Manuscript, Archives,
and Rare Book Library
EMORY UNIVERSITY
A FREEMAN
AND
YET A SLA YE.
By W. H. COSTON, B. I).,
WOHLWEND BROS., Printers, Burlington.
To lion. Frederick Douglass and Hon. John M.
Langston, who, by their integrity of character, un¬
wearied zeal and fidelity to public interests, hare vin¬
dicated the political and social aspirations of their race
this little volume is dedicated.
CONTENTS.
I. The Crime Against Christ.
II. Education Not a Specific for Race Asperi¬
ties .
III. The Impotency of Congress.
IV. Immigration Our Disaster.
V . The Nation's Mission.
VI. Labor, The Source of Our Development.
The Crime Against Christ.
"Christians shall not always slumber,
In the dark and dreary tomb,
Though they are a countless number,
Sleeping long in nature's womb.
Christ has promised his returning
To this fallen world of our's,
Then our earth's terrific burning
Shall declare His mighty powers."
istians have pro-
icgcm They do not
change the Gospel, but so desecrate it as to
have it subserve their ends. Thus the Scrip¬
tures have been made the vehicle of perverse
falsehood. The channel of their influence
has been through biography and history, the
former the record of individual mistakes, the
latter the chronicle of the imperfections of
having a high
6 A FREEMAN AND YET A SLAVE.
society. The isolated act of an individual
may form the nucleus of biography, but
only the genetic and current events of a peo¬
ple are the source of history. It has final
causes to which it may be traced. As a force
may be deflected in nature's sphere, so may it
be turned from the course of true chronology.
The deflection of the Gospel has been made to
serve grevious wrong and has become the
source of false authority. Had Scripture
been rightly interpreted to us, early in the
days of our bondage, American history as to us
would not have been alone of our parents'
superstition and of the intelligence of their
Masters. The chismatic period, which gave
rise to the Romanists, Recusants and Dis¬
senters, who were the centers of erroneous
but religious feuds, was superabundantly
charged with the Satanic spirit.
Luther, Calvin, Knox and Wesley may be
charged more or less rightly with having per¬
verted history. They are accountable for
the decadence of the hold of Scripture upon
the masses. Obstinate personality can alone
A FREEMAN AND YET A SLAVE. 7
propagate error. It alone is sufficient to ac¬
count for the rise and flourish of Sectari¬
anism They gave it Scriptural authority
and the commentaries of the two former to
slavery; its holy sanction ( ?) This discovers
the source of race hatred that disgraces the
religion of Christ, and the hypocracy of the
white ministry that monopolizes His hallowed
name. The sects to which these men were
fathers, arrogate His name, spurn His creed
and account the Apostolic church the accursed.
They are a stone of stumbling, their religion
is a crime against His rule of faith and
an offense against His rule of action.
Their happiness in religion is, in action,
oppressive and murderous. Shall we be
avenged by God in this life? He works His
will in harmful agencies as well as in love.
They have no real true principal of love. They
claim to be the sacred repository of the religion
of Christ and from them flows the most un¬
christian race animosities. They form an
under influence that denounce the modern
Christian church the enemy of the weakest.
8 A FREEMAN AND YET A SLAVE.
It is antagonistic to the end that Christ seem¬
ingly desired to accomplish. By nature's
law the strong survive while the weak perish.
The desire to modify this law seemed to have
actuated Christ. His work was surely upon
this line. It was without doubt an element of
His Gospel. Would he have called our "re¬
ligion a sham" and our "worship mockery"
as do the white ministry of to-day, and thus
in order to elevate us? The burlesques are
all the more potent for evil because they are
not of the ignorant rabble but of the learned
doctors. Their practical infidelity is the
crime charged against Christ. They are the
annelida of the church whose devotees, as
tendrils, make this land a hell for us with
the tacit assent of their religious teachers.
It is doubtful whether the religion of
Christ should be so modified in writing as to
apparantly localize its influence, and yet from
a large amount of testimony, both historic
and personal, it appears justifiable. For that
which is known in this country as Christianity
differs so greatly from what is so termed in
A FKEEMAN AND YET A SLAVE. 9
older countries; it differs not in faith, but in
practice, and to such a phenominal degree as
to be positively distinct, indeed it is American.
Is it j)ossible that it is not the genuine, not
the simple religion of Christ? I ask this
question in all sincerity, for it appears to me
that if it were the influence that has always
been in distant lands the friend of the weak,
the elevater of the oppressed, the emancipator
of the slave, that since the conditions have
been identical in this country, that similar
and consistent work should have been the re¬
sult ot its influence. It is believed by the
humble that if it were the genuine it would
be the solvent of the ills of a common people.
The relation it bore to slavery is the riddle
of history. Before God revealed this continent
to man, His influence upon man had been in
the interest of man; it emancipated and equal¬
ized. In the days of the Christian Fathers,
they only were made slaves who had re¬
ceived the anathema of the church. In that
crude period of its influence no Christian
was master of another believer. The deep
10 A FKEEMAN AND YET A SLAVE.
slumber of the middle ages was followed by
an energetic awakening. The zeal of the
church was quickened; new conquests were
made, new realms opened and new conver¬
sions made to the accepted faith. The church
blessed the crusaders and gave them "the
heathen for an inheritance." The heathen
were "punished for their ignorance and given
into bondage for their unbelief. This may ac¬
count for the attitude of Christianity towards
slavery in the nation of the people, for the
people and by the people. The church in¬
tended that slavery should be the path to
civilization and Christianity. Baptism in the
faith was the only demand made upon the
slave in order for him to receive his liberty.
In the early days of slavery this manner of
manumission obtained even in this country, it
was in conformity with Christian duty,"it bade
fare to strangle slavery in its incipiency."
It was Christian. It is the common regret of
American Christians, that in the period of the
nation's birth, Christian love was weaker than
worldly averice. If this human and Christian
A FREEMAN AND YET A SLAVE. 11
method had prevailed, much of our national
history, which now brings shame and regret
to all Americans alike, would not have been
made and the danger now impending would be
unborn. Indeed, this generation would have
denounced such a record of sorrow and blood
as being incredible and impossible of having
been made by their Christian Fathers. It is
not clear that the church opposed the first
legal infringement upon its rightful pri¬
vilege and Conscientious duty.
Maryland was the first to enact among its
" plantation laws, " a law contrary to this
method of manumission of slaves who had
become Christians. Virginia and South Car¬
olina followed soon after, in the order given,
and enacted similar laws. In the latter states
the legislation differed only as to Indians. It
sought to continue them in slavery, although
their constitution had shown its extreme weak¬
ness. They were freed only when the I'apidity
with which they died made it evident that they
cost more as slaves than they could be made to
produce. These enactments were published
12 A FREEMAN AND YE I A SLAVE.
in London and upon the continent. They
aroused in the Church of England a senti¬
ment of hostility against an institution which
it regarded "as a repressive influence upon
intelligence and genuine Christian liberty."
In 1741 negroes were first taught to read by
members of the "Society for the Propagation
of the Gospel in Foreign Parts." The first
work of this kind was done in Charlestown,
S. C., by "two young negroes." An eminent
writer says, that hardly any more pathetic-
picture can be presented to the mind of the
thoughtful Christian of to-day than this
quaint and humble effort to spread Chris¬
tianity and intelligence at the same time
among the slaves of the United States. How
curious it seems to think, that this little com¬
pany of God-fearing men met in the capitol
of Great Britian, seeking not only to spread
the knowledge of religion, but all the benefi¬
cent influences which attend true liberty,
purchasing, as one of their instrumentalities,
two young slaves, teaching those slaves not
only the principles of religion but the rudi-
A FKEEMAN AND YET A SLAVE. 13
mejits of an English education, and sending
them forth among slaves upon the planta¬
tions of the South, in order that their friends
and fellow-bondsmen might learn from them
the knowledge which maketh free. Such was
the result of Christianity in London. How
terribly different is the work of the alleged
identical influence upon different continents.
In 1834, in South Carolina, the state in which
the first Christianizing effort among slaves
was made, and by slaves, because, they
were the chattel of the Gospel Society
of London, the most cruel and barbarous law
was placed with the statuary law, to-wit: "If
any person shall hereafter teach any slave to
read or write, or cause any slave to be taught
to read or write, such person, if a free white
person, shall be lined not exceeding one hun¬
dred dollars for each offense, and imprisoned
not less than six months; or, if a free person
of color, shall be whipped not exceeding fifty
lashes and fined not exceeding fifty dollars,
and if a slave, to be whipped at the discretion
of the court not exceeding fifty lashes the in-
14 A FBEEMAN AND YET A SLAVE.
former to be entitled to one-half the fine and
to be a competent witness; and if any free
person of color or slave shall keep any school
or other place of instruction for teaching any
slave or free person of color, he shall be
liable to the same penalties prescribed by
this act on free persons of color and slaves for
teaching slaves to write." Truly American
Christianity should blush at its record
of tacit, if not of active assent to crime. But
till to-day it is true to its record. It defended
slavery; it fosters color prejudice, and by
failing to denounce the continued murder of
men and ravage of women, though they are
dark skinned by those whom it represents most
largely has become the powerful abettor of
their crimes. It apologizes for the crime of
race proscription and murder by boasting of
the superiorty of the white race and the neces-
ity of crime in order to protect the superior
race. Our inferiority is manifest by our power
of endurance. None but an inferior people
could have successfully withstood the mach¬
inations of a highly civilized and Christian
A FREEMAN AND YET A SLAVE. 15
race indefinitely, without having become ex¬
tinct or superior in crime. The Indian
has testified as to his strength by having be¬
come an extinct factor on his own continent.
It has lately produced clerical defense of
anarchy and those who sought to assassinate
and murder without restriction. But it is not
my purpose to excite ridicule, but to appeal to
the intellectual and Christian influence that
the order of things that now obtain may be
changed. To show that the methods now em¬
ployed by the truly philanthropic will of ne¬
cessity be abortive. To ask for that kind con¬
sideration and forbearance, that reason teaches
us to expect. Shall this comprehensive
end be achieved? The southern press and
pulpit may best answer. They have vast in¬
fluence, but it is commensurate with their
responsibility. The Freedman's Society of
the M. E. Church has spent nearly two mil¬
lions of dollars in an abortive effort to educate
the masses above prejudice. It has been an
abortive effort, because the church has either
knowingly or otherwise continued to teach the
16 A FREEMAN AND YET A SLAVE.
identical ideas upon which the advocates of
slavery rested their right to hold property in
humanity, the superiority of their race and the
existence of an instinctive race prejudice,
which of necessity cause race animosities. The
former of these absurdities has been exploded;
the later must be. The Christian Church must
become impartial instead of fostering the
weak in their ignorance and prejudice,
whether white or black, in the south or north,
and teach that in the moral fatherhood of
God, all are equal that equally obey; that in
our nation all are equal who obey its laws
and support its constitution. The benevolent
must learn that a race is but a moral person,
and for it to obtain the end apparently de¬
signed by God that it must come into asso¬
ciation with the people of the earth.
A FREEMAN AND YET A SLAVE. 17
Education Not a Specific for Race Asperities.
"Behold, I am a poor blind man,
Some say that I'm smitten by my God;
That do I justly feel my Father's ban
With scourges from his direful rod."
fHE race problem can not be solved by
the people in any section of the country,
we are not confined to any locality or
section. Contrary to the proven opposite,
we have thrived in the coldest climates under
circumstances the most unfavorable. Pre¬
judice uncler which we suffer but little more
than the nation is not confined to the south.
True we suffer from wrongs which rob us of
much that is dear to life, but we are convinced
that we suffer[less asthe[innocent sufferer than,
the guilty nation that violates its constitution
2
18 A FREEMAN dND YET A SLAVE.
by quietly allowing us to be murdered with¬
out its protest. In the north prejudice differs
only in the degree of its intensity. In the
north it is subtle; while in the south it is
violent. It has affected the body politic.
Education isolated and alone is not capable
of assuaging race asperities. It will only
be realized as the social relation between the
two people are extended, honorably regu¬
lated and perfected by the principle of
justice.
We are a social people, and "our friends" ( ?)
say, an intemperate, licentious and monstrous
creation. They aim to educate us by isolat¬
ing us from their refining influences. They
draw no instruction from the experience of
their own race civilization. They erroneously
claim that civilization is of their creation,
rather than of the world's growth. The most
they can rightly claim is to have modified it.
That is, they have given a quasi refinement
to crude customs, and have deteriorated the
refined moral principles of Asia, China and
Africa. The best influences of American civ-
A FREEMAN AND YET A SLAVE. 19
ilization were germinal in the civilization of
the ancients. The moral aspirations of the
American people, shorn of the vitiating pre¬
judice of the present age, were growing long
before the Christian era. "Our friends" in¬
herited them, and seek to keep them sacred
by ostracizing us. Ostracism is not an ed¬
ucator. They mean by educating us, the
giving of us a rudimentary knowledge of
the "three R's," and domestic politeness.
The agencies they use in the civilization of
the Indian and other savage people, namely:
Christianity, society and the industrial mart,
are not used in our behalf. They have tried
these agencies, and though they have been
adapted to the civilization of the Indian and
savagery in general, they have found their
influences ineffective when applied to us. To
make us Christians, they have found it abso¬
lutely necessary to prohibit us from their
churches as worshippers, from their schools
as pupils, from their homes as visitors, from
their business as employes, from all places
where we would come in contact with what
20 A FKEEMAN AND YET A SLAVE.
appears their highest and best influence. On
the other hand, they, for the purpose o£
Christianizing us, have introduced us to Jez¬
ebel and forced us into the employ of Ahob.
Among thieves, gamblers and persons of kin¬
dred pursuits we are relegated, in order that
we may build an impeachable character. It
is not clear to me, at least, that our present
condition of semi-savagery is not preferable
to the one to which such an education will
elevate us. The advocates and supporters
of this system deceive themselves in the be¬
lief that they are deceiving God. If educa¬
tion were capable of doing for the nation's
interest and us, what is hoped, it would be
made futile by the contradictory manner in
which it is used. True, the evils that men¬
ace both were born of ignorance. It is also
true that ignorance and education are foes,
and yet the learned and ignorant have and
are united in a continued assault upon us and
against the best interests of the nation.
Hitherto there has been no compromise be¬
tween them, but a ceaseless warfare for the
A FREEMAN AND YET A SLAVE. 21
mastery. The irrational prejudice against
color is the ground of their union. Of it
there has been gendered white and black con¬
stituencies that have everything in common
as essential objects. They have distinct ends
and analogous methods for their accomplish¬
ment, which, if perpetuated, must inevitably
bring about a conflict. It is for this reason,
therefore, that the measure of "National Aid
to Education" has so many and so persistent
advocates. If the nation is to remain forever
inseparably one, then some influence must
bring about a harmonious union between di¬
vergences what now seem imminent with na¬
tional danger. They are now a cankerous
growth, and will, if not harmonized, endanger
the very life of the country. Our illiteracy is
not alone accountable for the above; our ed¬
ucation will not of necessity change it. The
prejudice of the whites is not against our
ignorance, but our color, for in the section
in which illiteracy abounds we have no
monopoly upon the article; we can not be
educated above nor beneath our color.
22 A FREEMAN AND YET A SLAVE.
Is education, then, the specific? Will it
demonstrate sufficient o£ our virtues so as to
soften and ultimately do away with the pre¬
judice against us? Is it not clear, in view of
recent events, that education is not a universal
solvent for all of the ills that beset a great
nation? Is it proven that the so-called
race asperities and antagonisms may be so
directed as to lose their identity in education ?
If education, when applied to the question in
hand, were not so limited as to be deprived of
its legitimate adjuncts, it might become the
judicature of this vexed and intricate ques¬
tion. If the church welcomed us in the name
of Christ, with principles as broad as His; if
we were taught in the school in the interest
of God, humanity and the nation; if we were
employed in the industrial mart, that we
might realize the strength of our muscles,
then would the race problem be solved.
Those who advocate education as the means
by which to avert the impending evil, which
they claim to be of more paramount interest
to the nation than the reduction of either the
A FREEMAN AND YET A SLAVE. 23
tariff or the surplus, must devise a way to
raise the protective tariff imposed against us
by all capable in the least degree of assuag¬
ing prejudice of color. If education and
those who place it above the love of Christ,
as the one annihilator of race animosities, are
unable to remove this infernal tariff, then ed¬
ucation is unable to perform the task imposed
upon it. Color prejudice and American edu¬
cation are closely related; they are both
unique. The latter is more or less account¬
able for the former. The former is not an
exotic plant. It is peculiarly American. It
is the residue of relations that existed for
centuries. Color prejudice could not survive
Roman slavery, because Home held slaves of
all nations and races. The blacks became the
bulk of the slave mart after the physical in¬
ability of the Indians and Moors had shown
itself. The church, society and industry are
the successful means employed in Indian civ¬
ilization. The same have become captives of
the old confederate spirit and are the most
potent of the influences used to strain the ex-
24 A FREEMAN AND YET A SLAVE.
isting relations between the blacks and
whites, and make more intricate the nation's
future. They are used in invective; for in¬
stance: "Would you worship with a nigger?
Would you have your daughter wed a nigger?
Would you work with a nigger?" Such argu¬
ment, which is ever in use, especially in the
South, though vehemently condemned by the
moral conscience of the more intelligent of
the country as being infernal and insidious
in its attack, is still the captor of the same
class of citizens, who have been so far influ¬
enced by it as to yield to its damnable in¬
fluence. I ask, how shall education effect the
employers of this method of warfare? They
are not ignorant; they are the editors, lawyers,
doctors, ministers and professors; the very
agents of popular education and the accoun¬
table for nine of every ten homicides that
occur between the races in the South.
I ask with increased fervor and interest,
how shall education effect those who honestly
strive to solve this needless social dilemma,
and are unconsciously perpetuating its bane-
A FREEMAN AND YET A SLAVE. 25
ful influence by accepting the methods of
our enemies?
Anarchy was not smuggled into the United
States by aliens; it is the unnatural result of
the unnatural teaching of defiance to God,
humanity and the nation. It was not stran¬
gled at Chicago, for to strangle it the gallows
must be moved South of Mason's and Dixon's
Line. Education may be able to solve the
race problem satisfactorily, but it must be
more comprehensive than the American edu¬
cation of the nineteenth century. The earnest,
the intelligent and Christian may solve
it by accepting the full gospel of Christ.
When candid in their devotion to God, sin¬
cere in their patriotism, and honest in their
sympathy for us, they will.
26 A FREEMAN AND YET A SLAVE.
The Impotency of Congress.
||JINHERE is little analogy between our
Congress and the English Parliament.
^ The legislation of Parliament is su¬
preme. Queen Victoria rules an empire
which is an organic whole. The legislation
of her lords, upon receiving her approval,
is established. It is moreover executed as
emergencies occur. A law intended to defend
the Orangemen defends them as effectually in
Cork as in London. How different is it in
our own country? Congressional legislation
for the protection of our lives is considered
by the whites more mythical than real, with¬
out protective influence against them. The
President's signature lias character and sanc¬
tion only as it meets their approval. A
law which has received the highest sane-
A FREEMAN AND YET A SLAVE. 27
tion of the government ofttimes cannot be
executed at its seat. It is the case with re¬
gard to prohibitory laws. The United States
government may affirm with the people any
legislative or sentimental inclination of the
people, with the greatest assurance that "we,
the people," will authenticate it. But it can
not counteract that sentiment, wThether it be
right or wrong. Right, even as an abstrac¬
tion, is a misnomer. The will of the people
is alone right. As to us, it fluctuates with
sectional favor. So that in New York it may
be wrong to take our life, to deprive us of
liberty, or to prohibit us from the pursuit of
happiness, without the due process of law,
but in Mississippi our murder without refer¬
ence to law is considered the realization of
right. The government cannot execute a
general affirmative law in our defense.
The constitution is not equally the respect¬
ed magna charta of the states. Sectional
animosities prevent it from becoming. Devo¬
tion only attaches itself to a person. Per¬
sonal character can alone assuage animosi-
28 A FREEMAN AND YET A SLAVE.
ties. The personal responsible character of
the nation must be exalted, and the confed¬
erate view lost sight of before sectional
strifes die and the country becomes the real¬
ization of the patriotic. The country being
unable to execute the affirmative will of the
majority, it is, of course, incapable of enforc¬
ing its prohibitory laws. The constitutional
amendments were intended to prohibit certain
impending ills. The thirteenth grows in favor
with the increasing monetary experience of
the Southern states. It is not clear that
these amendments would have been fully re¬
spected had they been less the result of par¬
tisan legislation. Parties are an integral
part of our government. "We, the people,"
are morally obligated to obedience to its law.
It should lose its partisan character on re¬
ceiving the signature of our chief magistrate.
The amendments wThich originated in Con¬
gress and were sanctioned by both the loyal
and reconstructed states, had better never
been made, with one exception, so far
as they relate to us. Had the privilege of
A FREEMAN AND YE1 A SLAVE. 2,9
our voting been left to the sovereignty of the
several states, as the protection of our lives
has been, it would have met with the approval
of the people. It is useless to say that the
"new south" would be more perverse in
crime against humanity than the old
south, had it been so. Our progress would
not then excite the united opposition of four¬
teen states. Political avarice is more or
less accountable for it. The foresight of Lin¬
coln and Sumner must have seen the organi¬
zation of southern intelligence and wealth
against us in formidable array. Optional
prohibition gains vantage ground by ac¬
complishing the purpose designed. We
were citizens and would have obtained the
privelege of suffrage as we became capable
of performing the duties comprehended in
the term "citizen." The south, for as to
us there is no "new south," is only true
in persecuting us to its perverse selfish
character. Self-preservation demands of us
that we take cognizance of our wholesale ex-
stinction in the section of our making, and
30 A FREEMAN AND YET A SLAVE.
that we devise some means of a defensive
nature. The ballot, discriminately used, may
be made the means of our defense. It must
not be made to discriminate as to party as
much as to the individuals composing party
organization.
As they are, so will be the party. We must
cease to expect party loyalty to right the
wrongs that abuse us. The direct sequences
that occasion, our persecution must become
the objects of our study. If they be so-called
sectional intrusts, and against the general
intrusts of the states, let us not oppose them.
The government has absolved us. It is use¬
less for us to endeavor to foster upon it our
allegiance. If the Supreme Court recognizes
the doctrine of secession it is folly for us to
deny it. Let us make friends with our
enemies, the Johnies of the South. It will be,
wise and discriminate. It alone will amelio¬
rate our condition. It will be less reprehen¬
sible than praiseworthy. It will protect us
from hostile sentiment and lynch law. The
law that secures onr lives and property must
A FREEMAN AND YET A SLAVE. 31
be local and sectional. No other than
southern legislation can be of benefit to us in
the south. The Supreme Court has decided
that the nation has no right to protect us in
the exercise of rights declared to be ours in
the constitution. But it would, if emergency
occasioned, as inconsistently decided that
we are obligated to defend it. It is largely
guilty for many of the crimes committed
against us since its infernal miscarriage of
justice. It has sown to the wind the country
will reap, in due time, a whirl-wind of civil
strife. What are we, the sufferers, to do in the
midst of our experience of sorrow and blood.
General politics and questions that relate to
the country at large do not apply, nor can they
be made to relate to the ills that we suffer in
consequence of Republican perfidity on one
hand and Democratic ku-kluxisin on the other.
Can party loyalty be made of any benefit to
us? I am inclined to think that it cannot.
The question of our rights and privileges has
been relegated from the prominent position
given it by Charles Sumner and his colleagues
32 A FKEEMAN AND YET A SLAVE.
to the most obscure position held by political
questions. The question of finance and im¬
migration are of more importance to the
modern legislator than that of the right that
obtains in eight millions of American citizens
to live and enjoy the previleges Touched safe
to them by the country that they enthusiastic¬
ally engaged to save. This class of legislators
we may reach if we become more interested
in our advancement than in the assendancy
of party. We have nothing to gain from
either party. One has betrayed us, the
other murders us with impunity. Political
legislation is not the occasion of material ad¬
vancement. It is rather the result. Hence
it is not political legislation as to us or the
position we sustain to the body politic we
need, but the privileges that will allow us
to change our material condition. Poverty
is the potent occasion of crime. Local poli¬
ticians become national legislators. We are
more or less acquainted with them. If they
refuse to employ us in business, providing
we are capable, they are unworthy of our
A FREEMAN AND YET A SLAVE. 33
suffrage. No colored man should vote for
them. This method of retaliation on our
part can not work to the injury of any one,
but to the common good of all. It will soon
change our relative position to poverty and
crime. We should place a political boycott
on all who refuse us free access to the indus¬
trial mart. The business of all is protected
by the suffrage of all; it should, in proportion
to ability, give like opportunities to all.
If our political allegiance take on this busi¬
ness feature it will prove of more advantage
to us than the success or failure of either
of the political parties. The politics I
propose is unique. It is, at heart, I believe,
adaptable to us and will accelerate our ad¬
vancement. It could not prove abortive. Its
success is assured, if adapted to the local poli¬
tician, by his selfish nature. He will give
his soul for political preferment. He would
give employment without respect to color if
such a lash were held over him by us, his
colored constituents. The effect would not
actuate him alone, but his relatives and busi-
3
34 A FREEMAN AND YET A SLAVE.
ness friends would be reached. The method
I here propose may be open to the charge of
savoring of bribery. But bribery is never
committed in the interests of all. Nor does
it give the equivolent for what it receives.
It offers labor for capital and assays to force
capital to employ it, that it may be more
secure.
A FREEMAN AND YET A SLAVE.
35
Immigration Our Disaster.
ABOR and capital are not natural an¬
tagonists. One may so infringe upon the
other that they will become foes.
Each has inherent rights of which each is
alike jealous. American capital has sought
to ignore and crush its peer, labor. It has not
been violent in its methods, but it has ever
been subtle and persistent. It has not gener¬
ally sought directly to lessen the stipend paid
those whom it has employed, and yet that has
been its object. In the accomplishment of
which it has prostituted the national congress,
it has lowered wages by destroying the equi¬
poise which naturally exists between itself
and labor, by overflooding the country with
foreign laborers; to this end it successfully
used congress. The subterfuge given as an
36 A FBEEMAN AND YET A SLAVE.
apology for inviting the refuse of Europe is
the common desire to populate the far west.
It has resulted to the contrary, as it was really
intended by the capitalists with whom the
ideas [originated in supplanting home labor¬
ers. Legislation which gave impetus to the im¬
migration of skilled laborers has had the capi¬
talistic bonus of immediate and permanent
employment,'at wages which appeared to the
average European mechanic equal to a for¬
tune. Capital has been unmindful of its
safety, depending upon the general employ¬
ment of the masses. Congress protects it by
a system of protection from foreign competi¬
tion and compels the American laborer to
consume its products, in whose production
he has been successfully boycotted in favor
of the foreign immigrant. It is the system
by which the rich, the fitest, survive in pro¬
tection and the poor perish in competition.
The only benefit that is known to have resulted
from it is that it has increased prices and
lowered wages. As it relates to us as a pro¬
scribed class its influence is most damnable.
A FREEMAN AND YET A SLAVE. 37
From it, as consumers, we suffer; as the
poorer of consumers we suffer more than
our class; as the poorest of consumers, we
suffer most. It and immigration, which it
fosters, preclude us from free access to in¬
dustrial pursuits. They are silent but effec¬
tive means in perpetuating our deplorable
condition in the South. In the northern,
eastern, and western states they continue an
influx of foreign laborers who are an effectual
embargo against our intermigration. They
are preferred, not for their intelligence, but on
account of their color. As to intelligence
they are as void of it as we. We have been
inured to labor and are their peers, but repub¬
lican and democratic prejudice protect them
from competition with us in the school of labor.
Believing, as we do, in a common and free ac¬
cess of all Americans to the different industries
we should seek to raise this system of pro¬
scription levied against us. Our capacity for
labor should be the premises of our demand,
unrestricted employment the source of our
protest and the ground of our action against
38 A FREEMAN AND YET A SLAVE.
its continuance. It is gigantic in size, and
catholic in its influence. Its removal may in¬
volve political dissentions, civil eruptions and
social changes. Is there not a growing need
for such an awakening? It obtains through
political collusion with capital. It is the re¬
sult of republican legislation controlling im¬
migration. This party poises as our friend.
It is conscious of the baneful effect unlimited
immigration has upon us. It or its peer
must be the means, at least, of our relief
from this abuse. The platform of tlffe
party that sets forth protection to the Ameri¬
can laborer from foreign competition should
receive our suffrage without reference to
its history. In several of the states we
hold the balance of power. May we not use it ?
Poverty is parent of a species of slavery. Our
removal from it is mutually dependent upon
educational and industrial advancement. The
latter may be advanced by reducing the
number of foreign laborers to such a min¬
imum as will insure a demand for our em¬
ployment in all sections of the country. It
A FREEMAN AND YET A SLAVE. 39
should be our shibboleth, the party of our
affiliation should be made to adopt it as a
principal of its platform. If the republican
party are reluctant to adopt it, the party of
St. John may receive it with enthusiasm, or,
perchance, the party of Jefferson. Where
workingmen predominate, it must receive
respect and sympathy. Their appeal of
grievance is now receiving marked attention
in the popular branch of congress. But it is
the appeal of white laborers. As a prescribed
class we suffer peculiar grievances from pro¬
tection which we should make manifest.
Well meaning and conscientious gentlemen
of St. Paul and Minneapolis have organized
an Afro-American league, which has among
its laudable objects the location of a large
number of our people in Minnesota. These
gentlemen have failed to consider that labor
should demand intermigration. Homes are
not purchased even in Minnesota without
money, and money is only obtainable by
labor. Excepting St. Paul, Minneapolis, and
perhaps Dulutli, there is little employment in
40 A FREEMAN AND YET A SLAVE.
Minnesota. These cities are over crowded
with Swedes and Poles. They form the labor
element, and, if brought into competition with
us, they will be preferred. In Minnesota,
Illinois, Wisconsin and Iowa we are, if not in
large, respectable numbers. Necessity de¬
mands the organizing of similar leagues, for
similar purposes, as the one in Minnesota
in each of these states. Their utility will
be increased and influence enhanced by
adding to their purposes the one suggested.
By it we may create a demand for our now
rejected capacity. It will involve energetic
and aggressive use and direction of influence;
not less moral than political. Of all the peo¬
ple we can, least of any, fail to be judiciously
aggressive. We should study the methods of
Gladstone through Irish Americans. They
may reflect them imperfectly, yet the imper¬
fect are capable of representing the perfect.
The suggestion is practicable, capable, its end
constitutional and therefore can receive no
rational opposition. The converse of the
ninth section of the constitution confers upon
A FREEMAN AND YET A SLAVE. 41
the several states the right to prohibit foreign
immigration into their territory. If this be
accomplished in the states mentioned, or
any other it will justify our inter-immigration
to them in respectable numbers. The end is
worthy—it justifies the idea. It is capable of
raising the industrial embargo against us in
the worth, to prevent our being robbed and
murdered in the south. It is further able to
insure us a fair conpensation for our labor in
the states which sought to build a nation on
an abstraction. Education and industry are
boon companions. We must be mechanics
as well as professionals. Our present needs
though, are not wholly prophetic of our future
wants. Philosophy, unlike mechanical skill,
is the respository of human thought, while
each age produces its mechanics. In the
higher civilization of our country we shall be
black, but color prejudice shall have passed
and we shall inherit from the world's reposi¬
tory. The need of a new civilization is
mechanics; it has no use for domestics.
American civilization is still youthful. Will
42 A FREEMAN AND YET A SLAVE.
we become tradesmen? Our ignorance is the
alarming bugbear of our nation's thoughtful
white citizens. The ignorance, and crime,
plus the anarchism of European excretion,
are not considered menaces to the free in¬
stitutions that are alleged to be endangered
by our illiteracy. The feverish condition of
the industrial masses is not of American
planting. It is of un-American ideas as to
government; of customs as to living; rights
and privileges as to citizenship. It is fun¬
damentally inherent in our heterogeneous
tongue. It is parasitic and subsists upon the
conflicting ideas in alien dialects. It will
not suicide; neither can it be exiled. It will
subsist as long as foreigners perpetuate their
peculiar tongues. A word may contain
dynamite and its expression occasion a "Hay-
market." We are Americans and for us there
is no protection, there is no law; no court.
The prohibition of unquestioned immigration,
and even its utter prohibition, is worthy of
our best endeavor. As it is accomplished
life will be safer, property more secure and
our rights correspondingly recognized.
. FREEMAN AND YET A SLAVE.
43
THE NATION'S MISSION.
HIS country is a nation not a confeder¬
ation, the result of an agreement. It is
_at: grounded in personality, has life and is
an organization. Its development is in the
moral order of the world. It is only condi¬
tioned by its organic growth. The devine
purpose that permeates it assures its contin¬
uity. In history it has a vocation in whose
accomplishment its moral character is re¬
vealed. As a moral agent it is essentially
free from the sequence of necessity. It is
therefore not infallible, but becomes fixed in
righteousness as it fulfills its end in history.
It moves progressively toward that end. Its
liability to deflection rises from the fact that
it is very human. Deflection, the natural
result of prejudices, tends toward oppression
44 A FREEMAN AND YET A SLAVE.
and crime, whose legitimate heir is anarchy.
In anarchy there is the negation of its being.
It passes from history, as it fails to fulfill the
divine purpose. The premises of its being
are laid in the system of responsible agents.
Its power is delegated and constructive; it is
intended to build humanity. It is, therefore,
obligated to the people of all the earth. The
keys do not restrict its influence and the
sword does not increase its field. The oaths
of its chief magistrate is alike binding to the
state and church. God has no secular govern¬
ment. His government is essentially moral.
The crude state of man is animal, its end to
him above animal existence. Its capacity is
limited only by its choice and the tenacity
with which it prosecutes its vocation. It is
in its office to discipline, it may be to punish,
in order to exalt man over nature. It is the
power of God in history. He shaped its
course so that it progressively manifests
the brotherhood and equality of man. In its
office it is legislative, executive and judiciary.
By these functions it regulates, under self-
A FREEMAN AND YE1 A SLAVE. 45
imposed restrictions, the several states. Its
authority over them is not derived from them.
Their freedom is only assured by their power
to emancipate themselves from all irrational
bias. Our nation then is not the exclusive
possession of any family or race. Its mis¬
sion is not commercial. Its purpose in
relation to the world's people is not left to
the capricious action of man. The dis¬
covery of Columbus was not an accident.
The old world reached its summit in gather¬
ing of the nations and races in Rome. It was
the "Tower of Bable" that led to a new dis¬
persion, ultimately to the discovery of
America. The connection may be obscure,,
but there are historic paths that will lead the
faithful student from one to the other. Rome
as a Republic was analogous to our Republic,
but it was never a perfect type—could never
have been a model. A new continent was
alone fit for a new world. It is seemingly
fiting that the environment of new civiliza¬
tion should be in a new country. The Teu¬
tonic tribes in leaving the lands by the Elbe
46 A FKEEMAN AND YET A SLAVE.
and wiser, left the old civilization of Ger¬
many. They laid the foundations upon which
a more glorious civilization has been built
upon new soil.
American civilization might have been in¬
cubated on English soil; but it was hatched
on American territory. The American is
essentially American. He is the unfolding of
a moral man that was foreign to the old
world. Hence the nation is in no sense the
consequence of the accumulative work of any
particular race or nation. If it were it would
be as much of us, the despised Africo-
Americans, as of the proud Anglo-American.
The latter has determined its moral and
educational nature, while we have tilled
its soil and developed its financial re¬
sources. It is not an exponent of the sur¬
vival of the fitest. Among the nations
and people that form its populace, the more
opulent in moral culture have been, without
doubt, more serviceable in building its diplo¬
matic structure. But to identify the nation
with them, and their probity is to deny its
A. FREEMAN AND YET A SLAVE. 47
moral source, its evolution under God's pro¬
vidential care. As it is the exclusive produc¬
tion of no race or nation it will be the ex¬
clusive possession of none. It will be the fed¬
eration of all people, and not of the Anglo-
Saxon. The heterogeneous influences now
active will not die; they live in the national¬
ities and races that make up "we the people."
A dessection of the American body politic will
ever produce national peculiarities that may
be reconstructed into the German, Irish and
Swede as nations; into the Negro, India and
Chinese as races. It has invited all, and
forced some to accept of its hospitality. The
barriers raised by the influence of one nation
when in ascendency against the immigration
of an alien nationality or race will be removed
in the ascendency of an other. Hence, the
future of the nation is to be one of activity,
one of rebuilding of character for the eleva¬
tion of man in the image of God. In the
depth of its profundity it is a moral person;
otherwise it could not mould character. The
physical neither builds nor controls the
48 A FREEMAN AND YET A SLAVE.
moral, but the physical, it possesses all of
soul capacity; it distinguishes the right of its
citizens from those that inhere in itself. It
is obligated to perpetually secure them in
their inalienable rights; among these are life,
liberty, and pursuit of happiness. This duty
is not; transferable it is not devoloped upon
the states, but upon the nation. It is the
one solemn compact that mutually obligates
both the nation and state, the nation and
citizen in the duty of reciprocal defence. If
the nation violates it, it divorces the states
and loses the assent of the citizens, the unit
of its sovereignty. This compact the nation
must keep inviolate. It meets its end in
history proportionally as it is realized. The
origin of the nation was not material, but
moral. Its protection and perpetuity are not
dependent upon a material nor race premises,
but upon the proportionate growth between
its increase in age and numbers and in ap¬
preciation of the devine purpose in its
being. If prejudice of nationality or race be
sufficient to curtail or prohibit this growth
A FREEMAN AND YET A SLAVE. 49
then the nation must end in national affinity
or race isolation. If the whim that this is a
white man's government prevails, it must, of
its own weight divide the nation in two belts,
the white and black. The nation is called to
contend with the subtle influence making im¬
minent this the most direful result. Its solu¬
tion cannot be left in reason to politicians.
The nation, the sovereignty of the patriotic
people, is alone capable of contending success¬
fully with the race problem. It must contend
for its salvation, for its unity, the battle is
one of ideas, between the rational and irra¬
tional. A favorable solution cannot be bought
by the valor of the nation's soldiery, only as
each white and black citizen gains the victory
over his prejudices, goes forth loving hu¬
manity. Resolved, that the nation shall fulfill
its divine calling; that it must keep its holy
compact; that it is to enter the strife urged
upon it by the old confederacy for unity
and freedom; through sulfering and sac¬
rifice, with Christian faith in the redemption
of humanity, for the rights of humanity;
50 A FKEEMAN AND
rights given by God,
variety of the race has,
lations to the whole.
YET A SLAVE.
whose image each
as it bears vital re-
A FREEMAN AND YET A SLAVE. 51
Labor the Source of Our Development.
svelopment that
common inheritance of the universe.
The forces of nature are ever active--they
never rest. The sign of industry is a mail
properly limbed. The office of the symbol
has passed when his strength is utilized in
making his bread by the labor of his mind or
the work of his hand. Industry is God's
best gift to man. The heavens are the Lord's
but the earth He has given to the industrious
hands of his children. It is the instrument
"Bound in this house for molding clay,
No hill or dale the sight to cheer.
My heart desires to be away."—Rice.
Labor is the
52 A FREEMAN AND YET A SLAVE.
of civilization. Its product is capital. They
are equal among the varied interests of man.
Life separated from industry has little
worth; it is the essential of civilization, the
distinction between savagery and barbarism.
Our property, the fruit of our industry, testi¬
fies with greater certainty as to our change
from barbarism to civilization than does our
religious fervor. It binds families, commu¬
nities, cities, states and nations into an in¬
separable compact. It is the uniting prin¬
ciple of worldly existence. Property has been
respected and its owners elevated by its pos¬
session from the beginning. The Pilgrim
Fathers were mainly of the lowly but in¬
dustrious classes of London, and were aided
by "adventurous merchants of London" to
make their voyage in the Mayflower.
Their industry and frugal habits stood them
well. They looked upon labor not as a task,
but as a sacred covenant of the Lord, by
which they were "tied to all care of each
others good." The least informed among
us know that our nation's grandeur is the re-
A FREEMAN AND YET A SLAVE. 53
suit of ^industry. Its grandeur is not more
mechanical than moral, nor is it less Christian
by having been developed by industrious
pursuits.
Indeed, it may be thought if not spoken,
that Christianity has gained greater influence
over the world as the world has become more
industrious. To the industrious property is
a silent hut most sacred oath of protection.
Industry or labor is the repository of happi¬
ness. Poverty is not a manacle. It is to us a
blessing. Our capacity for universal indus¬
trious service is the one undeniable prophecy
of our future ascendency. The advancement
we are continually making in the different
schools of industry is progressingly satisfac¬
tory. Happiness is not the end of life, it is
not the object of industry. The end of life
is to serve, and happiness is consequential to
industrious living. Indolence is the boon
companion of happiness, and they too often
inveigh the efficient to the hut of imbecility.
Our desire and demand for free access to
labor of all classes, is not the wail of the
54 A FKEEMAN AND YET A SLAVE.
physically weak, but of the consciousness of
our capacity which is the ground of our com¬
plaint against the proscription levied against
us as laborers by the employers of our
country; it is preserving and meritorious. It
is the beneficent element of our character.
We sow a serviceable act; the act perishes
but the desire survives and ripens into sacrifi¬
cial character. In this, the youthful period
of our historic existence, are the sacrificial
privileges for the basis of our future. In our
meditations upon our laborious and unenvi¬
able position of the present, if the idea of
personal sacrifice for our race civilization be
given a place, it becomes at once the source
of consultation and encouragement, a motive
to our progress, and fulcrum to our as¬
cendency. The advice then, so cheaply and
often given, to acquire, use and enjoy, in¬
stead of to labor and save its fruit, as if the
aim of life were the acquisition of happiness,
is erroneous and destructive of our latent and
one recuperating resource. I say recuperat¬
ing resource, because I am established in the
A FKEEMAN AND YET A SLAVE. f>0
belief that we were once a strong people, and
that He will spare us that Ave may recover
ntrength before we go hence and be no more.
All honorable labor is to be apprised as a
blessing, and yet labor is classified. It was
once said to a Jew, that he lived in a circle,
and while all things, even heaven and earth
change, but a Jew never. To him there is no
backward, no forward; he is what his ances¬
tors were in the beginning. In this land I
draw you a circle -there; now tell me what
more a Jew's life is? Round and round,
Abraham here, Isaac and Jacob yonder,
God in the middle, and the circle by the
master of all thunders the circle is too large;
I draw it again; see the thumb spot is the
Temple, the finger lines Judea, outside the
circle space, is there nothing of value? the
Jew was asked. To us, everything, except
our capacity, is, outside of the domestic circle
.in which our enemies would restrict our pro¬
gress, and have us spend our capacity. We
should remember that domestic service is
honorable, but skilled labor is more so; more
~)6 A EKEEMAN AND YET A SLAVE.
useful, more valuable and that it possesses
the essential elements of protection, and that
to make our race of value to the world, we
must see that strength of muscle, the power
of skill and the force of intellect reigns out¬
side the circle. These are to us, therefore, a
backward and a forward—a subjective back¬
ward to physical powers and an objective
forward to moral and intellectual attain¬
ments. The earth is the object; it is the
world's treasury. And it may be ours, as we
possess it by honest toil. The environment
of this life shows that we were never in¬
tended to be idle. It agrees with the testi¬
mony of our bodies. Health and comfort
generally attend the industrious. Idleness
is the enemy to the body, mind and soul.
The condition of health is activity; it is
the natural law. As to our relation to labor
in the south and its assuaging influence upon
race animosities, I quote from Mr. T. T,
Fortune, the able economist and journalist,
from his work entitled, "Black and White."
I am not, says Mr. Fortune, seriously con->
A FREEMAN AND YET A SLAVE. 57
cerned about the frightful political disorders
which have disgraced the Southern States
since the close of the War of the Rebellion;
nor am I seriously concerned about the race-
wars in that section about which so much has
been justly said, and about which so very
little is really known, in spite of the vast
mass of testimony that did not more than
begin to tell the tale." I know that time and
education will give proper adjustment to the
politics of the south, and that the best men
of all classes, the intelligent and the prop¬
erty-holders will eventually grasp the reins
of political or civil power and give, as far as
they can, equilibrium to the unbalanced con¬
ditions.
The men of natural parts, of superior cul¬
ture and of ambitious spirit usually, in all
societies, manage to rise to the top as the
natural rulers of the people. You cannot
keep them down; yoii cannot repress them.
They rise to the top as naturally as sparks
liy upward to the heavens. Demagogues and
quacks manage only to impose upon the igno-
58 V FREEMA.N_A.ND YET A SLAVE.
rant and confiding, upon men, conscious of
their own inability to rule, who gladly trans¬
fer the responsibility to the first loud¬
mouthed fellow who comes along claiming, as
his own, superior capacity and virtue. Intel¬
ligent men do not permit ignoramuses and
adventurers to rule them; they prefer to rule
themselves; and they submit to be ruled by
such interlopers only so long as it takes them
to thoroughly understand the condition of
affairs. It is not, therefore, to be marvelled
at the white men of the south spread death
and terror in their pathway to the throne of
power in subverting the governments of the
reconstruction policy, based as those govern¬
ments were,- upon disorganized ignorance on
the part of the blacks and organized robbery
tm the part of the white adventurers, who
have become infamous under the expressive
term "carpet-baggers;" although the genuine
northern immigrants, the "Fools" who came
in good faith to cast in their lot with the
southern people, supposing themselves to be
welcome, should not share in the obloquy of
\ FREEMAN AND YET A SLAVE. 59
that epithet. But, should the white men of
the south continue indefinitely as the rulers
of the south, to the absolute exclusion of par¬
ticipation of the black citizens of those states,
then would my surprise be turned into pro¬
found amazement and horror at what such
tyranny would produce as a logical result.
Yet I know the temper of the people of the
south too well to base any deduction upon a
proposition so full of horror and despair.
And then, too, such a proposition would be
at variance with all accepted precedents of
two peoples living in the same community,
governed by the same laws and subject to the
same social and material conditions. I sub¬
mit that I have 110 fears about the future po¬
litical status of the whites and blacks of the
south. The intelligent, the ambitious and
the wealthy men of both races will eventually
rule over their less fortunate fellow-citizens
without invidious regard to race or previous
condition. And the great-grandson of. Sena¬
tor Wade Hampton may yet vote for the
great-grandson of Congressman Robt. Smalls
60 A FREEMAN AMD YET A SLAVE.
to be governor of the chivalric- commonwealth
of Strath Carolina. Senator Wade Hampton
may grit his teeth at this aspect of this case,
but it is strictly in the domain of probability.
The grandson of John C. Calhoun, the great
orator and statesman of South Carolina, has
not yet voted for a colored governor, but he
has for a colored sheriff and probate judge,
as the following testimony he gave before the
Blair committee on "Education and Labor" in
the city of New York, Sept. 13,1883, will show:
"Q. (The Chairman.) What do you think
of his (the black man's) intellectual and
moral qualities and his capacity for develop¬
ment? A. (Mr. Calhoun, John C.) The
probate judge of my county is a Negro and
one of my tenants, and I am here now in New
York attending to important business for my
county as an appointee of that man. He has
upon him the responsibilities of all estates
in the county; he is probate judge.
"Q. Is he a capable man? A. A very ca¬
pable man, and an excellent, good man, and a
very just one."
A FREEMAN AND YE'J A SLAVE. 61
Again Mr. Calhoun testified: "The sheriff
of my county is from Ohio, and a Negro, and
he is a man whom we all support in his office,
because he is capable of administering his
office."
When the grandson of John 0. Oallioun
can make such admissions, creditable alike
to his head and his heart, may not the
great-grandson of Wade Hampton rise up to
chase the Bourbonism of his great-grand¬
father into the tomb of disgruntlement? I
I have not the least doubt of such proba¬
bility. Again, I say, I am not seriously con¬
cerned about the future political status of
the black man of the south. He has talent;
he possesses a rare fund of eloquence, of wit
and humor, and these will carry him into the"
executive chambers of States, the halls of
legislation and on to the bench of the judici¬
ary. You can't bar him out; you caji't repress
him; he will make his way. God has planted
in his very nature those elements which con¬
stitute the stock-in-trade of the American
politician, ready eloquence, rich humor.
(V2 A FREEMAN ANI) YET A SLAVE.
quick perception and yon may rest assured
he will use all of them to the very best ad¬
vantage.
I know the municipalities in the south to¬
day, where capable colored men are regu¬
larly voted into responsible positions by the
best white men of their cities. And why
not? Do not colored men vote white men
into office? And, pray, is the white man less
magnanimous than the black man? Perish
the thought! No; the politics of the south
will readily adjust themselves to the best in¬
terest of the people; be very sure of this.
And the future rulers of the south will not
all be white, nor will they all be black; they
will be a happy commingling of the two
peoples.
And thus with the the so-called "war of
races:" it will pass away and leave not a trace
behind. It is based upon condition and color
prejudice—two things which cannot perpet¬
uate themselves. When the lowly condition
of the black man has passed away; when he
becomes a capable president of banks, of rail-
A FREE MAX AND YET A SLAVE. 63
roads and of steamboats; when he becomes a
large land-holder, operating bonanza farms
which enrich him and pauperize black and
white labor; when he is not only a prisoner at
the bar but a judge at the bench; when he sits
in the halls of legislation the advocate of the
people, or (more profit if less honor) the ad¬
vocate of vast corporations and monopolies;
when he has successfully metamorphosed
the condition which attaches to him as a
badge of slavery and degradation, and made
a reputation for himself as a financier, states¬
man advocate, land-holder, and money-shark
generally, his color will be swallowed up in
his reputation, his bank-account and his im¬
portant money interests.
Is this a fancy picture? Is there 110 sub¬
stantial truth seen in this picture of what
will, must and shall be, as the logical out¬
growth of Divine affirmation that of one
blood he created all men to dwell upon the
earth, and of the declaration of independence
that "we hold these truths to be self-evident.
That all men are created equal; that they
64 A FREEMAN AND YET A SLAVE.
are endowed by tlieir Creator with certain
unalienable rights; that among these are life,
liberty and the pursuit of happiness"?
Let us see.
A few months ago I sat in the banking
office of Mr. William E. Mathews and ex-
Congressman Joseph H. Rainey (of South
Carolina,) in Washington. As I sat there, a
stream of patrons came and went. The
whites were largely in the majority. They
all wanted to negotiate a loan, or to meet a
note just matured. Among the men were
contractors, merchants, department clerks, etc.
They all spoke with the utmost deference to
the colored gentlemen who had money to loan
upon good security and good interest.
A few months ago I dined with ex-Senator
B. K. Bruce (of Mississippi), now Register
of the United States Treasury. The ex-Sen¬
ator has a handsome house, and a delightful
family. In running my eyes over his card tray,
I saw the names of some of the formost men
and women of the nation who had called upon
Register and Mrs. Bruce. In passing through
A FREEMAN AND YET A SLAVE. 65
tlie Register department with the Senator,
sight-seeing, I was not surprised at the marks
of respect shown to Mr. Bruce by the white
ladies and gentlemen in his department.
Why? Because Mr. Bruce is a gentleman by
instinct, a diplomat by nature, and a scholar
who has "burned the midnight oil." Such a
person does not have to ask men and women
to respect him; they do so instinctively.
I walked down F street and called at the
office of Prof. Richard T. Greener, a ripe
scholar and a gentleman. The professor not
only has a paying law practice, but is presi¬
dent of a new insurance company. He has
all that he can do, and his patrons are both
black and white.
All this and more came under my observa¬
tion in the course of an hour's leisure at the
capitol of the nation. And the black man has
not yet aroused himself to a full sense of his
responsibilities or of his opportunities.
In Baltimore, Philadelphia, New York and
Boston we have colored men of large wealth,
who conduct extensive business operations
66 A FREEMAN AND YET A SLAVE.
and enjoy the confidence and esteem of their
fellow citizens without regard to caste.
Speaking upon the progress of the colored
race, in the course of an address on the "Civil
Eights Law," at Washington, October 20,
1883, the Hon. John Mercer Langston, Uni¬
ted States Minister and Consul General to
Hayti, and one of the most remarkable,
scholarly, and diplomatic men the colored
race in America has produced, drew the fol¬
lowing pen-picture:
"Do you desire to witness moral wonders'?
Start at Chicago; travel to St. Louis; travel
to Louisville; travel to Nashville; travel to
Chattanooga; travel on to New Orleans, and
in every state and city you will meet vast
audiences, immense concourses of men and
women with their children, boys and girls,
who, degraded and in ignorance because of
their slavery formerly, are to-day far advanced
in general social improvement.
"It would be remarkable now for you to go
into the home of one of our families, and find
even our daughters incompetent to discourse
A FREEMAN AND YET A SLAVE. 67
with you upon any subject of general inter¬
est with perfect ease and understanding.
Excuse me, if I refer to the fact that some
two weeks ago I visited St. Louis for two
reasons; first to see my son and daughter, and
secondly and mainly to attend the seventy-
second anniversary of the birth of perhaps
the richest colored man in the state of Mis¬
souri. I went to his house, and I was sur¬
prised as I entered his doors and looked
about his sitting-room and parlors, furnished
in the most approved modern style, in the
richest manner; but I was more surprised
when I saw one hundred guests come into the
home of this venerable man, to celebrate the
seventy-second anniversary of his birth, all
beautifully attired; and when he told me,
indirectly, how much money he had made
since the war, and what he was worth on the
night of this celebration, I was more sur¬
prised than ever. I am surprised at the
matchless progress the colored people of this
country have made since their emancipation.
I have traveled in the West Indies, I have
68 A FREEMAN AND YET A SLAVE.
seen the emancipated English, Spanish and
French Negro; but I have seen no emanci¬
pated Negro anywhere who has made the pro¬
gress at all comparable with the colored
people of the United States of America."
I desire it to be distinctly understood, that
I am not at all anxious about the mental and
material development of the colored people
of the United States. They are naturally
shrewd, calculating and agreeable, possessing
in a peculiar degree the art of pleasing; and
these qualities will give them creditable posi¬
tions in the business interests of the country
in a few years. But they must have time to
collect their wits, to sharpen their intelligence,
to train their moral sense and the feeling of
social responsibility, to fully comprehend all
that the change from chattel slavery to abso¬
lute freedom implies. Men cannot awaken
from a Rip Van Winkle slumber of a hundred
years and grasp at once the altered conditions
which flash upon them. The awakening is
terrific, appalling, staggering.
When a man has been confined for long
A FREEMAN AND YET A SLAVE. 69
years in a dark dungeon lie has no trouble in
discerning objects about him, which, when he
first entered his dungeon, were indistinct or
invisible to him. So when he is brought
suddenly to the strong lighf of the sun, the
effulgence overmasters him, and he is as
blind as a bat. But slowly and painfully he
becomes accustomed to the transition from
absolute darkness to absolute light, and when
nature wears to his vision her naturally gay
and winsome appearance. So with the slave.
His grasp of the conditions of freedom is slow
and uncertain. But give him time, lend him
a helping hand, and he will completely
master the situation.
In one of the most remarkable pamphlets of
the time, written by C. K. Marshall, D. D., of
Yicksburg, Miss., entitled "The Colored Race
Weighed in the Balance," being a reply to a
most malicious speech by J. L. Tucker, D. D.,
of Jackson, Miss., I find many truths that the
American people should know. Both Dr.
Marshall and Dr. Tucker are white ministers
of the south, and both should be intimately
70 A FREEMAN AND YET A SLAVE.
acquainted with the characteristics, capacity
and progress of the colored people. But Dr.
Tucker appears to be as ignorant of the
colored race as if he had spent his days in
the Sandwich Islands instead of the sunny
land of the south.
Dr. Marshall says:
"I think I know nearly all that can be said
against the Negro. In one form or another,
the complaints have been a thousand times
reiterated; but has he not been, and is he not
now what the white man and society have
made him? He is naturally peace-loving,
docile, and imitative. If kindly and justly
treated, with due allowance for the peculiar
elements that make up his life, he will render
back, in kind at least, equally with the brother
in white in like surroundings. Everybody
knows some reliable, trustworthy Negro man
and woman; and John Randolph said that of
two of the politest men he ever saw one was a
Negro. Gentleness is a wonderful agency in
managing a Negro: I know it tells powerfully
upon white folks. The psalmist, addressing
A FREEMAN AND YET A SLAVE. 71
his Maker, says: "Thy gentleness hath made
me great." It is a mighty lever; it moves the
world; it moved it before Archimedes; it moves
it still; but peevishness, fault-finding, scolding
cursing, pr-emature censure, haughty and as¬
suming ways, sullenness, ill-temper, whether
in the field, the kitchen, the nursery or
parlor, will legitimately result in thriftless-
ness, revolt, departure, and contempt for
white people! Many of the young generation
have not yet found their places in the new
order of things; and their silly parents work
themselves nearly to death to keep their sons
from the plow and to make ladies of their
daughters, just like white folks; but time,
gentleness, bread, and neat homes will, with
religion and culture, bring great changes.
And I say it to the credit of their former
owners, and their own instinct and capabili¬
ties, that they constitute to-day the best
peasantry, holding similar relations to the
ruling classes on the face of the earth. Their
vices are 110 greater; their respect for law
about the same; and their care for their
72 A FUEEMAN AND YET A SLAVE.
children little inferior. Besides, they speak
the language of their country better, are less
cringing and craven, freer from begging;
more manly, more polite, less priest-ridden,
less obsequious; have a higher estimate of
human rights and obligations; understand
farming, cooking, house-work, and manual
labor, in which they have been trained, better,
I insist, than any similarly conditioned race
or people. They are less profane—very much
less—than white people; less bitter, vindic¬
tive, and bloodthirsty; less intemperate, and
far, far less revengeful; and less selfish than
what they contemptously snub as "poor white
trash." But he is a sinner! I believe the
old stale rhyme tells some truth in a modified
sense, "In Adam's fall we sinned all;" but I do
not believe the serpent's tooth struck a more
deadly and depraving virus into the Negro's
share of the apple of Eden, dooming him as
a sinner to a lower plane of wickedness than
others. He commits not all, but many of the
sins, crimes, and misdemeanors, and indulges
many of the vices of polished humanity—
A FREEMAN AND YET A SLAVE. 73
cultured Caucasian humanity." "They have
had but moderate experience in the sole man¬
agement of their own affairs."
Again. "The Negro is neither a beggar,
nor a pauper, nor a tramp; and if honestly
dealt with, he can make his own way. Where
they are idle and profligate, execute the law
vigorously against them, and they will approve
and aid in the work. We can lift them up,
or cast them down. For one, I think we owe
them a debt of gratitude and impartial jus¬
tice for their faithful conduct during the war;
and when disposed to criticise and reproach
them for not coming in all things up to your
sentimental notions, just put yourself in their
place. Then you will, if your scales are true
and your weights just, settle the question
with little difficulty. I cannot serve my
readers better, perhaps, than by quoting the
words of the Rev. Dr. Callaway, lately Pro¬
fessor in Emory College, Oxford, Georgia,
and now President of Paine Institute, Augus¬
ta, Georgia, a native of that state, and to the
manor born. In a late address, he says: "We
74 A FREEMAN AND YET A SLAVE.
have spoken of the Negro as related to the
conduct of the war, but it remains to be said
that, in his relation to us as a friend during
that period, and to our wives and children as
guardian, the testimony of his fidelity is on
the lips of every surviving soldier. It is easy
to conjecture how, with a race less loyal to
home and patron, the testimony in the case
might have been a narrative of lawlessness
and license. What he refrained from, there¬
fore, is to his credit. But in the four years
of darkness and demoralization, when, be¬
sides those of military age, every boy whose
muscles were equal to the support of a mus¬
ket, and every old man with vigor enough to
mark time, was called to the front, the Negro,
commanding as a patriarch and reverent a§ a
priest, kept sacred vigil at our homes. Be¬
sides this, with a foresight not developed for
himself or his family, but evoked by virtue of
his office, and the piteous destitution of our
loved ones, he provided for their wants.
"They were a-liungered, and he fed them."
What he did is to his honor. What we re-
FREEMAN AND YET A SLAVE. 75
frain from in our place of power as the supe¬
rior race, shall be to our credit; what we do
in return shall be in proof of our apprecia¬
tion. The conduct of the Negro during the
war proves him kindly, temperate, trust¬
worthy; his conduct since the war reveals in
him considerateness, purpose, capacity, an
order of growing good qualities. During the
war his inferior courage, it may be assumed,
inured to his superior serviceableness, his
fears giving counsel to his courtesy and care.
So set it down, if you will, though the logic
is as lame as the charge is ungrateful.'"
This testimony upon the character, temper,
and adaptability of colored people is all the
more valuable, because Dr. Marshall not only
treats the question from a Christian stand¬
point, but because his intimate acquaintance
with the subject adds weight and authority
to his opinion.
In the same strain, Dr. Atticus G. Hay-
good, President of Emory College, in Georgia,
a man of the largest culture, Christian intel¬
ligence and progressive ideas, says, in his
76 A FREEMAN AND YET A SLAVE.
masterful work, "Our Brother in Black, His
Freedom and His Future."
"If white people and black people wish t o
know how to treat each other in all the rela¬
tions of life, let them study the Bible. Take
for example the business relations of life, the
old question of capital and labor, of service
and wages. For the settlement of all ques¬
tions that grow out of these relations the
laws laid down and the principles taught in
the Bible, are worth all the 'political econ¬
omies' in the world. They apply to all races
and conditions of men, in all countries and in
all times. They are as needful and useful in
New England factories as on southern plan¬
tations. Free Negroes are not the only un¬
derlings in the world, Negro servants are not
the only hirelings. There are thousands of
factory operatives, day laborers, domestic
servants, mechanics, sewing women, clerks,
apprentices, and such like whose cry for jus¬
tice against oppression goes up to heaven by
day and by night. 'For which things' sake,'
in all lands, 'the wrath of God is come upon
A FREEMAN AND YE1 A SLAVE. 77
the children of disobedience.' Let us here
recall some of these half-forgotten laws; they
must do us all good. I know they are needed
in the south; I am persuaded that they are
needed wherever there are masters and ser¬
vants."
Having heard a great deal about the con¬
dition of the colored people in Louisiana, I
decided that it would not be uninteresting to
have an authentic statement of that condition
by some person fully capable of furnishiug
the desired information. I therefore ad¬
dressed a letter to the Hon. Theophil T. Al-
lain, a colored member of the Louisiana
Legislature for Sweet Iberville parish, and a
large sugar planter. From Mr. Allain's letter
I condense the following statement, which
will be found very interesting, for many
reasons:
"First," says Mr. Allain, "I speak as a man
of the south, who pays taxes on thirty-five
thousand dollars wrorth of property, and with¬
out owing to any man one dollar. I claim to
be well informed as to the condition of the
78 A FKEEMAN AND YET A SLAVE.
colored people of the south, the people who
bear the heat and burden of the day.
"In the cotton sections of the south the Ne¬
groes are kept in subjugation, and are not
permitted to exercise the right of suffrage
guaranteed to them by the provisions of the
federal constitution. In the sugar-growing
districts of Louisiania the colored and white
people live upon terms of friendship and
cordiality. In these districts there are thou¬
sands of colored men, who before the war
were slaves, who now pay taxes upon prop¬
erty, assessed in their own names, ranging in
value from five hundred to fifty thousand
dollars. They produce principally rice and
sugar. It is a self-evident fact that the labor
of the colored men produces two-thirds of all
the cotton raised in the south, four-fifths of
all the sugar, nine-tenths of all the rice.
"In the cotton sections of Louisiana the
colored men work mostly on shares, and here
and there some of them have accumulated a
little money; but, as a rule, they make
fortunes for the landlords and die in poverty
A FREEMAN AND YET A SLAVE. 79
because of no fault of their own. Rent here,
as everywhere else, pulls the laborer down,
and keeps him down. What remains to him
after the landlord has taken his share, goes
to the Jew shopkeepers and other middle men
at crossroads, who will not be satisfied with
any profit less than one hundred to one hun¬
dred and fifty per cent.
"But the sugar districts of Louisiana are
like oases in the desert. Vacuum pans, steam
cars, fine machinery and smiling faces are to
be met on every hand. Colored laborers find
employment very readily in the sugar dis¬
tricts from October to February; and during
cultivationtime, in many places, the colored
laborers receive as high as one dollar and
twenty cents per day, and during the grind¬
ing season, which is the harvest time, la¬
borers receive from one dollar and twenty-
five cents to one dollar and fifty cents per
day in the field and seventy-five cents for one-
half of the night. At this season we run the
sugar machinery night and day. I should
not omit to state that colored men are, in the
80 A FREEMAN AND YET A SLAVE.
majority of cases, employed as engineers at
our sugar mills, and receive from two to two
and a half dollars per day.
"You will be surprised wlien I tell you that
the most of the bricklaying and plastering
work, and the blacksmithing and carpen¬
tering work is done in the sugar districts by
colored men, who average three dollars per
day for their work.
"There are fifty-eight parishes in Louis¬
iana, twenty four of them being sugar districts.
To illustrate the degree of toleration which
obtains in the cotton and sugar growing dis¬
tricts, take the following statement: In the
Louisiana House of Representatives there
are thirteen colored members—all from the
sugar districts; in the Senate there are four
colored members—all from the sugar districts.
This condition of things is readily accounted
for by the fact that the colored people in the
sugar districts are more generally tax payers
than they are in the cotton districts, and,
having mutual interests, both white and
black are more tolerant and better in-
A FREEMAN AND YET A SLAVE. 81
formed. The Bulldozer and White Liner
can find but little room to ply their nefarious
work where everybody finds plenty of work
that pays well, and where material prosperity
is the first, and political bickering the secon¬
dary consideration. Because of the mutual
interests at stake, colored men in the sugar
districts are often protected by their bitterest
political opponents.
"The State of Louisiana is assessed at
$200,000,000, of which her colored population
pay taxes upon more than $30,000,000—two-
thirds of this is owned by colored men in the
sugar districts."
I could multiply quotations, but they would
serve only to confirm my view, that the
colored man merely requires time to fully
comprehend his freedom and his opportuni¬
ties, to enjoy the ample immunities of the
first and to improve to the utmost the advan¬
tages of the second. All over the country the
colored man is coming to understand that if
he is ever to have and enjoy a status in this
country at all, commensurate with that of his
82 A FREEMAN AND YET A SLAVE.
white fellow-citizens, he must get his grip
upon the elements of success which they em¬
ploy with such effect, and boldly enter the
lists, a competitor who must make way for
himself. Dr. Marshall says truly: "The Ne¬
gro is neither a beggar, nor a pauper, nor a
tramp." He is, essentially, a man of the
largest wealth, God having given him, under
tropical conditions, a powerful physique, with
ample muscle and constitution to extract out
of the repositories of nature her buried
wealth. He only needs intelligence to use
the wealth he creates. When he has intel¬
ligence, he will no longer labor to enrich men
more designing and unscrupulous than he is;
the will labor to enrich himself and his chil¬
dren. Indeed, in his powerful muscle and en¬
during physical constitution, directed by in¬
telligence, the black man of the south, who
alone has demonstrated his capacity to labor
with success in the rice swamps, the cotton,
and the cornfields of the south, will ultimately
turn the tables upon the uncrupulous harpies
who have robbed him for more than two
A FREEMAN AND YET A SLAVE. 83
hundred years; and from having been the
slave of these men, he, in turn, will enslave
them. From having been the slave, he will
become the master; from having labored to
enrich others, he will force others to labor to
enrich him. The laws of nature are inexor¬
able, and this is one of them. The white men
of the south may turn pale with rage at this
aspect of the case, but it is written on the
wall. Already I have seen in the south the
black and the white farm laborers, working
side by side for a black landlord; already I
have seen in the south a black and a white
brick-mason (and carpenters as well) working
upon a building side by side, under a colored
contractor. And we are not yet two decades
from the surrender of Robert E. Lee and the
manumission of the black slave.
I have no disposition to infuriate any white
man of the south, by placing a red flag before
him; we simply desire to accustom him to
look upon a picture which his grand-children
will not, because of the frequency of the oc¬
currence, regard with anything more heart-
84 A FREEMAN AND YET A SLAVE.
rending than complacent indifference. The
world moves forward; and the white man of
the south could not stand still, if he so desired.
Like the black man, he must work, or perish;
like the black man, he must submit to the
sharpest competition, and rise or fall, as the
case may be. And so it should be.
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