Martin R. Delany - The Condition, Elevation, Emigration, and Destiny of the Colored People of the United States
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Martin R. Delany >> The Condition, Elevation, Emigration, and Destiny of the Colored People of the United States
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13 THE CONDITION, ELEVATION, EMIGRATION, AND DESTINY OF THE COLORED PEOPLE
OF THE UNITED STATES
Published 1852.
CONTENTS
The Condition, Elevation, Emigration, and Destiny of the Colored People
of the United States
Preface. 35
Chapter I. Condition of Many Classes in Europe Considered 41
Chapter II. Comparative Condition of the
Colored People of the United States 44
Chapter III. American Colonization 58
Chapter IV. Our Elevation in the United States 63
Chapter V. Means of Elevation 67
Chapter VI. The United States Our Country 74
Chapter VII. Claims of Colored Men as Citizens of the United States 75
Chapter VIII. Colored American Warriors 91
Chapter IX. Capacity of Colored Men and Women
as Citizen Members of Community 106
Chapter X. Practical Utility of Colored People of the Present
Day as Members of Society--Business Men and Mechanics 113
Chapter XI. Literary and Professional Colored Men and Women 128
Chapter XII. Students of Various Professions 148
Chapter XIII. A Scan at Past Things 151
Chapter XIV. Late Men of Literary, Professional and Artistic Note 155
Chapter XV. Farmers and Herdsmen 158
Chapter XVI. National Disfranchisement of Colored People 161
Chapter XVII. Emigration of the Colored People of the United States 175
Chapter XVIII. "Republic of Liberia" 177
Chapter XIX. The Canadas 189
Chapter XX. Central and South America and the West Indies 193
Chapter XXI. Nicaragua and New Grenada 202
Chapter XXII. Things as They Are 204
Chapter XXIII. A Glance at Ourselves--Conclusion 211
Appendix. A Project for an Expedition of Adventure,
to the Eastern Coast of Africa 221
_Sincerely dedicated to the American People, North and South._
_By Their Most Devout, and Patriotic Fellow Citizen, the Author_
PREFACE
The author of this little volume has no other apology for offering it to
the public, than the hurried manner in which it has been composed. Being
detained in the city of New York on business, he seized the opportunity
of a tedious delay, and wrote the work in the inside of one month,
attending to other business through the day, and lecturing on physiology
sometimes in the evening. The reader will therefore not entertain an
idea of elegance of language and terseness of style, such as should rule
the sentences of every composition, by whomsoever written.
His sole object has been, to place before the public in general, and the
colored people of the United States in particular, great truths
concerning this class of citizens, which appears to have been heretofore
avoided, as well by friends as enemies to their elevation. By opponents,
to conceal information, that they are well aware would stimulate and
impel them on to bold and adventurous deeds of manly daring; and by
friends, who seem to have acted on the principle of the zealous
orthodox, who would prefer losing the object of his pursuit to changing
his policy.
There are also a great many colored people in the United States, who
have independence of spirit, who desire to, and do, think for
themselves; but for the want of general information, and in consequence
of a prevailing opinion that has obtained, that no thoughts nor opinions
must be expressed, even though it would eventuate in their elevation,
except it emanate from some old, orthodox, stereotyped doctrine
concerning them; therefore, such a work as this, which is but a mere
introduction to what will henceforth emanate from the pen of colored men
and women, appeared to be in most anxious demand, in order to settle
their minds entirely, and concentrate them upon an effective and
specific course of procedure. We have never conformed with that class of
philosophers who would keep the people in ignorance, lest they might
change their opinion from former predilections. This we shall never do,
except pressing necessity demands it, and then only as a measure to
prevent bad consequences, for the time.
The colored people of to-day are not the colored people of a quarter of
a century ago, and require very different means and measures to satisfy
their wants and demands, and to effect their advancement. No wise
statesman presumes the same measures for the satisfaction of the
American people now, that may have been with propriety adopted
twenty-five years ago; neither is it wisdom to presume, that the
privileges which satisfied colored people twenty years ago, they will be
reconciled with now. That with which the father of the writer may have
been satisfied, even up to the present day, the writer cannot be content
with; the one lived in times antecedent to the birth of the other; that
which answered then, does not answer now: so is it with the whole class
of colored people in the United States. Their feelings, tastes,
predilections, wants, demands, and sympathies, are identical, and
homogeneous with those of all other Americans.
"Fleecy locks and black complexions,
Cannot alter nature's claim;
Skins may differ, but affections,
Dwell in black and white the same."
Many of the distinguished characters referred to in this work, who lived
in former days, for which there is no credit given, have been obtained
from various sources--as fragments of history, pamphlets, files of
newspapers, obsolete American history, and some from Mrs. Child's
Collection. Those of modern date, are living facts known to the writer
in his travels through the United States, having been from Canada and
Maine to Arkansas and Texas. The origin of the breast-works of cotton
bales on Chalmet Plains, at the battle of New Orleans, the writer
learned in that city, from old colored men in 1840, and subsequently,
from other sources; as well as much useful information concerning that
battle, from _Julien Bennoit_, spoken of in the work. He has before
referred to it some five or six years ago, through the columns of a
paper, of which he was then editor, and not until subsequently to his
narrating the same facts in these columns, was he aware that it was ever
mentioned in print, when he saw, on the 3d day of March, on looking over
the contributions of the "Liberty Bell," a beautiful annual of Boston,
the circumstances referred to by DAVID LEE CHILD, Esq., the particulars
of which will be found in our version.
The original intention was to make this a pamphlet of a few pages, the
writer commencing with that view; but finding that he could not thus
justify the design of the work, will fully explain the cause of its
present volume. The subject of this work is one that the writer has
given thought for years, and the only regret that he has now in placing
it before the public is, that his circumstances and engagements have
not afforded him such time and opportunity as to do justice to it. But,
should he succeed in turning the attention of the colored people, in
general, in this direction--he shall have been amply compensated for the
labor bestowed. An appendix will be found giving the plan of the author,
laid out at twenty-four years of age, but subsequently improved on, for
the elevation of the colored race. That plan of course, as this work
will fully show, has been abandoned for a far more glorious one; albeit,
we as a race, still lay claim to the project, which one day must be
added to our dashing strides in national advancement, successful
adventure, and unsurpassed enterprise.
One part of the American people, though living in near proximity and
together, are quite unacquainted with the other; and one of the great
objects of the author is, to make each acquainted. Except the character
of an individual is known, there can be no just appreciation of his
worth; and as with individuals, so is it with classes.
The colored people are not yet known, even to their most professed
friends among the white Americans; for the reason, that politicians,
religionists, colonizationists, and abolitionists, have each and all, at
different times, presumed to _think_ for, dictate to, and _know_ better
what suited colored people, than they knew for themselves; and
consequently, there has been no other knowledge of them obtained, than
that which has been obtained through these mediums. Their history--past,
present, and future, has been written by them, who, for reasons well
known, which are named in this volume, are not their representatives,
and, therefore, do not properly nor fairly present their wants and
claims among their fellows. Of these impressions, we design disabusing
the public mind, and correcting the false impressions of all classes
upon this great subject. A moral and mental, is as obnoxious as a
physical servitude, and not to be tolerated; as the one may, eventually,
lead to the other. Of these we feel the direful effects.
"If I'm designed your lordling's slave,
By nature's law designed;
Why was an independent wish
E'er planted in my mind!"
I
CONDITION OF MANY CLASSES IN EUROPE CONSIDERED
That there have been in all ages and in all countries, in every quarter
of the habitable globe, especially among those nations laying the
greatest claim to civilization and enlightenment, classes of people who
have been deprived of equal privileges, political, religious and social,
cannot be denied, and that this deprivation on the part of the ruling
classes is cruel and unjust, is also equally true. Such classes have
even been looked upon as inferior to their oppressors, and have ever
been mainly the domestics and menials of society, doing the low offices
and drudgery of those among whom they lived, moving about and existing
by mere sufferance, having no rights nor privileges but those conceded
by the common consent of their political superiors. These are historical
facts that cannot be controverted, and therefore proclaim in tones more
eloquently than thunder, the listful attention of every oppressed man,
woman, and child under the government of the people of the United States
of America.
In past ages there were many such classes, as the Israelites in Egypt,
the Gladiators in Rome, and similar classes in Greece; and in the
present age, the Gipsies in Italy and Greece, the Cossacs in Russia and
Turkey, the Sclaves and Croats in the Germanic States, and the Welsh and
Irish among the British, to say nothing of various other classes among
other nations.
That there have in all ages, in almost every nation, existed a nation
within a nation--a people who although forming a part and parcel of the
population, yet were from force of circumstances, known by the peculiar
position they occupied, forming in fact, by the deprivation of political
equality with others, no part, and if any, but a restricted part of the
body politic of such nations, is also true.
Such then are the Poles in Russia, the Hungarians in Austria, the
Scotch, Irish, and Welsh in the United Kingdom, and such also are the
Jews, scattered throughout not only the length and breadth of Europe,
but almost the habitable globe, maintaining their national
characteristics, and looking forward in high hopes of seeing the day
when they may return to their former national position of
self-government and independence, let that be in whatever part of the
habitable world it may. This is the lot of these various classes of
people in Europe, and it is not our intention here, to discuss the
justice or injustice of the causes that have contributed to their
degradation, but simply to set forth the undeniable facts, which are as
glaring as the rays of a noonday's sun, thereby to impress them
indelibly on the mind of every reader of this pamphlet.
It is not enough, that these people are deprived of equal privileges by
their rulers, but, the more effectually to succeed, the equality of
these classes must be denied, and their inferiority by nature as
distinct races, actually asserted. This policy is necessary to appease
the opposition that might be interposed in their behalf. Wherever there
is arbitrary rule, there must be necessity, on the part of the dominant
classes, superiority be assumed. To assume superiority, is to deny the
equality of others, and to deny their equality, is to premise their
incapacity for self-government. Let this once be conceded, and there
will be little or no sympathy for the oppressed, the oppressor being
left to prescribe whatever terms at discretion for their government,
suits his own purpose.
Such then is the condition of various classes in Europe; yes, nations,
for centuries within nations, even without the hope of redemption among
those who oppress them. And however unfavorable their condition, there
is none more so than that of the colored people of the United States.
II
COMPARATIVE CONDITION OF THE COLORED PEOPLE OF THE UNITED STATES
The United States, untrue to her trust and unfaithful to her professed
principles of republican equality, has also pursued a policy of
political degradation to a large portion of her native born countrymen,
and that class is the Colored People. Denied an equality not only of
political but of natural rights, in common with the rest of our fellow
citizens, there is no species of degradation to which we are not
subject.
Reduced to abject slavery is not enough, the very thought of which
should awaken every sensibility of our common nature; but those of their
descendants who are freemen even in the non-slaveholding States, occupy
the very same position politically, religiously, civilly and socially,
(with but few exceptions,) as the bondman occupies in the slave States.
In those States, the bondman is disfranchised, and for the most part so
are we. He is denied all civil, religious, and social privileges, except
such as he gets by mere sufferance, and so are we. They have no part nor
lot in the government of the country, neither have we. They are ruled
and governed without representation, existing as mere nonentities among
the citizens, and excrescences on the body politic--a mere dreg in
community, and so are we. Where then is our political superiority to the
enslaved? none, neither are we superior in any other relation to
society, except that we are defacto masters of ourselves and joint
rulers of our own domestic household, while the bondman's self is
claimed by another, and his relation to his family denied him. What the
unfortunate classes are in Europe, such are we in the United States,
which is folly to deny, insanity not to understand, blindness not to
see, and surely now full time that our eyes were opened to these
startling truths, which for ages have stared us full in the face.
It is time that we had become politicians, we mean, to understand the
political economy and domestic policy of nations; that we had become as
well as moral theorists, also the practical demonstrators of equal
rights and self-government. Except we do, it is idle to talk about
rights, it is mere chattering for the sake of being seen and heard--like
the slave, saying something because his so called "master" said it, and
saying just what he told him to say. Have we not now sufficient
intelligence among us to understand our true position, to realise our
actual condition, and determine for ourselves what is best to be done?
If we have not now, we never shall have, and should at once cease
prating about our equality, capacity, and all that.
Twenty years ago, when the writer was a youth, his young and yet
uncultivated mind was aroused, and his tender heart made to leap with
anxiety in anticipation of the promises then held out by the prime
movers in the cause of our elevation.
In 1830 the most intelligent and leading spirits among the colored men
in the United States, such as James Forten, Robert Douglass, I. Bowers,
A.D. Shadd, John Peck, Joseph Cassey, and John B. Vashon of
Pennsylvania; John T. Hilton, Nathaniel and Thomas Paul, and James G.
Barbodoes of Massachusetts; Henry Sipkins, Thomas Hamilton, Thomas L.
Jennings, Thomas Downing, Samuel E. Cornish, and others of New York; R.
Cooley and others of Maryland, and representatives from other States
which cannot now be recollected, the data not being at hand, assembled
in the city of Philadelphia, in the capacity of a National Convention,
to "devise ways and means for the bettering of our condition." These
Conventions determined to assemble annually, much talent, ability, and
energy of character being displayed; when in 1831 at a sitting of the
Convention in September, from their previous pamphlet reports, much
interest having been created throughout the country, they were favored
by the presence of a number of whites, some of whom were able and
distinguished men, such as Rev. R.R. Gurley, Arthur Tappan, Elliot
Cresson, John Rankin, Simeon Jocelyn and others, among them William
Lloyd Garrison, then quite a young man, all of whom were staunch and
ardent Colonizationists, young Garrison at that time, doing his
mightiest in his favorite work.
Among other great projects of interest brought before the convention at
a previous sitting, was that of the expediency of a general emigration,
as far as it was practicable, of the colored people to the British
Provinces of North America. Another was that of raising sufficient means
for the establishment and erection of a College for the proper education
of the colored youth. These gentlemen long accustomed to observation and
reflection on the condition of their people saw at once, that there must
necessarily be means used adequate to the end to be attained--that end
being an unqualified equality with the ruling class of their fellow
citizens. He saw that as a class, the colored people of the country were
ignorant, degraded and oppressed, by far the greater portion of them
being abject slaves in the South, the very condition of whom was almost
enough, under the circumstances, to blast the remotest hope of success,
and those who were freemen, whether in the South or North, occupied a
subservient, servile, and menial position, considering it a favor to get
into the service of the whites, and do their degrading offices. That the
difference between the whites and themselves, consisted in the superior
advantages of the one over the other, in point of attainments. That if a
knowledge of the arts and sciences, the mechanical occupations, the
industrial occupations, as farming, commerce, and all the various
business enterprises, and learned professions were necessary for the
superior position occupied by their rulers, it was also necessary for
them. And very reasonably too, the first suggestion which occurred to
them was, the advantages of a location, then the necessity of a
qualification. They reasoned with themselves, that all distinctive
differences made among men on account of their origin, is wicked,
unrighteous, and cruel, and never shall receive countenance in any shape
from us, therefore, the first acts of the measure entered into by them,
was to protest, solemnly protest, against every unjust measure and
policy in the country, having for its object the proscription of the
colored people, whether state, national, municipal, social, civil, or
religious.
But being far-sighted, reflecting, discerning men, they took a political
view of the subject, and determined for the good of their people to be
governed in their policy according to the facts as they presented
themselves. In taking a glance at Europe, they discovered there, however
unjustly, as we have shown in another part of this pamphlet, that there
are and have been numerous classes proscribed and oppressed, and it was
not for them to cut short their wise deliberations, and arrest their
proceedings in contention, as to the cause, whether on account of
language, the color of eyes, hair, skin, or their origin of
country--because all this is contrary to reason, a contradiction to
common sense, at war with nature herself, and at variance with facts as
they stare us every day in the face, among all nations, in every
country--this being made the pretext as a matter of _policy_ alone--a
fact worthy of observation, that wherever the objects of oppression are
the most easily distinguished by any peculiar or general
characteristics, these people are the more easily oppressed, because the
war of oppression is the more easily waged against them. This is the
case with the modern Jews and many other people who have
strongly-marked, peculiar, or distinguishing characteristics. This
arises in this wise. The policy of all those who proscribe any people,
induces them to select as the objects of proscription, those who
differed as much as possible, in some particulars, from themselves. This
is to ensure the greater success, because it engenders the greater
prejudice, or in other words, elicits less interest on the part of the
oppressing class, in their favor. This fact is well understood in
national conflicts, as the soldier or civilian, who is distinguished by
his dress, mustache, or any other peculiar appendage, would certainly
prove himself a madman, if he did not take the precaution to change his
dress, remove his mustache, and conceal as much as possible his peculiar
characteristics, to give him access among the repelling party.
This is mere policy, nature having nothing to do with it. Still, it is a
fact, a great truth well worthy of remark, and as such as adduce it for
the benefit of those of our readers, unaccustomed to an enquiry into the
policy of nations.
In view of these truths, our fathers and leaders in our elevation,
discovered that as a policy, we the colored people were selected as the
subordinate class in this country, not on account of any actual or
supposed inferiority on their part, but simply because, in view of all
the circumstances of the case, they were the very best class that could
be selected. They would have as readily had any other class as
subordinates in the country, as the colored people, but the condition of
society _at the time_, would not admit of it. In the struggle for
American Independence, there were among those who performed the most
distinguished parts, the most common-place peasantry of the Provinces.
English, Danish, Irish, Scotch, and others, were among those whose names
blazoned forth as heroes in the American Revolution. But a single
reflection will convince us, that no course of policy could have induced
the proscription of the parentage and relatives of such men as Benjamin
Franklin the printer, Roger Sherman the cobbler, the tinkers, and others
of the signers of the Declaration of Independence. But as they were
determined to have a subservient class, it will readily be conceived,
that according to the state of society at the time, the better policy on
their part was, to select some class, who from their political
position--however much they may have contributed their aid as we
certainly did, in the general struggle for liberty by force of arms--who
had the least claims upon them, or who had the _least chance_, or was
the _least potent_ in urging their claims. This class of course was the
colored people and Indians.
The Indians who in the early settlement of the continent, before an
African captive had ever been introduced thereon, were reduced to the
most abject slavery, toiling day and night in the mines, under the
relentless hands of heartless Spanish taskmasters, but being a race of
people raised to the sports of fishing, the chase, and of war, were
wholly unaccustomed to labor, and therefore sunk under the insupportable
weight, two millions and a half having fallen victims to the cruelty of
oppression and toil suddenly placed upon their shoulders. And it was
only this that prevented their farther enslavement as a class, after the
provinces were absolved from the British Crown. It is true that their
general enslavement took place on the islands and in the mining
districts of South America, where indeed, the Europeans continued to
enslave them, until a comparatively recent period; still, the design,
the feeling, and inclination from policy, was the same to do so here, in
this section of the continent.
Nor was it until their influence became too great, by the political
position occupied by their brethren in the new republic, that the German
and Irish peasantry ceased to be sold as slaves for a term of years
fixed by law, for the repayment of their passage-money, the descendants
of these classes of people for a long time being held as inferiors, in
the estimation of the ruling class, and it was not until they assumed
the rights and privileges guaranteed to them by the established policy
of the country, among the leading spirits of whom were their relatives,
that the policy towards them was discovered to be a bad one, and
accordingly changed. Nor was it, as is frequently very erroneously
asserted, by colored as well as white persons, that it was on account of
hatred to the African, or in other words, on account of hatred to his
color, that the African was selected as the subject of oppression in
this country. This is sheer nonsense; being based on policy and nothing
else, as shown in another place. The Indians, who being the most foreign
to the sympathies of the Europeans on this continent, were selected in
the first place, who, being unable to withstand the hardships, gave way
before them.
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