CHAPTER XXVII
MORAL REMEDIES
The regeneration of a race, as of mankind, is something that must proceed from within and work outward. Hence the most obvious remedy for race troubles is that both races should come up to a higher plane of living. What has been the progress of the Negro in that direction; what is the likelihood of further advance? The chance of the blacks is less than it would be if the white race had a larger part in it. The Negro is insensibly affected by the spirit of the community in which he lives. He knows that though ruffians threaten him with revolvers or with malignant looks that have a longer range, there are also broad-minded and large-hearted white men who bid him rise; but he is almost cut off from the machinery of civilization set in motion by his white neighbor; he cannot use or draw books from the public library; he practically cannot attend any churches, lectures, or concerts, except those provided directly for him. On the plantation he hardly sees a white face, except those of the managers and their families. He has little opportunity to talk with white men; none for that interchange of thought which is so much promoted by sitting round the same table. He can attend no colleges or schools with white students. In the common schools and in many institutions above, he meets only negro teachers. He is far more cut off from the personal touch and influence of white men and women of high quality than he was in slavery times.
Within his own race he experiences the influences of some notable minds, and, with few exceptions, the men recognized by the Negroes as their chief leaders counsel moderation and preach uplift. Many of the lesser leaders are deficient in character, and a large fraction of the ministers of the gospel do not, by their lives or conversation, enforce the lessons which they teach from the pulpit; they also have not the advantage of training by white teachers. In the process of separation of races, the negro mind has gone far toward losing touch with the white mind. The best friends of the race are grieved and humiliated from time to time to find that they had expected something which the Negroes did not recognize as due from them—service, loyalty, gratitude. Thousands of people believe that the Negro makes it the object of his life to cheat a white man. Thousands of Negroes feel that they are not bound by promises or contracts made to their own hurt.
Since the white race is not in such friendly relations with the Negro as to impress upon him the causes of white superiority, some Southern writers would like to see a sort of benevolent state socialism applied to the Negro, such as laws under which the coming and going of the blacks should be regulated, their implements secured, and labor distributed where it was needed. Like many other suggestions, this remedy would cure the Negro’s shiftlessness by taking away his self-control, and would apply to the lazy black man a régime which would be abhorrent if employed upon the lazy white man.
Where the Whites appreciate and aid the Negroes, the color line cuts them off from making the distinctions which are the rewards of the energetic and successful in other communities. The negro poet, the essayist, and the educator have no fellowship with those neighbors who could appreciate their genius. So far as the South can prevent it, the most energetic and successful negro business man can hope for no public office. The machinery for uplifting the Negro through white influence is no longer in operation. The inferior race is thrown back upon members of the inferior race for its moral stimulus; and then is reproached because it does not form higher ideals and advance more rapidly. The successful Negro exercising a good influence among his fellows cannot be admitted to the white man’s club, cannot be made the intimate of men of kindred aims. As Senator Williams says: “When we find a good negro we must encourage him to stay good and to grow better. We are doing too little of that. The old adage, ‘Give a dog a bad name and you have made a bad dog,’ is a good one. Indiscriminate cursing of the whole negro race, good and bad alike included, is an exemplification of the adage. I have frequently thought how hard it was for a good negro, especially during campaign times, to stay good or to grow better when he could not come within sound of a white speaker’s voice without hearing his whole race indiscriminately reviled without mention of him as an exception, even in the neighborhood where he was known to be one.”
One of the strongest civilizing forces both North and South has been the Church, through which has been spread abroad not only the incitements to life on a high plane, but the intellectual stimulus of the preacher’s voice, of the association of keen men, of Bible study. The Negro has the outward sign of this influence, the force of which is recognized by all candid people; but his clergy are not, as a class, moral leaders, and here, as in so many other directions, he is deprived of the leadership of the Whites. For similar populations in the North there is an apparatus of missions, and the schools and colleges planted by Northerners in the South are almost all substantially missionary movements; but the South dislikes them and makes almost no effort to rival them. The Christian church, which is the bearer of civilization to Africa, China, the American Indians, leaves the Negroes in great part to christianize themselves if they can.
The white man has another opportunity of helping upward his dark neighbor through his control of legislatures and courts. Garner would solve the problem—“not by denying him the advantages of education, but by curbing his criminal instincts through a more rigid enforcement of the law. The laws against carrying concealed weapons, against gambling, and against vagrancy should, if necessary, be increased in severity and enforced with a vigilance and certainty which will root out gambling, force the idle vagrant to work, and send the pistol carrier to prison. The abolition of the saloon and the extirpation of the ‘blind tiger’ and the cocaine dive would remove the most potent external causes of negro criminality.... Conditions could be materially improved by the establishment of a more adequate police surveillance and control and the introduction of a more effective police protection, for it is a well-known fact that in most Southern communities this protection is notoriously insufficient. It is also well worth considering whether some reasonable and effective measures might not be taken to prevent the movement of the negroes to the towns and cities and their segregation in particular localities.” Says an Alabamian lawyer: “A different and milder set of laws ought to be enacted for him than for the white man.... His best friends in the South are among our ‘gentlemen.’ The low White has no use for him. He hates the Negro and the Negro hates him.” From the federal government, as has been shown above, no effective legislation can be expected; but may not something be done by special state action?