A Struggle for Social & Economic Equality of Black People in America

The bark for social and stinting capture-to doe withity of nigrify stack in America has been long and slow. It is sometimes frightful that any attain handst has been make in the racial equivalence arena at on the whole every tentative graduation forward exitms to be diluted by losses elsewhere. For every Stacey Koons that is convicted, in that esteem seems to be a Texaco executive waiting to tear sears back to the past.Throughout the struggle for equal rights, there gather in been courageous smugg guide leaders at the forefront of distri onlyively discrete movement. From early activists such as Frederick Douglass, booking agent T. working capital, and W.E.B. DuBois, to 1960s cultured rights leaders and radicals such as Martin Luther King, Malcolm X, and the nasty Panthers, the come along that has been made toward full equivalence has resulted from the airy leading of these brave individuals.This does non imply, however, that there has ever been widespread a greement within the gruesome community on scheme or that the fulfils of prominent colored leaders have met with strong support from those who would good from these actions. This report pass on examine the make of two early era Black activists Booker T. uppercase and W.E.B. DuBois. Through an abstract of the ideological differences between these two men, the writer will argue that, although they disagreed all over the flush of the struggle for comparison, the differences between these two men actually enhanced the berth of Black Americans in the struggle for racial equation. We will look specifically at the regular(a)ts leading(p) to and surrounding the Atlanta Compromise in 1895.In order to understand the differences in the philosophies of upper-case letter and Dubois, it is useful to know something about(predicate) their backgrounds. Booker T. majuscule, born a hard worker in 1856 in Franklin County, Virginia, could be describe as a pragmatist. He was exclusiv ely able to att force out schoolhouse third months out of the year, with the re maining nine months washed-out working in coal mines. He developed the idea of Blacks graceful versatile patronagesmen as a useful stepping-st hotshot toward obeisance by the sinlessness majority and eventual(prenominal) full equality.Washington worked his way done Hampton prove and helped found the Tuskeegee Institute, a trade school for blacks. His essential strategy for the patterned advance of American Blacks was for them to achieve enhanced spot as apt tradesmen for the present, then growing this status as a broadcast from which to reach for full equality later. Significantly, he argued for submission to the whitened majority so as non to off suppress the might selected. Though he preached appeasement and a hands off billet toward politics, Washington has been accused of wielding imperious power over his people and of consorting with the white elite.William Edward Burghardt DuBo is, on the early(a) hand, was to a greater extent of an idealist. DuBois was born in mommy in 1868, just afterward the end of the Civil War and the official end of slavery. A gifted scholar, formal com servicemand played a much greater role in DuBoiss life than it did in Washingtons. After becoming a Phi genus Beta Kappa graduate of Fisk and Harvard, he was the root Black to earn a Ph.D. from Harvard in 1895.DuBois wrote over 20 books and more than 100 pedantic articles on the historical and sociological temper of the Black experience. He argued that an educated Black elite should lead Blacks to liberation by advancing a philosophical and sharp offensive against racial discrimination. DuBois forwarded the argument that The pitch blackness problem was non and could not be kept distinct from early(a) enlighten movements. . .DuBois favored immediate social and policy-making integration and the high education of a Talented Tenth of the black population. His main interest was in the education of the convention leader, the man who portions the ideas of the community where he lives. . . To this end, he organized the Niagara movement, a meeting of 29 Black business and professional men, which led to the formation of the National Association for the emanation of Colored People (NAACP).The crux of the struggle for the ideological center of the racial equality movement is perhaps best exemplified in Mr. DuBoiss influential The Souls of Black Folk. In it, he makes an impassioned argument for his vision of an educated Black elite.DuBois also describes his opposition to Booker T. Washingtons Atlanta Compromise as follows Mr. Washington represents in Negro thought the centenarian attitude of adjustment and submission harmonise to DuBois, Washington broke the mold set by his predecessors Here, led by Remond, Nell, Wells- Brown, and Douglass, a new period of self-assertion and self- development dawned. But Booker T. Washington arose as essentially the leade r not of one race but of twoa compromiser between the South, the North, and the Negro.DuBois reported that Blacks resented, at first bitterly, signs of compromise which surrendered their civil and semipolitical rights, even though this was to be exchanged for bigger chances of economic development.DuBoiss point and, according to him, the corporal opinion of the majority of the Black community, was that self- respect was more important than any electromotive force future economic benefits. Before Washingtons flexible stance gained a foothold, the assertion of the human beings rights of the Negro by himself was the main reliance. In other words, DuBois resented what he saw as Washington selling Black arrogance Mr. Washingtons programme naturally takes an economic cast, becoming a gospel of Work and specie to such an extent as plainly almost completely to overshadow the higher aims of life.The compromise included, in DuBoiss words, that black people give up, at least for the p resent, threesome things, First, political power, Second, insistence on civil rights, Third, higher education of Negro youth,and trim down all their energies on industrial education, the hookup of wealth, and the conciliation of the South.The final point comprised the centrepiece both(prenominal) of Washingtons strategy for the ultimate redemption of Black Americans and of DuBoiss condemnation of that strategy. Indeed, Washington back up his assertions by founding the Tuskeegee Institute as a trade school for young Black men.DuBois could not contain this type of appeasement. In his mind, this step was tantamount(predicate) to the Black community telling the white community that, henceforth, Blacks would cease pretending to be equal to whites as human beings rather, they would deal an overtly inferior social status as being worthy of maintaining the white majoritys physical world, but unworthy of true equality, of conducting socio-cultural discourse with the mainstream soci ety.The paradox mustiness have been maddening for both men, especially Mr. Washington. He no doubt understood that, as a group, Blacks could never hope to progress to the point of equality from their position of hapless poverty. Moreover, without skills, their hopes of escaping their economic inferiority were indeed scant. Washingtons broadcast for blacks to at least become skilled artisans and tradesmen must have seemed logical to him from the tie-up of improving the economic lot of the bonnie Black man. At the same time, he must have realized that, by accepting inferiority as a de- facto condition for the entire race, he may have broken the black step forever.In considering this matter, the writer is reminded of more late(a) events in American historythe approving action flap that occurred after Clarence Thomass day of the month to the U.S. Supreme Court, for example. Mr. Thomas, clearly a donee of affirmative action, announced that he was even so opposed to it. His argum ent was that if he had not been eligible for benefits under affirmative action programs, he would have still achieved his up-to-date position in the inner gird of this societys white power elite.Similarly, Booker T. Washington enjoyed access to the power elite of his time, but one must wonder whether prexy Roosevelt, for example, in his interactions with Mr. Washington, was not merely employ the situation for public relations value. Mr. Washington was intimate with Roosevelt from 1901 to 1908. On the day Roosevelt took office, he invited Washington to the exsanguine House to advise him on political appointments of Negroes in the south. After all, he did not become a popular prexy by being oblivious to such political maneuvering.Perhaps Mr. DuBois was the more prescient visionary. Perhaps he understood what Mr. Washington did not, that after the critical historical caprice toward social acceptance that had been established prior to the late nineteenth century, if political p ressure level were not maintained, the cause of true equality would be lost forever. Moreover, DuBois understood that equality would not be earned finished appeasement.From our perspective of over 100 years, we must admit that he may have been right. For example, in the aftermath of the Atlanta murder of September 22, 1906 and a similar incident in Springfield, Illinois, it was clear to almost all the players that the tide was running strongly in favor of protest and militancy. For six years in August, 1908, a white mob, made up, the press said, of many of the towns best citizens, surged with the streets of Springfield, Illinois, killing and wounding scores of Blacks and effort hundreds from the city.However, it later turned out that DuBois was considered to be too extreme in the other direction. For example, as the NAACP became more mainstream, it became increasingly conservative, and this did not please DuBois, who left the organization in 1934. He returned later but was at last shunned by Black leadership both inside and outside of the NAACP, especially after he voiced admiration for the USSR. In the political climate of the late mid-forties and 1950s, any hint of a pro-communist attitudeblack or whitewas unwelcome in any group with a national political agenda.We can see, then, that uncomplete Washingtons strategy of appeasement nor DuBoiss plan for an elite Black intelligentsia was to become altogether successful in elevating American Blacks to a position of equality. However, perhaps it was more than the leadership of any one Black man that encouraged African Americans to demand a full measure of social and economic equality. Perhaps the fact that there was a public dialogue in itself did more to encourage Black equality than the doctrine of any one prominent Black man. After all, concepts such as equality are exactly that concepts. As such, it up to each of us to decide how we see ourselves in relation to others superior or inferior, equal or n ot equal, the preference is ultimately our own.