marks an epoch in the history of the

slave. A wave of legislation passed over the South prohibiting the

slaves from learning to read and write, forbidding Negroes to preach,

and interfering with Negro religious meetings.

Virginia declared, in 1831, that neither slaves nor free Negroes might

preach, nor could they attend religious service at night without

permission. In North Carolina slaves and free Negroes were forbidden

to preach, exhort or teach "in any prayer-meeting or other association

for worship where slaves of different families are collected together"

on penalty of not more than thirty-nine lashes. Maryland and Georgia

had similar laws. The Mississippi law of 1831 said: It is "unlawful

for any slave, free Negro, or mulatto to preach the gospel" upon pain

of receiving thirty-nine lashes upon the naked back of the

presumptuous preacher. If a Negro received written permission from his

master he might preach to the Negroes in his immediate neighborhood,

providing six respectable white men, owners of slaves, were present.

In Alabama the law of 1832 prohibited the assembling of more than five

male slaves at any place off the plantation to which they belonged,

but nothing in the act was to be considered as forbidding attendance

at places of public worship held by white persons. No slave or free

person of color was permitted to "preach, exhort, or harangue any

slave or slaves, or free persons of color, except in the presence of

five respectable slaveholders, or unless the person preaching was

licensed by some regular body of professing Christians in the

neighborhood, to whose society or church the Negroes addressed

properly belonged."

In the District of Columbia the free Negroes began to leave white

churches in 1831 and to assemble in their own.

Thus it was that through the fear of insurrection, the economic press

of the new slavery that was arising, and the new significance of

slavery in the economics of the South, the strife for spiritual

brotherhood was given up. Slavery became distinctly a matter of race

and not of status. Long years before, the white servants had been

freed and only black servants were left; now social condition came to

be not simply a matter of slavery but a matter of belonging to the

black race, so that even the free Negroes began to be disfranchised

and put into the caste system (see Note 23).

A new adjustment of ethics and religion had to be made to meet this

new situation, and in the adjustment, no matter what might be said or

thought, the Negro and slavery had to be the central thing.

In the adjustment of religion and ethics that was made for the new

slavery, under the cotton kingdom, there was in the first place a

distinct denial of human brotherhood. These black men were not men in

the sense that white men were men. They were different--different in

kind, different in origin; they had different diseases (see Note 24);

they had different feelings; they were not to be treated the same;

they were not looked upon as the same; they were altogether apart and,

while perhaps they had certain low sensibilities and aspirations, yet

so far as this world is concerned, there could be with them neither

human nor spiritual brotherhood.

The only status that they could possibly occupy was the status of

slaves. They could not get along as freemen; they could not work as

freemen; it was utterly unthinkable that people should live with them

free. This was the philosophy that was worked out gradually, with

exceptions here and there, and that was thought through, written on,

preached from the pulpits and taught in the homes, until people in the

South believed it as they believed the rising and the setting of the

sun.

As this became more and more the orthodox ethical opinion, heretics

appeared in the land as they always do. But intolerance and anathema

met them. In community after community there was a demand for

orthodoxy on this one burning question of the economic and religious

South, and the heretics were driven out. The Quakers left North

Carolina, the abolitionists either left Virginia or ceased to talk,

and throughout the South those people who dared to think otherwise

were left silent or dead (see Note 25).

So long as slavery was an economic success this orthodoxy was all

powerful; when signs of economic distress appeared it became

intolerant and aggressive. A great moral battle was impending in the

South, but political turmoil and a development of northern thought so

rapid as to be unintelligible in the South stopped this development

forcibly. War came and the hatred and moral bluntness incident to war,

and men crystallized in their old thought.

The matter now could no longer be argued and thought out, it became a

matter of tradition, of faith, of family and personal honor. There

grew up therefore after the war a new predicament; a new-old paradox.

Upon the whites hung the curse of the past; because they had not

settled their labor problem then, they must settle the problem now in

the face of upheaval and handicapped by the natural advance of the

world.

So after the war and even to this day, the religious and ethical life

of the South bows beneath this burden. Shrinking from facing the

burning ethical questions that front it unrelentingly, the Southern

Church clings all the more closely to the letter of a worn out

orthodoxy, while its inner truer soul crouches before and fears to

answer the problem of eight million black neighbors. It therefore

assiduously "preaches Christ crucified," in prayer meeting _patois_,

and crucifies "Niggers" in unrelenting daily life.

While the Church in the North, all too slowly but surely is struggling

up from the ashes of a childish faith in myth and miracle, and

beginning to preach a living gospel of civic virtue, peace and good

will and a crusade against lying, stealing and snobbery, the Southern

church for the most part is still murmuring of modes of "baptism,"

"infant damnation" and the "divine plan of creation."

Thus the post-bellum ethical paradox of the South is far more puzzling

than the economic paradox. To be sure there is leaven in the lump.

There are brave voices here and there, but they are easily drowned by

social tyranny in the South and by indifference and sensationalism in

the North (see Note 26).

First of all the result of the war was the complete expulsion of

Negroes from white churches. Little has been said of this, but perhaps

it was in itself the most singular and tremendous result of slavery.

The Methodist Church South simply set its Negro members bodily out of

doors. They did it with some consideration for their feelings, with as

much kindliness as crass unkindliness can show, but they virtually

said to all their black members--to the black mammies whom they have

almost fulsomely praised and whom they remember in such astonishing

numbers to-day, to the polite and deferential old servant, to whose

character they build monuments--they said to them: "You cannot worship

God with us." There grew up, therefore, the Colored Methodist

Episcopal Church.

Flagrantly unchristian as this course was, it was still in some ways

better than the absolute withdrawal of church fellowship on the part

of the Baptists, or the policy of Episcopalians, which was simply that

of studied neglect and discouragement which froze, harried, and well

nigh invited the black communicants to withdraw.

From the North now came those Negro church bodies born of color

discrimination in Philadelphia and New York in the eighteenth century,

and thus a Christianity absolutely divided along the color line arose.

There may be in the South a black man belonging to a white church

to-day but if so, he must be very old and very feeble. This

anomaly--this utter denial of the very first principles of the ethics

of Jesus Christ--is to-day so deep seated and unquestionable a

principle of Southern Christianity that its essential heathenism is

scarcely thought of, and every revival of religion in this section

banks its spiritual riches solidly and unmovedly against the color

line, without conscious question.

Among the Negroes the results are equally unhappy. They needed ethical

leadership, spiritual guidance, and religious instruction. If the

Negroes of the South are to any degree immoral, sexually unchaste,

criminally inclined, and religiously ignorant, what right has the

Christian South even to whisper reproach or accusation? How often have

they raised a finger to assume spiritual or religious guardianship

over those victims of their past system of economic and social life?

Left thus unguided the Negroes, with some help from such Northern

white churches as dared, began their own religious upbuilding (see

Note 27). They faced tremendous difficulties--lack of ministers,

money, and experience. Their churches could not be simply centres of

religious life--because in the poverty of their organized efforts all

united striving tended to centre in this one social organ. The Negro

Church consequently became a great social institution with some

ethical ideas but with those ethical ideas warped and changed and

perverted by the whole history of the past; with memories, traditions,

and rites of heathen worship, of intense emotionalism, trance, and

weird singing.

And above all, there brooded over and in the church the sense of all

their grievances. Whatsoever their own shortcomings might be, at least

they knew that they were not guilty of hypocrisy; they did not cry

"Whosoever will" and then brazenly ostracize half the world. They

knew that they opened their doors and hearts wide to all people that

really wanted to come in and they looked upon the white churches not

as examples but with a sort of silent contempt and a real inner

questioning of the genuineness of their Christianity.

On the other hand, so far as the white post-bellum Christian church is

concerned, I can conceive no more pitiable paradox than that of the

young white Christian in the South to-day who really believes in the

ethics of Jesus Christ. What can he think when he hangs upon his

church doors the sign that I have often seen, "All are welcome." He

knows that half the population of his city would not dare to go inside

that church. Or if there was any fellowship between Christians, white

and black, it would be after the manner explained by a white

Mississippi clergyman in all seriousness: "The whites and Negroes

understand each other here perfectly, sir, perfectly; if they come to

my church they take a seat in the gallery. If I go to theirs, they

invite me to the front pew or the platform."

Once in Atlanta a great revival was going on in a prominent white

church. The people were at fever heat, the minister was preaching and

calling "Come to Jesus." Up the aisle tottered an old black man--he

was an outcast, he had wandered in there aimlessly off the streets,

dimly he had comprehended this call and he came tottering and swaying

up the aisle. What was the result? It broke up the revival. There was

no disturbance; he was gently led out, but that sudden appearance of a

black face spoiled the whole spirit of the thing and the revival was

at an end.

Who can doubt that if Christ came to Georgia to-day one of His first

deeds would be to sit down and take supper with black men, and who can

doubt the outcome if He did?

It is this tremendous paradox of a Christianity that theoretically

opens the church to all men and yet closes it forcibly and insultingly

in the face of black men and that does this not simply in the visible

church but even more harshly in the spiritual fellowship of human

souls--it is this that makes the ethical and religious problem in the

South to-day of such tremendous importance, and that gives rise to the

one thing which it seems to me is the most difficult in the Southern

situation and that is, the tendency to deny the truth, the tendency to

lie when the real situation comes up because the truth is too hard to

face. This lying about the situation of the South has not been simply

a political subterfuge against the dangers of ignorance, but is a sort

of gasping inner revolt against acknowledging the real truth of the

ethical conviction which every true Southerner must feel, namely: that

the South is eternally and fundamentally wrong on the plain straight

question of the equality of souls before God--of the inalienable

rights of all men.

Here are men--they are aspiring, they are struggling piteously

forward, they have frequent instances of ability, there is no doubt as

to the tremendous strides which certain classes of Negroes have

made--how shall they be treated? That they should be treated as men,

of course, the best class of Southerners know and sometimes

acknowledge. And yet they believe, and believe with fierce conviction,

that it is impossible to treat Negroes as men, and still live with

them. Right there is the paradox which they face daily and which is

daily stamping hypocrisy upon their religion and upon their land.

Their irresistible impulse in this awful dilemma is to point to and

emphasize the Negro's degradation, even though they know that it is

not the degraded Negro whom they most fear, ostracize, and fight to

keep down, but rather the rising, ambitious Negro.

If my own city of Atlanta had offered it to-day the choice between 500

Negro college graduates--forceful, busy, ambitious men of property and

self-respect, and 500 black cringing vagrants and criminals, the

popular vote in favor of the criminals would be simply overwhelming.

Why? because they want Negro crime? No, not that they fear Negro crime

less, but that they fear Negro ambition and success more. They can

deal with crime by chain-gang and lynch law, or at least they think

they can, but the South can conceive neither machinery nor place for

the educated, self-reliant, self-assertive black man.

Are a people pushed to such moral extremities, the ones whose

level-headed, unbiased statements of fact concerning the Negro can be

relied upon? Do they really know the Negro? Can the nation expect of

them the poise and patience necessary for the settling of a great

social problem?

Not only is there then this initial falseness when the South excuses

its ethical paradox by pointing to the low condition of the Negro

masses, but there is also a strange blindness in failing to see that

every pound of evidence to prove the present degradation of black men

but adds to the crushing weight of indictment against their past

treatment of this race.

A race is not made in a single generation. If they accuse Negro women

of lewdness and Negro men of monstrous crime, what are they doing but

advertising to the world the shameless lewdness of those Southern men

who brought millions of mulattoes into the world, and whose deeds

throughout the South and particularly in Virginia, the mother of

slavery, have left but few prominent families whose blood does not

to-day course in black veins? Suppose to-day Negroes do steal; who

was it that for centuries made stealing a virtue by stealing their

labor? Have not laziness and listlessness always been the followers of

slavery? If these ten millions are ignorant by whose past law and

mandate and present practice is this true?

The truth then cannot be controverted. The present condition of the

Negro in America is better than the history of slavery proves we might

reasonably expect. With the help of his friends, North and South, and

despite the bitter opposition of his foes, South and North, he has

bought twelve million acres of land, swept away two-thirds of his

illiteracy, organized his church, and found leadership and articulate

voice. Yet despite this the South, Christian and unchristian, with

only here and there an exception, still stands like a rock wall and

says: Negroes are not men and must not be treated as men.

When now the world faces such an absolute ethical contradiction, the

truth is nearer than it seems.

It stands to-day perfectly clear and plain despite all sophistication

and false assumption: If the contention of the South is true--that

Negroes cannot by reason of hereditary inferiority take their places

in modern civilization beside white men, then the South owes it to the

world and to its better self to give the Negro every chance to prove

this. To make the assertion dogmatically and then resort to all means

which retard and restrict Negro development is not simply to stand

convicted of insincerity before the civilized world, but, far worse

than that, it is to make a nation of naturally generous, honest people

to sit humiliated before their own consciences.

I believe that a straightforward, honorable treatment of black men

according to their desert and achievement, will soon settle the Negro

problem. If the South is right few will rise to a plane that will

make their social reception a matter worth consideration; few will

gain the sobriety and industry which will deserve the ballot; and few

will achieve such solid moral character as will give them welcome to

the fellowship of the church. If, on the other hand, Negroes with the

door of opportunity thrown wide do become men of industry and

achievement, of moral strength and even genius, then such rise will

silence the South with an eternal silence.

The nation that enslaved the Negro owes him this trial; the section

that doggedly and unreasonably kept him in slavery owes him at least

this chance; and the church which professes to follow Jesus Christ and

does not insist on this elemental act of justice merits the denial of

the Master--"_I never knew you._"

This, then, is the history of those mighty moral battles in the South

which have given us the Negro problem. And the last great battle is

not a battle of South or East, of black or white, but of all of us.

The path to racial peace is straight but narrow--its following to-day

means tremendous fight against inertia, prejudice, and intrenched

snobbery. But it is the duty of men, it is a duty of the church, to

face the problem. Not only is it their duty to face it--they _must_

face it, it is impossible not to, the very attempt to ignore it is

assuming an attitude. It is a problem not simply of political

expediency, of economic success, but a problem above all of religious

and social life; and it carries with it not simply a demand for its

own solution, but beneath it lies the whole question of the real

intent of our civilization: Is the civilization of the United States

Christian?

It is a matter of grave consideration what answer we ought to give to

that question. The precepts of Jesus Christ cannot but mean that

Christianity consists of an attitude of humility, of a desire for

peace, of a disposition to treat our brothers as we would have our

brothers treat us, of mercy and charity toward our fellow men, of

willingness to suffer persecution for right ideals and in general of

love not only toward our friends but even toward our enemies.

Judged by this, it is absurd to call the practical religion of this

nation Christian. We are not humble, we are impudently proud; we are

not merciful, we are unmerciful toward friend and foe; we are not

peaceful nor peacefully inclined as our armies and battle-ships

declare; we do not want to be martyrs, we would much rather be thieves

and liars so long as we can be rich; we do not seek continuously, and

prayerfully inculcate, love and justice for our fellow men, but on the

contrary the treatment of the poor, the unfortunate, and the black

within our borders is almost a national crime.

The problem that lies before Christians is tremendous (see Note 28),

and the answer must begin not by a slurring over of the one problem

where these different tests of Christianity are most flagrantly

disregarded, but it must begin by a girding of ourselves and a

determination to see that justice is done in this country to the

humblest and blackest as well as to the greatest and whitest of our

citizens.

Now a word especially about the Episcopal church, whose position

toward its Negro communicants is peculiar. I appreciate this position

and speak of it specifically because I am one of those communicants.

For four generations my family has belonged to this church and I

belong to it, not by personal choice, not because I feel myself

welcome within its portals, but simply because I refuse to be read

outside of a church which is mine by inheritance and the service of my

fathers. When the Episcopal church comes, as it does come to-day, to

the Parting of the Ways, to the question as to whether its record in

the future is going to be, on the Negro problem, as disgraceful as it

has been in the past, I feel like appealing to all who are members of

that church to remember that after all it is a church of Jesus Christ.

Your creed and your duty enjoin upon you one, and only one, course of

procedure.

In the real Christian church there is neither black nor white, rich

nor poor, barbarian, Scythian, bond nor free, but all stand equal

before the face of the Master. If you find that you cannot treat your

Negro members as fellow Christians then do not deceive yourselves into

thinking that the differences that you make or are going to make in

their treatment are made for their good or for the service of the

world; do not entice them to ask for a separation which your

unchristian conduct forces them to prefer; do not pretend that the

distinctions which you make toward them are distinctions which are

made for the larger good of men, but simply confess in humility and

self-abasement that you are not able to live up to your Christian

vows; that you cannot treat these men as brothers and therefore you

are going to set them aside and let them go their half-tended way.

I should be sorry, I should be grieved more than I can say, to see

that which happened in the Southern Methodist Church and that which is

practically happening in the Presbyterian Church, and that which will

come in other sects--namely, a segregation of Negro Christians, come

to be true among Episcopalians. It would be a sign of Christian

disunity far more distressing than sectarianism. I should therefore

deplore it; and yet I am also free to say that unless this church is

prepared to treat its Negro members with exactly the same

consideration that other members receive, with the same brotherhood

and fellowship, the same encouragement to aspiration, the same

privileges, similarly trained priests and similar preferment for them,

then I should a great deal rather see them set aside than to see a

continuation of present injustice. All I ask is that when you do this

you do it with an open and honest statement of the real reasons and

not with statements veiled by any hypocritical excuses.

I am therefore above all desirous that the younger men and women who

are to-day taking up the leadership of this great group of men, who

wish the world better and work toward that end, should begin to see

the real significance of this step and of the great problem behind it.

It is not a problem simply of the South, not a problem simply of this

country, it is a problem of the world.

As I have said elsewhere: "Most men are colored. A belief in humanity

is above all a belief in colored men." If you cannot get on with

colored men in America you cannot get on with the modern world; and if

you cannot work with the humanity of this world how shall your souls

ever tune with the myriad sided souls of worlds to come?

It may be that the price of the black man's survival in America and in

the modern world, will be a long and shameful night of subjection to

caste and segregation. If so, he will pay it, doggedly, silently,

unfalteringly, for the sake of human liberty and the souls of his

children's children. But as he stoops he will remember the indignation

of that Jesus who cried, yonder behind heaving seas and years: "Woe

unto you scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites, that strain out a gnat and

swallow a camel,"--as if God cared a whit whether His Sons are born of

maid, wife or widow so long as His church sits deaf to His own

calling:

"Ho! every one that thirsteth, come ye to the waters and he that hath

no money; come ye, buy and eat; yea, come, buy wine and milk without

money and without price!"

FOOTNOTES:

[1] Grimke: "Right on the Scaffold."

[2] "The Negro Church," Atlanta University Publications, No. 8.

* * * * *

NOTES

TO CHAPTERS III AND IV

* * * * *

NOTES TO CHAPTER III

NOTE 1

"The history of slavery and the slave trade after 1820 must be read in

the light of the industrial revolution through which the civilized

world passed in the first half of the nineteenth century. Between the

years 1775 and 1825 occurred economic events and changes of the

highest importance and widest influence. Though all branches of the

industry felt the impulse of this new industrial life, yet, if we

consider single industries, cotton manufacture has, during the

nineteenth century, made the most magnificent and gigantic advances."

This fact is easily explained by the remarkable series of inventions

that revolutionized this industry between 1738 and 1830, including

Arkwright's, Watt's, Compton's, and Cartwright's epoch making

contrivances. The effect which these inventions had on the manufacture

of cotton goods is best illustrated by the fact that in England, the

chief cotton market of the world, the consumption of raw cotton rose

steadily from 13,000 bales in 1781, to 572,000 in 1820, to 871,000 in

1830, and to 3,366,000 in 1860. Very early, therefore, came the query

whence the supply of raw cotton was to come. Tentative experiments on

the rich, broad fields of the Southern United States, together with

the indispensable invention of Whitney's cotton gin, soon answered

this question. A new economic future was opened up to this land, and

immediately the whole South began to extend its cotton culture, and

more and more to throw its whole energy into this one staple.

Here it was that the fatal mistake of compromising with slavery in the

beginning, and of the policy of _laissez-faire_ pursued thereafter,

became painfully manifest; for, instead now of a healthy, normal,

economic development along proper industrial lines, we have the

abnormal and fatal rise of a slave-labor, large-farming system, which,

before it was realized, had so intertwined itself with and braced

itself upon the economic forces of an industrial age, that a vast and

terrible civil war was necessary to displace it. The tendencies to a

patriarchal serfdom, recognized in the age of Washington and

Jefferson, began slowly but surely to disappear; and in the second

quarter of the century Southern slavery was irresistibly changing from

a family institution to an industrial system.

DuBois, "Suppression of the Slave Trade," p. 151.

A list of the chief inventions most graphically illustrates the

above:--

1738, John Jay, fly shuttle.

John Wyatt, spinning by rollers.

1748, Lewis Paul, carding machine.

1760, Robert Kay, drop box.

1769, Richard Arkwright, water-frame and throstle.

James Watt, steam-engine.

1772, James Lees, improvements on carding-machine.

1775, Richard Arkwright, series of combinations.

1779, Samuel Compton, mule.

1785, Edmund Cartwright, power-loom.

1803-4, Radcliffe and Johnson, dressing-machine.

1817, Roberts, fly-frame.

1818, William Eaton, self-acting frame.

1825-30, Roberts, improvements on mule.

Cf. Baines, "History of the Cotton Manufactures," pp. 116-23;

"Encyclopaedia Britannica," 9th ed., article "Cotton."

NOTE 2

In 1832, Alabama declared that "any person or persons who shall

attempt to teach any free person of color or slave to spell, read, or

write, shall, upon conviction thereof by indictment, be fined in a

sum not less than $250, nor more than $500."

Georgia, in 1770, fined any person who taught a slave to read or write

twenty pounds. In 1829 the State enacted:

"If any slave, Negro or free person of color, or any white person,

shall teach any other slave, Negro or free person of color to read or

write, either written or printed characters, the same free person of

color or slave shall be punished by fine and whipping, or fine or

whipping, at the discretion of the court; and if a white person so

offend, he, she or they shall be punished with a fine not exceeding

$500 and imprisonment in the common jail at the discretion of the

court."

In 1833 this law was put into the penal code, with additional

penalties for using slaves in printing offices to set type. These laws

were violated sometimes by individual masters, and clandestine schools

were opened for Negroes in some of the cities before the war. In 1850

and thereafter there was some agitation to repeal these laws and a

bill to that effect failed in the Senate of Georgia by two or three

votes.

Louisiana, in 1830, declared that "All persons who shall teach or

permit or cause to be taught any slave to read or write shall be

imprisoned not less than one month nor more than twelve months."

Missouri, in 1847, passed an act saying that "No person shall keep or

teach any school for the instruction of Negroes or mulattoes in

reading or writing in this state."

North Carolina had schools supported by free Negroes up until 1835,

when they were abolished by law.

South Carolina, in 1740, declared: "Whereas, the having of slaves

taught to write or suffering them to be employed in writing may be

attended with inconveniences, be it enacted, that all and every person

and persons whatsoever who shall hereafter teach or cause any slave

or slaves to be taught, or shall use or employ any slave as a scribe

in any manner of writing whatever, hereafter taught to write, every

such person or persons shall for every such offense forfeit the sum of

L100 current money."

In 1800 and 1833 the teaching of free Negroes was restricted: "And if

any free person of color or slave shall keep any school or other

places of instruction for teaching any slave or free person of color

to read or write, such free person of color or slave shall be liable

to the same fine, imprisonment and corporal punishment as by this act

are imposed and inflicted on free persons of color and slaves for

teaching slaves to write." Other sections prohibited white persons

from teaching slaves. Apparently whites might teach free Negroes to

some extent.

Virginia, in 1819, forbade "all meetings or assemblages of slaves or

free Negroes or mulattoes mixing and associating with such slaves,

... at any school or schools for teaching them reading and writing,

either in the day or night." Nevertheless free Negroes kept schools

for themselves until the Nat Turner Insurrection, when it was enacted,

1831, that "all meetings of free Negroes or mulattoes at any

school-house, church, meeting-house or other place, for teaching them

reading and writing, either in the day or night, under whatsoever

pretext, shall be deemed and considered an unlawful assembly." This

law was carefully enforced.

In the Northern States few actual prohibitory laws were enacted, but

in Connecticut, New York, Pennsylvania, Ohio and elsewhere, mob

violence frequently arose against Negro schools, and in Connecticut

the teaching of Negroes was restricted as follows in 1833: "No person

shall set up or establish in this state any school, academy or other

literary institution for the instruction or education of colored

persons who are not inhabitants of this State, or harbor or board,

for the purpose of attending or being taught or instructed in any such

school, academy or literary institution any colored person who is not

an inhabitant of any town in this State, without the consent, in

writing, first obtained, of a majority of the civil authority, and

also of the select-men of the town in which each school, academy or

literary institution is situated." This was especially directed

against the famous Prudence Crandall school, and was repeated in 1838.

Ohio decreed, in 1829, that "the attendance of black or mulatto

persons be specifically prohibited, but all taxes assessed upon the

property of colored persons for school purposes should be appropriated

to their instruction and no other purpose." This prohibition was

enforced, but the second clause was a dead letter for twenty years.

Cf. Atlanta University Publications, No. 6.

NOTE 3

Cf. Cairnes' "Slave Power."

NOTE 4

Stephen A. Douglas said "that there was not the shadow of doubt that

the slave-trade had been carried on quite extensively for a long time

back, and that there had been more slaves imported into the Southern

States, during the last year, than had ever been imported before in

any one year, even when the slave-trade was legal. It was his

confident belief, that over fifteen thousand slaves had been brought

into this country during the past year (1859). He had seen, with his

own eyes, three hundred of those recently-imported, miserable beings,

in a slave-pen in Vicksburg, Miss., and also large numbers at Memphis,

Tenn." It was currently reported that depots for these slaves existed

in over twenty large cities and towns in the South, and an interested

person boasted to a senator, about 1860, that "twelve vessels would

discharge their living freight upon our shores within ninety days from

the 1st of June last," and that between sixty and seventy cargoes had

been successfully introduced in the last eighteen months. (Cf. DuBois:

"Slave Trade," ch. xi.)

NOTE 5

Cf. Olmsted's "Journeys" and Helper's "Impending Crisis."

NOTE 6

Has not the time come for characterizing war plainly and ceasing to

envelope it in a haze of sentimental lies? We have near worshiped the

Civil War for a generation, when in truth it was a disgrace to

civilization and we know it.

NOTE 7

Cf. Blaine: "Twenty Years in Congress"; "American Political Science

Review," Vol. 1, pp. 44-61; _e.g._, "South Carolina, besides thus

minutely regulating the labor of Negroes under contract, prohibited

them from practicing the 'art, trade or business of an artisan,

mechanic, or shopkeeper,' or any other trade or business on their own

account without paying an annual license fee to the district judge.

And no Negro could obtain a license who had not served a term of

'apprenticeship' at the trade. Tennessee also required licenses; and

Mississippi required Negroes to have written evidence of their home

and employment. Mississippi also prohibited the renting or leasing of

any land to Negroes, except in incorporated towns and cities."

Louisiana had perhaps the most outrageous provisions.

NOTE 8

Albion W. Tourgee said: "They instituted a public school system in a

region where public schools had been unknown. They opened the

ballot-box and the jury-box to thousands of white men who had been

debarred from them by a lack of earthly possessions. They introduced

home rule in the South. They abolished the whipping-post, the

branding-iron, the stocks and other barbarous forms of punishment

which had up to that time prevailed. They reduced capital felonies

from about twenty to two or three. In an age of extravagance they were

extravagant in the sums appropriated for public works. In all that

time no man's rights of person were invaded under the forms of law."

Thomas E. Miller, a Negro member of the late Constitutional Convention

of South Carolina, said: "The gentleman from Edgefield (Mr. Tillman)

speaks of the piling of the State debt; of jobbery and peculation

during the period between 1869 and 1873 in South Carolina, but he has

not found voice eloquent enough nor pen exact enough to mention those

imperishable gifts bestowed upon South Carolina between 1873 and 1876

by Negro legislators--the laws relative to finance, the building of

penal and charitable institutions, and, greatest of all, the

establishment of the public school system. Starting as infants in

legislation in 1869, many wise measures were not thought of, many

injudicious acts were passed. But in the administration of affairs for

the next four years, having learned by experience the result of bad

acts, we immediately passed reformatory laws touching every department

of state, county, municipal and town governments. These enactments are

to-day upon the statute books of South Carolina. They stand as living

witnesses of the Negro's fitness to vote and legislate upon the rights

of mankind."

Cf. Love's "Disfranchisement of the Negro," p. 10.

NOTE 9

Cf. "The Economic Future of the Negro," in papers and proceedings of

the eighteenth Annual Meeting, American Economic Association, pp.

219-42.

NOTE 10

See Alabama Laws on Labor Contracts.

NOTE 11

See Laws of Alabama, 1906-1907.

NOTE 12

See Laws of South Carolina, 1906-1907.

NOTE 13

Cf. Bulletin Number 8, 12th United States Census.

NOTE 14

This statement when made was challenged by a Virginia rector. Let John

Sharp Williams, minority leader of the House of Representatives answer

him.

"It is the physical presence of the Negro which constitutes the Negro

problem and the race issue. It is not the fact that the Negro can vote

in the South, because, as a matter of fact, he cannot and does not.

The Negro problem would be just as troublesome as it is to-day if the

fifteenth amendment were repealed. The fifteenth amendment touches it

only on its political or voting side, where the trouble is cured

already in the South. It is true that the Negro does vote in Ohio,

Illinois and New Jersey and various other places. But the people of

those states could to-morrow, if they wanted to, get rid of his vote,

just as we have got rid of it in Mississippi. The very fact that they

have not done it is proof of the fact that they do not want to do it,

and that very fact is the death-blow of the Vardaman agitation."

Negroes are disfranchised by legal and illegal methods and by unfair

administration of the law. The "white" primary is a wide-spread

subterfuge: to the democratic primary election all white men are

admitted without question, and no Negro under any circumstances. The

verdict of the primary is then registered in a farce "election." In

Atlanta, _e.g._, at the "election" 700 votes are cast in a city of

100,000! The success of the "white" primary depends of course (_a_) on

the illegal power of the party chiefs to exclude any votes they choose

on any pretext and (_b_) on the absolute and unfair control of

election machinery and returns by one party and (_c_) on public

acquiescence in this travesty on popular government.

NOTE 15

The Atlanta riot had two distinct phases: first, Saturday, the killing

of innocent and surprised Negroes by a white mob; then a lull when

blacks rapidly armed themselves; finally the attempt to renew the

assault by a crowd mingled with county policemen, who were repulsed by

a fierce defense by Negroes; these Negroes were afterward acquitted of

murder by a southern jury. The number of white and black killed in

that encounter will never be known, but it stopped the riot. Cf.

"World To-Day," Nov. 1906.

NOTE 16

The executive officials of the miners in Alabama consist of four

whites and four Negroes.

NOTE 17

Ten good references on the economic history of the Negro and slavery

are:

1. Kemble, Fanny, "A Journal of a Residence on a Georgia Plantation,"

N.Y., 1863. 337 pp. 12mo.

2. Olmsted, F.L., "A Journey in the Sea Board Slave States," N.Y.,

1856. 723 pp. 12mo.

3. Cairnes, J.E., "The Slave Power: Its Character, Career, and

Probable Designs," London, 1862. 304 pp., 2d ed. N.Y. 410 pp.

4. United States 12th Census, Bulletin No. 8: "Negroes in United

States," by W.F. Wilcox and W.E.B. DuBois, Wash., 1904, 333 pp.

5. "The Philadelphia Negro" (Publications of the University of

Pennsylvania) 520 pp. Ginn.

6. "The Suppression of the Slave Trade" (Harvard Historical

Monographs, No. 1) 335 pp. Longmans, 1896.

7. Atlanta University Publications:

No. 3, "Efforts for Social Betterment," 66 pp. 1898.

No. 4, "The Negro in Business," 77 pp. 1899.

No. 7, "The Negro Artisan," 192 pp. 1902.

8. Bulletins of the United States Department of Labor.

Nos. 10, 14, 22, 32, 35, 37, 38, 48.

9. United States: Report of the Industrial Commission 1901-2, 19 vols.

10. Proceedings of the American Economic Association, 1906.

NOTES TO CHAPTER IV

NOTE 18

See Atlanta University Publications, No. 8, Section 4.

NOTE 19

"Baptism doth not alter the condition of the person as to his bondage

or freedom, in order that diverse masters freed from this doubt may

more carefully endeavor the propagation of Christianity." (Williams I,

139.)

NOTE 20

Cf. Dr. Albert Bushnell Hart, "The Realities of Negro Suffrage,"

Proceedings of the American Political Science Association, Vol. II,

1905.

NOTE 21

The Church of England through the "Society for the Propagation of the

Gospel" (incorporated 1701) sent several missionaries who worked

chiefly in the North. The history of the society goes on to say: "It

is a matter of commendation to the clergy that they have done thus

much in so great and difficult a work. But, alas! what is the

instruction of a few hundreds in several years with respect to the

many thousands uninstructed, unconverted, living, dying, utter pagans.

It must be confessed what hath been done is as nothing with regard to

what a true Christian would hope to see effected." After stating

several difficulties in respect to the religious instruction of the

Negroes, it is said: "But the greatest obstruction is the masters

themselves do not consider enough the obligation which lies upon them

to have their slaves instructed." The work of this society in America

ceased in 1783. The Methodists report the following members:

1786 1,890

1790 11,682

1791 12,884

1796 12,215

Nearly all were in the North and the border states. Georgia had only

148. The Baptists had 18,000 Negro members in 1793. As to the

Episcopalians, the single state of Virginia where more was done than

elsewhere will illustrate the result:

"The Church Commission for Work among the Colored People at a late

meeting decided to request the various rectors of parishes throughout

the South to institute Sunday-schools and special services for the

colored population 'such as were frequently found in the South before

the war.' The commission hope for 'real advance' among the colored

people in so doing. We do not agree with the commission with respect

to either the wisdom or the efficiency of the plan suggested. In the

first place, this 'before the war' plan was a complete failure so far

as church extension was concerned, in the past when white churchmen

had complete bodily control of their slaves....

"The Journals of Virginia will verify the contention, that during the

'before the war' period, while the bishops and a large number of the

clergy were always interested in the religious training of the slaves,

yet as a matter of fact there was general apathy and indifference upon

the part of the laity with respect to this matter.

"At various intervals resolutions were presented in the Annual

Conventions with the avowed purpose of stimulating an interest in the

religious welfare of the slaves. But despite all these efforts the

Journals fail to record any great achievements along that line.... So

faithful had been the work under such conditions that as late as 1879

there were less than 200 colored communicants reported in the whole

state of Virginia." (_Church Advocate._)

NOTE 22

Charles C. Jones: "The Religious Instruction of the Negroes in the

United States," Savannah, 1842. Cf. Atlanta University Publication,

No. 8, passim.

NOTE 23

Cf. Hart, _supra._ Note too the decrease in the proportion of free

Negroes.

NOTE 24

Note Dr. Cartwright's articles; DeBow's "Review," Vol. II, pp. 29,

184, 331 and 504. Cf. Fitzhugh, "Cannibals All."

NOTE 25

Cf. Weeks, "Southern Quakers and Slavery," Balt. 1896; Ballagh,

"Slavery in Virginia."

NOTE 26

There has been in the North a generously conceived campaign in the

last ten years to emphasize the good in the South and minimize the

evil. Consequently many people have come to believe that men like

Fleming and Murphy represent either the dominant Southern sentiment

or that of a strong minority. On the contrary the brave utterances of

such men represent a very small and very weak minority--a minority

which is growing very slowly and which can only hope for success by

means of moral support from the outside. Such moral support has not

been generally given; it is Tillman, Vardaman and Dixon who get the

largest hearing in the land and they represent the dominant public

opinion in the South. The mass of public opinion there while it

hesitates at the extreme brutality of these spokesmen is nearer to

them than to Bassett or Fleming or Alderman.

NOTE 27

Cf. "The Negro Church," Atlanta University Publication, No. 8. 212 pp.

1903.

NOTE 28

Twenty good references on the ethical and religious aspect of slavery

and the Negro problem are:

C.C. Jones, "The Religious Instruction of the Negroes in the United

States," Savannah, 1842. 277 pp. 12mo.

R.F. Campbell, "Some Aspects of the Race Problem in the South,"

Pamphlet, 1899. Asheville, N.C. 31 pp. 8vo.

R.L. Dabney, "Defence of Virginia, and Through Her of the South," New

York, 1867. 356 pp. 12mo.

Nehemiah Adams, "A South Side View of Slavery," Boston, 1854. viii,

7-214 pp. 16mo.

Richard Allen, First Bishop of the A.M.E. Church. "The life,

experience and gospel labors of the Rt. Rev. Richard Allen." Written

by himself. Phila., 1793. 69 pp. 8vo.

Matthew Anderson, "Presbyterianism and Its Relation to the Negro,"

Phila., 1897.

Geo. S. Merriam, "The Negro and the Nation," N.Y., 1906. 436 pp.

12mo.

M.S. Locke, "Anti-Slavery in America," 255 pp. 1901.

W.A. Sinclair, "The Aftermath of Slavery," etc., with an introduction

by T.W. Higginson, Boston, 1905. 358 pp.

N.S. Shaler, "The Neighbor: The Natural History of Human Contrasts"

(The problem of the African), Boston, 1904. vii, 342 pp. 12mo.

Atlanta University Publications:

Number 6, "The Negro Common School," 120 pp. 1901.

Number 8, "The Negro Church," 212 pp. 1903.

Number 9, "Notes on Negro Crime," 76 pp. 1904.

E.H. Abbott, "Religious life in America," A record of personal

observation. N.Y.: _The Outlook_, 1902. xii, 730 pp. 8vo.

W.E.B. DuBois, "The Souls of Black Folk," Chicago, 1903.

Friends, "A Brief Testimony of the Progress of the Friends Against

Slavery and the Slave-Trade," 1671-1787. Phila., 1843.

J.W. Hood, "One Hundred Years of the A.M.E. Zion Church."

S.M. Janney, "History of the Religious Society of Friends," Phila.,

1859-1867.

D.A. Payne, "History of the A.M.E. Church," Nashville, 1891.

S.B. Weeks, "Anti-Slavery Sentiment in the South," Washington, D.C.,

1898. "Southern Quakers and Slavery," Baltimore, 1896.

White, "The African Preacher."

* * * * *

+-----------------------------------------------------------+

| Typographical errors corrected in text: |

| |

| Page 162: 'My I add that' replaced with 'May I add that' |

| |

+-----------------------------------------------------------+

* * * * *