African-American responses to Jim Crow USHC 3.5

USHC-3.5 Evaluate the varied responses of African-Americans to the restrictions imposed on them in the post-Reconstruction period, including the leadership and strategies of Booker T. Washington, W. E. B. DuBois, and Ida B. Wells-Barnett.

African-American Response Determined to claim the full rights of citizenship in a democracy, African-Americans responded to the restrictions placed upon them by the Jim Crow laws and their loss of the vote through poll taxes and literacy tests. African-American leaders emerged who were united in their determination to attain full citizenship but were divided as to the best strategy to pursue The strategies each advocated depended in large measure on personal background and the audience that each addressed.

Booker T. Washington Was born a slave in the South Raised himself to a leadership position through his hard work and determination to receive an education He founded the Tuskegee Institute in order to provide vocational training to African-Americans

Booker T. Washington (cont.) George Washington Carver worked at Tuskegee developing new crops to aid the poverty- stricken cotton farmers of the region Booker T. Washington’s experience in the increasingly segregated South led him to advocate vocational education and opportunities for employment as more important to the well-being of African-Americans than social and political equality

Booker T. Washington (cont.) Although Washington’s ultimate goal was full equality, he knew that African-Americans who were too assertive in advocating for their political and social rights might fall victim to a lynching.

Booker T. Washington (cont.) Southern businessmen opened textile mills throughout the region Booker T. Washington pleaded with them to hire the hard-working former slaves in his so-called “Atlanta Compromise” speech The agreement was never written down. Essential elements of the agreement were that blacks would not ask for the right to vote, they would not retaliate against racist behavior, they would tolerate segregation and discrimination, that they would receive free basic education, education would be limited to vocational or industrial training (for instance as teachers or nurses), liberal arts education would be prohibited (for instance, college education in the classics, humanities, art, or literature).

Booker T. Washington (cont.) His public statements suggested that he was willing to accept the second-class citizenship offered by Jim Crow laws and literacy tests and poll taxes in exchange for jobs that would alleviate the poverty of African-Americans. Yet Washington lobbied behind the scenes for greater social and political rights He sometimes secretly financed legal challenges to Jim Crow laws

Booker T. Washington (cont.) Although Washington’s strategy was acceptable to the white majority of the South, jobs were not forthcoming Southern African-Americans revered Washington but northern African-Americans criticized his gradualism and “accommodation”

W.E.B. DuBois Born free in the North Attended prestigious schools on scholarship and earned a PhD from Harvard University DuBois opposed Washington’s emphasis on vocational education

W.E.B. DuBois (cont.) Argued that all African-Americans should have the opportunity for any education that fit their talents DuBois promoted the development of a “Talented Tenth” of well-educated African-American leaders

W.E.B. DuBois (cont.) DuBois voiced both his opposition to Washington’s strategy and his own advocacy for full social and political rights for all African-Americans Expressed through the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP), which he had helped to found, and its publication The Crisis, which he edited

Reaction to DuBois DuBois’s militant rhetoric energized his readers, the growing African-American middle class Was less acceptable to the white community

Northern View On Race Schools, neighborhoods, and public facilities continued to be segregated in the North by practice (de facto) In the South by law (de jure) African-Americans were most often the last hired and the first fired (LIFO)

In the future … It would be many years, the 1940s, before the NAACP would be systematically successful in protecting the rights of African-Americans in the courts Culminating with Brown v. Board of Education [1954] and launching the modern civil rights movement

Ida Wells-Barnett Born a slave in Mississippi shortly before emancipation She grew up on a plantation where her parents continued to work for their former master Educated in a Reconstruction-era freedom school, Wells-Barnett took a job as a teacher and later as a newspaper writer

Ida Wells-Barnett (cont.) Ida Wells-Barnett experienced Jim Crow first hand when she was forcibly removed from a railroad car and forced to sit in a colored-only car She sued the railroad company but her initial victory was overturned on appeal

Ida Wells-Barnett (cont.) She wrote an editorial critical of the segregated schools in Memphis that cost Wells-Barnett her job as a teacher Wells-Barnett also experienced violent intimidation when a friend was lynched in Memphis This experience launched her investigation of lynching as a newspaper editor

Ida Wells-Barnett (cont.) She devoted the rest of her life to an anti-lynching crusade Her outspoken criticisms of lynching met with a violent reaction from whites and she was forced to leave Memphis

Her views Ida Wells-Barnett actively objected to Booker T. Washington’s strategy which she labeled as accommodation She was a founding member of the NAACP, but left that group when it was not militant enough

Her views She worked with Jane Addams to prevent the Chicago public schools from being segregated Supported the cause of women’s suffrage Ida raised awareness of the conditions of African-Americans on both the national and international levels