This is signed, “William Syphax, William H. A. Wormley, Trustees of Colored Schools.”
There is then a Minority Report, signed, “Charles King, Trustee of Colored Schools of Washington and Georgetown,” dissenting in some respects from the Majority Report, but coïnciding with it absolutely on this most important question. From the Minority Report I read as follows:—
“In reference to schools of mixed races I think a difference of opinion may exist among the real friends of the colored people; but the time is rapidly approaching when this discrimination must be obliterated all over our country, and I know of no better locality in which to make a beginning than in the District of Columbia, and no better time than the present.”[9]
Sir, these are wise words. That is well put; whatever may be the difficulties elsewhere, they should not be allowed to prevail here. This member of the Board knows “no better locality in which to make a beginning than in the District of Columbia, and no better time than the present.”
He then proceeds:—
“Let all discrimination on account of color be avoided in the public schools of Washington, let them be amply provided for in respect to funds and teachers, and a very few years will see the example followed all over our free country. The colored race will feel the stimulating effects of direct competition with the white race, their ambition and self-respect will grow under its influence and add dignity to their character, and rapidly develop a style and type of manhood that must place them on an equality with any of the other races of men.
“We have seen this prejudice die out on the field of battle, where white and colored have fought together for the same flag. It has been met and conquered at the ballot-box and in the halls of our local and general Legislatures, and why should it not receive the same fate in our school-rooms? Why educate American youth in the idea that superiority exists in the color of the skin, when our Declaration of Independence, of which we boast so much, flatly contradicts it?”[10]
Now, Sir, I might well leave this whole question on this remarkable statement by these colored Trustees. They have spoken for themselves, for their race, and for us. Who can speak better? I know not if anything can be added to their Reports. I content myself with one further word, concluding as I began.
The Senator from New Hampshire finds the principle correct, but not practical. To that I say, Try it. Try the principle, and it will be found practical. It will work. Never was there any correct principle that would not work. I know it is sometimes said that white parents would not send their children to the schools. How long would that be? One week, two weeks, one month, two months. Some might do so possibly for a brief time, just as for a brief time white persons refused to enter the street cars when they were opened to colored persons. It did not last long. According to my experience, men are not in the habit of biting off their own noses for any very long time. Life is too short to prolong this process; and I do not believe that the people of the District of Columbia would reject for their children the advantages of the common schools simply because these schools were brought into harmony with the promises of the Declaration of Independence.