The Political Capacity
of The Negro
BY
Prof. KELL Y MILLER
Howard University
Washington, D. C.
[Reprinted from the "Nineteenth Century" of England]
Price 10 cents
1910.
MURRAY BROS. PRESS
WASHINGTON, D. C.
•I "The most remarkable article in the Nineteenth Century
this month is that on "The American Negro as a Political Fac¬
tor.'' It is written by Professor Kelly Miller, Dean of the Col¬
lege of Arts and Sciences, Howard University, Washington.
It is the most intrepid, thorough-going defence of the political
capacity of the Negro that I have yet seen. Prof. Miller's fer¬
vid plea for the African ought to produce the same impression
upon the educated men as Johnson's victory at Reno produced
on the mean whites everywhere. Give the Negro a fair chance
and he may be able to hold his own with the best of us."—
London Review of Reviews, W. T. Stead, Editor.
<5 "A remarkable article."—Birmingham (England) Daily
Mail.
"A vigorous, courageous defense of the political capacity of
the black man."—American Review of Reviews.
The American Negro as a Political Factor.
PROFESSOR E. A. FREEMAN once defined politics as
present histor}r, and history as past politics. With a
greater proneness for picturesque language, John J. Ingalls
described politics as 'the metaph3Tsics of force,' in which none
but the strenuous may expect to play a part. According to
Webster's Standard Dictionary, politics is 'that part of ethics
which has to do with the regulation and government of a
nation or State, the defence of its existence and rights against
foreign control and conquest, the augmentation of its stiength
and resources, and the protection of its citizens in their rights,
with the preservation and improvement of their morals.'
According to this conception, it will be seen that politics is
the chief concern of man in his associated relations, and con¬
ditions all other modes of activity, whether economic,
industrial, educational, or social.
The derivative or secondary meaning of the word 'polities'
is the management of a political party and the advancement
of candidates to office. Throughout our discussion it will be
well to keep sharply in mind the distinction between politics
as the science of government and politics as the art of
partisan policy and manipulation. In a country like ours,
where the functions of government are conducted through
partisan organizations, the secondary meaning of the word is
apt to obscure its primary significance in popular estimation.
The vast majority of people have no conception of the word
aside from partj^ contentions and the procurement of office.
So great is the perversity of popular understanding that to
refer to a public man as a politician is accounted an uncompli¬
mentary designation.
In considering the negro as a political factor, reference is
hardty ever had to the essential functions and purposes of
government, but he is regarded merely as the sport, the jest,
and the riddle of party rivalry. Our political philosophers
are inclined to ignore the negro as a constituent governmental
factor by reason of the manner of his introduction into this
country. The African was imported for the sole purpose of
performing manual and menial labour. His bodily powers
alone were called into requisition. His function was as
purely mechanical as that of the ox which pulls the plough.
He was a chattel, a part of the nation's material assets.
There was no more thought of admitting him into the body
politic than of'thus ennobling the lower animals. The gulf
that separated him from the proud Aryan was supposed to be
so wide and deep that the two races could never be made
amenable to the same moral, political, and social regime.
(1)
2
But the transplanted African has manifested surprising:
capacities and aptitudes for the standards of his European
captors, so that the races must now be separated, if at all,,
by purely artificial barriers. This upward struggle on the
part of the African has been against continuous doubt,,
ridicule, and contemptuous denial on the part of those who*
would profit by his inferior status. Those who once assumed
the piety of their day and generation at one time stoutly
declared that the negro did not possess a soul to be saved in
the world to come, but was merely as the beasts that perish;;
but he is now considered the man of over-soul, as Emerson
would say, by reason of his marvellous emotional character¬
istics. Then the wise ones maintained that he did not possess,
a mind to to be enlightened according to the standards of
European intellect, and hence he was forbidden a knowledge-
of letters. The same dogma affirmed that the black man
would not work except under the stern compulsion of the-
white man's beneficent whip, and that he would die out under
freedom. But all these dogmas have been disproved by the
progress of events.
The ancient doctrine of racial inferiority however, now re¬
asserts itself under a different guise. With a prudent general¬
ity it avers with great vehemence of spirit that the negro is
inherently, unalterably, and everlastingly inferior to the
white race as a part of God's cosmic scheme of things, andr
therefore, is an unfit factor for self-government, which is the
highest human function. It is a shrewd and cunning con¬
troversialist who posits the universal negative and defies the
world to disprove his thesis. His tactical method is to den}"
all things, and to ignore that which has been proved. But in
spite of it all, the negro is steadily and unmistakably moving
towards the great free ocean of human privilege, and, like
the mountain stream, though his progress here and there ma}'
be impeded and delayed, artificial barriers and obstructions
can only retard but not stay his onward flow.
The white race in this country is ensnared in the meshes of
its own law. The negro has been, and is, the incidental bene¬
ficiary of this entanglement. Circumstances have forced him
into a political scheme not designed for him. Universal prin¬
ciples have no ethnic quality. By the irony of history the
white man's maxims have risen up to trouble him. The Ten
Commandments will not budge, neither will the Declaration
of Independence. It is said that the Anglo-Saxon race is
noted for its bad logic but good sense. The revolutionary
fathers must have shut their eyes to the logical results of
their own doctrine, or else they lacked the courage of their
conscience. The negro has been the incidental beneficiary of
the two waves of revolutionary feeling which has swept the
current of popular sentiment beyond the limits of its
accustomed channel. He moves up and down on the scale of
national sentiment as the mercury in the thermometric tube,
3
Teaching blood-heat in periods of national stress and excite¬
ment and sinking to the freezing point in seasons of tran¬
quillity and repose. In none other than revolutionary crises
►could the Declaration of Independence have been written or
the last two amendments appended to our Federal Constitu¬
tion. The former held out to the negro the hope of ultimate
•citizenship and political equality, while the latter was the first
step towards this realisation. These two milestones of
promise and partial fulfilment were one hundred years apart.
As the nation is becoming settled in its normal modes, the
•disposition is to relegate the negro to a state of political
nullity.
But, despite this political apostasy, the negro constitutes a
political factor which cannot be ignored without local and
national peril. He constitutes one-ninth the numerical
strength of the American people, and is promiscuously
scattered over the whole geographical area of the United
States, ranging in relative density from ten to one in the
black belts of the South to less than one per cent, in the
higher latitudes. He furnishes one-sixth of the wage-earning
class, and is inextricably interwoven in the national, industrial,
and economic fabric. He speaks the same language, conducts
the same modes of activity, reads the same literature, worships
Ood after the same ritual as his white fellow-citizens. As the
late Dr. W. T. Harris once said, he has acquired the Anglo-
Saxon consciousness and put on his spiritual clothing. He
•delights in his new habiliment. He appeals to his white
brother in the language of Ruth to Naomi: 'Where thou goest
I will go; and where thou lodgest I will lodge; thy people
shall be my people, and thy God my God; where thou diest I
will die, and there will I be buried.'
A nation consists of the people living in a prescribed
territory who hold the same general belief, sentiment, and
aspiration. The negro is, therefore, not an alien but an
essential part of the body politic. He is not like the Red
Indian, with whose corporeal presence alone we have to deal
and who stands stolidly aloof from the great throbbing current
of national thought, feeling, and aspirations, but he is a vital
part in the spirit and potency of the national life. The negro
is not merely a recipient but a partaker in all of the objects
and aims of government. Is he not a vital element in every
measure intended to preserve the national peace and prosperity,
to augment the nation's strength and resources, for the pro¬
tection of citizens in their rights, and the preservation and
improvement of their morals? The negro may indeed be
eliminated by force as a factor in party management and
patronage, but he can no more be eliminated from politics, in
the broader significance of that term, than we can eliminate
one side from a triangle without destroying the figure.
In current political discussion the negro is ever referred to
4
as a negligible public quantitj". The term 'southern people,
by a strange twist of lexical usage, is intended to signify a
part, and sometimes a smaller part, of the community, and
3ret the negro in the South, in some instances, constitutes the
majority of the population and contributes the greater part
of the industrial strength, and makes possible the large
proportion of the public powers and functions of the State.
Whenever political exigency suggests the curtailment of the
representative power resident in the black population b}T wa}T
of reducing representation in the national Congress, the
beneficiaries of this power interpose the most strenuous and
vehement objections. The marble apex of a monument may
indeed look with despite upon the grosser material of its-
foundation, but it cannot den}r that the foundation is as
essential an element of the structuae as its more ornamental
and pretentious capstone.
The present reactionar}T political tendency has produced a
class of political leaders who base their motive on race hatred
and strife. They are adepts in the use of the dynamic power
of race animosit}r. Without philosophic insight or far-seeing
wisdom, they appeal to the passion of their followers with
utter recklessness of logic and conscience. That the negro is-
incapable of self-government is a maxim which springs
spontaneously from the lips of everv speaker and to the pen
tip of every writer who attempts to justify the unrighteous
and iniquitous political treatment which is accorded him.
This assertion they relish and roll under their tongues as a
sweet morsel. By hoary usage and glib recital it has become
a stereotyped motto. We are ever referred to the failure of
the native tribes in Africa, the dismal experiments of Hayti
and Liberia, and the reconstruction regime of the Southern
States. These are always recounted in the same order of
recital, and set forth with the same vehemence of rhetoric as
the basis of the same derogatory conclusion. The argument,
or alleged argument, has been repeated so often that the
indolent feel forced to accept it through sheer weariness. It
is dinged into their dull understanding by unending and
never-varying repetition as the recurrent chorus of a popular
song. The unvaried repetition of a hoary argument ordinariljr
damages the inteliectual reputation of its users as being
deficient in originality and resource; but those who delight to
belittle and condemn the negro are no whit abashed by such
considerations of moral and intellectual frugalit3r.
What is self-government? If by the power of self-govern¬
ment we mean the ability of any people to exist according to
the requirements of their own stage of development under
their own autonomy, and to adjust themselves to that environ¬
ment, then all the peoples on the face of the earth are capable
of self-government. If, on the other hand, it implies the
ability of the retarded races to regulate their affairs after the
fashion of the most advanced section of the European people,
o
then the question is not onl}T unnecessary but preposterous,
Ireland has for 3Tears been waging a gigantic struggle for the
priceless boon of self-government, as the Englishman under¬
stands and exercises that function, but England, on the other
hand, is determined towithold it on the ground that the wild,
h3rsteric Celt is not prepared to exercise so high a prerogative
with safet}T to himself and to the British Empire. The
masses of the population of Europe, with centuries of inherited
freedom and civilization behind them, are not deemed fit for
self-government in the most exalted sense of that term.
Indeed, it is onhT the Anglo-Saxon race that has as yet
demonstrated the capacity to use this prerogative as a means
of social and political progress. The revolutions and counter¬
revolutions, and rumours of revolutions, which are almost
dail}T occuring in South and Central American Republics, show
that the forms of government copied from Anglo-Saxon
models are far in advance of the development of these Latin
cop3Tists. Self-government is not an absolute but a relative term.
The Red Indian governed himself for centuries before the
advent of the pale-face, and throve much better under his own
autonomy than under alien control. The negroes of HajTti
tinder their own form of government are as happy and con¬
tented, as thrift3T and progressive, and are approaching the
standards'of European civilisation as surely and as rapid^ as
the corresponding number of blacks in Jamaica under British
control, or as a like number of negroes in Georgia under the
dominion of the Stars and Stripes. If it be true that the
negro has never shown any conspicuous capacit3r for self govern¬
ment after the European standard, it is also true that the white
race has not 3Tet shown any conspicuous success in governing
him.
The Republic of Ha3"ti, contrar3r to prevailing belief, is the
most marvellous illustration of self-governing abilit3T on the
face of the glob. Where else can be found a race of slaves
who rose up in their independence of spirit and banished the
ruling race to another continent, set up free government, and
maintained it for one hundred 3^ears in face of the taunts and
sneers and despiteful usage of a frowning world? If there be
imperfections, internal dissensions, and repeated revolutions,
it is merely a repetition of the experience of mankind in learn¬
ing the lesson of self-government.
Liberia is held up to ridicule and scorn, and pointed to as
an everlasting argument of the negro's governmental
incapacity; and yet we have here a handful of ex-slaves who
had only played for a while in the backyard of American
civilisation, and who, feeling the fires of freedom burning in
their breasts, crossed the ocean and established a government
on the miasmatic coasts of Africa. This Government has
been maintained, however feebly, for ninety years. For nearly
a century a handful of American negroes have exercised a
salutar3T control over two millions of natives, and have
6
maintained themselves amid the intrigue and sinister design
of great European Powers. If the colony at Jamestown or at
Plymouth had been forced to confront such an overwhelming
number of savages as the Liberian colony has had to do, and
had they been cut off from the constant stream of European
reinforcement, direction and support fifty years after their
foundation, the}T would have perished from savage onslaught
and the vicissitudes of the wilderness of the new world.
But those who deny the political capacity of the negro point
to the reconstruction regime, and exclaim 'What need we of
further proof?' At the time of reconstruction 95 per cent, of
the negroes were densely illiterate, none of whom had had ex¬
perience in governmental affairs. This happened, too, at a
period of general political and social upheaval, when the
country was overrun with nondescript and renegade advent¬
urers who were going throughout the land seeking whom they
might devour. They seized upon the newl} enfranchised
negro as their natural prey. And yet these ignorant ex-slaves,
amid all the snares which beset them from without and with¬
in, maintained Governments for several years, against which
the only charge that has ever been preferred is that they were
grotesque and extravagant. Grotesqueness is a matter of
taste. In many minds it is synonymous with the unusual. If
we are unaccustomed to seeing negroes in places of political
control, the spectacle of the negro Congressman or judge
would at first seem incongruous and grotesque, but as a part
of the usual order it would become normal and seemly in our
eyes. If we may believe the rumours of municipal mis¬
management, it is doubtful whether any one of the Southern
States, in their palmiest recostruction days, could equal New
York, Philadelphia, St. Louis or San Francisco in the quality
or extent of public corruption. The corrupting influence and
practice, be it understood, was not due to the initiative of the
negro, but of the white carpet-bagger and native scalawag
who exploited him in his weakness. These much-abused
'negro Governments,' as they are called, changed the oligarchy
of the conquered States into true democracies, inaugurated a
system of public instruction for all classes, and the general
character of their Constitutions was regarded as so excellent
that many of them have not been altered up to the present
time, except for the worse. As documents of human liberty
they stand out bold and pronounced as compared with the
tricky instruments which have supplanted them. They passed
no laws against human liberty, or at variance with the Con¬
stitution of the United States. They denied no man the God-
given right of liberty, or the constitutionally vouchsafed
privilege of participating in the Government under which he
must live. The failure of these Governments was inevitable.
To expect ignorant and inexperienced slaves to maintain a
Government not merely for themselves, but also for a greater
7
number of Anglo-Saxons witn trained faculty for leadership
and inborn power of dominion, is a proposition too preposter¬
ous for the present generation to entertain. The marvel is
not that thej^ succeeded so poorlj^, but that they proceeded at
all. It is not to the negro's discredit that he did not accom¬
plish the impossible.
It is time to lay aside the animosities of bygone recon¬
struction and consider the situation in the light of changed
conditions. The question of the present day is not whether
the negro can govern himself, but how far, with increasing
intelligence and substance, he can co-operate with the white
race in maintaining good government for all; and whether he
can be effectually ignored as a governmental factor by any
section of the country without accumulating serious peril, not
only for that section but for the nation at large.
That the participation of the negro in governmental affairs
constitutes a menace both to himself and the communit3r is a
dogma which has attained wide currency and general accept¬
ance in present-da}T discussion; but, like other damaging
dogmas of which he from time immemorial has been made the
victim, this proposition is not justly upheld by facts or
argument; and yet it has been proclaimed and asseverated
with such positiveness of assertion and rhetorical vehemence,
as almost to deceive his erst-while friends, who once
championed his cause as being entitled to the full measure of
the prerogative and privilege of an American citizen. The
former enthusiastic and aggressive attitude towards the rights
of this race has given way to a feeble, apathetic and
apolegetic avowal of faith in the abstract principle of human
rights, but there is a sinister indifference to practical applica¬
tion and concrete sanction. Such defenders of the negro's
cause
Damn with faint praise, assent with civil leer:
And without sneering- teach the rest to sneer.
This radical change of attitude has been due to a studied and
deliberate policy on the part of the more rabid and rancorous
anti-negro agitators, who study to make this race odious and
offensive in the eyes of the civilized world. They have
seized upon the evil deeds of the dastardly wrongdoer, and
exploited them to the everlasting detriment of a whole race.
Their chief delight consists in learning that some negro, in
some part of the land, has committed a flagrant and outrage¬
ous crime. They count that day a sad one when the niorning's
paper does not reveal that some one out of ten millions has
been apprehended for a grave and nefarious offence. With
ghoulish glee they revel in the hideous manifestations of
human nature if the culprit happens to be of the despised
blood.
Such a deliberate and calculated propaganda to exploit and
magnify the moral and criminal imperfections of any other
element of our population would blast and blacken the reputa-
s
tioii of the race held in despite, and make it odious in_ the
estimation of their fello;vv-men. If evenT offence committed
by an Italian wrongdoer should be magnified in its heinous
and hideous features, and proclaimed in flaming headliness
all over America as portraying the bestial traits and tenden¬
cies of the diabolical 'dago,' that race would soon be deemed
unfit to form a constituent and participating factor in the
equation of our national life. The negro race is daily sub¬
jected to microscopic search for shortcomings and imperfec¬
tions to be exploited for political ends. The negro is the
victim of the iniquitous propaganda that portraj^s and
magnifies repugnant imperfections which in the case of other
races are attributed to human frailty. This political
philosophy is clearly expressed in one of the homel3T maxims
of its chief philosopher: 'The negro is a frozen serpent, and
we propose to keep him frozen.' His facts are erroneous and
his philosophy is false. Tte negro is in no sense a menace to
America or to any part of it except in so far as ignorance is a
menace to knowledge, vice to virtue, degradation to decency;
and the onl}T effective way to relieve the menace of the situa¬
tion is by removing the cause and not perpetuating it under
the spell of any fancied dread. If the negro is to be kept
'frozen' under such frenzied philosophy, the white race, too,
may become frost-bitten b}T the resulting frigidity of the
atmosphere.
On the other hand, the ne£ro has evinced amazing patriotic
devotion. As soom as the first pangs of grief at severance
from his native land faded away, he fell complete^ in love
with his new environment. He soon forgot the 'sunny clime
and palmy wine' of his native land for the 'cotton, corn, and
sweet potatoes' of old Virginia. The negro is unsurpassed in
the strength and intensity of his local attachment. Herein
consists the true quality of patriotism. It is not to be found
merely in the achievements of renowned warriors and states¬
men, which indeed are their own reward. In this tense onl}r
a few conspicuous names in an3T country could be accounted
patriotic, but rather the duties and endearments of the com¬
mon people make the deeper and more lasting impression
upon the human heart. Robert Burns, the national poet of
Scotland, has seized upon the endearments and local attach¬
ments of the lowly life of Scotland and woven them into
soulful song, and has thus rendered old Scotia ever dear to
all mankind. If the human heart ever turns with a passionate
longing to our own southland, it will not be in quest of
traditions of their great warriors and statesmen, but rather
to revel in the songs, the sorrows, the sighings, and the
spiritual strivings as embodied in the plantation melodies.
Which of her patriotic odes would America not willing^ give
in exchange for 'Swing low, sweet chariot,' or 'Steal away
to Jesus'? Or where can be found a pathetic or patriotic
appeal more rac}1- of the soil and melting to the soul than
"9
Way down on fhe Suwanee River'? It Is curious that negro
furnished the musical inspiration for the Southern Confed¬
eracy, for the famous song of Dixie merely expresses the
.•songing of the slave to return to his native home 'way down
South in Dixie.'
It is claimed that it is the white man's country. This pro¬
position is understandable when we consider that the white
race constitutes eight-ninths of its population, and has
absorbed a still larger proportion of its material and substan¬
tial strength; and, representing as thej^ do the most populous
and powerful factor, they are fairly entited to, as they are in
the habit of securing, all that justly belongs to them; but,
according to any just and righteous standard, this country
belongs to the negro as much as to any other, not only be¬
cause he has helped to redeem it from the wilderness by the
energy of his arm, but because he has also bathed it with his
blood and watered it with his tears, and hallowed it with the
3rearnings of his soul.
Not only in local attachment but also in devotion of spirit
to American institutions and ideals the negro has played a
notable part. It was the negro slave whose blood was first
shed in the streets of Boston as an earnest of American
independence. The statue of Crispus Attucks on Boston
Common was doubtless intended to typify the spirit of the
revolutionary war, but it has a deeper and muter meaning.
It illustrates the self-sacrificing patriotism of a transplanted
race. In every national crisis the negro has demonstrated
his patriotism anew. It runs like a thread through every
chapter of our national history from Boston Common to San
Juan Hill. His soldierly service has not been that of the
Hessian hireling peddling his prowess for pay, or the cowardly
conscript forced to the front by the bayonet behind, but .he
has ever rushed to his country's battle-line with his country's
battle-cry exultant on his lips. He was with Washington in
the da}xs of Valley Forge. He was with Jackson behind the
fleecy breast-works of New Orleans. He responded two
hundred thousand strong to the call of Father Abraham for
the preservation of this Union; and it was his valour, as
much as any other, that placed the American standards on
the Spanish ramparts in the West Indies. Is it a political as
it is a sacred principle that without the shedding of blood
there is no remission of sins? If this be true, when we con¬
sider the blood of the captive making red the Atlantic current
on his way to a cruel bondage, the blood of a slave drawn by
the lash, the blood of the soldier shed in behalf of his country
the blood of the victim of cruelty and outrage, we ma'
exclaim, with Kipling :
If blood be the price of liberty,
If blood be the price of liberty,
If blood be the price of liberty,
Lord God! he has paid in full.
10
It does seem remarkable that this crude, untutored race'
without inheritance of freedom, should display such an absorb¬
ing- passion for free institutions. Throughout the whole
range of sectional contention the negro has been on the side
of liberty, law and the national authority. On the^whole he
has advocated the party, men, measures and policies that
were calculated to uphold the best traditions and the highest
American ideals. He is passionately attached to party organ¬
ization, which embodies principles too subtle to be grasped
in the abstract. His attachment to the partjr of Lincoln and
Sumner was characterized by blind hysteria verging on fanat¬
icism. He did not regard it as an instrument to be used, but
as a fetish to be worshipped. He bowed down before it with
reverence and gratitude and awe, as Friday before the gun of
Robinson Crusoe because it had once rescued him from circum¬
stances of great peril. This is the manner in which the ne¬
gro manifested patriotism. To him part}7 signified all that
there was worthy and noble in the country. All else was
ruin and destruction. His ablest and most sagacious leader,
Frederick Douglass, at that time counselled that 'the Republi¬
can party is the ship, all else is the sea.' The verdict of his¬
tory will show that even this excessive party devotion was in
the line of the highest and best patriotism, for the party of
his love was, at that time, the exclusive part}r of progress
and freedom. The political historian will seek in vain to find
in any national or local crises that the negro has ever upheld
unworthy local or national aim or ideal. The possibility of
such patriotic devotion ought to convince the nation that the
black race is a natural storehouse of loyalty which it may yet
be called upon to utilize in the day of peril. No people of
Anglo-Saxon breed would, like the negro, practise civic and
political self-sacrifice, and say to their country, Though you
slay me, yet will I serve you.'
By what possible stretch of argument can a race with such
potential patriotic capacity be construed into a menace to free
institutions? If there be any menaceful feature in the negro's
political status, it is merely that he grows out of ignorance,
poverty, and the resultant degradation. These are only tem¬
porary and incidental, and they endure only until adequate
means are put forth for their removal. There are some who
are blinded by the spirit of racial animosity and hate, and with
whom racial passion is the only political stock-in-trade, so that
they will willingly create a racial menace where none exists,
or perpetuate it though it might easily be removed. These are
the most unloyal, unpatriotic men in America, and could pro¬
fitably sit at the feet of the negro, whom they hold in despite,
and learn the fundamental principles of loyalty and devotion
to country and its cause.
That the negro is unfit to participate in any degree in the
affairs of government passes as a political axiom in some sect¬
ions of the country- Whoever dares question the validity of
11
this axiom, by that attitude puts himself outside the pale of
tolerant consideration. Acquiescence is the one test of politi¬
cal and social sanit}T. Men alwaj^s resent the attempt to up¬
root their fo'ndly cherished dogmas, especially if thejT inure
to their benefit or appeal to their vanity; but, like most pass¬
ionate dogmas, this one fails of substantiation when subjected
to practical test. Its only support is a vehement and intolera¬
ble spirit which is appealed to as the first and last principles
of argument.
Experience does not show that, where the negro exercises
the untrammelled right of franchise, he ever votes for men or
measures inimical to the best welfare of the country at large
or of the communit}r in which he resides. In Missouri, Ken¬
tucky, West Virginia, and Marjrland, where the negro vote
represents a considerable fraction of the totglelectorate, negro
voters uniformly support the best men and measures put for¬
ward in their respective States. The men who, in these bord¬
er States, have succeeded to office largely on the basis of neg ro
votes stand, and have alwa}TS stood, for the best local and
national ideas. If we take the personnel of the Senators,
Representatives, and local officials, with negro support, and
compare them with the corresponding officials, on the basis
of an exclusive white electorate, the former would suffer no
whit by comparison either in ability, devotion, or patriotic in¬
tegrity. In a border State, where the negro vote constitutes
one-fifth of the total electorate, desperate efforts have been
made to eliminate him from the franchise. The reasons urged
are mainly speculative and frenzied. The most ardent elim-
inatist may be confidently challenged to point out where the
negro vote in that State has ever resulted in the choice of un¬
worthy or incompetent public servants, or has promoted meas¬
ures contrary to the peace, progress, and well-being of the
commonwealth.
Since reconstruction, numerous negroes have filled official
positions under the Government, both elective and appointive.
They have usually conducted the business committed to them
to the entire satisfaction of the people, and have been subject¬
ed to the same test of competency as white officials in like stat¬
ions. The Chief Federal official in a Southern State is a negro
who has filled the position for thirteen years, and holds a
record of efficiency comparable with any official of his grade
in the entire public service. Protest against such officials is
not because they are incompetent or undeserving, but merely
because, for racial reasons, they are considered undesirable.
If the reasoning might be put in a logical formula, it would
run thus : 'The white man should rule; therefore the negro is
unfit to exercise any of the functions of government.' Or, as
a famous critic once said, Shakespeare should not have paint¬
ed Othello black, because a hero of a drama ought to be white.
The negro is now passing through the most distressing
stage of Ills political experience. He stands listlessly b3r as
his political rights are denied, his privileges curtailed, and
the current of public feeling grows cold and chilly. The con¬
stitutional amendments in the reconstruction States have
been and are inspired b}' the purpose to eliminate the black
factor from the govermental equation. This is the overt or
covert intention of them all. B}t the utmost stretch of ingen¬
uity and strain of conscience the technical phrasing oi the
letter ma)T seem to square with constitutional requirements*
but there is no room to doubt the underlying spirit and pur¬
pose. It does not lessen the fraudulent quality of fraud by
giving it legal sanction. These tricky and ingenious instru¬
ments may seem to do credit to the cunning of their devisers,
but they portra}T a lamentable state of the conscience. If the
offence must needs-come, it were far better that the wrong¬
doer should sin against the law than that the seared sonscience
of the State should enact an unrighteous code. President
Taft has explained, in extenuation of the devious devices to-
eliminate the negro, that statesmen in the afflicted StatesT
growing weary of individual fraud and violence, preferred
that the State should relieve the individual conscience b}T a
legal sanction. We condemn butchery and slaughter in Turk¬
ey, not because they are more outrageous than the innumera¬
ble murders and lynchings in the United States, but because
they have the tacit or avowed sanction of constituted author-
it)T. Lygching is the outbreak of an evil propensity which
constituted authorities are either unable or unwilling to
check; but is it not infinitely better that, if lynchings must
needs be, they should stand as an expression of individual sin
against the law rather than that they should be sanctioned by
law ?
No law, whether enacted by God or man, has ever been
perfectly obe3Ted. The Ten Commandments have been violat¬
ed hourly ever since they were announced amid the thunder
and smoke of Mount Sinai. Should the Divine Author, there¬
fore, modify his law to accommodate human frailties and im¬
perfections ? Above all things the organic laws of a State
should be fair and candid, and should recommend themselves
to the conscientious approval of all honest and upright citi¬
zens. Great indeed is the condemnation of that common¬
wealth whose organic law rests upon the basis of a lie.
These disfranchisement measures, harsh and severe as they
are in many features, meet with little or no opposition from
the nation at large. Although the clear and unmistakable
intent of the Federal Constitution is set at naught, yet the
nation suffereth it to be so. There is no moral force in the
nation at present that will lead to their undoing, and no poli¬
tical exigency seems to demand it. That they violate the
spirit, if not by letter, of the Federal Constitution is notorious.
Every fourteen-year-old child in America is fully aware of this
fact, and yet the nation winks at the violation of its own
13
fundamental law. Men of the highest patriotic and personal
probity ignore their oath to execute the law, and condone its
annulment. If there is a growing disrespect for law in the
attitude of the American mind, thecau.se is not far to seek or
hard to find. If one portion of the organic law of the land
ma3T be violated with impunity, why may not another if it
seems to conflict with our interests or with our prejudices?
The negro is impotent. He makes his pun}T protest, but the
nation heeds it not. It is like sheep proclaiming the law of
righteousness to a congregation of wolves. A complaint is
effective only in so far as there is power to enforce it. That
individual, race, or nation is considered cowardl}-, and justly
so, that will not use all avaible means to enforce a proper
recognition of its rights and prerogatives; while the woild
looks with comtempt upon a people who allow themselves to
suffer wrong and injustice without using the most effective
protests at their command. It also despises a lachrj-mose
race which possesses no language but a cry. The sufferer owes
it to the wrongdoer, not less than to himself, not to remain
impassive or indifferent under outrage and wrong. It lowers
the moral status of the perpetrator, not less than the victim,
to encourage him to continue in his career of evildoing with
none to molest or make afraid.
The Anglo-Saxon race boasts that it neither needs nor heeds
a law in face of its imperial will. It is his imperturbable spirit
That bids him flout the laws he makes,
Thats bids him make the laws he flouts.
And 3Tet this imperturable race must be amenable to the ethic
principles which operate regardless of ethnic proclivities.
The question as to whether might makes right must be rele¬
gated to the realm of pure morals; but sensible men know
that might is still the effective force in practical government.
In spite of constitutional compacts or written pledges, the
strong will rule the weak, the rich will control the poor, and
the wise will dominate the simple. In such contingences we
can always foretell the outcome with the predictive decision
of natural law, and we may rely upon the prediction with the
same assurance as we expect sparks to fly upward, or water to
seek its level. This may not be the written law or the preach¬
ed gospel, but in its effective sanction of the practical conduct
of men it is stronger than either. Social forces work out
their inevitable results as assuredly as natural causes. The
laws of social evolution are not going to suspend their oper¬
ation. No one expects that the earth will again stand and
gaze like Joshua's moon an Ajalon until a feebler contestant
wins a victory over a more powerful adversary. If history
teaches any clear lesson it is to the efiect that the developed
races are superior in all practical tests of power to the back¬
ward ones. This is especially true in the political arena.
It is this sphere that the Anglo-Saxon race manifests its pe¬
culiar genius. Worldwide dominion seems to be in the line
14
of its natural destin}r. The Englishman has clearly mani¬
fested his political superiorit}' over the Asiatic, as did the old
Roman over the Gaul and the Briton. A handful of English¬
men control the destinj- of two hundred million dusky Hindoos,
with as much ease as the legions of Csesar controlled the
nomads of the forests of Northern Europe. This political
dominance is not due to an attribute of blood, but rises from
a practical efficienc3T gained through the discipline of civilisa¬
tion. Thirty thousand American co-Liberians are able to
keep under governmental control two million of native Afri¬
cans by reason of their superior discipline and efficiency. All
of which goes to show that it is not blood but circumstances,
and conditions that count for political dominance. Negro
domination is an absurd and impossible issue which has served
onl)" sinister political ends. The negro, with his traditional
handicaps and political ineptitude, can no more dominate aii}^
section of the nation than the babies in the cradle. But con¬
science makes political cowards who tremble at a shadow.
A timid statesmanship is dominated by a fancied dread which
a sober judgment shows to be impossible of realisation.
The question of government of a heterogenous population
is always one of great difficulty and complexit}\ The racial
situation in the United States leads to an endless tangle.
The negro is promiscously scattered throughout the entire
white population. The unequal densit}" of distribution com¬
plicates the political question. If there were territorial com¬
pactness of this racial element, or if it were equally diffused
throughout the whole area, the problem in its political aspect
would be greatly simplified. It is a much simpler problem to>
formulate a satisfactorjT plan of political privilege for the
Philippine Islands than it is for South Carolina or Alabama.
The Filipino has territorial and racial solidarity, whereas in
the South two dissimilar classes cover the same area. It is
always easier to govern one race than two. On the other
hand, if the negro were equally distributed among the States
he would not constitute more than one-eighth of the strength
of any community, and there would scarcely be any necessity
for special political plans or policies to cover his case. As a
political factor he would be absorbed in the general equation.
The very complexity of the racial situation will ultimately
compel political and civil uniformity. In this country politi¬
cal, social, and economic conditions gravitate toward equa'lit3T.
We may continue to expect thunderstorms in the political
firmament so long as there exists inequality of political tem¬
perature in the atmosphere of the two regions. Neither Mass¬
achusetts nor Mississippi will rest satisfied until there is an
equality of political condition in both States. We are just be¬
ginning to appreciate the full significance of Abraham Lin¬
coln's philosophy when he said that this country cannot exist
'half slave and half free.' Democratic institutions can no
lb
more tolerate a double political status than two standards of
•ethics or dicrepant units of weight and measure.
All patriotic citizens must be interested in any honest effort
to purify and elevate the suffrage. Honest effort to eliminate
ignorance and corruption, in order to promote good govern¬
ment for all the people, must be appreciated as a poltiical exi¬
gency, if not approved as a political principle. But no plan,
not based on racial grounds and operated by tricky and fraud¬
ulent manipulation, can be devised which will shut in all
white men and shut out all negroes. No such racial separa-
trix can be found. The clear purpose of the revised constitu¬
tion, as is shown by ancestry clauses as well as by unfair man¬
ipulation of these laws between the races, is to eliminate the ne-
^ro wholl\T from all governmental control. The negro is will¬
ing to any test which the white race is willing to impose upon
itself. He is willing to drink of the political cup of which
the white man drinks, and to be baptised with the baptism
with which he is baptised withal.
There are in the United States ten million of negroes, a
large proportion of whom possess the requisite intelligence
and general qualification for the exercise of the high function
of citizenship, and yet they are without a voice in the govern¬
ment. There is no negro in either House of the National
Congress, scarcely one in any State Legislature, to make the
laws b\T which the race is to be governed, nor yet a judge on
the bench to interpret these laws, nor an administrative
officer to enforce them. If the nation desires the negro to
develope into an effective factor of the American people he
must be given the same consideration, both before the law
and behind the law, as enjoyed by his white fellow-citizens.
He merely asks for equality of rights; no more, no less, no
other.
The contention that in a heterogeneous racial situation one
race alone must govern is without sanction either in ethics or
experience. No man is good enough to govern another with¬
out his consent. The rich are not good enough to govern the
poor; the Protestant is not good enough to govern the Catholic;
the white man is not good enough to govern the negro. The
class that is shut out from all participation in government
will soon be shut out from participation in everything else
that is worth while, and that the controlling tlass covets.
The privilege to work, to acquire an education, and to
accumulate property is indeed of great value, but it cannot
atone for the loss of the right to vote, which under our scheme
of government is the right preservative of all other rights
and privileges.
Experience shows that schemes of disfranchisement are
always accompanied by vehement onslaught on the negro, and
proscriptive legislation restricting his general welfare. It is
noticeable that, in sections of cities where disfranchised
neo-roes reside, there are few public improvements, because
Ifi.
the residents have no voice directl}r or indirectl}" in the choice
of the city councilmen. The black resident has no say as to
who shall be alderman from his ward, and consequently this
prudent official, exercising ordinary political sagacity, gives
first consideration to the insistent claims of his white constit¬
uents, who can influence his continuance in office. It is a law
of human nature that, where we are intent on our own interests,
we abate our zeal for the welfare of others who ma}r not be
insistent upon their own claims. If the Protestants had
exclusive control of government, the Catholics would have
little show of a 'square deal' where their interests seemed
divergeni or in conflict with the welfare of the dominant creed.
It is precisely for this reason that all elements in a heteroge¬
neous population should have some say in the common govern¬
ment. This county is making a mistake by depriving the
negro of all participation in government, locally and nationally.
The negro should be taught the beneficent purpose and
principles of law and order. He should be led to have implicit
faith in the righteousness and integrity of the law. Good
citizenship cannot be secured by holding up the harsh, the
cruel and repressive leatures of government. The policeman's
club is oftentimes the only governmental instrument with
which the negro comes in contact. No other enlightened
nation on earth adopts this method of dealing with a back¬
ward or retarded people. England, France, and Germany
always make such people see and appreciate the beneficent
ends of government by making them a participant factor in it.
There is no enlightened Government on earth, with a prudent
regard for its own best interests, that ruthlessly overrides the
sensibilities of the governed.
The political status of the negro will probably culminate
under the administration of President Taft. If by tacit
acquiescence he lends implied encouragement to the retro¬
grade tendency of the times, the repeal of the Fourteenth and
Fifteenth Amendments, which is now merely a matter of
academic discussion, may become a practical issue. If, on the
other hand, the last two amendments of the Constitution are
regarded as a vital part of that instrument whose enforcement
is involved in the obligation of his high office, then an
affirmative attitude will do much to check the growing senti¬
ment which makes the last addition to the highest law of the
land void and of none effect. President Taft comes of the
highest patriotic and philanthropic traditions and ideals; but
the tangle of the race problem will not yield to a generous
lisposition and personal goodwill, of which the President has
m unlimited endowment. To the negro the danger seems
chat he may allow the rights of a race to be sacrificed on the
liter of other pressing national problems. His ardent desire
o establish peace and goodwill between the North and the
.vhite South must meet with sympathetic response in the heart
>f every true and loyal American; but a sacrifice of the Four-
;eenth and Fifteenth Amendments is too great a price to be
17.
paid even for a consummation so devoutly to be wished. Mr.
Taft is the first American President to come to the office with
a colonial experience and policy whose very foundation rests
upon the inferior political status of the subject race. It is easy
to transfer the habit of mind and bias of feeling- from the
t1 ilipino in the Islands to the negro in the states. In his letter
of acceptance, Candidate Taft stated that he stood unequivo¬
cally by the Fourteenth and Fifteenth Amendments of the
Constitution, both in letter and in spirit. His advisory, though
unofficial attitude in the recent campaign in Marjdand was to
the same.effect. But these utterances were more than offset
by the statement in his inaugural address to the effect that he
would not appoint coloured men to office w;here local opposition
was gendered. This suggestion is sufficient to invite the
fiercest antagonism to the appointment of a negro to a federal
office in any communit3T in the United States. It seems some¬
what anomalous that in places where the majority of the
population are negroes who belong to the President's political
part}T, no one of this race can be appointed to any federal office if
the minority, who opposed his election, should enter protest.
From the present appearance of thing's, under the operation
of the announced policy of the President, there will probably
not be a negro office-holder in the South by the close of his
administration. The elimination of the negro from office in
the South means his eventual elimination in the nation.
Elimination from office means elimination from politics.
The fact that a Cabinet officer, in open public utterances,
boldly advocates the elimination of the negro from politics
gives the whole race much anxiety. Usually a Cabinet
Minister voices the policy and purpose of the administration
of which he forms a part. President Taft has finished the
first year of his administration. His policies are not yet dis¬
tinctive and definitely set. It does not yet clearly appear what
they shall be. Every patriotic and loyal citizen should be
patient with an administration charged with such heavy duties
and responsibilities, even though it may not be able at once to
stress the issues in which he is especially, even vitally, con¬
cerned. The negro is watching the administration of Presi¬
dent Taft with hopes and fears. May his hopes be triumphant
over his fears!
Kelly Miller.
Hozuard University, Washington.
August, IQIO.
Monographs on Race Problem
By KELLY MILLER
Social Equality
5 cents while they last
An Appeal to Reason, open letter to John Temple Graves
5 cents while they last
Roosevelt and the Negro
5 cents while they last
Forty Years of Negro Education
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Ultimate Race Problem
10 cents
The Political Capacity of the Negro
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ADDRESS AUTHOR.
RACE ADJUSTMENT
. . . by . . .
KELLY MILLER, Howard University,
Washington, D. C.
A Standard book on the Race Question.
Price S2.00
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wisdom in deduction than have ever before been dedicated to a work
of this kind by any member of his race."
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contribution this time from the most intellectual negro author living.—
Booh News Monthly.
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wishes and demands for equal recognition in civil and political rights
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