The Gift of Black Folk: The Negroes in the Making of AmericaDu Bois, W. E. B. (William Edward Burghardt)
History
The Gift of Black Folk: The Negroes in the Making of America
Du Bois, W. E. B. (William Edward Burghardt)
African Americans -- History; United States -- Race relations
The future of America is in the keeping of the 80 per cent. of the
population, separate in blood and race from the colonial descent group.
Love of native land is one of the strongest and noblest passions of which
a man is capable. Family life, religion, the soil which holds the dust
of our fathers, sentiment for ancestral property, and many other bonds,
make the ties of home so strong and enduring, and unite a man’s life so
closely with its native environment, that grave and powerful reasons must
exist before a change of residence is contemplated. Escape from religious
persecution and political tyranny were unquestionably the chief reasons
which induced the early comers to America to brave the dangers of an
unknown world. Yet that very intolerance against which this was a protest
soon began to be exercised against all those unwilling to accept in their
new homes the religious leadership of those in control.
It is not necessary to go into the persecutions due to religious bigotry
of the colonial period. While the spirit of liberty was in the free air
of the colonies and would finally have secured national independence, it
is not possible to underestimate the support brought to the revolting
colonials because of the attitude of Great Britain in allowing religious
freedom to Canada after it had been taken from the French. After the
victory of New Orleans, a spirit of national consciousness on a
democratic basis was built up and the narrow spirit of colonialism and
of religious intolerance was to a great degree repudiated by the people,
when they had become inspired with the American spirit,—only to be
revived later on.
The continued manifestation of intolerance has been the most persistent
effort in our national life. It has done incalculable harm. It is
apparently deep-rooted, an active force in almost every generation.
Present in the 30’s, 40’s and 50’s, stopped temporarily for two decades
by the Civil War, it has recurred subsequently again and again; revived
since the Armistice, it is unfortunately shown today in as great a
virulence and power of destructiveness as at any time during the last
hundred years.
After the 70’s, as the aliens became numerically powerful and began to
demand political representation, movements based on religious prejudice
were started from time to time, some of which came to temporary
prominence, later to die an inglorious death; but all these movements
which attempted to deprive aliens of their right of freedom to worship
were calculated to bring economic discontent and to add to the measure of
national disunion and unhappiness.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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