Question: Putting aside for the moment the question of right and wrong and the iniquity of the causes back of present relations, do you believe that the relations are becoming better or worse, or are they at a standstill?

Answers:

1. Better, decidedly better. If it becomes unprofitable to lynch Negroes, or unprofitable to shoot them up in riots, they will probably more and more be let alone. The riots in Chicago and Washington mean that not only Negroes will lose their lives. They also indicate to me that the Negro feels that his back is more and more to the wall, and he is bestirring himself. So long as he is satisfied, his case is hopeless. When he begins to force respect he will usher in the dawn of a new day. Again there is an increasing number of evidences that white people are waking up to the conditions. Negroes feel that some of the "Study Groups" are ineffective, but the fact remains that at one time the race question was not deemed worthy of study except by Negroes. When all is said, I would rather be living in 1920 than in 1870.

2. The relations are becoming worse. Relatively speaking, race relations in America have not kept pace with progress in many fields along other lines. The great desideratum is that the Negro change his point of view.

3. The present relations between the races seem more tense than formerly. This is due to the fact that Negroes have developed within the past few years a greater race consciousness, a great race respect. The immigration from the South which permitted him to enter into the industrial life of the North with very few hindrances, to partake of its civic life without an ever-constant reminder of race, was one of the main factors in increasing race consciousness and race respect. Another factor was the treatment as equals and fellow human beings of the Negro soldiers by the French soldiery and people. These things have caused the Negro to demand the respect which he is entitled to as a man and the privileges due him as a citizen. The whites at the present time still object to giving him these. This causes friction. I believe, however, that it will be lessened as soon as the whites realize that these demands of the Negro will not be withdrawn but will continue to be made with greater insistence.

4. Better.

5. Much was gained through the war. However, at the present time things seem to be at a standstill.

6. Racial relations between all races were never more acute nor more keenly felt and resented than during the present day.

7. Conditions, I believe, are getting a little better.

8. I don't believe that consideration of right and wrong influences fundamental reactions. One's conception of advantage and disadvantage determines the character of every act. I believe that all social relations are in a state of flux and that with the improvement of mankind which is coming with the evolution of a sense of higher values there will be an improvement in human relationships.

9. Race relations on the whole are growing worse instead of better, and they are crystallizing in the wrong direction. The whites are adjusting their conscience to their conduct, and are consciously or unconsciously justifying violation of the Ten Commandments, the Golden Rule, the Sermon on the Mount, the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution of the United States at the behest of race prejudice.

10. They are becoming distinctly worse as each year solidifies the hatred and crystallizes the opinions of the whites which immediately subsequent to the Civil War were in a chaotic state.

11. The last year or so has shown that riots are more quickly started. In our opinion race relations are likely to get much worse, especially if the present flood of European immigration continues. But getting worse to become better is much like a boil which, after it gathers and breaks, leaves the body in a healthier condition. Negroes are becoming more and more determined to enjoy their constitutional rights.

12. I am in doubt.

13. I am an optimist. I believe relations are becoming better.

Question: Do you believe that money and the acquisition of wealth make an appreciable difference in the degree of respect in which Negroes are held by their white neighbors, or in the treatment they receive?

Answers:

1. Yes, money and wealth are the root of all good and evil. In North Carolina, a rich Negro, McCary, who, it was alleged, had been caught in intimate relations with a leading white woman, was sued for money damages instead of being lynched. Money and wealth must be widely diffused enough to make an appreciable difference, however; isolated cases of wealth ordinarily engender friction and hatred.

2. No, because I personally know many who are highly respected and kindly treated in their communities though in very humble circumstances.

3. I believe that money or wealth causes more respect to be accorded within white people's hearts, but it is more likely to increase racial feeling than to lessen it. The element of jealousy among poorer whites probably gives rise to such statements as keeping the Negro in his place. The whites of better circumstances merely use these existing feelings to gain their own selfish ends.

4. Yes, and no. Money is power. The power over a man's subsistence is the power over his will. The individual who has money is sought because he is in a position to confer advantages. He is likewise hated because he can inflict pain. Were race prejudice logical and based upon reason and not hysteria, the procurement of money and the consequent demonstration of basic equality would improve conditions. However, the majority of persons do not think but are exploited. Religious dogmas and racial antipathies being useful adjuncts in the process are sufficient to outweigh material or rational considerations.

5. Absolutely.

6. The possession of money causes whites to accord the Negro more respect and better treatment if the particular Negro can intelligently handle his affluent situation so as to demand such.

7. I think that money and the acquisition of wealth make an appreciable difference in the degree of respect in which Negroes are held by their white neighbors; not that the prejudice against the race is reduced considerably or possibly to any extent, but because men worship dollars, and if they are possessed by Negroes, Negroes fall in for additional respect as the holders of wealth.

8. I believe that the acquisition of wealth causes marked increase in respect, provided that a fairly large group of Negroes in that community respectively are the possessors; but for merely one or two persons to acquire wealth in a community is not likely to inspire respect. It may cause its opposite. I assume, of course, that a fair intelligence was necessary to secure the wealth.

9. Intelligence and wealth are necessary to the self-respect of the Negro. I doubt not that in many instances they would increase racial friction for the time being; but the time must come and is now near at hand, when the white race must recognize that the whole is greater than any of its parts. A community like Chicago, for instance, cannot be intelligent if the Negro is ignorant; it cannot be competent if the Negro is inefficient; it cannot be virtuous if the Negro is vicious; it cannot be healthy if the Negro is diseased. Intelligence and wealth will not of themselves solve the race problem, but the problem cannot be solved without intelligence and wealth.

10. Money and wealth do make a difference in the amount of respect accorded to individuals, as they lessen the causes for class antagonism. The white man accords esteem to those who are able to secure good clothing, decent homes, education, and indulge in what are considered luxuries. These things, too, increase the respect the Negro has for himself and make him demand respect from others. The treatment accorded him is not likely to be changed as his advancement tends to increase hatred among the whites whom he rises above, and a desire not to treat him as an equal among those whose level he reaches.

11. Money, commerce, rule the world. The average white man is happiest when he sees the Negro down. But if the Negro has money he is willing to conceal his prejudice and trade with him. Money, in the possession of no matter whom, commands fear, which is the nearest most human beings get to having respect for others. While one rich Negro in a town, in most instances, would receive pretty much the same treatment as other Negroes, yet a hundred rich Negroes in that same town would certainly make a big difference. Apply this ratio to the nation. A rich Negro, even in Georgia or Mississippi, certainly has a far pleasanter lot than a poor white.

12. Yes.

13. Yes, it does for white people. To quote a friend, "It is easy for anybody to be respectful and courteous to a million dollars." This is especially true of Americans.

Question: Do you believe that if Negroes were 100 per cent literate it would make any great difference in race relations? Are general and higher education likely to widen the breach between Negroes and white persons, increase intolerance, resentment, sensitiveness to insults, or can a quieted process of adjustment or complete fusion of interests be expected?

Answers:

1. Education will help decidedly, especially that kind of education which gives Negroes a command of some special accomplishment in any field of endeavor. Higher education will not in my opinion widen the breach if Negroes will consciously and deliberately set out to educate white people as to their ideals, ability and character, and at the same time labor to increase the spirit of self-help and self-confidence among their own group which will serve to decrease ignorance and irresponsibility among the less fortunate and untrained members of the race.

2. I conceive that literacy in itself is a cure for nothing except illiteracy. One-hundred-per-cent literate Negroes without proper use of their literacy may even make matters worse. General and higher education may be expected to make matters better only if there is general and higher education among whites and the education on both sides is of the right kind. In America, at present, education, where it touches race lines, appears to be more propaganda than education. It is reported that some histories of reconstruction taught to Negroes by the state in parts of the United States emphasize and detail their shortcomings and omit their virtues. Obviously such education is education for mistrust, unrest, conflict. It educates the races apart, and its logical consequence is conflict. I am ready to answer, then, that general and higher education which emphasizes likeness and passes over without undue attention unlikeness, education which aims to have men live in harmony and cooperation and does not aim to array classes against classes and races against races by omissions and emphasis, may be expected to better our race relations in the United States provided it finds lodgment in the school systems of both races.

3. If 10,000,000 literate Negroes were environed with 100,000,000 white men, the majority of whom were below their cultural level, the dominant minds among the whites would arouse ethnic antagonisms as an economic weapon to be used in promoting their selfish ends. I believe that there is not a single force, ethical, religious, or of any type, sufficiently powerful to cause an individual to forego what he believes to be his highest advantage, and the appeal to group instincts is the easiest method of securing mass action.

4. If Negroes were 100 per cent literate they would certainly be more sensitive to insults and more resentful. I should expect a great increase in racial differences, unless those Negroes imbibed a tendency to non-resistance. That, however, is far from likely. With universal literacy, a larger acquaintance with current events and conditions, Negroes could immeasurably improve their living conditions, but their contacts with the whites would be far more unpleasant.

5. One hundred per cent literacy among Negroes would make a huge difference. In the long run it would lessen the breach between Negroes and white persons, for Negroes would strive for equality. The most essential thing is to produce a change in the mental equipment of the Negro. The white man's mind will take care of itself. What is needed is a more balanced and equal meeting of the minds. But there would be bloodshed at the beginning.

6. Resentment and sensitiveness to insults will increase on the part of Negroes as they grow in intelligence, but as their spirits rebel more insistently and positively against insults, it cannot help but have its effect upon white men who ignorantly mistreat them, and if the respect growing out of love does not follow, the respect growing out of tolerance, as in the case of the Jews in America, will ensue and result in recognition of equal intelligence and culture.

7. Literacy must be 100 per cent on both sides to bring about a "complete fusion of interests" or a "quieted process of adjustment." Intelligent Negroes among uneducated whites would aggravate the situation.

8. If Negroes were 100 per cent literate they would command more respect, because men always command more respect when they are intelligent.

9. I believe in education first, last, and always as a leveller and as a bulwark of defense. There is no race prejudice among broadly cultured people. Art knows no such distinctions.

10. (a) Yes. (b) Not, if at the same time the education of the whites is broadened and made more general. (c) Better education of both races will facilitate a fusion of interests, beginning probably in economic relations.

11. It would make them much more bitter, for (a) the Negro would be more sensitive to injustice and have more of the combative spirit which literacy usually gives, and (b) whites would be more jealous and anxious to show the Negro his place. I believe that such an intensification of the struggle is desirable and necessary, as I don't believe that the brilliant ideas necessary for solution of the race problem can come other than as the children of the most intense and bitter racial conflict. Of course it would defeat its purpose if such a conflict were bloody, as then we would have a long period of the nauseating burden such as America suffers with today, viz.: the North attempting to reconcile the South.

12. Literacy will make a difference also in race relations. The difference will increase in degree as literacy advances beyond the mere ability to read and write to a wider participation in every field of educational or intellectual endeavor. As far as I have been able to observe, the breach between whites and Negroes is widened as Negroes advance in education and culture. The educated Negro rarely comes in contact with the white man as a menial or laborer—the only point of contact which the great majority of white people want. He will respect the Negro teacher, lawyer, doctor, or business man who knows his work thoroughly and can do as well as he. He is not likely, however, to find any reason to co-operate with this class of Negroes, and the Negroes do seek such co-operation.

13. (a) Yes. (b) In slavery times whites made it a crime to teach Negroes to read. That desire, in up-to-date garb, remains in the breast of most whites today. To many white persons a Negro of superior talent and refinement is a more detestable production than the most pronounced rogue. Most white persons, even of the best quality, are secretly displeased at a Negro of this type. They were brought up to regard Negroes as being below them, and the sight is a blow to their vanity. (c) A dollar talks much more sweetly than Emerson or Shakespeare and even Christ to most men, therefore a process of adjustment or complete fusion of interests will be effected chiefly through trade relationship, not esthetics.

Question: If unrestricted suffrage were given Negroes throughout the United States, would matters be helped?

Answers:

1. Equal suffrage between the races in some parts of the country would doubtless precipitate a temporary disturbance, but it is not thinkable that under democratic institutions any group or class can be permanently or for a long while refused equal participation in the government under which they live and by which they are controlled. Shall we do evil that good may come?

2. Every appreciable increase in power among Negroes will be met with jealousy and repression by the whites. Unrestricted suffrage does not mean much when people have guns at the polls and dare other people to vote. Its inception would mean acute racial trouble, I think, but if the Negroes used the same means and methods to register their vote as the whites do to keep them from registering it, and kept it up long enough, ultimately conditions would be very much improved where Negroes constitute about half the population of a unit.

3. Yes. Even though Negroes might not vote intelligently at the outset, they would tend to vote for their own welfare. The Negro does not feel wholeheartedly that he is a part of the American people. But with the vote he would be in a better position to work for common ends. Though voting for the capitalist parties would not mean much to the Negro, a vote for the money barons is better than no vote at all.

4. Unrestricted suffrage is a right as well as a privilege. It is essential for building up the sense of responsibility and loyalty among any group of people in a democracy founded on the ideals of the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution.

5. Yes, the ballot is a protection which the Negro now is intelligent enough to use and keep. In the present segregated condition of the Negro, the ballot has a genuine property value. Police protection, better lighted and better paved streets, I am convinced, must come to him through the ballot or else he does not get them.

6. Unrestricted Negro suffrage would help a great deal in securing for Negroes the things it is possible to secure through the use of the ballot. Political parties, as well as the Negro himself, would realize the power of Negro suffrage and would doubtless be inclined to cater to that vote. The exercise of such unlimited suffrage is likely to increase for a time the tenseness in race relations, as the whites would not readily give up the domination they have secured. The agitation in Ohio and in the Middle West over the exercise by the Negro of his suffrage shows how clearly the white man fears the power of the ballot when used by the Negro.

7. Other things remaining the same, it would not.

8. Not necessarily by that fact alone. The ultimate value of the right of suffrage is conditioned by the intelligence with which that right is used.

9. This goes without saying. In Chicago, Negroes exercise considerable influence in the city administration, because of their strong political power. The same is true of New York and Cleveland. Apply this to the nation.

10. Yes.

11. Yes, if we had a third party with racial cohesion.

12. Suffrage to be effective must be taken and not conferred. "Who would be free, himself must strike the blow." A man has no right that he can't protect and defend.

Question: How about religion as a solvent of racial difficulties and differences?

Answers:

1. Religion, if it ever becomes a vital force in the everyday affairs of people, will be one of the greatest forces in solving race difficulties. At the present time its influence is practically nil. The average church is still calling worn-out theology religion; those which have adopted a more modern and practical view of religion are too few to exert any influence in race problems.

2. Religion per se, to my mind, has failed, but Christianity, the spirit manifested by Jesus Christ in his life and which he commanded his followers to imitate, if adopted in its vital truth and simplicity by all professing Christians, could solve all the difficulties.

3. Religion might be helpful in solving racial difficulties if it were tried—but it has not been very largely tried yet.

4. Religion as a solvent of racial difficulties is necessary, but both groups will need to practice it to the same degree.

5. The religion of America, or of any other country, is merely an index to the national character. Religion expresses itself in the church, and the church is a capitalistic institution. Expressed religion in America, because its pecuniary existence largely depends upon the rank and file of the people who support it, will not rise above the prejudices and folkways of that rank and file. Religion will not solve many racial difficulties or differences.

6. Religion hardly touches the deeper motivations. It may regulate details, but usually the priest-craft succeeds by sophistry, emphasis or omission in avoiding certain fundamental issues in their religious exhortations. It often appears that the preacher is retained to idealize the crassness of the world, and unpleasant things are simply taboo. He must look to his salary.

7. It has no utility. It had no utility in the world war and so a fortiori could have no utility in our race problem where more bitter issues are involved.

8. Unfortunately religion has little sanction over the social conduct where interest and passions are involved. This was too sadly manifested in the world war. It is to be hoped, however, that there may arise a moral and spiritual renaissance under whose sanction religion may exercise controlling influence over the frictional relations among men.

9. Very much overestimated is religion as a solvent of racial differences. Neither Negroes nor whites have enough confidence in it to put it into practical application. No one thing will bring about the Negro's real emancipation. The fight must be carried on in every sphere where prejudice has vitiated relations.

10. Religion has failed to solve the racial difficulties and differences in America because its principles have never been practiced by the people. Religion has remained a beautiful theory. If the religious principles were practiced there would be no racial difficulties.

11. Utterly valueless. The average individual cannot think. He lives only in the concrete. Material advantages outweigh philosophical benefits. Deprive religion of the moving force of fear which its exponents engender, and it will entirely cease to be dynamic.

12. The religion of Christ will prove a solvent if men ever give it a trial.

13. Religion, in our opinion, has never settled any question. Nothing else contains so much the germs of strife. Mankind, throughout the ages, has never been able to agree on it. The history of Europe, Asia and Northern Africa is one long record of warring religions.

Question: What are some of the most pronounced mental complexes experienced in adjusting your personal desires and expectations to the present social system?

Answers:

1. A constant haunting feeling when in the presence of white persons that they desire to shun me because of my color; that they are eager to use me to further their ends under the guise of piety or patronizing the "good-feeling-toward-your-people" attitude. I suffer from time to time an acute embarrassment because of uncouth conduct in the presence of white persons on the part of uncultured Negroes. Such conduct embarrasses me generally, but the presence of white persons who are supposed to be inimical seems to be the dominant element in the situation.

2. The most pronounced mental complex which I experience in adjusting my desires and expectations to the present social system is not the "inferiority complex" with which most Negroes are charged by the whites. I desire all that the social system affords; but as to expectation it is necessary for me to use auto-hypnotism to make myself expect it in order that I can present to the white man the front of optimism, the necessary air of expectancy to secure success. The shocks and disappointments which a Negro must constantly experience tend to get him in the attitude of expecting nothing.

3. I can't describe the mental complexes, but some are caused by situations such as these: I go to the library to get a book, and I am told that I must sit in a seat among dusty shelves of newspaper files at a table marked "For colored people"; in order to see a play I have to sit in the gallery. I submit to that and when I get to the theater, I am told that no seats are reserved for colored people. I go to a lecture by the Hon. Mr. So and So (white) and he discusses the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution, creating much enthusiasm among the unthinking and some of the thinking. Then the next morning I take up the paper of which the same gentleman is the editor, and read a sneering editorial on the race question, and so on.

4. Personally, I am able to impersonalize my relation to the situation, and experience no mental perplexities. I try to preserve a rational attitude in an irrational environment and objectify cruelty, injustice and wrong. I know that I as an individual am not Jim Crowed, or disfranchised or socially isolated; it is the race to which I belong. My only perplexity is how to remove these racial, not personal, disqualifications.

5. Determination to fulfill my personal desires in spite of the present social system; a loss of respect for the white man's sense of justice.

6. The arrogance of the poor ignorant white man and the snobbishness of the middle class. This is the stumbling-block for the future of our race to overcome.

7. Trying to get white persons, as employers, etc., to accept me as a man first of all, then to judge me on my merits, irrespective of my color. Trying to attain to the same degree of success and liberty of any other man of my training and experience in spite of the world in which I live.

8. Amused and almost cynical tolerance. A desire to reap the greatest possible advantages from the system, without permitting my intelligence to admit that it is right because it is personally advantageous.

9. My desires are never adjusted to the present "social system"; they are constantly out of harmony with the practices of our so-called democracy, as these practices relate to the Negro.

10. If this question means what I think it does, space will not permit an intelligent answer.

11. A hyper-sensitiveness in regard to the subject Negro; a tendency to see racial antagonism as a motive of conduct in every act of white persons when perhaps it is sometimes absent; a hesitancy about entering public places or approaching individuals for fear of rebuff or insult; a withdrawal into a Negro world in which almost every thought and act are colored by a racial aspect before a humanitarian one, are some of the mental complexes experienced in a greater or less degree by almost every colored person.

Question: Do you believe that Negroes are prejudiced against white persons?

Answers:

1. Some are, but the prejudice is due to nurture rather than to nature.

2. Prejudice means pre-judgment. Negroes come into the world to find most white persons disliking them. They grow up in an atmosphere where they find whites ready to insult them because of the color Nature saw fit to give them. Therefore, knowledge, not prejudice, causes Negroes to dislike whites. Human beings, and even dumb animals, love only those who love them. The average Negro is, however, quick to drop this defensive attitude when he meets a fair-minded white person. Perhaps too easily, as he is often taken advantage of by shrewd whites disguised as friends.

3. I do not believe that Negroes are inherently prejudiced against the white race. Personally, I have absolutely no such prejudice. I do not believe that the white race is inherently prejudiced against the Negro, but that it is wholly a feeling stimulated by social opinion which can be modified and controlled. I put in evidence the facts: First, when social pressure is removed, white women marry Negro men, and white men marry Negro women. Second, the superior always shows prejudice against the inferior, whether superiority is claimed on basis of wealth, culture, birth, or position. The prejudices of inferior against superior is never so pronounced as that of superior against inferior. Natural antipathy is mutually reciprocal. Third, some white persons are less influenced by it than others. Fourth, race antagonism as such is scarcely discernible where Latin civilization and the Catholic religion are in control. Fifth, it does not exist in the Mohammedan dispensation. Sixth, the experience of thousands of Negro soldiers in France proves its comparative absence. Seventh, race prejudice seems to be principally the vice of the Teuton and the Anglo-Saxon, which must be subject to ultimate control. It will not be quite so strong among Germans as it was before the war.

4. I do not believe that Negroes as a race are prejudiced against white people, although I am conscious of an increasing prejudice against white people on the part of many individual Negroes, especially educated colored women who live in the South and resent keenly the indiscriminate approaches of white men.

5. Many Negroes are cynical of all the professions of white men. They often express their hatred of white people openly. I think, however, that feeling is more prevalent among the younger Negroes than among the older ones.

6. Many pretend to be. Most of them are not.

7. Yes, 98 per cent of them are.

8. Not as individuals. They are affected by the spirit of mass hostility to dissimilar masses based upon the desire to appropriate and retain advantages. Racial prejudices are the products of the will of dominant individuals evoking responses from weaker intelligences and serving the purpose of the dominating mind.

9. If so, to a very slight extent. What feeling most Negroes have is created almost solely to offset the prejudice and antagonism of the whites. The prejudice of the whites I might describe as primary; that of the colored, secondary.

10. Yes; too much so among some groups.

11. Negroes in most cases are very much prejudiced against whites.

12. Yes. The difference lies in the degree. Prejudice is artificial. It is learned. The white boy and girl have been "taught" more prejudice than the Negro. Negroes seldom teach prejudice outright. When they learn it, it is inescapable. America is a school, I fear, at present where even the most backward learns something of prejudice whether he will it or not.

13. I believe there is a strong prejudice against white persons. This antipathy is, I believe, not based on racial unlikeness, but on resentment because of cruel treatment as an inferior.

Question: Are you ever conscious of a feeling of racial inferiority or even the desire to compensate for a supposed inferiority?

Answers:

1. I attribute inferiority and superiority alike to individuals, not race. I have every confidence that my race is capable of producing as great men, and proportionately as many of them, as any other race under the sun. I trace to environment the responsibility for not releasing their energy upon constructive work, but concentrating it upon gaining a living or a chance to gain a living. Many times I feel the desire to compensate for a supposed inferiority, because I believe in nailing a lie wherever possible.

2. I never have a feeling of racial inferiority or a desire to compensate for a supposed inferiority (with reservations). I am usually cognizant of the fact that most white people consider the Negro an inferior. This often causes the bristles to rise on my back.

3. Personally, at no moment of our lives. The Negro is really superior in stamina. His race is progressing, while the whites appear to be standing still. The white race has had seven thousand years or more of education and civilization, yet in this prosperous republic today the average white person is comparatively poor and possesses little education. The Negro, in spite of the oppressive handicap due to color, is progressing along all lines, commercial, professional and artistic.

4. I am never conscious of racial inferiority, but I am a firm believer in the theory that any human being will be whatever his environment and his heredity will make of him, regardless of the color of his skin or the form of his skull. One in considering this point of view should be sure not to confuse the words "inferiority" and "inequality."

5. No.

6. I feel no desire to apologize to the world because I am a colored woman; I had to be of some race, and here I am.

7. No. I believe that accidents of environment determine relative positions.

8. Decidedly no! I believe absolutely in my own worth as a man and as a Negro and defer only to wider experience, knowledge, or skill, whether possessed by white persons or Negroes.

9. No!

10. No.

11. I never have a feeling of racial inferiority or a desire to compensate for a supposed inferiority.

12. Personally, I am absolutely unconscious of any feeling of racial inferiority. I recognize the control of social forces and influences which may seem too strong to be overcome at present. I simply suffer it to be so now.

13. I have never felt any racial inferiority, though always when thrown in school work or business with white people the desire to do my work as well or better than they is very strong. This desire comes primarily from a desire to show that the Negro is not inferior in his ability.

Question: Do you believe that there should be recognized leaders of Negroes? Are there such persons whom you regard as qualified for leadership? Discuss their merits and demerits.

Answers:

1. As long as the dominant power treats with us as with Negroes rather than as with American citizens, there will be need of recognized leaders; but these leaders should be chosen by the Negroes themselves, not chosen and imposed by others.

2. Yes and no. Theoretically and ultimately, no. Practically and immediately, yes. In any clearly differentiated group the spokesman should come from and grow out of conditions within the group. In a community in which there were cultural and not ethnic divisions there would be no need for Negro leaders. What was good for the hive would be for the good of each bee. However, in a community in which color is a target, defensive alliances under the best possible leadership are a sine qua non. I am too close to the problem to have sufficient perspective to attempt the discussion of personalities.

3. Logically, no. Practically, under present conditions it is imperative to have Negro leaders. Where people do not read much, do not study much, they are incapable of doing much thinking. Better a bad leader under such circumstances than no leader at all. The very clashes between rival leaders with their several points of view force the rank and file to attend to conditions and compare conflicting views. This often marks the beginning of interests in striving to improve conditions. The merits of leaders are considered in another place.

4. I do not think that it will be possible, or advisable, to attempt to appoint or elect leaders for Negroes. Naturally men and women of exceptional powers will be recognized by those of less developed powers as leaders of thought in various connections in their several localities.

5. There should be no recognized leaders of Negroes except those who are selected from groups or bodies of Negroes—selected by them for a particular purpose or a particular cause. I do not believe in Negro leadership secured by members of the white race and then handed to our group as a leader without first having had the endorsement of the Negroes themselves.

6. Yes. Emmet Scott, Dr. Du Bois and Mr. Grimke. Mr. Scott has great executive ability. Dr. Du Bois is a great philosopher and an ardent race rights advocate. Mr. Grimke a scholar and wise counsellor. This combination as Leaders' Council would, in my opinion, conserve our best interests. Mr. Scott is too much of an opportunist for an ideal leader, Dr. Du Bois is too radical at times, Mr. Grimke is too much of an intellectual recluse.

7. There should be recognized leaders of Negroes, recognized by Negroes because of their merits in their particular fields of endeavor. There are Negroes qualified for such leadership today, but their affiliations with organizations largely or partly supported by philanthropic whites negative their usefulness.

8. I believe every community should develop its own leadership. A great deal of our present leadership is too largely clerical and political and therefore not free, broad, and independent. We need a leadership which is free, courageous, and which possesses a program and definite objective.

9. I do not approve self-appointed leadership or leadership bestowed by white friends because they can command funds. If there are to be leaders, they should be chosen by selection so that there can be "solemn referendum." With this qualification, there are a large number of Negroes whom I would vote for as leaders. The trouble now is that our so-called leaders are not responsible to those whom they are supposed to represent.

10. There should not be; as soon as one appears, destructive influences are brought to bear upon him both from within and without, making of him within a short period an extremely artificial and useless guide, but who is followed, nevertheless, by Negroes blindly to their own great injury.

11. I believe firmly in the capacity of the race for self-leadership. Any people can govern themselves better than an outsider is apt to govern them, unless the alien is willing to become naturalized in the group he aspires to lead. The white race at present is unable or unwilling to become naturalized in the Negro group.

12. The basis of Negro leadership should rest on the ability to develop within the masses a desire and the power to obtain better homes, education and their privileges as citizens without belittling themselves or adopting the toadying attitude. Any individual who is striving in a community to secure these things for his people should be considered a leader. The mere ability to write a book, edit a magazine, or publicly express the cause of the Negro is not a sufficient qualification for leadership even though it does bring national prominence.

13. (a) Under the circumstances, yes. (b) Useless to discuss this. People usually choose as their leaders those who express most strongly prevailing sentiments. (c) The followers are their own judges of merit and demerit.

Question: What, in your opinion, are some of the greatest mistakes of prominent Negroes in their policies or stand on racial issues?

Answers:

1. Most are honest, I think, but emphasize too much some one pet solution, such as "Get Property," "Industrial Education," etc. Many are insincere, using their influence to feather their own nests, letting the race go hang. An intolerance among Negroes themselves for those among their number who have different opinions as to the wisest courses in arriving at the better conditions which they equally are trying to bring about. Some characteristics possessed by most of the so-called leaders may be summed as follows:

Don't bother and leave all in the hands of God.

Overestimation of the Negroes' present attainments, eulogies instead of information.

Oratory of denunciation only, raising prejudice against whites but offering no course of action or thought leading to improvement either of Negroes personally or individually, or as a race.

A disinclination to tell the blunt truth when interracial conferences offer the opportunity for an exchange of views.

2. The greatest mistake that leaders usually make is that of failing to study the problems towards the solution of which they are working. They also are not willing to co-operate with leaders along other lines.

3. Selfishness and lack of moral backbone in the face of possible financial loss.

4. To accept that there is a purely racial psychology. And to think, act, or accept as a Negro and not as a man.

5. (a) Compromising attitude; (b) depending on support of white people financially and morally; (c) failure to co-operate freely with all cases among the Negroes themselves.

6. Lack of absolute frankness with white people about mind and feeling of Negroes; lack of absolute frankness with Negroes about their own shortcomings and failure. I believe that many men are overcoming this weakness.

7. Short-sightedness. They seem not to look ahead and see the consequence of their arrangements and concessions. Most of them, because of the manner of their selections, are unacquainted with history, sociology, etc. They see the present, not even the present generation. They fall into advices and concessions today which prove a noose tomorrow. There is lack of poise. Often they seem to know nothing of a means. There is no intermediate ground; it simply is or it is not. This absolutism inevitably leads to trouble. This of course does not apply to all of our leaders.

8. The greatest mistakes of prominent Negroes in their stands: A statesman is supposed to be the fusion of two necessary elements: (1) the theorist, such as we have in our college professors and most of our writers; and (2) the practical politician who can get things done. The main fault with most of our prominent Negroes in their policies and behavior is that they never accomplish this fusion; all fall very definitely into either group one or group two, and either group by itself is helpless.

9. The greatest mistake of prominent Negroes, in my judgment, is that they pay too great a deference to the attitude of the white race rather than to the inherent demands of humanity. Jesus refused to defer to the arrogance of Pilate, although he exercised the power of life or death.

10. Faulty perspective due to improper training; failure to grasp the economic significance of race prejudice; and a tendency to preach the doctrine of non-resistance when they get rich and fat. The younger crop of Negroes, armed with modern scientific education are remedying the first two. Time will show whether they will prove more unselfish.