_Darkwater_ may be regarded as the reply to such a position as that taken by Dr. Stoddard. If the white world conceives it to be its destiny to exploit the darker races of mankind, then it simply remains for the darker races to gird their loins for the contest. "What of the darker world that watches? Most men belong to this world. With Negro and Negroid, East Indian, Chinese, and j.a.panese they form two-thirds of the population of the world. A belief in humanity is a belief in colored men. If the uplift of mankind must be done by men, then the destinies of this world will rest ultimately in the hands of darker nations. What, then, is this dark world thinking? It is thinking that as wild and awful as this shameful war was, it is nothing to compare with that fight for freedom which black and brown and yellow men must and will make unless their oppression and humiliation and insult at the hands of the White World cease. The Dark World is going to submit to its present treatment just as long as it must and not one moment longer."
Both of these books are strong, and both are materialistic; and materialism, it must be granted, is a very important factor in the world just now. Somewhat different in outlook, however, is the book that labors under an economic subject, _Empire and Commerce in Africa_. In general the inquiry is concerned with the question, What do we desire to attain, particularly economically, in Africa, and how far is it attainable through policy? The discussion is mainly confined to the three powers: England, France, and Germany; and special merit attaches to the chapter on Abyssinia, probably the best brief account of this country ever written. Mr. Woolf announces such fundamental principles as that the land in Africa should be reserved for the natives; that there should be systematic education of the natives with a view to training them to take part in, and eventually control, the government of the country; that there should be a gradual expatriation of all Europeans and their capitalistic enterprises; that all revenue raised in Africa should be applied to the development of the country and the education and health of the inhabitants; that alcohol should be absolutely prohibited; and that Africa should be completely neutralized, that is, in no case should any military operations between European states be allowed. The difficulties of the enforcement of such a program are of course apparent to the author; but with other such volumes as this to guide and mold opinion, the time may indeed come at no distant date when Africa will cease to exist solely for exploitation and no longer be the rebuke of Christendom.
These four books then express fairly well the different opinions and hopes with which Africa and the world problem that the continent raises have recently been regarded. It remains simply to mention a conception that after the close of the war found many adherents in the United States and elsewhere, and whose operation was on a scale that forced recognition. This was the idea of the Provisional Republic of Africa, the Universal Negro Improvement a.s.sociation and African Communities League of the World, the Black Star Line of steamships, and the Negro Factories Corporation, all of which activities were centered in New York, had as their organ the _Negro World_, and as their president and leading spirit Marcus Garvey, who was originally from Jamaica. The central thought that appealed to great crowds of people and won their support was that of freedom for the race in every sense of the word.
Such freedom, it was declared, transcended the mere demand for the enforcement of certain political and social rights and could finally be realised only under a vast super-government guiding the destinies of the race in Africa, the United States, the West Indies, and everywhere else in the world. This was to control its people "just as the Pope and the Catholic Church control its millions in every land." The related ideas and activities were sometimes termed grandiose and they awakened much opposition on the part of the old leaders, the clergy, while conservative business stood aloof. At the same time the conception is one that deserves to be considered on its merits.
It is quite possible that if promoted on a scale vast enough such a Negro super-government as that proposed could be realized. It is true that England and France seem to-day to have a firm grip on the continent of Africa, but the experience of Germany has shown that even the mailed fist may lose its strength overnight. With England beset with problems in Ireland and the West Indies, in India and Egypt, it is easy for the millions in equatorial Africa to be made to know that even this great power is not invincible and in time might rest with Nineveh and Tyre.
There are things in Africa that will forever baffle all Europeans, and no foreign governor will ever know all that is at the back of the black man"s mind. Even now, without the aid of modern science, information travels in a few hours throughout the length and breadth of the continent; and those that slept are beginning to be awake and restless.
Let this restlessness increase, let intelligence also increase, let the natives be aided by their fever, and all the armies of Europe could be lost in Africa and this ancient mother still rise b.l.o.o.d.y but unbowed.
The realization of the vision, however, would call for capital on a scale as vast as that of a modern war or an international industrial enterprise. At the very outset it would engage England in nothing less than a death-grapple, especially as regards the shipping on the West Coast. If ships can not go from Liverpool to Seccondee and Lagos, then England herself is doomed. The possible contest appalls the imagination.
At the same time the exploiting that now goes on in the world can not go on forever.
CHAPTER XVII
THE NEGRO PROBLEM
It is probably clear from our study in the preceding pages that the history of the Negro people in the United States falls into well defined periods or epochs. First of all there was the colonial era, extending from the time of the first coming of Negroes to the English colonies to that of the Revolutionary War. This divides into two parts, with a line coming at the year 1705. Before this date the exact status of the Negro was more or less undefined; the system of servitude was only gradually pa.s.sing into the sterner one of slavery; and especially in the middle colonies there was considerable intermixture of the races. By the year 1705, however, it had become generally established that the Negro was to be regarded not as a person but as a thing; and the next seventy years were a time of increasing numbers, but of no racial coherence or spiritual outlook, only a spasmodic insurrection here and there indicating the yearning for a better day. With the Revolution there came a change, and the second period extends from this war to the Civil War.
This also divides into two parts, with a line at the year 1830. In the years immediately succeeding the Revolution there was put forth the first effective effort toward racial organization, this being represented by the work of such men as Richard Allen and Prince Hall; but, in spite of a new racial consciousness, the great ma.s.s of the Negro people remained in much the same situation as before, the increase in numbers incident to the invention of the cotton-gin only intensifying the ultimate problem. About the year 1830, however, the very hatred and ignominy that began to be visited upon the Negro indicated that at least he was no longer a thing but a person. Lynching began to grow apace, burlesque on the stage tended to depreciate and humiliate the race, and the South became definitely united in its defense of the system of slavery. On the other hand, the Abolitionists challenged the att.i.tude that was becoming popular; the Negroes themselves began to be prosperous and to hold conventions; and Nat Turner"s insurrection thrust baldly before the American people the great moral and economic problem with which they had to deal. With such divergent opinions, in spite of feeble attempts at compromise, there could be no peace until the issue of slavery at least was definitely settled. The third great period extends from the Civil War to the opening of the Great War in Europe. Like the others it also falls into two parts, the division coming at the year 1895. The thirty years from 1865 to 1895 may be regarded as an era in which the race, now emanc.i.p.ated, was mainly under the guidance of political ideals. Several men went to Congress and popular education began to be emphasized; but the difficulties of Reconstruction and the outrages of the KuKlux Klan were succeeded by an enveloping system of peonage, and by 1890-1895 the pendulum had swung fully backward and in the South disfranchis.e.m.e.nt had been arrived at as the concrete solution of the political phase of the problem. The twenty years from 1895 to 1915 formed a period of unrest and violence, but also of solid economic and social progress, the dominant influence being the work of Booker T.
Washington. With the world war the Negro people came face to face with new and vast problems of economic adjustment and pa.s.sed into an entirely different period of their racial history in America.
This is not all, however. The race is not to be regarded simply as existent unto itself. The most casual glance at any such account as we have given emphasizes the importance of the Negro in the general history of the United States. Other races have come, sometimes with great gifts or in great numbers, but it is upon this one that the country"s history has turned as on a pivot. It is true that it has been despised and rejected, but more and more it seems destined to give new proof that the stone which the builders refused is become the head stone of the corner.
In the colonial era it was the economic advantage of slavery over servitude that caused it to displace this inst.i.tution as a system of labor. In the preliminary draft of the Declaration of Independence a noteworthy pa.s.sage arraigned the king of England for his insistence upon the slave-trade, but this was later suppressed for reasons of policy.
The war itself revealed clearly the fallacy of the position of the patriots, who fought for their rights as Englishmen but not for the fundamental rights of man; and their att.i.tude received formal expression in the compromises that entered into the Const.i.tution. The expansion of the Southwest depended on the labor of the Negro, whose history became inextricably bound up with that of the cotton-gin; and the question or the excuse of fugitives was the real key to the Seminole Wars. The long struggle culminating in the Civil War was simply to settle the status of the Negro in the Republic; and the legislation after the war determined for a generation the history not only of the South but very largely of the nation as well. The later disfranchising acts have had overwhelming importance, the unfair system of national representation controlling the election of 1916 and thus the att.i.tude of America in the world war.
This is an astonishing phenomenon--this vast influence of a people oppressed, proscribed, and scorned. The Negro is so dominant in American history not only because he tests the real meaning of democracy, not only because he challenges the conscience of the nation, but also because he calls in question one"s final att.i.tude toward human nature itself. As we have seen, it is not necessarily the worker, not even the criminal, who makes the ultimate problem, but the simple Negro of whatever quality. If this man did not have to work at all, and if his race did not include a single criminal, in American opinion he would still raise a question. It is accordingly from the social standpoint that we must finally consider the problem. Before we can do this we need to study the race as an actual living factor in American life; and even before we do that it might be in order to observe the general importance of the Negro to-day in any discussion of the racial problems of the world.
1. _World Aspect_
Any consideration of the Negro Problem in its world aspect at the present time must necessarily be very largely concerned with Africa as the center of the Negro population. This in turn directs attention to the great colonizing powers of Europe, and especially to Great Britain as the chief of these; and the questions that result are of far-reaching importance for the whole fabric of modern civilization. No one can gainsay the tremendous contribution that England has made to the world; every one must respect a nation that produced Wycliffe and Shakespeare and Darwin, and that, standing for democratic principles, has so often stayed the tide of absolutism and anarchy; and it is not without desert that for three hundred years this country has held the moral leadership of mankind. It may now not unreasonably be asked, however, if it has not lost some of its old ideals, and if further insistence upon some of its policies would not const.i.tute a menace to all that the heart of humanity holds dear.
As a preliminary to our discussion let us remark two men by way of contrast. A little more than seventy years ago a great traveler set out upon the first of three long journeys through central and southern Africa. He was a renowned explorer, and yet to him "the end of the geographical feat was only the beginning of the enterprise." Said Henry Drummond of him: "Wherever David Livingstone"s footsteps are crossed in Africa the fragrance of his memory seems to remain." On one occasion a hunter was impaled on the horn of a rhinoceros, and a messenger ran eight miles for the physician. Although he himself had been wounded for life by a lion and his friends said that he should not ride at night through a wood infested with beasts, Livingstone insisted on his Christian duty to go, only to find that the man had died and to be obliged to retrace his footsteps. Again and again his party would have been destroyed if it had not been for his own unbounded tact and courage, and after his death at Chitambo"s village Susi and Chuma journeyed for nine months and over eight hundred miles to take his body to the coast. "We work for a glorious future," said he, "which we are not destined to see--the golden age which has not been, but will yet be.
We are only morning-stars shining in the dark, but the glorious morn will break, the good time coming yet. For this time we work; may G.o.d accept our imperfect service."
About the time that Livingstone was pa.s.sing off the scene another strong man, one of England"s "empire builders," began his famous career. Going first to South Africa as a young man in quest of health, Cecil Rhodes soon made a huge fortune out of Kimberley diamonds and Transvaal gold, and by 1890 had become the Prime Minister of Cape Colony. In the pursuit of his aims he was absolutely unscrupulous. He refused to recognize any rights of the Portuguese in Matabeleland and Mashonaland; he drove hard bargains with the Germans and the French; he defied the Boers; and to him the native Africans were simply so many tools for the heaping up of gold. n.o.body ever said of him that he left a "fragrant memory" behind him; but thousands of bruised bodies and broken hearts bore witness to his policy. According to the ideals of modern England, however, he was a great man. What the Negro in the last a.n.a.lysis wonders is: Who was right, Livingstone or Rhodes? And which is the world to choose, Christ or Mammon?
There are two fundamental a.s.sumptions upon which all so-called Western civilization is based--that of racial and that of religious superiority.
Sight has been lost of the fact that there is really no such thing as a superior race, that only individuals are superior one to another, and a popular English poet has sung of "the white man"s burden" and of "lesser breeds without the law." These two a.s.sumptions have accounted for all of the misunderstanding that has arisen between the West and the East, for China and j.a.pan, India and Egypt can not see by what divine right men from the West suppose that they have the only correct ancestry or by what conceit they presume to have the only true faith. Let them but be accepted, however, let a nation be led by them as guiding-stars, and England becomes justified in forcing her system upon India, she finds it necessary to send missionaries to j.a.pan, and the lion"s paw pounces upon the very islands of the sea.
The whole world, however, is now rising as never before against any semblance of selfishness on the part of great powers, and it is more than ever clear that before there can be any genuine progress toward the brotherhood of man, or toward comity among nations, one man will have to give some consideration to the other man"s point of view. One people will have to respect another people"s tradition. The Russo-j.a.panese War gave men a new vision. The whole world gazed upon a new power in the East--one that could be dealt with only upon equal terms. Meanwhile there was unrest in India, and in Africa there were insurrections of increasing bitterness and fierceness. Africa especially had been misrepresented. The people were all said to be savages and cannibals, almost hopelessly degraded. The traders and the politicians knew better.
They knew that there were tribes and tribes in Africa, that many of the chiefs were upright and wise and proud of their tradition, and that the land could not be seized any too quickly. Hence they made haste to get into the game.
It is increasingly evident also that the real leadership of the world is a matter not of race, not even of professed religion, but of principle.
Within the last hundred years, as science has flourished and colonization grown, we have been led astray by materialism. The worship of the dollar has become a fetish, and the man or the nation that had the money felt that it was ordained of G.o.d to rule the universe. Germany was led astray by this belief, but it is England, not Germany, that has most thoroughly mastered the _Art of Colonization_. Crown colonies are to be operated in the interest of the owners. Jingoism is king. It matters not that the people in India and Africa, in Hayti and the Philippines, object to our benevolence; _we_ know what is good for them and therefore they should be satisfied.
In Jamaica to-day the poorer people can not get employment; and yet, rather than accept the supply at hand, the powers of privilege import "coolie" labor, a still cheaper supply. In Sierra Leone, where certainly there has been time to see the working of the principle, native young men crowd about the wharves and seize any chance to earn a penny, simply because there is no work at hand to do--nothing that would genuinely nourish independence and self-respect.
It is not strange that the worship of industrialism, with its attendant compet.i.tion, finally brought about the most disastrous war in history and such a breakdown of all principles of morality as made the whole world stand aghast. Womanhood was no longer sacred; old ideas of ethics vanished; Christ himself was crucified again--everything holy and lovely was given to the grasping demon of Wealth.
Suddenly men realized that England had lost the moral leadership of the world. Lured by the ideals of Rhodes, the country that gave to mankind _Magna Charta_ seemed now bent only on its own aggrandizement and preservation. Germany"s colonies were seized, and anything that threatened the permanence of the dominant system, especially unrest on the part of the native African, was throttled. Briton and Boer began to feel an ident.i.ty of interest, and especially was it made known that American Negroes were not wanted.
Just what the situation is to-day may be ill.u.s.trated by the simple matter of foreign missions, the policy of missionary organizations in both England and America being dictated by the political policy of the empire. The appointing of Negroes by the great American denominations for service in Africa has practically ceased, for American Negroes are not to be admitted to any portion of the continent except Liberia, which, after all, is a very small part of the whole. For the time being the little republic seems to receive countenance from the great powers as a sort of safety-valve through which the aspiration of the Negro people might spend itself; but it is evident that the present understanding is purely artificial and can not last. Even the Roman Empire declined, and Germany lost her hold in Africa overnight. Of course it may be contended that the British Empire to-day is not decadent but stronger than ever. At the same time there can be no doubt that Englishman and Boer alike regard these teeming millions of prolific black people always with concern and sometimes with dismay. Natives of the Congo still bear the marks of mutilation, and men in South Africa chafe under unjust land acts and constant indignities in their daily life.
Here rises the question for our own country. To the United States at last has come that moral leadership--that obligation to do the right thing--that opportunity to exhibit the highest honor in all affairs foreign or domestic--that is the ultimate test of greatness. Is America to view this great problem in Africa sympathetically and find some place for the groping for freedom of millions of human beings, or is she to be simply a p.a.w.n in the game of English colonization? Is she to abide by the principles that guided her in 1776, or simply seize her share of the booty? The Negro either at home or abroad is only one of many moral problems with which she has to deal. At the close of the war extravagance reigned, crime was rampant, and against any one of three or four races there was insidious propaganda. To add to the difficulties, the government was still so dominated by politics and officialdom that it was almost always impossible to get things done at the time they needed to be done. At the same time every patriot knows that America is truly the hope of the world. Into her civilization and her glory have entered not one but many races. All go forth against a common enemy; all should share the duties and the privileges of citizenship. In such a country the law can know no difference of race or cla.s.s or creed, provided all are devoted to the general welfare. Such is the obligation resting upon the United States--such the challenge of social, economic, and moral questions such as never before faced the children of men. That she be worthy of her opportunity all would pray; to the fulfilment of her destiny all should help. The eyes of the world are upon her; the scepter of the ages is in her hand.
2. _The Negro in American Life_
If now we come to the Negro in the United States, it is hardly an exaggeration to say that no other race in the American body politic, not even the Anglo-Saxon, has been studied more critically than this one, and treatment has varied all the way from the celebration of virtues to the bitterest hostility and malignity. It is clearly fundamentally necessary to pay some attention to racial characteristics and gifts.
In recent years there has been much discussion from the standpoint of biology, and special emphasis has been placed on the emotional temperament of the race. The Negro, however, submits that in the United States he has not been chiefly responsible for such miscegenation as has taken place; but he is not content to rest simply upon a _tu quoque_.
He calls attention to the fact that whereas it has been charged that lynchings find their excuse in rape, it has been shown again and again that this crime is the excuse for only one-fourth or one-fifth of the cases of violence. If for the moment we suppose that there is no question about guilt in a fourth or a fifth of the cases, the overwhelming fraction that remains indicates that there are other factors of the highest importance that have to be considered in any ultimate adjustment of the situation. In every case accordingly the Negro asks only for a fair trial in court--not too hurried; and he knows that in many instances a calm study of the facts will reveal nothing more than fright or hysteria on the part of a woman or even other circ.u.mstances not more incriminating.
Unfortunately the whole question of the Negro has been beclouded by misrepresentation as has no other social question before the American people, and the race asks simply first of all that the tissue of depreciation raised by prejudice be done away with in order that it may be judged and estimated for its quality. America can make no charges against any element of her population while she denies the fundamental right of citizenships--the protection of the individual person. Too often mistakes are made, and no man is so humble or so low that he should be deprived of his life without due process of law. The Negro undoubtedly has faults. At the same time, in order that his gifts may receive just consideration, the tradition of burlesque must for the time being be forgotten. All stories about razors, chickens, and watermelons must be relegated to the rear; and even the revered and beloved "black mammy" must receive an affectionate but a long farewell.
The fact is that the Negro has such a contagious brand of humor that many people never realize that this plays only on the surface. The real background of the race is one of tragedy. It is not in current jest but in the wail of the old melodies that the soul of this people is found.
There is something elemental about the heart of the race, something that finds its origin in the forest and in the falling of the stars. There is something grim about it too, something that speaks of the lash, of the child torn from its mother"s bosom, of the dead body swinging at night by the roadside. The race has suffered, and in its suffering lies its destiny and its contribution to America; and hereby hangs a tale.
If we study the real quality of the Negro we shall find that two things are observable. One is that any distinction so far won by a member of the race in America has been almost always in some one of the arts; and the other is that any influence so far exerted by the Negro on American civilization has been primarily in the field of aesthetics. The reason is not far to seek, and is to be found in the artistic striving even of untutored Negroes. The instinct for beauty insists upon an outlet, and if one can find no better picture he will paste a circus poster or a flaring advertis.e.m.e.nt on the wall. Very few homes have not at least a geranium on the windowsill or a rosebush in the garden. If we look at the matter conversely we shall find that those things which are most picturesque make to the Negro the readiest appeal. Red is his favorite color simply because it is the most p.r.o.nounced of all colors. The principle holds in the sphere of religion. In some of our communities Negroes are known to "get happy" in church. It is, however, seldom a sermon on the rule of faith or the plan of salvation that awakens such ecstasy, but rather a vivid portrayal of the beauties of heaven, with the walls of jasper, the feast of milk and honey, and the angels with palms in their hands. The appeal is primarily sensuous, and it is hardly too much to say that the Negro is thrilled not so much by the moral as by the artistic and pictorial elements in religion. Every member of the race is an incipient poet, and all are enthralled by music and oratory.
Ill.u.s.trations are abundant. We might refer to the oratory of Dougla.s.s, to the poetry of Dunbar, to the picturesque style of DuBois, to the mysticism of the paintings of Tanner, to the tragic sculpture of Meta Warrick Fuller, and to a long line of singers and musicians. Even Booker Washington, most practical of Americans, proves the point, the distinguishing qualities of his speeches being anecdote and vivid ill.u.s.tration. It is best, however, to consider members of the race who were entirely untaught in the schools. On one occasion Harriet Tubman, famous for her work in the Underground Railroad, was addressing an audience and describing a great battle in the Civil War. "And then,"
said she, "we saw the lightning, and that was the guns; and then we heard the thunder, and that was the big guns; and then we heard the rain falling, and that was drops of blood falling; and when we came to git in the c.r.a.ps, it was dead men that we reaped." Two decades after the war John Jasper, of Richmond, Virginia, astonished the most intelligent hearers by the power of his imagery. He preached not only that the "sun do move," but also of "dry bones in the valley," the glories of the New Jerusalem, and on many similar subjects that have been used by other preachers, sometimes with hardly less effect, throughout the South. In his own way Jasper was an artist. He was eminently imaginative; and it is with this imaginative--this artistic--quality that America has yet to reckon.
The importance of the influence has begun to be recognized, and on the principle that to him that hath shall be given, in increasing measure the Negro is being blamed for the ills of American life, a ready excuse being found in the perversion and debas.e.m.e.nt of Negro music. We have seen discussions whose reasoning, condensed, was somewhat as follows: The Negro element is daily becoming more potent in American society; American society is daily becoming more immoral; therefore at the door of the Negro may be laid the increase in divorce and all the other evils of society. The most serious charge brought against the Negro intellectually is that he has not yet developed the great creative or organizing mind that points the way of civilization. He most certainly has not, and in this he is not very unlike all the other people in America. The whole country is still in only the earlier years of its striving. While the United States has made great advance in applied science, she has as yet produced no Shakespeare or Beethoven. If America has not yet reached her height after three hundred years of striving, she ought not to be impatient with the Negro after only sixty years of opportunity. But all signs go to prove the a.s.sumption of limited intellectual ability fundamentally false. Already some of the younger men of the race have given the highest possible promise.
If all of this, however, is granted, and if the Negro"s exemplification of the principle of self-help is also recognized, the question still remains: Just what is the race worth as a constructive factor in American civilization? Is it finally to be an agency for the upbuilding of the nation, or simply one of the forces that r.e.t.a.r.d? What is its real promise in American life?
In reply to this it might be worth while to consider first of all the country"s industrial life. The South, and very largely the whole country, depends upon Negro men and women as the stable labor supply in such occupations as farming, saw-milling, mining, cooking, and washing.
All of this is hard work, and necessary work. In 1910, of 3,178,554 Negro men at work, 981,922 were listed as farm laborers and 798,509 as farmers. That is to say, 56 per cent of the whole number were engaged in raising farm products either on their own account or by way of a.s.sisting somebody else, and the great staples of course were the cotton and corn of the Southern states. If along with the farmers we take those engaged in the occupations employing the next greatest numbers of men--those of the building and hand trades, saw and planing mills, as well as those of railway firemen and porters, draymen, teamsters, and coal mine operatives--we shall find a total of 71.2 per cent engaged in such work as represents the very foundation of American industry. Of the women at work, 1,047,146, or 52 per cent, were either farm laborers or farmers, and 28 per cent more were either cooks or washerwomen. In other words, a total of exactly 80 per cent were engaged in some of the hardest and at the same time some of the most vital labor in our home and industrial life. The new emphasis on the Negro as an industrial factor in the course of the recent war is well known. When immigration ceased, upon his shoulders very largely fell the task of keeping the country and the army alive. Since the war closed he has been on the defensive in the North; but a country that wishes to consider all of the factors that enter into its gravest social problem could never forget his valiant service in 1918. Let any one ask, moreover, even the most prejudiced observer, if he would like to see every Negro in the country out of it, and he will then decide whether economically the Negro is a liability or an a.s.set.
Again, consider the Negro soldier. In all our history there are no pages more heroic, more pathetic, than those detailing the exploits of black men. We remember the Negro, three thousand strong, fighting for the liberties of America when his own race was still held in bondage. We remember the deeds at Port Hudson, Fort Pillow, and Fort Wagner. We remember Santiago and San Juan Hill, not only how Negro men went gallantly to the charge, but how a black regiment faced pestilence that the ranks of their white comrades might not be decimated. And then Carrizal. Once more, at an unexpected moment, the heart of the nation was thrilled by the troopers of the Tenth Cavalry. Once more, despite Brownsville, the tradition of Fort Wagner was preserved and pa.s.sed on.
And then came the greatest of all wars. Again was the Negro summoned to the colors--summoned out of all proportion to his numbers. Others might desert, but not he; others might be spies or strikers, but not he--not he in the time of peril. In peace or war, in victory or danger, he has always been loyal to the Stars and Stripes.
Not only, however, does the Negro give promise by reason of his economic worth; not only does he deserve the fullest rights of citizenship on the basis of his work as a soldier; he brings nothing less than a great spiritual contribution to civilization in America. His is a race of enthusiasm, imagination, and spiritual fervor; and after all the doubt and fear through which it has pa.s.sed there still rests with it an abiding faith in G.o.d. Around us everywhere are commercialism, politics, graft--sordidness, selfishness, cynicism. We need hope and love, a new birth of idealism, a new faith in the unseen. Already the work of some members of the race has pointed the way to great things in the realm of conscious art; but above even art soars the great world of the spirit.
This it is that America most sadly needs; this it is that her most fiercely persecuted children bring to her.
Obviously now if the Negro, if any race, is to make to America the contribution of which it is capable, it must be free; and this raises the whole question of relation to the rest of the body politic. One of the interesting phenomena of society in America is that the more foreign elements enter into the "melting pot" and advance in culture, the more do they cling to their racial ident.i.ty. Incorporation into American life, instead of making the Greek or the Pole or the Irishman forget his native country, makes him all the more jealous of its traditions. The more a center of any one of these nationalities develops, the more wealthy and cultured its members become, the more do we find them proud of the source from which they sprang. The Irishman is now so much an American that he controls whole wards in our large cities, and sometimes the cities themselves. All the same he clings more tenaciously than ever to the celebration of March 17. When an isolated Greek came years ago, poor and friendless, n.o.body thought very much about him, and he effaced himself as much as possible, taking advantage, however, of any opportunity that offered for self-improvement or economic advance. When thousands came and the newcomers could take inspiration from those of their brothers who had preceded them and achieved success, nationality a.s.serted itself. Larger groups now talked about Venizelos and a greater Greece; their chests expanded at the thought of Marathon and Plato; and companies paraded amid applause as they went to fight in the Balkans. In every case, with increasing intelligence and wealth, race pride a.s.serted itself. At the same time no one would think of denying to the Greek or the Irishman or the Italian his full rights as an American citizen.
It is a paradox indeed, this thing of a race"s holding its ident.i.ty at the same time that it is supposed to lose this in the larger civilization. Apply the principle to the Negro. Very soon after the Civil War, when conditions were chaotic and ignorance was rampant, the ideals constantly held before the race were those of white people. Some leaders indeed measured success primarily by the extent to which they became merged in the white man"s life. At the time this was very natural. A struggling people wished to show that it could be judged by the standards of the highest civilization within sight, and it did so.
To-day the tide has changed. The race now numbers a few millionaires. In almost every city there are beautiful homes owned by Negroes. Some men have reached high attainment in scholarship, and the promise grows greater and greater in art and science. Accordingly the Negro now loves his own, cherishes his own, teaches his boys about black heroes, and honors and glorifies his own black women. Schools and churches and all sorts of cooperative enterprises testify to the new racial self-respect, while a genuine Negro drama has begun to flourish. A whole people has been reborn; a whole race has found its soul.
3. _Face to Face_
Even when all that has been said is granted, it is still sometimes maintained that the Negro is the one race that can not and will not be permitted to enter into the full promise of American life. Other elements, it is said, even if difficult to a.s.similate, may gradually be brought into the body politic, but the Negro is the one element that may be tolerated but not a.s.similated, utilized but not welcomed to the fullness of the country"s glory.