Black and White: Land, Labor, and Politics in the SouthFortune, Timothy Thomas
History
Black and White: Land, Labor, and Politics in the South
Fortune, Timothy Thomas
African Americans -- Southern States; Southern States -- Economic conditions; United States -- Race relations
I do not hesitate to affirm, that while the work done by the
charitable for the black citizen of this Republic has been of the most
incalculable benefit to him, it has also done him injury which it will
take years upon years to eradicate. The misrepresentations resorted
to, to obtain money to "lift him up," have spread broadcast over the
land a feeling of contempt for him as a man and pity for his lowly and
unfortunate condition; so that throughout the North a business man
would much rather _give a thousand dollars_ to aid in the education of
the black heathen than to give a black scholar and gentleman an
opportunity to honestly _earn a hundred dollars_. He has no confidence
in the capacity of the black man. He has seen him pictured a savage,
sunk in ignorance and vice--an object worthy to receive alms, but
incapable of making an honest living. So that when a black man
demonstrates any capacity, shows any signs of originality or genius,
rises just a few inches above the common, he at once becomes an object
rare and wonderful--a "Moses," a "_leader_ of his people."--It is
almost as hard for an educated black man to obtain a position of trust
and profit as it is for a camel to go through the eye of a needle. The
missionaries, the preachers, and the educators, assisted by the
newspapers and the magazines, have educated the people into the false
opinion that it is safer to "donate" a thousand dollars to a colored
college than it is to give one black man a chance to make an honest
living.
Let us now look at the system of education as it has been operated
among the colored people of the South.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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