Description
Week 3 Discussion Overview
For timeline/date help, please refer to the Black Past Remembered https://www.blackpast.org/african-american-history-timeline/
Because we have so much information to process this week, please read and watch everything in the Week 3 Content “lecture,” but write full responses to only two of the four Discussion options. (You can pick which 2. )
The options are:
1) What was Reconstruction, why did it end, and what are the 3 Civil War Amendments to the Constitution?
2) How did Booker T. Washington and W.E.B. Du Bois agree and disagree about providing different kinds of educational opportunities for the 4 million former enslaved people, and their children and grandchildren.
3) Why was lynching such a powerful tool of oppression? Why was this illegal practice not ended either by local or state law enforcement or by the federal government? What has the EJI done to commemorate the lives lost to lynching?
4) How did the dominant white culture compete with the developing African American culture of the late 1900s to define what it meant to be of African descent?
Class Material
Reconstruction and New Laws
The first 12 years after the end of the Civil War (1865) were particularly good ones for many formerly enslaved people because they were given protections and rights from the federal government that they had never enjoyed before. The 13th Amendment (1865) abolished slavery, except for convicted criminals (an important exception). The 14th Amendment (1868) stated that people of African descent were full citizens of the United States and deserved equal protection under the law. The 15th Amendment extended the right to vote to all black men over age 21 (1870), including a provision that individual states could not do anything to restrict the right to vote. Please be sure you know these Amendments well and realize that they are significant rights that are still threatened in 2020. Civil War Amendments to the U.S. Constitution
Because they are particularly interesting, substantive, and lay the groundwork for understanding the years following the end of Reconstruction, please watch these two PBS documentaries, hosted by Professor Henry Louis Gates, Jr. The videos can be watched with “closed captioning” if you are hard of hearing. If you cannot view the films, please let me know at Melinda.schwenk-borrell@faculty.umuc.edu.
Reconstruction, PBS, 2019 – Part 1 – Reconstruction Part 1
Reconstruction, PBS, 2019 – Part 2 – Reconstruction Part 2
Reconstruction, PBS, 2019 – Part 3 – Reconstruction Part 3
The Importance of an Education – but what kind?
In our work this week, we see how education was a point of contention, starting off with a bang after the Civil War when formerly enslaved people flocked to informal schools set up for them, often by whites who came from the North to teach. By the late 1800s public schools in the South were segregated with black schools receiving far fewer public resources than white schools to operate their programs. Many black children were forced not to attend school but to work in the fields. If you are interested in this subject and wish to do a research project in this course on African American education, consider reading Carter G. Woodson’s famous book, The Mis-Education of the Negro (1933). Here, however, is the central argument that Woodson was making about education following the Civil War:
From Chapter 2: “The idea of educating the Negroes after the Civil War was largely a prompting of philanthropy. Their white neighbors failed to assume this responsibility. These black people had been liberated as a result of a sectional conflict out of which their former owners had emerged as victims. From this class, then, the freedmen could not expect much sympathy or cooperation in the effort to prepare themselves to figure as citizens of a modern republic.”
“From functionaries of the United States Government itself and from those who participated in the conquest of the secessionists early came the plan of teaching these freedmen the simple duties of life as worked out by the Freedmen’s Bureau and philanthropic agencies. When systematized this effort became a program for the organization of churches and schools and the direction of them along lines which had been considered most conducive to the progress of people otherwise circumstanced. Here and there some variation was made in this program in view of the fact that the status of the freedmen in no way paralleled that of their friends and teachers, but such thought was not general. When the Negroes in some way would learn to perform the duties which other elements of the population had prepared themselves to discharge they would be duly qualified, it was believed, to function as citizens of the country. . . . .”
White attitudes toward the formerly enslaved people, and even of those African Americans who were not enslaved or had even been born “free,” however, was not conducive to the transition of black people into fully functioning American citizens. Indeed, no matter the education and attainments of African Americans, white people either saw black people as “simple” or as “violent.” As Ibram X. Kendi writes: “For years, northern racists had agreed, almost religiously, that enslaved Africans were like brutes. They disagreed, among themselves, about the capacity of Black people for freedom, independence, and civilization. This racist northern debate – segregationists adamant about Black brutes’ incapacity, assimilationists like [William Lloyd] Garrison and Villard adamant about Black brutes’ capacity – became the conversation in the wake of emancipation. Hardly anyone in a position of authority – whether in the conomic elite, the political elite, the cultural elite, or the intellectual elite – brought antiracist ideas of equal Black people into this conversation” (223-224).
In other words, the dominant elites in American society did not feel black people were capable of being “human” enough to handle freedom. Although given complete citizenship rights by a very liberal Congress and the Northern states through the passage of the 14th and 15th Amendments to the Constitution, the generally held view was that African Americans had to EARN those rights. But the standards by which such rights could be bestowed were never clear. By 1895, black leaders had pretty much given up trying to demand equal treatment under the law or the right to vote.
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One way out of oppression and into full rights seemed rationally to be the education of black people to a level that would earn the respect of whites. Two of the people whose works we will read this week, W.E.B. Du Bois (1868-1963) and Booker T. Washington (1856-1915) advised two different approaches for advancing the education of African Americans. Du Bois was born into a middle-class family in Massachusetts and was the first African American to receive a Ph.D. from Harvard College. His field of research was sociology. Washington, on the other hand, was born a slave, and survived through terrific hardship to found the Tuskegee Institute and to become the most highly respected African American of his time.
It is important to understand how and why these two great men disagreed on how to “prepare” the formerly enslaved people and their descendants for full participation in society. The standards of “civilized” behavior were foisted upon people of color as an excuse for subjecting them to second-class citizenship, despite the passage of laws guaranteeing their equality. Sad to say, most white Americans were convinced that races of people varied greatly, and the “best” race were people who descended from the people in Northern Europe. They truly thought, “How could people from AFRICA who had been SLAVES possibly figure out how to be respectable individuals in American society in 1880?” After the end of Reconstruction in 1877, the establishment of Jim Crow stereotypes and laws confining the lives of African Americans were based upon these racist beliefs.
The Rise of Segregation and Jim Crow America
After 1877, having equal rights as citizens became very tough for African Americans because the federal government’s oversight of the former rebel states ended. Quickly, the white populations reclaimed power in the Southern state legislatures, the courts, and other avenues for law and justice, creating barriers for equality for African Americans. Laws were created to keep African Americans from being in town after sundown, going to theaters and libraries, holding meetings anywhere other than at a church, and even playing games like chess with white people. More seriously, blacks could not serve on juries, and most were forbidden to register to vote in the South or run for public office anywhere in the U.S.
Booker T. Washington and W.E.B. Du Bois offered different approaches to handling the growing political and civil oppression of African Americans in the 1890s and early 1900s. In 1895, Washington gave his most famous speech, “The Atlanta Compromise”* where he claimed to a white audience of Southern farm owners that blacks would give up their civil rights, live in segregated areas, and would ask only to be given jobs. Du Bois found it ridiculous to give up African Americans’ rights as citizens, especially when the hope of retrieving them at a later time would be determined by whites. You will read about both men’s ideas about how best to improve the lives of African Americans under conditions of oppression in these two chapters from books written by Du Bois and Washington at the turn of the last century.
From The Future of the American Negro, Chapter 3, Booker T. Washington, 1899 – Washington, Chapter 3
And Du Bois’ response to Washington’s ideas about education.
From The Souls of Black Folk, Chapter 3, W.E.B. Du Bois, 1903
As you read, ask yourself where the two men’s ideas overlap and where they diverge.
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Here is an interactive exercise to help you understand how different Du Bois and Washington were in envisioning what African Americans should do to succeed. After doing the exercise, report in the Discussion area which person you “backed.” Comparing Du Bois and Washington
Terrorism: Lynching to “Control” African Americans
As the post-Reconstruction laws and regulations restricted the lives of Southern blacks more and more, the violence against African Americans also became worse. Before we get into the use of physical violence upon African Americans, please take a look at this description of what life was like in “Jim Crow” America. Many of the laws that were imposed in the South were also present in the North to a somewhat lesser extent. For example, black people were barred from working in most companies around the country except as janitors or cooks. Jim Crow: Jim Crow Laws
Ida B. Wells was the most famous crusader against lynching and how newspapers reported on them. Black schools, churches, and places of business were also targets for bombing or arson, especially if whites perceived them to be successful. Please read this brief biography about her: Biography of Ida B. Wells. In addition, please read her influential pamphlet: “The Red Record: Tabulated Statistics and Alleged Causes of Lynching in the United States,” which is a primary historical document giving statistics on and describing the violence against African Americans, published in 1892: The Red Record
As you review Wells’ text, see if you can discover what reasons were given for lynching. Lynching was, of course, not legal, and yet it was widely accepted by many whites as just punishment outside the courts of law. What does Wells think is the underlying reason why some whites wanted to lynch African American men?
In 2015 the Equal Justice Initiative, a group in Montgomery, Alabama, created the first memorial for those who were lynched. Their report on lynching gives the most up-to-date figures on how many people suffered under this scourge, and where lynching was most prevalent in the United States. The EJI also supports modern equal justice reform through the actions of the police, the courts, and prison sentencing for African Americans.
Bryan Stevenson is the lawyer who founded EJI, and the book and movie “Just Mercy” are about some of his earlier cases to overturn false convictions of black men.
Lynching was so widely accepted that photographs of them were used as postcards. These postcards went through the U.S. mails, and no police or legal authority did anything to stop the practice of lynching. The U.S. Congress refused to take up anti-lynching laws until very recently. It was not until 2018 that the Senate passed (unanimously) anti–lynching legislation, the Justice for Victims of Lynching Act; the House of Representatives, however, took no action, so the bill wasn’t passed until two years later. On February 26, 2020, the House passed a revised version, the Emmett Till Anti–lynching Act, by a vote of 410–4.
For your information, I have included the distressing images of lynchings used on postcards, but do not feel you must look at them. They serve as a reminder of how violent American racism has been in the past, opening the question whether that violence will continue to destroy lives and to subvert the rule of law. The American tradition of not respecting the integrity and rights of the black body has not ended in 2020. https://withoutsanctuary.org/
The Rise of a Varied and Sophisticated African American Culture
To counterbalance the more grim aspects of this week, I want to share with you a few images and examples of people who not only survived these harsh times but managed to thrive. Yes, there were African Americans who became doctors, lawyers, business owners, scholars, and writers. As Booker T. Washington, at least 80% of black people in the South were tied to the land as farmers, migrant workers, tenant farmers and crop-sharers, some African Americans were finding ways to build businesses, get an advanced education, and to enter the middle class. Unfortunately, LEO won’t let me post the pictures of them, but here’s a link to photographs of Victorian men and women of color. Photography became very popular in the 1880s and 1890s, and most people could afford to go to a studio for a formal portrait. Here’s a gallery of these folks: Victorian Men and Women of Color. Although they imitated the styles of wealthy white people, these Victorian African Americans look beautiful and stylish in their own right. African Americans began to develop their own “fashion” and “style” from the 1920s onward.
I also like to forefront the poet Paul Laurence Dunbar (1872-1906), who wrote both in “Negro” vernacular and in “standard” English. White folks preferred his vernacular works in part because these poems and stories confirmed white people’s notions of the simplicity or backwardness of African Americans. Here is one of his “vernacular” poems, A Negro Love Song and here is one in more standard English: Invitation to Love. In his short life, Dunbar wrote about and lived the problem of “double-consciousness,” an idea first formally described by W.E.B. Du Bois in his 1903 book The Souls of Black Folk:
“After the Egyptian and Indian, the Greek and Roman, the Teuton and Mongolian, the Negro is a sort of seventh son, born with a veil, and gifted with second-sight in this American world,—a world which yields him no true self-consciousness, but only lets him see himself through the revelation of the other world. It is a peculiar sensation, this double-consciousness, this sense of always looking at one’s self through the eyes of others, of measuring one’s soul by the tape of a world that looks on in amused contempt and pity. One ever feels his twoness,—an American, a Negro; two souls, two thoughts, two unreconciled strivings; two warring ideals in one dark body, whose dogged strength alone keeps it from being torn asunder” (Chapter 1).
Also popular in the late 19th century were the “Uncle Remus” stories, supposedly the slave stories told to a young white boy prior to the Civil War and then written down by him to much popular acclaim (Joel Chandler Harris). For a relatively quick rundown of the problems with “Uncle Remus,” here’s a fun blogpost on the topic: Uncle Remus. The “Uncle Remus” stories very much shaped white consciousness of what slavery had been like, and was further ingrained when Walt Disney did a movie about the stories called Song of the South (1946). It’s not surprising that most whites didn’t think slavery was so bad because of the popularity of such Hollywood films as Song of the South and Gone with the Wind (1939). Here’s a little clip from the Disney version of slavery: Song of the South – Movie Trailer (1946)
Finally, we have to touch upon the rise of African American music in the late 19th century. Scott Joplin began to write wonderful ragtime pieces that contained both jazz and European influences: The Easy Winners. The Fisk Jubilee Singers, started in 1871 to provide much needed funds for Fisk University, continue to this day to promote African American music of the 19th century: Fisk Jubilee Singers. The Blues were also taking root as a musical form in the Mississippi Delta but also throughout the South. Here’s a cut from Memphis Slim, a mid-20th century artist, playing in the early blues tradition: 4 O’Clock Blues. And, of course, the development of black music also had its roots in the polyglot culture of New Orleans: New Orleans jazz in 1900 (2.30 minutes). One composer I learned about recently was Nathaniel Dett who combined African rhythms and classical music in a variety of musical formats. Here is his 1909“Juba Dance” – Nathaniel Dett’s “Juba Dance” A “Juba Dance” was a form of dancing performed by slaves with West African roots. Here’s a recreation of what that dance was like: Juba Dance
In time, Juba Dancing evolved into American tap dancing, performed with great verve and style by the Nicholas Brother, starting when they were children in the 1930s in Hollywood movies. Note, however, that by the 1920s and 1930s, performers of African descent often wore formal clothing, not what they would have worn during slave times: The former slave dance updated for the movies
So, despite the growing economic, political, educational, and civil rights challenges to African Americans in the 1870-1900 time period, the roots for the flowering of African American culture and political action were growing deep and strong as well.
Let me know if you have any questions.
*Text of the “Atlanta Compromise Speech” 1895
Work Cited
I highly recommend everyone purchase and read for their own understanding and continued reflection upon racism in the United States:
Kendi, Ibram X. Stamped from the Beginning: The Definitive History of Racist Ideas in America. New York: Nation Books, 2016.
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