COLONEL ROOSEVELT AND WHAT I HAVE LEARNED FROM HIM
Some years ago—and not so very many, either—I think that I should have
been perfectly safe in saying that the highest ambition of the average
Negro in America was to hold some sort of office, or to have some sort
of job that connected him with the Government. Just to be able to live
in the capital city was a sort of distinction, and the man who ran an
elevator or merely washed windows in Washington (particularly if the
windows or the elevator belonged to the United States Government) felt
that he was in some way superior to a man who cleaned windows or ran an
elevator in any other part of the country. He felt that he was an
office-holder!
There has been a great change in this respect in recent years. Many
members of my race have learned that, in the long run, they can earn
more money and be of more service to the community in almost any other
position than that of an employé or office-holder under the Government.
I know of a number of recent cases in which Negro business men have
refused positions of honour and trust in the Government service because
they did not care to give up their business interests. Notwithstanding,
the city of Washington still has a peculiar attraction and even
fascination for the average Negro.
I do not think that I ever shared that feeling of so many others of my
race. I never liked the atmosphere of Washington. I early saw that it
was impossible to build up a race of which the leaders were spending
most of their time, thought, and energy in trying to get into office, or
in trying to stay there after they were in. So, for the greater part of
my life, I have avoided Washington; and even now I rarely spend a day in
that city which I do not look upon as a day practically thrown away.
I do not like politics, and yet, in recent years, I have had some
experience in political matters. However, no man who is in the least
interested in public questions can escape some sort of connection with
politics, I suppose, even if he does not want a political position. As a
matter of fact, it was just because it was well known that I sought no
political office of any kind and would accept no position with the
Government, unless it were an honorary one, that brought my connection
with politics about.
One thing that has taught me to dislike politics is the observation
that, as soon as any person or thing becomes the subject of political
discussion, he or it at once assumes in the public mind an importance
out of all proportion to his or its real merits. Time and time again I
have seen a whole community (sometimes a whole county or state) wrought
up to the highest pitch of excitement over the appointment of some
person to a political position paying perhaps not more than $25 or $50 a
month. At the same time I have seen individuals secure important
positions at the head of a manufacturing house or receive an appointment
to some important educational position that paid three or four times as
much money (or perhaps purchase a farm), where just as much executive
ability was required, without arousing public attention or causing
comment in the newspapers. I have also seen white men and coloured men
resign important positions in private life where they were earning much
more than they could get under the Government, simply because of the
false and mistaken ideas of the importance which they attached to a
political position. All this has given me a distaste for political life.
In Mississippi, for example, a coloured man and his wife had charge, a
few years ago, of a post-office. In some way or other a great discussion
was started in regard to this case, and before long the whole community
was in a state of excitement because coloured people held that position.
A little later the post-office was given up and the coloured man, Mr. W.
W. Cox, started a bank in the same town. At the present time he is the
president of the bank and his wife assists him. As bankers they receive
three or four times as much pay as they received from the post-office.
The bank is patronized by both white and coloured people, and, when last
I heard of it, was in a flourishing condition. As president of a Negro
bank, Mr. Cox is performing a much greater service to the community than
he could possibly render as postmaster. There are, no doubt, a great
many people in his town who would be able to fill the position of
postmaster, but there are very few who could start and successfully
carry on an institution that would so benefit the community as a Negro
bank. While he was postmaster, merely because his office was a political
one, Mr. Cox occupied for some time the attention of the whole state of
Mississippi; in fact, he (or rather his wife) was for a brief space
almost a national figure. Now he is occupying a much more remunerative
and important position in private life, but I do not think that he has
attracted attention to amount to anything outside of the community in
which he lives.
The effect of the excitement about this case has been greatly to
exaggerate the importance of holding a Government position. The average
Negro naturally feels that there must be some special value to him as an
individual, as well as to his race, in holding a position which white
people don’t want him to hold, simply because he is a Negro. It leads
him to believe that it is in some way more honourable or respectable to
work for the Government as an official than for the community and
himself as a private citizen.
Because of these facts, as well as for other reasons, I have never
sought nor accepted a political position. During President Roosevelt’s
administration I was asked to go as a Commissioner of the United Sates
to Liberia. In considering whether I should accept this position, it was
urged that, because of the work that I had already done in this country
for my own people and because my name was already known to some extent
to the people of Liberia, I was the person best fitted to undertake the
work that the Government wanted done. While I did not like the job and
could ill spare the time from the work which I was trying to do for the
people of my own race in America, I finally decided to accept the
position. I was very happy, however, when President Taft kindly decided
to relieve me from the necessity of making the trip and allowed my
secretary, Mr. Emmett J. Scott, to go to Africa in my stead. This was as
near as I ever came to holding a Government job. But there are other
ways of getting into politics than by holding office.
In the case of the average man, it has seemed to me that as soon as he
gets into office he becomes an entirely different man. Some men change
for the better under the weight of responsibility; others change for the
worse. I never could understand what there is in American politics that
so fatally alters the character of a man. I have known men who, in their
private life and in their business, were scrupulously careful to keep
their word—men who would never, directly or indirectly, deceive any one
with whom they were associated. When they took political office all this
changed.
I once asked a coloured hack-driver in Washington how a certain coloured
man whom I had known in private life (but who was holding a prominent
office) was getting on. The old driver had little education but he was a
judge of men, and he summed up the case in this way:
“Dere is one thing about Mr. ——; you can always depend on him.” The old
fellow shook his head and laughed. Then he added: “If he tells you he’s
gwine to do anything, you can always depend upon it that he’s _not_
gwine to do it.”
This sort of change that comes over people after they get office is not
confined, however, to the Negro race. Other races seem to suffer in the
same way. I have seen men who, in the ordinary affairs of life, were
cool and level headed, grow suspicious and jealous, give up interest in
everything, neglect their business, sometimes even neglect their
families; in short, lose entirely their mental and moral balance as soon
as they started out in quest of an office.
I have watched these men after the political microbe attacked them, and
I know all the symptoms of the disease that follows. They usually begin
by carefully studying the daily newspapers. They attach great importance
to the slightest thing that is said (or not said) by persons who they
believe have political influence or authority. These men (the men who
dispense the offices) soon come to assume an enormous importance in the
minds of office-seekers. They watch all the movements of the political
leaders with the greatest anxiety, and study every chance word that they
let drop, as if it had some dark and awful significance. Then, when they
get a little farther along, the office-seekers will, perhaps, be found
tramping the streets, getting signatures of Tom, Dick, and Harry as a
guarantee that they are best qualified to fill some office that they
have in view.
[Illustration:
“LITTLE TEXAS” SCHOOLHOUSE, ALABAMA
Which has been replaced by a $600 building
]
[Illustration:
“WASHINGTON MODEL SCHOOL,” ALABAMA
With dwelling for its two teachers
]
I remember the case of a white man who lived in Alabama when President
McKinley was first elected. This man gave up his business and went to
Washington with a full determination to secure a place in the
President’s cabinet. He wrote me regularly concerning his prospects.
After President McKinley had filled all the places in his cabinet, the
same individual applied for a foreign ambassadorship; failing in that,
he applied for an auditor-ship in one of the departments; failing in
that, he tried to get a clerkship in Washington; failing in that, he
finally wrote to me (and to a number of other acquaintances in Alabama)
and asked me to lend him enough money to defray his travelling expenses
back to Alabama.
Of course, not all men who go into politics are affected in the way that
I have described. Let me add that I have known many public men and have
studied them carefully, but the best and highest example of a man that
was the same in political office that he was in private life is Col.
Theodore Roosevelt. He is not the only example, but he is the most
conspicuous one in this respect that I have ever known.
I was thrown, comparatively early in my career, in contact with Colonel
Roosevelt. He was just the sort of man to whom any one who was trying to
do work of any kind for the improvement of any race or type of humanity
would naturally go to for advice and help. I have seen him and been in
close contact with him under many varying circumstances and I confess
that I have learned much from studying his career, both while he was in
office and since he has been in private life. One thing that impresses
me about Mr. Roosevelt is that I have never known him, having given a
promise, to overlook or forget it; in fact, he seems to forget nothing,
not even the most trivial incidents. I found him the same when he was
President that he was as a private citizen, or as Governor of New York,
or as Vice-President of the United States. In fact, I have no hesitation
in saying that I consider him the highest type of all-round man that I
have ever met.
One of the most striking things about Mr. Roosevelt, both in private and
public life, is his frankness. I have been often amazed at the absolute
directness and candour of his speech. He does not seem to know how to
hide anything. In fact, he seems to think aloud. Many people have
referred to him as being impulsive and as acting without due
consideration. From what I have seen of Mr. Roosevelt in this regard, I
have reached the conclusion that what people describe as impulsiveness
in him is nothing else but quickness of thought. While other people are
thinking around a question, he thinks through it. He reaches his
conclusions while other people are considering the preliminaries. He
cuts across the field, as it were, in his methods of thinking. It is
true that in doing so he often takes great chances and risks much. But
Colonel Roosevelt is a man who never shrinks from taking chances when it
is necessary to take them. I remember that, on one occasion, when it
seemed to me that he had risked a great deal in pursuing a certain line
of action, I suggested to him that it seemed to me that he had taken a
great chance.
“One never wins a battle,” he replied, “unless he takes some risks.”
Another characteristic of Colonel Roosevelt, as compared with many other
prominent men in public life, is that he rarely forgets or forsakes a
friend. If a man once wins his confidence, he stands by that man. One
always knows where to find him—and that, in my opinion, accounts to a
large degree for his immense popularity. His friend, particularly if he
happens to be holding a public position, may become very unpopular with
the public, but unless that friend has disgraced himself, Mr. Roosevelt
will always stand by him, and is not afraid or ashamed to do so. In the
long run the world respects a man who has the courage to stand by his
friends, whether in public or private life, and Mr. Roosevelt has
frequently gained popularity by doing things that more discreet
politicians would have been afraid to do.
I first became acquainted with Mr. Roosevelt through correspondence.
Later, in one of my talks with him—and this was at a time when there
seemed little chance of his ever becoming President, for it was before
he had even been mentioned for that position—he stated to me in the
frankest manner that some day he would like to be President of the
United States. The average man, under such circumstances, would not have
thought aloud. If he believed that there was a remote opportunity of
gaining the Presidency, he would have said that he was not seeking the
office; that his friends were thrusting it on him; that he did not have
the ability to be President, and so forth. Not so with Colonel
Roosevelt. He spoke out, as is his custom, that which was in his mind.
Even then, many years before he attained his ambition, he began to
outline to me how he wanted to help not only the Negro, but the whole
South, should he ever become President. I question whether any man ever
went into the Presidency with a more sincere desire to be of real
service to the South than Mr. Roosevelt did.
That incident will indicate one of the reasons why Mr. Roosevelt
succeeds. He not only thinks quickly, but he plans and thinks a long
distance ahead. If he had an important state paper to write, or an
important magazine article or speech to prepare, I have known him to
prepare it six or eight months ahead. The result is that he is at all
times master of himself and of his surroundings. He does not let his
work push him; he pushes his work.
Practically everything that he tried to do for the South while he was
President was outlined in conversations to me many years before it
became known to most people that he had the slightest chance of becoming
President. What he did was not a matter of impulse but the result of
carefully matured plans.
An incident which occurred immediately after he became President will
illustrate the way in which Mr. Roosevelt’s mind works upon a public
problem. After the death of President McKinley I received a letter from
him, written in his own hand, on the very day that he took the oath of
office at Buffalo as President—or was it the day following?—in which he
asked me to meet him in Washington. He wanted to talk over with me the
plans for helping the South that we had discussed years before. This
plan had lain matured in his mind for months and years and, as soon as
the opportunity came, he acted upon it.
When I received this letter from Mr. Roosevelt, asking me to meet him in
Washington, I confess that it caused me some grave misgivings. I felt
that I must consider seriously the question whether I should allow
myself to be drawn into a kind of activity that I had definitely
determined to keep away from. But here was a letter which, it seemed to
me, I could not lightly put aside, no matter what my personal wishes or
feelings might be. Shortly after Mr. Roosevelt became established in the
White House I went there to see him and we spent the greater part of an
evening in talk concerning the South. In this conversation he emphasized
two points in particular: First, he said that wherever he appointed a
white man to office in the South he wished him to be the very highest
type of native Southern white man—one in whom the whole country had
faith. He repeated and emphasized his determination to appoint such a
type of man regardless of political influences or political
consequences.
Then he stated to me, quite frankly, that he did not propose to appoint
a large number of coloured people to office in any part of the South,
but that he did propose to do two things which had not been done before
that time—at least not to the extent and with the definite purpose that
he had in mind. Wherever he did appoint a coloured man to office in the
South, he said that he wanted him to be not only a man of ability, but
of character—a man who had the confidence of his white and coloured
neighbours. He did not propose to appoint a coloured man to office
simply for the purpose of temporary political expediency. He added that,
while he proposed to appoint fewer coloured men to office in the South,
he proposed to put a certain number of coloured men of high character
and ability in office in the Northern states. He said that he had never
been able to see any good reason why coloured men should be put in
office in the Southern states and not in the North as well.
As a matter of fact, before Mr. Roosevelt became President, not a single
coloured man had ever been appointed, so far as I know, to a Federal
office in any Northern state. Mr. Roosevelt determined to set the
example by placing a coloured man in a high office in his own home city,
so that the country might see that he did not want other parts of the
country to accept that which he himself was not willing to receive. Some
months afterward, as a result of this policy, the Hon. Charles W.
Anderson was made collector of internal revenues for the second district
of New York. This is the district in which Wall Street is located and
the district that receives, perhaps, more revenue than any other in the
United States. Later on, Mr. Roosevelt appointed other coloured men to
high office in the North and West, but I think that any one who examines
into the individual qualifications of the coloured men appointed to
office by Mr. Roosevelt will find, in each case, that they were what he
insisted that they should be—men of superior ability and of superior
character.
President Taft happily has followed the same policy. He has appointed
Whitefield McKinlay, of Washington, to the collectorship of the port of
Georgetown, a position which has never heretofore been held by a black
man. He had designated J. C. Napier, cashier of the One-Cent Savings
Bank of Nashville, Tenn., to serve as register of the United States
treasury; and he has recently announced the appointment of William H.
Lewis, assistant United States district attorney, Boston, Mass., to the
highest appointive position ever held by a black man under the Federal
Government, namely, to a place as assistant attorney general of the
United States.
Back of their desire to improve the public service, Mr. Roosevelt and
Mr. Taft have had another purpose in appointing to office the kind of
coloured people that I have named. They have said that they desire the
persons appointed by them to be men of the highest character in order
that the younger generation of coloured people might see that men of
conspicuous ability and conspicuous purity of character are recognized
in politics as in other walks of life. They have hoped that such
recognition might lead other coloured people to strive to attain a high
reputation.
Mr. Roosevelt did not apply this rule to the appointments of coloured
people alone. He believed that he could not only greatly improve the
public service, but to some extent could change the tone of politics in
the South and improve the relations of the races by the appointment of
men who stood high in their professions and who were not only friendly
to the coloured people but had the confidence of the white people as
well. These men, he hoped, would be to the South a sort of model of what
the Federal Government desired and expected of its officials in their
relations with all parties.
During the first conference with Mr. Roosevelt in the White House, after
discussing many matters, he finally agreed to appoint a certain white
man, whose name had been discussed, to an important judicial position.
Within a few days the appointment was made and accepted. I question
whether any appointment made in the South has ever attracted more
attention or created more favourable comment from people of all classes
than was true of this one.
During the fall of 1901, while I was making a tour of Mississippi, I
received word to the effect that the President would like to have a
conference with me, as soon as it was convenient, concerning some
important matters. With a friend, who was travelling with me, I
discussed very seriously the question whether, with the responsibilities
I already had, I should take on others. After considering the matter
carefully, we decided that the only policy to pursue was to face the new
responsibilities as they arose, because new responsibilities bring new
opportunities for usefulness of which I ought to take advantage in the
interest of my race. I was the more disposed to feel that this was a
duty because Mr. Roosevelt was proposing to carry out the very policies
which I had advocated ever since I began work in Alabama. Immediately
after finishing my work in Mississippi I went to Washington. I arrived
there in the afternoon and went to the house of a friend, Mr. Whitefield
McKinlay, with whom I was expected to stop during my stay in Washington.
This trip to Washington brings me to a matter which I have hitherto
constantly refused to discuss in print or in public, though I have had a
great many requests to do so. At the time, I did not care to add fuel to
the controversy which it aroused, and I speak of it now only because it
seems to me that an explanation will show the incident in its true light
and in its proper proportions.
When I reached Mr. McKinlay’s house I found an invitation from President
Roosevelt asking me to dine with him at the White House that evening at
eight o’clock. At the hour appointed I went to the White House and dined
with the President and members of his family and a gentleman from
Colorado. After dinner we talked at considerable length concerning plans
about the South which the President had in mind. I left the White House
almost immediately and took a train the same night for New York. When I
reached New York the next morning I noticed that the New York _Tribune_
had about two lines stating that I had dined with the President the
previous night. That was the only New York paper, so far as I saw, that
mentioned the matter. Within a few hours the whole incident completely
passed from my mind. I mentioned the matter casually, during the day, to
a friend—Mr. William H. Baldwin, Jr., then president of the Long Island
Railroad—but spoke of it to no one else and had no intention of doing
so. There was, in fact, no reason why I should discuss it or mention it
to any one.
My surprise can be imagined when, two or three days afterward, the whole
press, North and South, was filled with despatches and editorials
relating to my dinner with the President. For days and weeks I was
pursued by reporters in quest of interviews. I was deluged with
telegrams and letters asking for some expression of opinion or an
explanation; but during the whole of this period of agitation and
excitement I did not give out a single interview and did not discuss the
matter in any way.
Some newspapers attempted to weave into this incident a deliberate and
well-planned scheme on the part of President Roosevelt to lead the way
in bringing about the social intermingling of the two races. I am sure
that nothing was farther from the President’s mind than this; certainly
it was not in my mind. Mr. Roosevelt simply found that he could spare
the time best during and after the dinner hour for the discussion of the
matters which both of us were interested in.
The public interest aroused by this dinner seemed all the more
extraordinary and uncalled for because, on previous occasions, I had
taken tea with Queen Victoria at Windsor Castle; I had dined with the
governors of nearly every state in the North; I had dined in the same
room with President McKinley at Chicago at the Peace-jubilee dinner; and
I had dined with ex-President Harrison in Paris, and with many other
prominent public men.
Some weeks after the incident I was making a trip through Florida. In
some way it became pretty generally known along the railroad that I was
on the train, and the result was that at nearly every station a group of
people would get aboard and shake hands with me. At a little station
near Gainesville, Fla., a white man got aboard the train whose dress and
manner indicated that he was from the class of small farmers in that
part of the country. He shook hands with me very cordially, and said:
“I am mighty glad to see you. I have heard about you and I have been
wanting to meet you for a long while.”
I was naturally pleased at this cordial reception, but I was surprised
when, after looking me over, he remarked: “Say, you are a great man. You
are the greatest man in this country!”
I protested mildly, but he insisted, shaking his head and repeating,
“Yes, sir, the greatest man in this country.” Finally I asked him what
he had against President Roosevelt, telling him at the same time that,
in my opinion, the President of the United States was the greatest man
in the country.
“Huh! Roosevelt?” he replied with considerable emphasis in his voice. “I
used to think that Roosevelt was a great man until he ate dinner with
you. That settled him for me.”
This remark of a Florida farmer is but one of the many experiences which
have taught me something of the curious nature of this thing that we
call prejudice—social prejudice, race prejudice, and all the rest. I
have come to the conclusion that these prejudices are something that it
does not pay to disturb. It is best to “let sleeping dogs lie.” All
sections of the United States, like all other parts of the world, have
their own peculiar customs and prejudices. For that reason it is the
part of common-sense to respect them. When one goes to European
countries or into the Far West, or into India or China, he meets certain
customs and certain prejudices which he is bound to respect and, to a
certain extent, comply with. The same holds good regarding conditions in
the North and in the South. In the South it is not the custom for
coloured and white people to be entertained at the same hotel; it is not
the custom for black and white children to attend the same school. In
most parts of the North a different custom prevails. I have never
stopped to question or quarrel with the customs of the people in the
part of the country in which I found myself.
Thus, in dining with President Roosevelt, there was no disposition on my
part—and I am sure there was no disposition on Mr. Roosevelt’s part—to
attack any custom of the South. There is, therefore, absolutely no
ground or excuse for the assertion sometimes made that our dining
together was part of a preconcerted and well-thought-out plan. It was
merely an incident that had no thought or motive behind it except the
convenience of the President.
I was born in the South and I understand thoroughly the prejudices, the
customs, the traditions of the South—and, strange as it may seem to
those who do not wholly understand the situation, I love the South.
There is no Southern white man who cherishes a deeper interest than I in
everything that promotes the progress and the glory of the South. For
that reason, if for no other, I will never willingly and knowingly do
anything that, in my opinion, will provoke bitterness between the races
or misunderstanding between the North and the South.
Now that the excitement in regard to it is all over, it may not be out
of place, perhaps, for me to recall the famous order disbanding a
certain portion of the Twenty-fifth Infantry (a Negro regiment) because
of the outbreak at Brownsville, Texas, particularly since this is an
illustration of the trait in Mr. Roosevelt to which I have referred. I
do not mind stating here that I did not agree with Mr. Roosevelt’s
method of punishing the Negro soldiers, even supposing that they were
guilty. In his usual frank way, he told me several days prior to issuing
that order what he was going to do. I urged that he find some other
method of punishing the soldiers. While, in some matters, I was perhaps
instrumental in getting him to change an opinion that he had formed, in
this case he told me that his mind was perfectly clear and that he had
reached a definite decision which he would not change, because he was
certain that he was right.
At the time this famous order was issued there was no man in the world
who was so beloved by the ten millions of Negroes in America as Colonel
Roosevelt. His praises were sung by them on every possible occasion. He
was their idol. Within a few days—I might almost say hours—as a
consequence of this order, the songs of praise of ten millions of people
were turned into a chorus of criticism and censure.
Mr. Roosevelt was over and over again urged and besought by many of his
best friends, both white and coloured, to modify or change this order.
Even President Taft, who was at that time Secretary of War, urged him to
withdraw the order or modify it. I urged him to do the same thing. He
stood his ground and refused. He said that he was convinced that he was
right and that events would justify his course.
Notwithstanding the fact that I was deeply concerned in the outcome of
this order, I confess that I could not but admire the patience with
which Mr. Roosevelt waited for the storm to blow over. I do not think
that the criticisms and denunciation which he received had the effect of
swerving him in the least from the general course that he had determined
to pursue with regard to the coloured people of the country. He was just
as friendly in his attitude to them after the Brownsville affair as
before.
Months have passed since the issuing of the order; the agitation has
subsided and the bitterness has disappeared. I think that I am safe in
saying that, while the majority of coloured people still feel that
Colonel Roosevelt made a mistake in issuing the order, there is no
individual who is more popular and more loved by the ten millions of
Negroes in America than he.