DOES THE NORTH AFFORD TO THE NEGRO BETTER OPPORTUNITIES OF MAKING A LIVING THAN THE SOUTH? Rev. J. H. Anderson.
Colonization is a condition of cosmopolitan society as it is of races. As "birds of a feather flock together," so the different races in the American civilization form settlements or colonies, as far as possible. The truthfulness of this statement is seen in the thickly-settled German, Irish, Jewish and Italian communities in the North. Their race affinities produce natural and social relations promotive of their varied interests. The Negro's civil and social privileges are more restricted in the South than in the North, owing to which fact the Negroes of the South are more united than the Negroes of the North. In the North a few individuals may rise to intellectual, professional, business and mechanical distinctions, but from general employment in the skilled industries, business enterprises and political preferment he is debarred, and, being cheaply and conveniently accommodated in almost every respect by the whites, he is not under the same necessity as the Southern Negro to establish and operate business enterprises. It is rather inconvenient to establish and maintain Negro business enterprises and schools in the North, for the reason that there are no thickly settled communities. A Negro lawyer, doctor, dressmaker, music teacher, hair dresser and mechanic do well in some instances, because they receive patronage from the whites. It is not so much the prejudice of the whites nor the indifference of the Negro as it is the peculiar conditions of the North that prevent the Negro from enjoying the business enterprises and founding race institutions. The few new institutions and even churches in the North are largely sustained by donations from the whites. Renting houses and purchasing property and living in the North are commensurate with the large scale and competition along all lines of industry, and social life is so active that the most rigid economy and business tact are essential to success in any kind of business in the North. The Negro who embarks in business in the North has not only to compete with his own people, but with the shrewd Yankee, who seeks to Before the formation of labor unions and federations in the North, the Negro skilled laborer found employment, but after deciding to exclude the Negro from membership these unions became an effective dictating power to employ when Negroes applied to them for work. The tax-payers in many Northern sections favor mixed schools because it is less expensive to have them. They would not be justified in maintaining separate schools for the few Negro pupils. Of course, race favoritism, competition and prejudice, combine to exclude Negro teachers, and yet a few Negro teachers are employed to teach in the mixed schools. That Negro children, procuring their education by Negro teachers in the Negro schools, can better appreciate race efficiency and dignity there can be no question. The Northern Negro is ill fitted for living in the South, it being difficult for him to adapt himself to the conditions of the South, yet it is quite easy for the Southern Negro to adapt himself to the North where full and free expression is equally accorded to all, and where no legal discriminations are made and where the social question is left for adjustment by the parties nearest concerned. In the North the Negro has the opportunity of advocating the interests of his Southern brother in a way that would not be tolerated in the South, and thus the Northern Negro can assist in the formation of a proper sentiment in his favor. The Northern Negro is, therefore, a necessity to the Southern Negroes, and vice versa. The Negro's destiny is to be worked out in the South because he has greater numerical strength and superior advantages in the South, notwithstanding the civil, social and legal restrictions upon him. The lesson of self-dependence and self-effort is forced upon the Southern Negro as not upon the Northern Negro. When the Southern Negro was emancipated, his first thought was The prejudices of the whites against the Negro have rather helped him, in that they have stimulated him to make greater efforts to reach the independence of the white man. Having lived in both sections of our country, I am prepared to say that the Negro can do better towards working out his destiny in the South than in the North. SECOND PAPER. DOES THE NORTH AFFORD TO THE NEGRO BETTER OPPORTUNITIES OF MAKING A LIVING THAN THE SOUTH? Prof. W. H. Councill
A comparison of the opportunities which different sections hold out to any class of our fellow citizens should not be regarded as hostile criticism. No man, no country suffers by the truth. We cannot answer this question by yes or no. The North affords the better opportunities in some things, while in others the South gives the Negro the better opportunity for making a living. If we are correct in putting a broad and educated mind as the foundation for every useful superstructure, we are forced to admit that the opportunity for laying this foundation is better in the North, where a century of thought on popular education has developed the finest public school system in the world. While this brings the Northern Negro in contact with the great Anglo-Saxon mind, and fits him for making a living and for business in that atmosphere, he has to undergo a kind of mental acclimatization before he can effectively and usefully enter into work in the South, where the atmosphere at every turn is different from that in the North. For In a country where competition is sharp, as in this country, and where any kind of excitement is resorted to in order to give advantage to the competitors, the minority race, especially in inferior circumstances, must suffer along lines of battle for bread in which, the masses engage. Thus it is, while the Northern Negro enjoys high privileges of an intellectual character among the classes, he is bumped, shunned, and pushed to the rear among the quarreling, scrambling masses. There are scattered far and wide a few Negroes in the North who are doing well in business. They get the patronage of their white neighbors. There are few communities in the North where the Negro population is strong enough to support a Negro in business, if the race lines were drawn in business. I think the voluntary collections of like tribes and races of men, as Italians, Jews, Chinese, Poles, Norwegians, Swedes, and the like, in settlements in our large cities and some country districts, show clearly the gregarious disposition of like peoples; and from time out of mind each tribe, clan or race, has depended upon itself for patronage and support. In order for the Negro to succeed in any considerable degree in business in the North, it would be necessary to increase the Negro population in that section. As I have intimated above, there are few fields for operation in the North for Negroes, regardless of their ability to succeed, for there are few cases where Negro patronage is not limited to the Negro population. While occasionally a few Negroes may get patronage from the other clans and tribes it is nevertheless true that Ninety-two per cent of the Negro population reside in the South, where slavery left them. Under normal conditions there should be ninety-two per cent of Negro wealth, thrift and energy in the South. The opportunity to accumulate wealth and the accumulation are different. The Southern Negro is a wealth producer. He does four-fifths of the agricultural labor of the South and thereby adds four-fifths to the wealth of the South derived from agriculture, the leading Southern industry. If the whole of the billion dollars to the credit of the Negro race were placed to the credit of the Southern Negro alone, it would be less than half of what he should have saved since the war. The Negroes of the South handle more money than New England did one hundred years ago, and yet New England would be glad to place her barrels of gold and silver at nominal interest—so rich has she grown, although in the chilly winds of the Northeast. The opportunities for the Southern Negro are as good for material gain as are enjoyed by any other people in this country. The census of 1890 shows two hundred and twenty-four occupations followed by the wage-earners of the United States. The Negroes are represented in every one of these occupations—grouped under five heads: Professional, Agriculture, trade and transportation, manufactures and personal service. The Southern Negro, while not in all of them, occupies in the South the vantage ground in those that bring the most independence in living. We must not forget that agriculture is what we might call the staple industry of the South. I am indebted to Hon. Judson W. Lyons, register of the United States Treasury, for the following statistics, showing the wonderful influence of Negro labor in the commercial industries of the world: More cotton is exported from the United States than any other article. In the last ten years, 30,000,000,000 pounds of cotton, valued at $225,000,000 have been exported. The United States produces more cotton than all the balance of the world. The cotton manufactories of Great Britain, Germany, Fifty-seven per cent of the Negro race are engaged in agricultural pursuits, and 31 per cent are engaged in personal service. Therefore, 88 per cent of the wage-earners of the race in the South are engaged in these two pursuits, or, in other words, 88 per cent of the wage-earners of the race have opportunity for profitable employment. Where the masses of the Negroes are found and can get paying work, as they can in the South, there we must expect the greatest prosperity among Negroes. Our expectation is highly gratified in this case in the South. No doubt if the ninety-two per cent Negro population were to exchange places with the eight per cent, the opportunities now held out in the South would be transferred to the North. Our opportunities over those enjoyed by our Northern brethren are the creatures of accidents rather than of our meritorious invention. The opportunities to win character and wealth afforded the Negroes of the South by agriculture and domestic service are probably better than are enjoyed by any other class of people in the world. The field is broad and ripe and the Negro must now see and seize these opportunities or they will pass from the race forever. No peasant population ever had more favorable environments. The Negro does not only do four-fifths of the agricultural labor of the South, but he has the opportunity to own four-fifths of the land he cultivates. This opportunity is not enjoyed by any other peasant class in the world. As I see it, the greatest success for the Negro race in America lies in the farm. There he meets the least resistance and obtains the greatest sustenance. There color prejudice is almost unknown, while everywhere in the mechanic arts, prejudice is bitter, competition is sharp, and the chances for success are small. This It would be hard to find a people better suited for domestic and personal service than the Negro. In all the elements which are necessary for personal and domestic service, the Negro cannot be excelled. He is not treacherous. He forms no plots and schemes to entrap his master. He resorts to no violent incendiary measures of avenging himself against his master, but he humbly and tamely submits to the conditions, ever looking for betterment through superhuman agencies. If the South would only look this matter squarely in the face, it would admit that it has the best service on earth, and would vote liberal appropriations for the development of Negro education of every character. It may seem to persons not informed incredible, but it is no less a fact that where racial prejudice runs highest in the South and the demarcation between the races is most distinct along social lines, there the Negro is most prosperous, and, strange to say, advances most rapidly in material wealth. Self-help, self-dependence, faith in self, seem to spur to success as nothing else does. The drug store is the creature of Anglo-Saxon prejudice in denying Negroes accommodations at the soda-water fountains run by white men. In a score of channels the Negro is pushed on to success by Anglo-Saxon discrimination. What seems a curse is in reality a blessing to the race. Anglo-Saxon prejudice forces the Negro to take advantage of his great opportunity to get rich. |