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diff --git a/.gitattributes b/.gitattributes new file mode 100644 index 0000000..6833f05 --- /dev/null +++ b/.gitattributes @@ -0,0 +1,3 @@ +* text=auto +*.txt text +*.md text diff --git a/39742-8.txt b/39742-8.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..bc955d1 --- /dev/null +++ b/39742-8.txt @@ -0,0 +1,5349 @@ +Project Gutenberg's Half a Man, by Mary White Ovington and Franz Boas + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: Half a Man + The Status of the Negro in New York + +Author: Mary White Ovington + Franz Boas + +Release Date: May 20, 2012 [EBook #39742] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1 + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK HALF A MAN *** + + + + +Produced by David Edwards, Paul Clark and the Online +Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net (This +file was produced from images generously made available +by The Internet Archive) + + + + + + Transcriber's Note: + + Every effort has been made to replicate this text as faithfully as + possible, including inconsistencies in spelling and hyphenation. + Some changes of spelling have been made. They are listed at the end + of the text. + + Italic text has been marked with _underscores_. + OE ligatures have been expanded. + + + + + HALF A MAN + + THE STATUS OF THE NEGRO + IN NEW YORK + + BY + MARY WHITE OVINGTON + + _WITH A FOREWORD BY DR. FRANZ BOAS + OF COLUMBIA UNIVERSITY_ + + LONGMANS, GREEN, AND CO. + FOURTH AVENUE & 30TH STREET, NEW YORK + LONDON, BOMBAY, AND CALCUTTA + 1911 + + + _Copyright, 1911, by_ + LONGMANS, GREEN, AND CO. + + THE · PLIMPTON · PRESS + [W · D · O] + NORWOOD · MASS · U · S · A + + + TO + THE MEMORY OF MY FATHER + THEODORE TWEEDY + OVINGTON + + + + +FOREWORD + + +Miss Ovington's description of the status of the Negro in New York City +is based on a most painstaking inquiry into his social and economic +conditions, and brings out in the most forceful way the difficulties +under which the race is laboring, even in the large cosmopolitan +population of New York. It is a refutation of the claims that the Negro +has equal opportunity with the whites, and that his failure to advance +more rapidly than he has, is due to innate inability. + +Many students of anthropology recognize that no proof can be given of +any material inferiority of the Negro race; that without doubt the bulk +of the individuals composing the race are equal in mental aptitude to +the bulk of our own people; that, although their hereditary aptitudes +may lie in slightly different directions, it is very improbable that the +majority of individuals composing the white race should possess greater +ability than the Negro race. + +The anthropological argument is invariably met by the objection that the +achievements of the two races are unequal, while their opportunities are +the same. Every demonstration of the inequality of opportunity will +therefore help to dissipate prejudices that prevent the best possible +development of a large number of our citizens. + +The Negro of our times carries even more heavily the burden of his +racial descent than did the Jew of an earlier period; and the +intellectual and moral qualities required to insure success to the Negro +are infinitely greater than those demanded from the white, and will be +the greater, the stricter the segregation of the Negro community. + +The strong development of racial consciousness, which has been +increasing during the last century and is just beginning to show the +first signs of waning, is the gravest obstacle to the progress of the +Negro race, as it is an obstacle to the progress of all strongly +individualized social groups. The simple presentation of observations, +like those given by Miss Ovington, may help us to overcome more quickly +that self-centred attitude which can see progress only in the domination +of a single type. + +This investigation was carried on by Miss Ovington under the auspices of +the Greenwich House Committee on Social Investigations, of which she was +a Fellow.[1] + +FRANZ BOAS. + + +FOOTNOTE: + +[1] The Greenwich House Committee on Social Investigations is composed +of Edwin R. A. Seligman, Chairman, Franz Boas, Edward T. Devine, +Livingston Farrand, Franklin H. Giddings, Henry R. Seager, Vladimir G. +Simkhovitch, Secretary. + +Miss Ovington's is the second publication of the Committee, the first +being Mrs. Louise Bolard More's "Wage-Earners' Budgets," published by +Henry Holt & Co. + + + + +CONTENTS + + + CHAPTER PAGE + + I "UP FROM SLAVERY" 5 + + II WHERE THE NEGRO LIVES 31 + + III THE CHILD OF THE TENEMENT 52 + + IV EARNING A LIVING--MANUAL LABOR AND THE TRADES 75 + + V EARNING A LIVING--BUSINESS AND THE PROFESSIONS 106 + + VI THE COLORED WOMAN AS A BREAD WINNER 138 + + VII RICH AND POOR 170 + + VIII THE NEGRO AND THE MUNICIPALITY 195 + + IX CONCLUSION 218 + + APPENDIX 229 + + INDEX 233 + + + + +HALF A MAN + + + + +INTRODUCTION + + +Six years ago I met a young colored man, a college student recently +returned from Germany where he had been engaged in graduate work. He was +born, he told me, in one of the Gulf States, and I questioned him as to +whether he intended going back to the South to teach. His answer was in +the negative. "My father has attained success in his native state," he +said, "but when I ceased to be a boy, he advised me to live in the North +where my manhood would be respected. He himself cannot continually +endure the position in which he is placed, and in the summer he comes +North to be a man. No," correcting himself, "to be half a man. A Negro +is wholly a man only in Europe." + +Half a man! During the six years that I have been in touch with the +problem of the Negro in New York this characterization has grown in +significance to me. I have endeavored to know the life of the Negro as I +know the life of the white American, and I have learned that while New +York at times gives full recognition to his manhood, again, its race +prejudice arrests his development as certainly as severe poverty arrests +the development of the tenement child. Perhaps a study of this shifting +attitude on the part of the dominant race, and of the Negro's reaction +under it, may not be unimportant; for the color question cannot be +ignored in America, nor should the position taken by her largest city be +overlooked. And those who love their fellows may be glad, among New +York's four millions--its Slavs and Italians, its Russians and +Asiatics--to meet these dark people who speak our language and who for +many generations have made this country their home. + + + + +CHAPTER I + +"UP FROM SLAVERY" + + +The status of the Negro in New Amsterdam, a slave in a pioneer +community, differed fundamentally from his position today in New York. +His history from the seventeenth to the twentieth century contains many +exciting incidents, but those only need be considered here that show a +progress or a retardation in his attainment to manhood. What were his +struggles in the past to secure his rights as a man? + +Slavery in the early days of the colonies was more brutal than at the +time of final emancipation. Savages recently arrived from Africa lacked +the docility of blacks reared in bondage, and burning and torturing, as +well as whipping, were recognized modes of punishment. Masters looked +upon their Negroes, bought at the Wall Street market from among the +cargo of a recently arrived slaver, with some suspicion and fear. Nor +were their apprehensions entirely without reason. In 1712 some of the +discontented among the New York slaves met in an orchard in Maiden Lane +and set fire to an outhouse. Defending themselves against the citizens +who ran to put out the flames, they fired, killing nine men and wounding +six. Retribution soon followed. They were pursued when they attempted +flight, captured and executed--some hanged, some burned at the stake, +some left suspended in chains to starve to death. + +Perhaps it was the memory of this small revolt that caused the people of +New York in 1741 to lay the blame for a series of conflagrations upon +their slaves. Nine fires that seemed to be incendiary came one upon +another, and a robbery was committed. To escape death herself, a +worthless white servant girl gave testimony against the Negroes who +frequented a tavern where she was employed, declaring that a plot had +been conceived whereby the slaves would kill all the white men and take +control of the city. New York was aflame with fear, and evidence that at +another time would have been rejected, was listened to by the judges +with grave attention. The slaves were allowed no defence, and before the +city had recovered from its fright, it had burned fourteen Negroes, +hanged eighteen, and transported seventy-one.[1] + +Historians today think that the slaves were in no way concerned in this +so-called "plot." The two thousand blacks in the city might have done +much mischief to the ten thousand whites, but their servile condition +made an organized movement among them impossible. We may infer, however, +from the fear which they provoked, that they were not all docile +servants. In a letter written at the port of New York in 1756, an +English naval officer says of the city, "The laborious people in general +are Guinea Negroes who lie under particular restraints from the attempts +they have made to massacre the inhabitants for their liberty."[2] +Janvier in his "Old New York" thinks, "that the alarm bred by the +so-called Negro plot of 1741 was most effective in checking the growth +of slavery in that city." Probably the restlessness of the slaves, their +efforts toward manhood, in a community where there was little economic +justification for slavery, contributed to the movement for emancipation +that began in 1777. + +Emancipation came gradually to the New York Negro. Gouverneur Morris at +the state constitutional convention of 1776-1777 recommended that "the +future legislature of the state of New York take the most effectual +measures consistent with the public safety and the private property of +individuals for abolishing domestic slavery within the same, so that in +future ages every human being who breathes the air of this state shall +enjoy the privileges of a freeman." The postponement of action to a +future legislature was keenly regretted by John Jay, who was absent from +the convention when the slavery question arose, but who had hoped that +New York might be a leader in emancipation. The state's initial measure +for abolishing slavery was in 1785, when it prohibited the sale of +slaves in New York. This was followed in 1799 by an act giving freedom +to the children of slaves, and in 1817 by a further act providing for +the abolition of slavery throughout the state in 1827. This law went +into effect July 4, 1827, the emancipation day of the Negroes in New +York. + +With gradual emancipation and the cessation of the sale of slaves, the +Negroes numerically became unimportant in the city. In 1800 they +constituted ten and a half per cent of the population. Half a century +later, while they had doubled their numbers, the immense influx of +foreign immigrants brought their proportion down to two and seven-tenths +per cent. In 1850 and 1860 their positive as well as their relative +number decreased, and it was not until twenty years ago that they began +to show some gain. The last census returns of 1900 give Greater New York +(including Brooklyn) 60,666 Negroes in a population of 3,437,202, one +and eight-tenths per cent. It seems probable that the census of 1910 +will show a large positive and a slight relative Negro increase.[3] + +The relative decrease in the number of Negroes did not, however, produce +a decrease in the agitation upon their presence and position in the +city. Their political status was a subject for heated discussion even +before their complete emancipation. The first state constitution, +drafted in 1777, was without color discrimination, since it based the +suffrage upon a property qualification requiring voters for governor and +senators to be freeholders owning property worth £100. A Negro with such +a holding was a phenomenon, a curiosity. But by 1821, when the framing +of the second constitution was in progress, Negroes of some education +were an appreciable element in the population, and with them ignorant, +recently emancipated slaves. Should they be admitted to the full manhood +suffrage contemplated for the whites? Those who favored the new +democratic movement were doubtful of its applicability to colored +people. Livingston, a champion of universal white manhood suffrage, was +against giving the black man the vote. On the other hand, the +conservative Chancellor Kent, apprehending in the new constitution "a +disposition to encroach on private rights,--to disturb chartered +privileges and to weaken, degrade, and overawe the administration of +justice," would yet have made no color discrimination, and Peter A. Jay, +who did not believe in universal white manhood suffrage, urged that +colored men, natives of the country, should derive from its institutions +the same privileges as white persons. The second constitution when +adopted enfranchised practically all white men, but gave the Negroes a +property qualification of $250. The issue of the revolution, however, +was not far from men's thoughts, and "taxation without representation" +was not permitted; for while no colored man might vote without a +freehold estate valued at 250 dollars, _no person of color was subject +to direct taxation unless he should be possessed of such real estate_. + +In 1846 a third constitutional convention was held, and the same matter +came up for debate. John L. Russell of St. Lawrence declared that "the +Almighty had created the black man inferior to the white man," while +Daniel S. Waterbury of Delaware County believed that "the argument that +because a race of men is marked by a peculiarity of color and crooked +hair they are not endowed with a mind equal to another class who have +other peculiarities is unworthy of men of sense." John H. Hunt of New +York City proclaimed that "We want no masters, least of all no Negro +masters.... Negroes are aliens." And he predicted that the practical +effect of their admission to the suffrage would be their exclusion from +Manhattan Island. A delegation of colored men appeared at Albany before +the suffrage committee, but their arguments and those of their friends +produced no effect. The new constitution contained the same Negro +property qualification, and it was not until 1874, after the passage of +the fifteenth amendment to the Constitution of the United States, that +legislation placed the Negro voter of New York upon the same footing as +the white.[4] + +Had New York sincerely desired to keep the Negro in an inferior +position, it could have accomplished this by refusing him an education. +This it never did, though it suffered much tribulation regarding the +place and manner of his instruction. Before the establishment of a +public school system, the Manumission society, an association composed +largely of Friends, though including in its membership John Jay, De Witt +Clinton, and Alexander Hamilton, undertook the education of the Negro. +In 1787 it opened a school for Africans on Cliff Street. One of the +early teachers was Charles C. Andrews, whose little book on "The African +Free Schools," published in 1830, shows a kindly tolerance for the black +race. "As a result of forty years' experience," he writes, "the idea +respecting the capacity of the African race to receive a respectable and +even a liberal education has not been visionary." And he recites the +names of some of his pupils: "Rev. Theodore S. Wright, graduate of +Princeton Theological Seminary; John B. Russworm, graduate of Bowdoin; +Edward Jones, graduate of Amherst; William Brown and William G. Smith, +students of the medical department, Columbia College: all of them +persons of color." Describing an annual exhibition of his school on May +12, 1824, he quotes from the _Commercial Advertiser_ of the same date: +"We never beheld a white school, of the same age (of and under the age +of fifteen), in which, without exception, there was more order and +neatness of dress and cleanliness of person. And the exercises were +performed with a degree of promptness and accuracy which was +surprising." + +In 1834 the public school association took over the schools of the +Manumission society, but before this time the Negroes had begun to +assert themselves regarding the method and place of instruction for +their children. They clamored for colored teachers and succeeded in +displacing Charles Andrews himself. In 1838, at their desire, the word +African was changed to colored in describing the race; but of chief +importance to their educational future, they began a protest, only to +end in 1900, against segregation. + +Removed from the care of the Manumission society, the colored schools +deteriorated. Their grade was reduced,[5] and owing to the growth of the +city, their attendance was very irregular, the severe winter weather +often keeping children who lived at a distance at home. A Brooklyn man +tells me that, when a boy, he used to walk from his home at East New +York to Fulton Ferry, passing inferior Brooklyn colored schools, and +after crossing the river, on up to Mulberry Street to be instructed by +the popular colored teacher, John Peterson. Here he received a good +education; but few boys would have endured a daily trip of fourteen +miles. Increasingly parents, if the colored school of their neighborhood +was not of the best, sent their boys and girls to be instructed with the +white boys and girls of their district. + +The state law declared that any city or incorporated village might +establish separate schools for the instruction of African youths, +provided the facilities were equal to those of white schools, and when, +in 1862, a colored parent brought a case against the city for forcing +her child to go to a colored school, the case was lost.[6] Nevertheless, +during the nineteenth century Negroes in some numbers attended white +schools in both Brooklyn and New York, and Negro parents continued in +their quiet but persistent efforts against segregation. Then again, New +York grew too rapidly to segregate any race. The Negro boys and girls +were scattered through many districts, and the attendance at colored +schools fell off; in 1879 it was less than in 1878, and in 1880 less +than in 1879; so that the Board of Education in 1883 decided to +disestablish three colored schools. + +But this involved another factor. If the colored schools were +disestablished, what would become of the colored teachers? The Negroes +met this issue by delaying disestablishment for a year, while the +teachers went about among the parents of the ward, making friends and +urging that children, _white or colored_, be sent to their schools. +Numbers of new pupils of both races were brought in within the year, and +at the end of the time, after a hearing before the governor, then Grover +Cleveland, a bill was passed prohibiting the abolition of two of the +three colored schools, but also making them open to all children +regardless of color.[7] + +Occasionally a colored girl graduated from the normal college of the +city, but if there was no vacancy for her in the four colored schools +she received no appointment. In 1896, however, a normal graduate, Miss +S. E. Frazier, insisted upon her right to be appointed as teacher in any +school in which there was a vacancy. She visited the ward trustees and +the members of the Board of Education, and represented to them the +injustice done her and her race in refusing her the chance to prove her +ability as a teacher in the first school that should need a normal +graduate. She was finally appointed to a position in a white school. Her +success with her pupils was immediate, and since then the question of +race or color has not been considered in the appointment of teachers in +New York. + +Until 1900, the state law permitted the establishment of separate +colored schools. In that year, however, on the initiative of Theodore +Roosevelt, then governor, the legislature passed a bill providing that +no person should be refused admission or be excluded from any public +school in the state on account of race or color.[8] This closed the +question of compulsory segregation in the state, though before this it +had ceased in New York. Public education was thus democratized for the +New York Negroes, their persistent efforts bringing at the end complete +success. + +While the colored people in New York started with segregated schools and +attained to mixed schools, the movement in the churches was the reverse. +At first the Negroes were attendants of white churches, sitting in the +gallery or on the rear seats, and waiting until the white people were +through before partaking of the communion; but as their number increased +they chafed under their position. Why should they be placed apart to +hear the doctrine of Christ, and why, too, should they not have full +opportunity to preach that doctrine? The desire for self-expression was +perhaps the greatest factor in leading them to separate from the white +church. In 1796 about thirty Negroes, under the leadership of James +Varick,[9] withdrew from the John Street Methodist Episcopal Church, +and formed the first colored church of New York. Varick had been denied +a license to preach, but now as pastor of his own people, he was +recognized by the whites and helped by some of them. He was the founder +of the African Methodist Episcopal Zion Church. + +The Abyssinian Baptist Church was organized in 1800 by a few colored +members who withdrew from the First Baptist Church, then in Gold Street, +to establish themselves on Worth Street,[10] and in 1818 the colored +Episcopalians organized St. Philip's Church. In 1820 one of their race, +Peter Williams, for six years deacon, became their preacher. + +Another prominent church was the colored Congregational, situated, in +1854, on Sixth Street; and it was the determined effort of its woman +organist to reach the church in time to perform her part in the Sunday +morning service that led to an important Negro advance in citizenship. + +In the middle of the last century the right of the Negro to ride in car +or omnibus depended on the sufferance of driver, conductor, and +passenger. Sometimes a car stopped at a Negro's signal, again the driver +whipped up his horses, while the conductor yelled to the "nigger" to +wait for the next car. Entrance might always be effected if in the +company of a white person, and the small child of a kindly white +household would be delegated to accompany the homeward bound black +visitor into her car where, after a few minutes, conductor and +passengers having become accustomed to her presence, the young +protector might slip away. Such a situation was very galling to the +self-respecting negro. + +In July, 1854, Elizabeth Jennings, a colored school-teacher and organist +at the Congregational Church, attempted to board a Third Avenue car at +Pearl and Chatham Streets. She was hurrying to reach the church to +perform her part in the service. The conductor stopped, but as Miss +Jennings mounted the platform, he told her that she must wait for the +next car, which was reserved for her people. "I have no people," Miss +Jennings said. "I wish to go to church as I have for six months past, +and I do not wish to be detained." The altercation continued until the +car behind came up, and the driver there declaring that he had less room +than the car in front, the woman was grudgingly allowed to enter the +car. "Remember," the conductor said, "if any passenger objects, you +shall go out, whether or no, or I'll put you out." + +"I am a respectable person, born and brought up in New York," said Miss +Jennings, "and I was never insulted so before." + +This again aroused the conductor. "I was born in Ireland," he said, "and +you've got to get out of this car." + +He attempted to drag her out. The woman clung to the window, the +conductor called in the driver to help him, and together they dragged +and pulled and at last threw her into the street. Badly hurt, she +nevertheless jumped back into the car. The driver galloped his horses +down the street, passing every one until a policeman was found who +pushed the woman out, not, however, until she had taken the number of +the car. She then made her way home. + +Elizabeth Jennings took the case into court, and it came before the +Supreme Court of the State in February, 1855, Chester A. Arthur, +afterwards President of the United States, being one of the lawyers for +the plaintiff. The judge's charge was clear on the point that common +carriers were bound to carry all respectable people, white or colored, +and the plaintiff was given $225 damages, to which the court added ten +per cent and costs; and to quote the New York _Tribune's_ comment on the +case,[11] "Railroads, steamboats, omnibuses, and ferryboats will be +admonished from this as to the rights of respectable colored +people."[12] + +When you talk with the elderly educated colored people of New York +today, they tell you that before the War were "dark days." The +responsibility felt by the thoughtful Negroes was very great. They had +not only their own battles to wage, but there were the fugitives who +were entering the city by the Underground Railroad, whom they must +assist though it cost them their own liberty. In 1835 a Vigilance +Committee was formed in New York City to take charge of all escaping +slaves, and also to prevent the arrest and return to slavery of free men +of color. Colored men served on this Committee, and its secretary was +the minister of the church to which Elizabeth Jennings was endeavoring +to make her way that Sunday morning, the Reverend Charles B. Ray. In +1850 the New York State Vigilance Committee was formed with Gerritt +Smith as President and Ray as Secretary. Ray's home was frequently used +to shelter fugitives.[13] Once a young man, stepping up to the door and +learning that it was Charles Ray's house, whistled to his companions in +the darkness, and fourteen black men made their appearance and received +shelter. There would also come the task of negotiating for the purchase +of a slave, or this proving impossible, for the careful working out of +a means for his escape. Dark days, indeed, but made memorable to the +Negro by heroic work and the friendship of great men. Perhaps the two +races have never worked together in such fine companionship as at the +unlawful and thrilling task of protecting and aiding the fugitive. + +The hardest year of the century for the Negro was 1863, when the draft +riot imperilled every dark face. Many Negroes fled from the city. +Colored homes were fired, the Orphan Asylum for colored children on +Fifth Avenue was burned, and even the dead might not be buried save at +the peril of undertaker and priest. Elizabeth Jennings, now Mrs. Graham, +lost a child when the rioting was at its height. An undertaker named +Winterbottom, a white man, was brave enough to give his services, +winning the lasting gratitude and patronage of the colored people. With +the danger of violence about them, the father and mother went to +Greenwood Cemetery, where the Reverend Morgan Dix of Trinity Church read +the burial service at the grave. + +With the end of the War and the passage of the fourteenth and fifteenth +amendments came a revulsion of feeling for the race. "I remember," an +old time friend of the Negro tells me, "when the fifteenth amendment was +passed. The colored people stood in great numbers on the streets, and on +their faces was a look of gratitude and thanksgiving that I shall never +forget." Following the amendment came the State Civil Rights Bill in +1873, declaring that all persons should be entitled to full and equal +accommodations in all public places; and discrimination for a time +largely ceased. + +While the colored people were winning citizenship, their progress in +industry was also considerable. Until 1860 the race was infrequently +segregated, and black and white were neighbors, not only in their homes, +but in business. Samuel R. Scottron, a careful Negro writer, compiled a +long list of the trades in which Negroes engaged before the War. Besides +the various lines of domestic service, in which they were more +frequently seen than today--coachmen, cooks, waitresses, seamstresses, +barbers--there were many craftsmen, ship-builders, trimmers, riggers, +coopers, caulkers, printers, tailors, carpenters. "Second-hand clothing +shops were everywhere kept by colored men. All the caterers and +restaurant keepers of the high order, as well as small places, were kept +by colored men.... Varick and Peters kept about the most pretentious +barber shop in the city. Patrick Reason was one of the most capable +engravers. The greatest among the restaurateurs was Thomas Downing, who +kept a restaurant under what is now the Drexel Building, corner of Wall +and Broad Streets. The drug stores of Dr. James McCune Smith on West +Broadway, and Dr. Philip A. White on Frankfort Street, were not +outclassed by any kept by white men in their day."[14] + +And so the list goes on. It is perhaps somewhat exaggerated in the +importance in the city's business life which it gives to the colored +race. Charles Andrews, in 1837, says of the pupil who graduates from his +school, "He leaves with every avenue closed against him--doomed to +encounter as much prejudice and contempt as if he were not only +destitute of that education which distinguishes the civilized from the +savage, but as if he were incapable of receiving it." And he goes on to +tell of those few who have been able to learn trades, and their +subsequent difficulties in finding employment in good shops. White +journeymen object to working in the same shop with them, and many of the +best lads go to sea or become waiters, barbers, coachmen, servants, +laborers. But he is writing of an early date, and the opinion of the +colored people seems to be that, before our large foreign immigration, +the Negro was more needed in New York than today and received a large +share of satisfactory employment. His chief competitor was the Irish +immigrant, like himself an agricultural laborer, without previous +training in business, and he was frequently able to hold his own in his +shop. His long experience in domestic service, moreover, made him a +better caterer than the representatives of any other nationality that +had yet entered the city. His churches were flourishing, thus securing a +profession for which he had natural ability, and as we have seen, +colored men and women taught in the New York schools. + +The city grew rapidly after 1875, and the colored society, the little +group that had attained to modest means and education, bought homes, +chiefly in Brooklyn, where land was easier to secure than in Manhattan, +and strove to enlarge the opportunities for those who were to come after +them. Color prejudice had waned, and they often met with especial +consideration because of their race. Had they been white they would have +slipped into the population and been lost, as happened to the Germans +and the Irish, who had been their competitors. As it was, they formed a +society apart from the rest of the city, meeting it occasionally in work +or through the friendship of children, who, left to themselves, know no +race. They had battled against prejudice and had won their rights as +citizens. + +As we look at the life of a segregated people, however, we see that we +tend always to regard not the individual but the group. The Negro is a +man in Europe, because there he is an individual, standing or falling +by his own merits. But in America, even in so cosmopolitan a city as New +York, he is judged, not by his own achievements, but by the achievements +of every other New York black man. So we will leave these able colored +Americans, who won much both for themselves and for their race, and turn +to the mass of the Negroes, the toiling poor, who dwell in our tenements +today. + + +FOOTNOTES: + +[1] Daniel Horsmanden, "New York Conspiracy, or a History of the Negro +Plot." + +[2] James Grant Wilson, "History of New York," Vol. II, p. 314. + +[3] + POPULATION OF NEW YORK FROM 1800 TO 1900: TOTAL AND NEGRO. + + BOROUGH OF MANHATTAN + Percentage + Total Negro of Negroes + + 1800 60,515 6,382 10.5 + + 1810 96,373 9,823 10.2 + + 1820 123,706 10,886 8.8 + + 1830 202,589 13,976 6.9 + + 1840 312,710 16,358 5.2 + + 1850 515,547 13,815 2.7 + + 1860 805,658 12,574 1.6 + + 1870 942,292 13,072 1.5 + + BOROUGHS OF MANHATTAN AND BRONX + + 1880 1,206,299 19,663 1.6 + + 1890 1,515,301 23,601 1.6 + + 1900 2,050,600 38,616 1.9 + + GREATER NEW YORK + + 1900 3,437,202 60,666 1.8 + +[4] For a full account of the Negro's political status in New York +consult Charles Z. Lincoln's "Constitutional History of New York." + +[5] Thomas Boese's "Public Education in the City of New York," p. 227. + +[6] King _v._ Gallagher, 1882. + +[7] A. Emerson Palmer, "The New York Public School." + +[8] Laws of New York, Chapter 492. + +[9] B. F. Wheeler, D.D., "The Varick Family." + +[10] Geo. H. Hansell, "Reminiscences of New York Baptists." + +[11] _New York Tribune_, February 23, 1855. + +[12] "The Story of an Old Wrong," in _The American Woman's Journal_, +July, 1895. + +[13] Life of the Reverend Charles B. Ray. + +[14] _Colored American Magazine_, October, 1907. + + + + +CHAPTER II + +WHERE THE NEGRO LIVES + + +It is thirty-five years since, in his Symphony, Sidney Lanier told of + + "The poor + That stand by the inward opening door + Trade's hand doth tighten evermore, + And sigh their monstrous foul air sigh + For the outside hills of liberty." + +Were Lanier writing this today, we should wonder whether New York's +crowded tenements had not served as inspiration for his figure. The +island of Manhattan, about eight miles long by two miles wide, with an +additional slender triangle of five miles at the north end, in 1905, +housed two million one hundred and twelve thousand people. These men and +women and children were not scattered uniformly throughout the island, +but were placed in selected corners, one thousand to the acre, while a +mile or so away large comfortable homes held families of two or three. +This was Manhattan's condition in 1905, and with each succeeding year +more congestion takes place, and more pressure is felt upon the inward +opening door.[1] + +The Negro with the rest of the poor of New York has his part in this +excessive overcrowding. The slaver in which he made his entrance to this +land provided in floor space six feet by one-foot-four for a man, five +feet by one-foot-four for a woman, and four feet by one-foot-four for a +child.[2] This outdoes any overcrowding New York can produce, but an +ever increasing cost in food and rent is bringing into her interior +bedrooms a mass of humanity approximating that of the slaver's ship. +These new-comers, however, are not unwilling occupants, since unlike the +slaves they may spend their day and much of their night amid an ocean of +changing and exciting incidents. If you are young and strong, you care +less where you sleep than where you may spend your waking hours. + +From among the millions of New York's poor, can we pick out the Negroes +in their tenements? This is not so difficult a task as it would have +proved fifty years ago when the colored were scattered throughout the +city; today we find them confined to fairly definite quarters. A black +face on the lower East Side is viewed with astonishment, while on the +middle West Side it is no more noticeable than it would be in Atlanta or +New Orleans. Roughly we may count five Negro neighborhoods in Manhattan: +Greenwich Village, the middle West Side, San Juan Hill, the upper East, +and the upper West sides. Brooklyn has a large Negro population, but it +is more widely distributed and less easily located than that of +Manhattan. + +Of the five Manhattan neighborhoods the oldest is Greenwich Village, +according to Janvier once the most attractive part of New York, where +the streets "have a tendency to sidle away from each other and to take +sudden and unreasonable turns." Here one finds such fascinating names as +Minetta Lane and Carmine and Cornelia Streets. These and neighboring +thoroughfares grow daily more grimy, however, and no longer merit +Janvier's praise for cleanliness, moral and physical. The picturesque, +friendly old houses are giving way to factories with high, monotonous +fronts, where foreigners work who crowd the ward and destroy its former +American aspect. + +Among the old time aristocracy bearing Knickerbocker names there are a +few colored people who delight in talking of the fine families and past +wealth of old Greenwich Village. Scornful of the gibberish-speaking +Italians, they sigh, too, at their own race as they see it, for the +ambitious Negro has moved uptown, leaving this section largely to +widowed and deserted women and degenerates. The once handsome houses, +altered to accommodate many families, are rotten and unwholesome, while +the newer tenements of West Third Street are darkened by the elevated +road, and shelter vice that knows no race. Altogether, this is not a +neighborhood to attract the new-comer. Here alone in New York I have +found the majority of the adults northern born, men and women who, +unsuccessful in their struggle with city life, have been left behind in +these old forgotten streets.[3] + +The second section, north of the first, lies between West Fourteenth and +West Fifty-ninth Streets, and Sixth Avenue and the Hudson River. In 1880 +this was the centre of the Negro population, but business has entered +some of the streets, the Pennsylvania Railroad has scooped out acres for +its terminal, and while the colored houses do not diminish in number, +they show no decided increase. No one street is given over to the Negro, +but a row of two or three or six or even eight tenements shelter the +black man. The shelter afforded is poorer than that given the white +resident whose dwelling touches the black, the rents are a little +higher, and the landlord fails to pay attention to ragged paper, or to a +ceiling which scatters plaster flakes upon the floor. In the Thirties +there are rear tenements reached by narrow alley-ways. Crimes are +committed by black neighbor against black neighbor, and the entrance to +the rear yard offers a tempting place for a girl to linger at night. A +rear tenement is New York's only approach to the alley of cities farther +south. + +There are startling and happy surprises in all tenement neighborhoods, +and I recall turning one afternoon from a dark yard into a large +beautiful room. Muslin curtains concealed the windows, the brass bed was +covered with a thick white counterpane, and on either side of the +fireplace, where coal burned brightly in an open grate, were two rare +engravings. It was a workroom, and the mistress of the house, steady, +capable, and very black, was at her ironing-board. By her sat the +colored mammy of the story book rocking lazily in her chair. She +explained to me that her daughter had found her down south, two years +ago, and brought her to this northern home, where she had nothing to do, +for her daughter could make fifty dollars a month. This home picture was +made lastingly memorable by the younger woman's telling me softly as she +went with me to the door, "I was sold from my mother, down in Georgia, +when I was two years old. I ain't sure she's my mother. _She_ thinks so; +but I can't ever be sure." + +Homes beautiful both in appearance and in spirit can rarely occur where +people must dwell in great poverty, but there are many efforts at +attractive family life on these streets. A few of the blocks are orderly +and quiet. Thirty-seventh Street, between Eighth and Ninth Avenues, is +largely given over to the colored and is rough and noisy. Here and down +by the river at Hell's Kitchen the rioting in 1900 between the Irish and +the Negro took place. Men are ready for a fight today, and the children +see much of hard drinking and quick blows. + +"The poorer the family, the lower is the quarter in which it must live, +and the more enviable appears the fortune of the anti-social class."[4] +A vicious world dwells in these streets and makes notorious this section +of New York. For this is a part of the Tenderloin district, and at +night, after the children's cries have ceased, and the fathers and +mothers who have worked hard during the day have put out their lights, +the automobiles rush swiftly past, bearing the men of the "superior +race." Temptation is continuous, and the child that grows up pure in +thought and deed does so in spite of his surroundings. + +Before reaching West Fifty-ninth Street, the beginning of our third +district, we come upon a Negro block at West Fifty-third Street. When +years ago the elevated railroad was erected on this fashionable street, +white people began to sell out and rent to Negroes; and today you find +here three colored hotels, the colored Young Men's and Young Women's +Christian Associations, the offices of many colored doctors and lawyers, +and three large beautiful colored churches. The din of the elevated +drowns alike the doctor's voice and his patient's, the client's and the +preacher's. + +From Fifty-ninth Street, walking north on Tenth Avenue, we begin to +ascend a hill that grows in steepness until we reach Sixty-second +Street. The avenue is lined with small stores kept by Italians and +Germans, but to the left the streets, sloping rapidly to the Hudson +River, are filled with tenements, huge double deckers, built to within +ten feet of the rear of the twenty-five foot lot, accommodating four +families on each of the five floors. We can count four hundred and +seventy-nine homes on one side of the street alone! + +This is our third district, San Juan Hill, so called by an on-looker who +saw the policemen charging up during one of the once common race fights. +It is a bit of Africa, as Negroid in aspect as any district you are +likely to visit in the South. A large majority of its residents are +Southerners and West Indians, and it presents an interesting study of +the Negro poor in a large northern city. The block on Sixtieth Street +has some white residents, but the blocks on Sixty-first, Sixty-second, +and Sixty-third are given over entirely to colored. On the square made +by the north side of Sixty-first, the south side of Sixty-second +Streets, and Tenth and West End Avenues, 5.4 acres, the state census of +1905 showed 6173 inhabitants.[5] All but a few of these must have been +Negroes, as the avenue sides of the block, occupied by whites, are short +and with low houses. It is the long line of five-story tenements, +running eight hundred feet down the two streets, that brings up the +enumeration. The dwellings on Sixty-first and Sixty-second Streets are +human hives, honeycombed with little rooms thick with human beings. +Bedrooms open into air shafts that admit no fresh breezes, only foul +air carrying too often the germs of disease. + +The people on the hill are known for their rough behavior, their +readiness to fight, their coarse talk. Vice is abroad, not in insidious +form as in the more well-to-do neighborhood farther north, but open and +cheap. Boys play at craps unmolested, gambling is prevalent, and Negro +loafers hang about the street corners and largely support the Tenth +Avenue saloons. + +But San Juan Hill has many respectable families, and within the past +five years it has taken a decided turn for the better. The improvement +has been chiefly upon Sixty-third Street where two model tenements, one +holding one hundred, the other one hundred and sixty-one families, have +been opened under the management of the City and Suburban Homes Company, +the larger one having been erected by Mr. Henry Phipps. Planning for a +four per cent return on their investment, these landlords have rented +only to respectable families, and their rule has changed the character +of the block.[6] Old houses have been remodelled to compete with the +newer dwellings, street rows have ceased, and the police captain of the +district, we are told, now counts this as one of the peaceful and +law-abiding blocks of the city. When its other blocks show a like +improvement, San Juan Hill will no longer merit its belligerent name. + +The lower East Side of Manhattan, a many-storied mass of tenements and +workshops, where immigrants labor and sleep in their tiny crowded rooms, +was once a fashionable American district. At that time Negroes dwelt +near the whites as barbers, caterers, and coachmen, as laundresses and +waiting-maids. But with the removal of the people whom they served, the +colored men and women left also, and it is difficult to find an African +face among the hundreds of thousands of Europeans south of Fourteenth +Street. On Pell Street, in the Chinese quarter, there used to be two +colored families on friendly terms with their neighbors, who, however, +went uptown for their pleasures and their church. + +It is not until we reach Third Avenue and Forty-third Street that we +come to the East Side Negro tenement. From this point, such houses run, +a straggling line, chiefly between Second and Third Avenues, to +the Bronx where the more well-to-do among the colored live. At +Ninety-seventh Street, and on up to One Hundredth Street, dark faces are +numerous. About six hundred and fifty Negro families live on these four +streets and around the corner on Third Avenue. Occasionally they live in +houses occupied by Jews or Italians. Above this section there are a +number of Negro tenements in the One Hundred and Thirties, between +Madison and Fifth Avenues--almost a West Side neighborhood, since it +adjoins the large colored quarter to the west of Fifth Avenue. On the +whole, the East Side is not often sought by the colored as a place of +residence. Their important churches are in another part of the city, and +every New Yorker knows the difficulty in making a way across Central +Park. Yet, the neighborhood is not uncivil to them, and one rarely reads +here of race friction. Doubtless this is in part owing to the smallness +of the population, all of Manhattan east of Fifth Avenue containing but +fourteen per cent of the apartments occupied by colored in the city; but +it is partly, too, that Jews and Italians prove less belligerent +tenement neighbors than Irish. + +Five years ago, those of us who were interested in the Negro poor +continually heard of their difficulty in securing a place to live. Not +only were they unable to rent in neighborhoods suitable for respectable +men and women, but dispossession, caused perhaps by the inroad of +business, meant a despairing hunt for any home at all. People clung to +miserable dwellings, where no improvements had been made for years, +thankful to have a roof to shelter them. Yet all the time new-law +tenements were being built, and Gentile and Jew were leaving their +former apartments in haste to get into these more attractive dwellings. +At length the Negro got his chance; not a very good one, but something +better than New York had yet offered him--a chance to follow into the +houses left vacant by the white tenants. Owing in part to the energy of +Negro real estate agents, in part to rapid building operations, +desirable streets, near the subway and the elevated railroad, were +thrown open to the colored. This Negro quarter, the last we have to note +and the newest, has been created in the past eight years. When the +Tenement House Department tabulated the 1900 census figures for the +Borough of Manhattan, and showed the nationalities and races on each +block, it found only 300 colored families in a neighborhood that today +accommodates 4473 colored families.[7] This large increase is on six +streets, West Ninety-ninth, between Eighth and Ninth Avenues, West One +Hundred and Nineteenth, between Seventh and Eighth Avenues, and West One +Hundred and Thirty-third to One Hundred and Thirty-sixth Streets, +between Fifth and Seventh Avenues, with a few houses between Seventh and +Eighth, and on Lenox Avenues. There are colored tenements north and +south of this; and while these figures are correct today,[8] they may +be wrong tomorrow, for new tenements are continually given over to the +Negro people. Moreover, on all of these streets are colored boarding and +lodging houses, crowded with humanity. Houses today fall into the hands +of the Negro as a child's blocks, placed on end, tumble when a push is +given to the first in the line. The New York _Times_, in August, 1905, +gives a graphic account of the entrance of the colored tenant on West +Ninety-ninth Street. Two houses had been opened for a short time to +Negroes when the other house-owners capitulated, and the colored influx +came: "The street was so choked with vehicles Saturday that some of the +drivers had to wait with their teams around the corners for an +opportunity to get into it. A constant stream of furniture trucks loaded +with the household effects of a new colony of colored people who are +invading the choice locality is pouring into the street. Another equally +long procession, moving in the other direction, is carrying away the +household goods of the whites from their homes of years." The movement +is not always so swift as this, but it is continuous. + +This last colored neighborhood perhaps ought not to be spoken of as +belonging to the poor; not to Lanier's poor whose door pressed so +tighteningly inward. Here are homes where it is possible, with +sufficient money, to live in privacy, and with the comforts of steam +heat and a private bath. But rents are high, and if money is scarce, the +apartment must be crowded and privacy lost. Moreover, vice has made its +way into these newly acquired streets. The sporting class will always +pay more and demand fewer improvements than the workers, and, unable to +protect himself, the respectable tenant finds his children forced to +live in close propinquity to viciousness. Each of these new streets has +this objectionable element in its population, for while some agents +make earnest efforts to keep the property they handle respectable, they +find the owner wants money more than respectability. + +In our walk up and down Manhattan, turning aside and searching for +Negro-tenanted streets, we ought to see one thing with clearness--that +the majority of the colored population live on a comparatively few +blocks. This is a new and important feature of their New York life, and +in certain parts of the city it develops a color problem, for while you +seem an inappreciable quantity when you constitute two per cent of the +population in the borough, you are of importance when you form one +hundred per cent of the population of your street. This congestion is +accompanied by a segregation of the race. The dwellers in these +tenements are largely new-comers, men and women from the South and the +West Indies,[9] seeking the North for greater freedom and for economic +opportunity. Like any other strangers they are glad to make their home +among familiar faces, and they settle in the already crowded places on +the West Side. Freedom to live on the East Side next door to a Bohemian +family may be very well, but sociability is better. The housewife who +timidly hangs her clothes on the roof her first Monday morning in New +York is pleased to find the next line swinging with the laundry of a +Richmond acquaintance, who instructs her in the perplexing housekeeping +devices of her flat. No chattering foreigner could do that. And while to +be welcome in a white church is inspiring, to find the girl you knew at +home, in the next pew to you, is still more delightful when you have +arrived, tired and homesick, at the great city of New York. So the +colored working people, like the Italians and Jews and other +nationalities, have their quarter in which they live very much by +themselves, paying little attention to their white neighbors. If the +white people of the city have forced this upon them, they have easily +accepted it. Should this two per cent of the population be compelled to +distribute itself mathematically over the city, each ward and street +having its correct quota, it would evince dissatisfaction. This is not +true of the well-to-do element, but of the mass of the Negro workers +whose homes we have been visiting. Loving sociability, these new-comers +to the city--and it is in the most segregated districts that the greater +number of southern and British born Negroes are found--keep to their own +streets and live to themselves. If they occupy all the sidewalk as they +talk over important matters in front of their church, the outsider +passing should recognize that he is an intruder and take to the curb. He +would leave the sidewalk entirely were he on Hester Street or Mulberry +Bend. New-comers to New York usually segregate, and the Negro is no +exception. + +While congestion and segregation seem important to us as we look at +these colored quarters, I suspect that the matter most pertinent to the +Negro new-comer is, not where he will live nor how he will live, but +whether he will be able to live in New York at all, whether he can meet +the landlord's agent the day he comes to the door. For New York rents +have mounted upwards as have her tenements. The Phipps model houses, +built especially to benefit the poor, charge twenty-five dollars a month +for four tiny rooms and bath; and while this is a little more than the +dark old time rooms would bring, it takes about all of the twenty-five +dollars you make running an elevator, to get a flat in New York. What +wonder that, once secured, it is overrun with lodgers, or that, if +privacy is maintained, there is not enough money left to feed and clothe +the growing household. The once familiar song of the colored comedian +still rings true in New York: + + "Rufus Rastus Johnson Brown, + What you gwine ter do when de rent comes roun'?" + + +FOOTNOTES: + +[1] Harold M. Finley in _Federation_, May, 1908. + +[2] Thomas Clarkson, "History of the Abolition of the Slave Trade," p. +378. + +[3] Place of birth of 1036 New York Negro tenement dwellers. These +figures were obtained chiefly from personal visits: + + ======================================================================== + | Totals | East | Greenwich | Middle | San | Upper + | | Side | Village | West | Juan | West + | | | | Side | Hill | Side + ---------------------+--------+------+-----------+--------+------+------ + New England | 18 | 1 | 4 | 7 | 5 | 1 + West | 11 | 1 | 0 | 5 | 4 | 1 + New York | 157 | 6 | 47 | 42 | 55 | 7 + New Jersey | 18 | 1 | 4 | 3 | 9 | 1 + Pennsylvania | 19 | 0 | 3 | 3 | 12 | 1 + Maryland | 37 | 1 | 0 | 6 | 27 | 3 + District of Columbia | 26 | 0 | 1 | 5 | 16 | 4 + Virginia | 375 | 8 | 15 | 71 | 244 | 37 + Carolinas | 217 | 6 | 16 | 64 | 127 | 4 + Gulf States | 65 | 0 | 2 | 23 | 39 | 1 + Canada | 2 | 0 | 1 | 1 | 0 | 0 + West Indies | 87 | 1 | 6 | 13 | 67 | 0 + Europe | 4 | 0 | 1 | 0 | 3 | 0 + ---------------------+--------+------+-----------+--------+------+------ + | 1036 | 25 | 100 | 243 | 608 | 60 + ======================================================================== + +[4] S. N. Patten, "New Basis of Civilization," p. 52. + +[5] Some doubt is cast upon this figure. The New York Health Department +in an enumeration of its own, in 1905, found a population of 3833. There +is no question, however, of the great congestion of this block and the +one north and south of it. The erection of new tenements has gone on +rapidly since 1905, sweeping away the children's playgrounds, and making +this one of the most crowded centres of New York. + +[6] Too much cannot be said of the beneficial effect of good housing in +a colored neighborhood, when under such able management as the City and +Suburban Homes Company. Decent homes under competent management are +absolutely necessary to an improvement in the Negro quarters of +Manhattan and of Brooklyn as well. I can speak with some authority of +the good done by the Phipps houses on West Sixty-third Street, as I +lived, for eight months, the only white tenant in the one hundred and +sixty-one apartments. Church and philanthropy had done and are doing +excellent work on these blocks, but a sudden and marked improvement came +from good housing, from the building of clean, healthful homes for +law-abiding people. + +[7] The Tenement House Department tabulated the number of Negro +families living in tenements on these streets. I have counted the number +of flats rented to colored people. + +[8] July 15, 1910. + +[9] The yearly arrivals of "African blacks" at the port of New York, +secured from the Immigration Commissioner, are as follows: 1902-03, 110; +1903-04, 547; 1904-05, 1189; 1905-06, 1757; 1906-07, 2054; 1907-08, +1820; 1908-09, 2119. The year runs from July 1 to June 30. + + + + +CHAPTER III + +THE CHILD OF THE TENEMENT + + +Within the last few years white Americans, many of whom were formerly +ignorant of their condition, have been taught that they are possessed of +a racial antipathy for human beings whose color is not their own. They +have a "natural contrariety," "a dislike that seems constitutional" +toward the dark tint that they see on another's face. But however well +they may have conned their lesson, it breaks down or is likely to be +forgotten in the presence of a Negro baby; for a healthy colored baby +is a subject, not for natural contrariety, but for sympathetic +cuddling. They are most engaging new-comers, these "delicate bronze +statuettes,"[1] only warm with life, and smiling good will upon their +world. + +Not many colored babies are born in New York, at least not enough to +keep pace with the deaths. The year 1908 saw in all the boroughs 1973 +births as against 2212 deaths at all ages.[2] + +In this same year the colored births for Manhattan and the Bronx were +1459, and the deaths under one year of age 424, an infant mortality rate +of 290 to every thousand.[3] That is, two babies in every seven died +under one year of age. The white infant mortality rate was 127.7, a +little less than half that of the colored. + +Why should we have in New York this enormous colored infant death rate? +Many physicians believe it indicates a lack of physical stamina in the +Negro, an inability to resist disease. This may be so, but before +falling back upon race as an explanation of high infant mortality, we +need to exhaust other possible causes. We do not question the vitality +of the white race when we read that in parts of Russia 500 babies out +of every thousand die within the year; nor do we believe the people of +Fall River, a factory town in Massachusetts, have an inherent inability +to resist disease, though their infant mortality rate in 1900 was 260 in +one thousand births. We look in these latter cases, as we should in the +former, to see if we find those conditions which careful students of the +subject tell us accompany a high infant death rate. + +Among the first of the accepted causes of infant mortality is the +overcrowding of cities. We have viewed overcrowding as a usual condition +among the Negroes of New York, and have seen the small, ill-ventilated +bedroom where the baby spends much of its life. Heat, with its +accompanying growth of bacteria and swift process of decomposition, is a +second cause. New York's high infant mortality comes in the summer +months when in the poorest quarters it has been known to reach four +hundred in the thousand.[4] In the hot, crowded tenements, and no +place can be so hot as New York in one of its July record-breaking +weeks, the babies die like flies, and yet not like flies, for the flies +buzz in hundreds about the little hot faces. Excitement, late hours, +constant restlessness, these, too, cause infant mortality. On a city +block tenanted by hundreds of men and women and little children, no hour +of the night is free from some disturbance. Children whimper as they +wake from the heat, babies cry shrilly, and the brightly-lighted streets +are rarely without the sound of human footsteps. The sensitive new-born +organism knows nothing of the quiet and restful darkness of nature's +night. + +But the most important cause of infant mortality[5] is improper infant +feeding. And here we meet with a condition that confronts the Negro +babies of New York far more than it confronts the white. For a properly +fed baby is a breast fed baby, or else one whose food has been prepared +with great care, and mothers forced by necessity to go out to work, +cannot themselves give their babies this proper food. It is among the +infants of mothers at work that mortality is high. Mr. G. Newman, an +English authority on this subject, gives an interesting example of this +in Lancashire, where, during the American civil war, many of the cotton +operatives were out of employment and many more worked only half time. +Privation was great. A quarter of the mill hands were in receipt of poor +relief, the general death rate increased, but _the infant mortality rate +decreased_. The mothers, forced by circumstances to remain away from the +factory, though in a state of semi-starvation, by their nursing and by +their care of the home preserved the lives of their infants. Negro +mothers, owing to the low wage earned by their husbands, for the general +welfare of the family and to avoid semi-starvation, like the Lancashire +women, leave their homes, but they thereby sacrifice the lives of many +of their babies. The percentage for 1900 of Negro married women in New +York engaging in self-supporting work was 31.4 in every hundred; of +white married women 4.2 in every hundred, seven times as many in +proportion among the Negroes as among the whites.[6] The Negro also +shows a large percentage of widows, a quarter of all the female +population over ten years of age. Some of these, we have no means of +knowing how many, are widows only in name, and have babies for whom they +must in some way provide support. The colored mother who has no husband +often takes a position in domestic service and boards her baby, paying +usually by the month, and finding the opportunity to visit her infant +perhaps once a week. Sometimes she secures a "baby tender" who can give +kindly, intelligent care; but under the best conditions her child will +be bottle fed and in tenement surroundings inimical to health, while +sometimes the woman to whom she intrusts her infant will be ignorant of +the simplest matters of hygiene. + +I remember an old colored woman, she must be dead by this time, who kept +a baby farm. Her health was poor, and when I saw her, she had taken to +her bed and lay in a dark room with two infants at her side. They were +indescribably puny, with sunken cheeks and skinny arms and hands, +weighing what a normal child should weigh at birth, and yet six and +seven months old. The woman talked to me enthusiastically of salvation +and gave filthy bottles to her charges. She was exceptionally +incompetent, but there are others doing her work, too old or too +ignorant properly to attend to the babies under their care. + +Mothers who go out to day's-work are also unable to nurse their babies +or to prepare all their food. The infant is placed in the care of some +neighbor or of a growing daughter, who may be the impatient "little +mother" of a number of charges. When the hot summer comes, such a baby +is likely to fall the victim of epidemic diarrhoea, caused by pollution +of the milk. Newman has a striking chart of infant death rates in Paris +in which he pictures a rate mounting in one week as high as 256 in the +thousand among the artificially fed infants, while for the same week, +among the breast fed babies, the mortality is 32. The Negro mother, +seeking self-support by keeping clean another's house or caring for +another's children, finds her own offspring swiftly taken from her by a +disease that only her nourishing care could forestall.[7] + +Remedial measures have for some time been taken in New York to check +infant mortality, and they have met with some success. The distribution +of pasteurized milk by Mr. Nathan Straus, the establishment of milk +stations during the summer months in New York and Brooklyn where mothers +at slight cost may secure proper infant food, and where much educative +work is done by the visiting nurse, the multiplication of day nurseries, +all these have helped to decrease the death rate. The Negroes have been +benefited by these remedial agencies, but their percentage of 290 is +still a matter for grave attention. + +Two out of seven of New York's Negro babies die in the first year, but +the other five grow up, some with puny arms and ricketty legs, others +again too hardy for bad food or bad air to harm. + +Like the babies these children suffer from their mother's absence at +work. Family ties are loose, and more than other children they are +handicapped by lack of proper home care. In an examination of the +records of the Children's Court for three years I found that out of 717 +arraignments of colored children, 221 were for improper guardianship, +30.8 per cent of the whole. Among the Russian children of the East Side, +Tenth and Eleventh Wards, only 15 per cent of arraignments were on this +complaint, indicating twice as many children without parental care among +the colored as among the children of the Tenth and Eleventh Wards. Rough +colored girls, also, whose habits were too depraved to permit of their +remaining without restraint, were frequently committed to reformatories. + +Truancy is not uncommon in colored neighborhoods, though few cases come +before the courts. Sometimes the boy or girl is kept at home to care for +the younger children, but again, lacking the mother's oversight, he +remains on the street when he should be in school, or arrives late with +ill prepared lessons. + +Asking a teacher of long experience among colored and white children +concerning their respective scholarship, he assured me that the colored +child could do as well as the white, but didn't. "From 20 to 50 per cent +of the mothers of my colored children," he said, "go out to work. There +is no one to oversee the child's tasks, and consequently little +conscientious study." + +One can scarcely blame the children; and certainly one cannot blame the +mothers for toiling for their support. And the fathers, though they work +faithfully, are rarely able to earn enough unaided to support their +families. Perhaps in time the city may improve matters by opening its +school-rooms for a study period in the afternoon. + +But meanwhile the children are without proper care. This is not hard to +endure in the summer, but in winter it is very trying to be without a +home. Poor little cold boys and girls, some of them mere babies! You see +them in the late afternoon sitting on the tenement stairs, waiting for +the long day to be done. It seems a week since they were inside eating +their breakfast. The city has not pauperized them with a luncheon, and +they have had only cold food since morning. Sometimes they have been all +day without nourishment. When the door is opened at last, there are many +helpful things for them to do for their mother, and reading and +arithmetic are relegated to so late an hour that their problem is only +temporarily solved by sleep. + +Not all the colored working women, however, go out for employment. +Laundry work is an important home industry, and one may watch many +mothers at their tubs or ironing-boards from Monday morning until +Saturday night. This makes the tenement rooms, tiny enough at best, +sadly cluttered, but it does not deprive the children of the presence of +their mother, who accepts a smaller income to remain at home with them. +For after we have made full allowance for the lessening of family ties +among the Negroes by social and economic pressure, we find that the +majority of the colored boys and girls receive a due share of proper +parental oversight. They are fed on appetizing food, cleanly and +prettily dressed, they are encouraged to study and to improve their +position, and they are given all the advantages that it is possible for +their mothers and fathers to secure. + +Jack London tells in the "Children of the Abyss" of the East Side of +London, where "they have dens and lairs into which to crawl for sleeping +purposes, and that is all. One can not travesty the word by calling such +dens and lairs 'homes.'" I have seen thousands of Negro dwelling-places, +but I cannot think of half a dozen, however great their poverty, where +this description would be correct. No matter how dingy the tenement, or +how long the hours of work, the mother, and the father, too, try to make +the "four walls and a ceiling" to which they return, home. Visitors +among the New York poor, in the past and in the present, testify that +given the same income or lack of income, the colored do not allow their +surroundings to become so cheerless or so filthy as the white, and that +when there is an opportunity for the mother to spend some time in the +house, the rooms take on an air of pleasant refinement. Pictures +decorate the walls, the sideboard contains many pretty dishes, and the +table is set three times a day. Meals are not eaten out of the paper bag +common on New York's East Side, but there is something of formality +about the dinner, and good table manners are taught the children. The +tenement dwelling becomes a home, and the boys and girls pass a happy +childhood in it. + +Watching the colored children for many months in their play and work, I +have looked for possible distinctive traits. The second generation of +New Yorkers greatly resembles the "Young America" of all nationalities +of the city, shrill-voiced, disrespectful, easily diverted, whether at +work or at play, shrewd, alert, and mischievous--the New York street +child. I remember once helping with a club of eight boys where +seven nationalities were represented, and where no one could have +distinguished Irish from German or Jew from Italian, with his eyes +shut. Had a Negro been brought up among them he would quickly have taken +on their ways. Of the colored children who model their lives after their +mischievous young white neighbors, many outdo the whites in depravity +and lawlessness; but among the boys and girls who live by themselves, as +on San Juan Hill, one sees occasional interesting traits. + +The records of the Children's Court of New York (Boroughs of Manhattan +and the Bronx) throw a little light on this matter, and are sufficiently +important to quote with some fulness. For the three years studied, 1904, +1905, 1906, I tabulated the cases of the colored children brought before +the court, and also the cases of the children of the Tenth and Eleventh +Wards, chiefly Hungarians and Russian Jews, expecting to find, in two +such dissimilar groups, interesting comparisons. The following table +shows the result of this study. The court in its annual report gives the +figures for the total number of arrests which I have incorporated in my +table: + + RECORD OF ARRESTS IN CHILDREN'S COURT OF MANHATTAN AND THE BRONX FOR + 1904, 1905, 1906 + + Key to Column Headers-- + A: No. of children. + B: Arrests per cent. + + =================================================================== + | | 10th | Total arrests + | | and | for all + | Negro | 11th | children + | Arrests | Wards | in Manhattan + | | Arrests | and Bronx + +-----+------+-----+------+-------+------ + | A | B | A | B | A | B + -------------------------+-----+------+-----+------+-------+------ + Petit larceny | 56 | 7.8 | 139 | 6.8 | 2,697 | 10.1 + Grand larceny | 27 | 3.8 | 108 | 5.3 | 878 | 3.3 + Burglary--Robbery | 27 | 3.8 | 116 | 5.7 | 1,383 | 5.2 + Assault | 27 | 3.8 | 61 | 3.0 | 669 | 2.5 + Improper guardianship | 221 | 30.8 | 305 | 15.0 | 6,386 | 23.9 + Disorderly | | | | | | + child--ungovernable | | | | | | + child | 90 | 12.6 | 124 | 6.1 | 1,980 | 7.4 + Depraved girl | 33 | 4.6 | 21 | 1.1 | 312 | 1.2 + Violation of labor law | 0 | 0 | 73 | 3.5 | 592 | 2.1 + Unlicensed peddling[8] | 0 | 0 | 130 | 6.4 | 0 | .0 + Truancy | 5 | .7 | 23 | 1.0 | 298 | 1.1 + Malicious mischief | 1 | .1 | 9 | .4 | 179 | .7 + Violation of Park | | | | | | + Corporation ordinances | 0 | 0 | 25 | 1.2 | 175 | .7 + Mischief, including | | | | | | + craps, throwing stones, | | | | | | + building bonfires, | | | | | | + fighting, etc. | 214 | 29.8 | 896 | 43.7 |10,267 | 38.4 + Unclassified felonies, | | | | | | + misdemeanors | 13 | 1.8 | 16 | .7 | 799 | 3.0 + All others | 3 | .4 | 3 | .1 | 90 | .4 + -------------------------+-----+------+-----+------+-------+------ + | 717 |100.0 |2049 |100.0 |26,705 |100.0 + =================================================================== + + Percentage of Negro to total, 1904-1907 2.7 + Percentage of Negro to total, 1907-1910 1.9 + +Our table shows us that which we have already noted, the high percentage +of improper guardianship among the Negroes and the grave number of +depraved Negro girls. For the sins of petit larceny, grand larceny, and +burglary, putting the three together, the colored child shows a slightly +smaller percentage than the East Side white, a noticeably smaller +percentage than the total number of children. The sin of theft is often +swiftly attributed to a black face, but this percentage indicates that +the colored child has no "innate tendency" to steal. Ten per cent of the +arrests among the East Side children are for unlicensed peddling and +violation of the labor law, but no little Negro boys plunge into the +business world before their time. They have no keen commercial sense to +lead them to undertake transactions on their own account, and they are +not desired by purchasers of boy labor in the city. + +The most important heading, numerically, is that of mischief, and here +the Negro falls far behind the Eastsider, behind the average for the +whole. While depravity among the girls and improper guardianship are the +race's most serious defects, as shown by the arrests among its children +in New York, tractability and a decent regard for law are among its +merits. The colored child, especially if he is in a segregated +neighborhood, is not greatly inclined to mischief. My own experience has +shown me that life in a tenement on San Juan Hill is devoid of the +ingenious, exasperating deviltry of an Irish or German-American +neighborhood. No daily summons calls one to the door only to hear wildly +scurrying footsteps on the stairs. Mail boxes are left solely for the +postman's use, and hallways are not defaced by obscene writing. There is +plenty of crap shooting, rarely interfered with by the police, but there +is little impertinent annoyance or destructiveness. + +An observer, watching the little colored boys and girls as they play on +the city streets, finds much that is attractive and pleasant. They sing +their songs, learned at school and on the playground, fly their kites, +spin their tops, run their races. They usually finish what they begin, +not turning at the first interruption to take up something else. They +move more deliberately than most children, and their voices are slower +to adopt the New York screech than those of their Irish neighbors on the +block above them. Altogether they are attractive children, particularly +the smaller ones, who are more energetic than their big brothers and +sisters. Good manners are often evident. While receiving an afternoon +call from two girls, aged four and five, I was invited by the older to +partake of half a peanut, the other half of which she split in two and +generously shared with her companion. "Gim'me five cents," I once heard +a Negro boy of twelve say to his mother who walked past him on the +street. She did not seem to hear, but the boy's companion, a youth of +the same age, reproved him severely for his rude speech. When walking +with an Irish friend, who had worked among the children of her own race, +I saw a colored boy run swiftly up the block to meet his mother. He +kissed her, took her bundle from her, and carrying it under his arm, +walked quietly by her side to their home. "There are many boys here," I +said, "who are just as courteous as that." "Is that so?" she retorted +quickly, "Then you needn't be explaining to me any further the reason +for the high death rate." + +The gentle, chivalrous affection of the child for its mother is daily to +be seen among these boys and girls. "Your African," said Mary Kingsley, +"is little better than a slave to his mother, whom he loves with a love +he gives to none other. This love of his mother is so dominant a factor +in his life that it must be taken into consideration in attempting to +understand the true Negro."[9] And if the child lavishes affection upon +its parent, the mother in turn gives untiringly to her child. She is the +"mammy" of whom we have so often heard, but with her loving care +bestowed, as it should be, upon her own offspring. She tries to keep her +child clean in body and spirit and to train it to be gentle and good; +and in return usually she receives a stanch devotion. I once found +fault with a colored girl of ten years for her rude behavior with her +girl companions, adding that perhaps she did not know any better, at +which she turned on me almost fiercely and said, "It's our fault; we +know better. Our mothers learn us. It's we that's bold." As one watches +the boys and girls walking quietly up the street of a Sunday afternoon +to their Sunday-school, neatly and cleanly dressed, one appreciates the +anxious, maternal care that strives as best it knows how, to rear honest +and God-fearing men and women. + +Paul Lawrence Dunbar has painted the Negro father, his "little brown +baby wif sparklin' eyes," nestling close in his arms. Working at unusual +hours, the colored man often has a part of the day to give to his +family, and one sees him wheeling the baby in its carriage, or playing +with the older boys and girls. + +Negroes seem naturally a gentle, loving people. As you live with them +and watch them in their homes, you find some coarseness, but little +real brutality. Rarely does a father or mother strike a child. +Travellers in Central and West Africa describe them as the most friendly +of savage folk, and where, as in our city, they live largely to +themselves, they keep something of these characteristics. But it is only +a step in New York from Africa into Italy or Ireland; and the step may +bring a sad jostling to native friendliness. To hold his own with his +white companions on the street or in school, the Negro must become +pugnacious, callous to insult, ready to hit back when affronted. Many +are like the little girl who told me that she did not care to play with +white children, "because," she explained, "my mother tells me to smack +any one who calls me nigger, and I ain't looking for trouble." The +colored children aren't looking for trouble. They have a tendency to run +away from it if they see it in the form of a gang of boys coming to them +around the corner. They believe if they had a fight, it wouldn't be a +fair one, and that if the policeman came, he would arrest them and not +their Irish enemies. So they grow up on streets through which few white +men pass, leading their own lives with their own people and thinking not +overmuch of the other race that surrounds them. But the day comes when +school is over, and the outside world, however indifferent they may be +to it, must be met. They must go out and grapple with it for the means +to hire a cooking stove and a dark bedroom of their own; they must think +of making money. So they stand at the corner of their street, looking +out, and then move slowly on to find what opportunity is theirs to come +to a full manhood. The way ahead does not seem very bright, and some +move so timidly that failure is sure to meet them at the first turning. +But some have the courage of the little colored girl, aged four, who led +a line of kindergarten children up their street and then on to the +unknown country that lay between them and Central Park. At the first +block a mob of Irish boys fell upon them, running between the lines, +throwing sticks, and calling "nigger" with screams and jeers. The leader +held her head high, paying no attention to her persecutors. She neither +quickened nor slowed her pace, and when the child at her side fell back, +she pulled her hand and said, "Don't notice them. Walk straight ahead." + + +FOOTNOTES: + +[1] Dudley Kidd's, "Savage Childhood," a delightful book. + +[2] Report of the Department of Health, City of New York, 1908, pp. +844, 849. The returns for births, the report states, are incomplete. + +[3] This per cent is obtained from two sources, the births from the +Department of Health report, and the deaths from the Mortality +Statistics of the United States Census, 1908. "Colored" includes +Chinese, a negligible quantity in the infant population. + +[4] Third Annual Report of the New York Milk Committee, 1909. + +[5] See G. Newman, "Infant Mortality," for a careful study of this +whole subject. + +[6] Census, 1900, combination of Population table and Women at Work. + +[7] It is interesting to see that the married women of Fall River, +where we found a very high infant death rate, show a percentage of +married women at work of twenty in a hundred. + +[8] My tabulations of the Negro and Tenth and Eleventh Ward Children +are from the Court's unpublished records to which I was allowed access. +The absence of any figures for Unlicensed Peddling in the Total +indicates that in its printed reports the Court has included Unlicensed +Peddling with Unclassified Misdemeanors. + +[9] Mary Kingsley, "West African Studies," p. 319. + + + + +CHAPTER IV + +EARNING A LIVING--MANUAL LABOR AND THE TRADES + + +In "The American Race Problem," one of our recent important books upon +the Negro, the author, Mr. Alfred Holt Stone of Mississippi, after a +survey of the world, declares that "to me, it seems the plainest fact +confronting the Negro is that there is but one area of any size wherein +his race may obey the command to eat its bread in the sweat of its face +side by side with the white man. That area is composed of the Southern +United States."[1] + +On examination we find that only men of English and North European stock +are "white" to Mr. Stone, and that his statement is too sweeping by a +continent or two, but as applying to the United States, it will usually +meet with unqualified approval. It is generally believed that +discrimination continually retards the Negro in his search for +employment in the North, while in the South "he is given a man's chance +in the commercial world." Northern men visiting southern colored +industrial schools advise the pupils to remain where they are, and +restless spirits among the race are assured that it is better to submit +to some personal oppression than to go to a land of uncertain +employment. The past glory of the North is dwelt upon, its days of black +waiters, and barbers, and coachmen, but the present is painted in harsh +colors. + +There is some truth in this comparison of economic conditions among the +Negroes in the North and in the South, but it must not be taken too +literally. Today's tendency to minimize southern and maximize northern +race difficulties, while strengthening the bonds between white +Americans, sometimes obscures the real issues regarding colored labor in +this country. We need to look carefully at conditions in numbers of +selected localities, and we can find no northern city more worthy of +our study than New York. + +The New York Negro constitutes today but two per cent of the population +of Manhattan, one and eight-tenths per cent of that of Greater New York; +and, as many workers in Manhattan live in Brooklyn, the larger area is +the better one to consider. In 1900, the census volume on occupations +gives the number of males over ten years of age engaged in gainful +occupations in Greater New York at 1,102,471, and of that number 20,395 +or 1.8 per cent, eighteen in every thousand, are Negroes. In Atlanta, to +take a southern commercial centre, 351 out of every thousand male +workers are Negroes. This enormous difference in the proportion of +colored workers to white must never be forgotten in considering the +labor situation North and South. We cannot expect in the North to see +the Negro monopolizing an industry which demands a larger share of +workers than he can produce, nor need we admit that he has lost an +occupation when he does not control it. + +We often come upon such a statement as that of Samuel R. Scottron, a +colored business man, who, writing in 1905, said, "The Italian, +Sicilian, Greek, occupy quite every industry that was confessedly the +Negro's forty years ago. They have the bootblack stands, the news +stands, barbers' shops, waiters' situations, restaurants, janitorships, +catering business, stevedoring, steamboat work, and other situations +occupied by Negroes."[2] Did the colored men have all this forty years +ago when they were only one and a half per cent of the population? If +so, there were giants in those days, or New York was much simpler in its +habits than now. At present the control by the colored people of any +such an array of industries would be quite impossible. To take four out +of the nine occupations enumerated: the census of 1900 gives the number +of waiters at 31,211; barbers, 12,022; janitors, 6184; bootblacks, 2648; +a total of 52,065. But in 1900 there were only 20,395 Negro males +engaged in gainful occupations in New York. Without a vigorous astral +body the 20,000-odd colored men could not occupy half these jobs. If +they dominated in the field of waiters they must abandon handling the +razor, and not all the colored boys could muster 2684 strong to black +the boots of Greater New York. We must at the outset recognize that as a +labor factor the Negro in New York is insignificant. + +The volume of the federal census for 1900 on occupations shows us how +the Negroes are employed in New York City. There are five occupational +divisions, and the Negroes and whites are divided among them as follows: + + ==================================================================== + | White | Per | Negro | Per + | | cent | | cent + ------------------------------+-----------+-------+---------+------- + Agricultural pursuits | 9,853 | .9 | 251 | 1.2 + Professional service | 60,037 | 5.6 | 729 | 3.6 + Domestic and personal service | 189,282 | 17.6 | 11,843 | 58.1 + Trade and transportation | 398,997 | 37.1 | 5,798 | 28.4 + Manufacturing and mechanical | | | | + pursuits | 417,634 | 38.8 | 1,774 | 8.7 + ------------------------------+-----------+-------+---------+------- + Total | 1,075,803 | 100.0 | 20,395 | 100.0 + ==================================================================== + +But in examining in detail the occupations under these different +headings, we get a clearer view of the place the Negro maintains as a +laborer by finding out how many workers he supplies to every thousand +workers in a given occupation. He should average eighteen if he is to +occupy the same economic status as the white man. Taking the first +(numerically) important division, Domestic and Personal Service, we get +the following table: + + DOMESTIC AND PERSONAL SERVICE + + Key to column headers-- + A: Total number of males in each occupation. + B: Number of Negroes in occupation. + C: Number of Negroes to each 1000 workers in occupation. + + ======================================================= + | A | B | C + ------------------------------+---------+--------+----- + Barbers and hairdressers | 12,022 | 215 | 18 + Bootblacks | 2,648 | 51 | 20 + Launderers | 6,881 | 70 | 10 + Servants and waiters | 31,211 | 6,280 | 201 + Stewards | 1,366 | 140 | 103 + Nurses | 1,342 | 22 | 16 + Boarding and lodging house | | | + keepers | 474 | 10 | 21 + Hotel keepers | 3,139 | 23 | 7 + Restaurant keepers | 2,869 | 116 | 40 + Saloon keepers and bartenders | 17,656 | 111 | 6 + Janitors and sextons | 6,184 | 800 | 129 + Watchmen, firemen, policemen | 16,093 | 116 | 7 + Soldiers, sailors, marines | 3,707 | 56 | 15 + Laborers (including elevator | | | + tenders, laborers in coal | | | + yards, longshoremen, and | | | + stevedores) | 98,531 | 3,719 | 38 + | | | + Total, including some | | | + occupations not specified | 206,215 | 11,843 | 57 + ======================================================= + +The most important of these groups, not only in absolute numbers, but in +proportion to the whole working population, is the servants and waiters. +Two hundred out of every thousand (we must remember that the proportion +to the population would be eighteen out of every thousand) are holding +positions with which they have long been identified in America. We +cannot tell from the census how many "live out," or how many are able to +go nightly to their homes, how many have good jobs, and how many are in +second and third rate places. A study of my own of 716 colored men helps +to answer one of these questions. Out of 176 men coming under the +servants' and waiters' classification, I found 5 caterers, 24 cooks, 26 +butlers, 30 general utility men, 41 hotel men, and 50 waiters. Sixty per +cent of the 176 lived in their own homes, not in their masters'. Some of +the cooks and waiters were on Pullman trains or on river boats or +steamers; only a few were in first-class positions in New York. In the +summer many of these men are likely to go to country hotels, and with +the winter, if New York offers nothing, migrate to Palm Beach or stand +on the street corner while their wives go out to wash and scrub.[3] +"An' it don't do fer me ter complain," one of them tells me, "else he +gits 'high' an' goes off fer good." Waiters in restaurants sometimes do +not make more than six dollars a week, to be supplemented by tips, +bringing the sum up to nine or ten dollars. Hall men make about the +same, but both waiters and hall men in clubs and hotels receive large +sums in tips or in Christmas money. The Pullman car waiters have small +wages but large fees. + +Looking again at the census, we see that 129 out of every thousand +janitors and sextons are colored. The janitor's position varies from the +impecunious place in a tenement, where the only wage is the rent, to the +charge of a large office or apartment building. Then come the laborers, +nearly four thousand strong, with the elevator boy as a familiar figure. +Forty per cent of the 139 laborers in my own tabulation were elevator +boys, for, except in office buildings and large stores and hotels, this +occupation is given over to the Negro, who spends twelve hours a day +drowsing in a corner or standing to turn a wheel. Paul Lawrence Dunbar +wrote poetry while he ran an elevator, and ambitious if less talented +colored boys today study civil service examinations in their unoccupied +time; but the situation as a life job is not alluring. Twenty-five +dollars a month for wage, with perhaps a half this sum in tips, twelve +hours on duty, one week in the night time and the next in the day--no +wonder the personnel of this staff changes frequently in an apartment +house. A bright boy will be taken by some business man for a better job, +and a lazy one drifts away to look for an easier task, or is dismissed +by an irate janitor. + +Quite another group of laborers are the longshoremen who, far from +lounging indolently in a hallway, are straining every muscle as they +heave some great crate into a ship's hold. The work of the New York +dockers has been admirably described by Mr. Ernest Poole, who says of +the thirty thousand longshoremen on the wharves of New York--Italians, +Germans, Negroes, and Swedes, "Far from being the drunkards and bums +that some people think them, they are like the men of the lumber camps +come to town--huge of limb and tough of muscle, hard-swearing, +quick-fisted, big of heart." Their tasks are heavy and irregular. When +the ship comes in, the average stretch of work for a gang is from twelve +to twenty hours, and sometimes men go to a second gang and labor +thirty-five hours without sleep. Their pay for this dangerous, +exhausting toil averages eleven dollars a week. "There are thousands of +Negroes on the docks of New York," Mr. Poole writes me, "and they must +be able to work long hours at a stretch or they would not have their +jobs." At dusk, Brooklynites see these black, huge-muscled men, many of +them West Indians, walking up the hill at Montague Street. In New York +they live among the Irish in "Hell's Kitchen" and on San Juan Hill. They +are usually steady supporters of families. + +New York demands strong, unskilled laborers. To some she pays a large +wage, and Negroes have gone in numbers into the excavations under the +rivers, though a lingering death may prove the end of their two and a +half or perhaps six or seven dollar a day job. Many colored men worked +in the subway during its construction. One sees them often employed at +rock-drilling or clearing land for new buildings. About a third of the +asphalt workers, making their two dollars and a half a day, are colored. +Some educated, refined Negroes choose the laborer's work rather than +pleasanter but poorly paid occupations. A highly trained colored man, a +shipping clerk, making seven dollars a week, left his employer to take a +job of concreting in the subway at $1.80 a day. His decision was in +favor of dirty, severe labor, but a living wage. + +When the next census is published, those of us who are carefully +watching the economic condition of the Negro expect to find a movement +from domestic service into the positions of laborers, including the +porters in stores, who belong in our second census division. + +Kelly Miller[4] describes the massive buildings and sky-seeking +structures of our northern city, and finds no status for the Negro above +the cellar floor. One can see the colored youth gazing wistfully through +the office window at the clerk, whose business reaches across the ocean +to bewilderingly wonderful continents, knowing as he does that the +employment he may find in that office will be emptying the white man's +waste paper basket. + + TRADE AND TRANSPORTATION + + Key to Column Headers-- + A: Total number of males in each occupation. + B: Number of Negroes in each occupation. + C: Number of Negroes to each 1000 workers in occupation. + + ============================================================= + | A | B | C + --------------------------------------+---------+------+----- + Agents--commercial travellers | 27,456 | 67 | 2 + Bankers, brokers, and officials of | | | + banks and companies | 11,472 | 7 | 0 + Bookkeepers--accountants | 22,613 | 33 | 1 + Clerks, copyists (including shipping | | | + clerks, letter and mail carriers) | 80,564 | 423 | 5 + Merchants (wholesale and retail) | 72,684 | 162 | 2 + Salesmen | 45,740 | 94 | 2 + Typewriters | 3,225 | 36 | 11 + Boatmen and sailors | 8,188 | 145 | 18 + Foremen and overseers | 3,111 | 18 | 6 + Draymen, hackmen, teamsters | 51,063 | 1439 | 28 + Hostlers | 5,891 | 633 | 107 + Livery stable keepers | 967 | 9 | 9 + Steam railway employees | 11,831 | 70 | 6 + Street railway employees | 7,375 | 11 | 1 + Telegraph and telephone operators | 2,430 | 6 | 2 + Hucksters and peddlers | 12,635 | 69 | 5 + Messengers, errand and office boys | 13,451 | 335 | 25 + Porters and helpers (in stores, etc.) | 11,322 | 2143 | 188 + Undertakers | 1,572 | 15 | 9 + | | | + Total, including some occupations | | | + not specified | 405,675 | 5798 | 14 + ============================================================= + +This, however, does not apply to government positions, and a large +number of the 423 colored clerks in 1900 were probably in United States +and municipal service. The latter we shall consider later as we study +the Negro and the municipality. Of the former, in 1909 there were about +176 in the New York post-offices.[5] Ambitious boys work industriously +at civil service examinations, and a British West Indian will even +become an American citizen for the chance of a congenial occupation. The +clerkship, that to a white man is only a stepping-stone, to a Negro is a +highly coveted position. + +I have made two divisions of this census list; the first includes those +occupations requiring intellectual skill and carrying with them some +social position, the second, those demanding only manual work. It is in +the second that the colored man finds a place, and as a porter he +numbers 2143, and reaches almost as high a percentage as the waiter and +servant. Porters' positions are paid from five to fifteen dollars a +week, the man receiving the latter wage performing also the duties of +shipping clerk. There is some opportunity for advance, always within the +basement, and there are regular hours and a fairly steady job. + +The heading of draymen, hackmen, and teamsters, with 28 colored in every +thousand, shows that the Negro has not lost his place as a driver. The +chauffeur does not appear in the census, but the Negro is steadily +increasing in numbers in this occupation, and conducts three garages of +his own. + +The last census division to be considered in this chapter is that of +Manufacturing and Mechanical Pursuits. + + MANUFACTURING AND MECHANICAL PURSUITS + + Key to Column Headers-- + A: Total number of males in each occupation. + B: Number of Negroes in each occupation. + C: Number of Negroes to each 1000 workers in occupation. + + ============================================================= + | A | B | C + --------------------------------------+---------+-------+---- + Engineers, firemen (not locomotive) | 16,579 | 227 | 14 + Masons (brick and stone) | 12,913 | 94 | 7 + Painters, glaziers, and varnishers | 27,135 | 177 | 6 + Plasterers | 4,019 | 51 | 12 + Blacksmiths | 7,289 | 29 | 4 + Butchers | 12,643 | 31 | 2 + Carpenters and joiners | 29,904 | 94 | 3 + Iron and steel workers | 10,372 | 40 | 4 + Paper hangers | 962 | 18 | 19 + Photographers | 1,590 | 22 | 14 + Plumbers, gas and steam fitters | 16,614 | 31 | 2 + Printers, lithographers, and pressmen | 21,521 | 53 | 2 + Tailors | 56,094 | 69 | 1 + Tobacco and cigar factory operators | 11,689 | 189 | 16 + Fishermen and oystermen | 1,439 | 65 | 45 + Miners and quarrymen | 326 | 21 | 64 + Machinists | 17,241 | 47 | 3 + | | | + Total, including some occupations | | | + not specified |419,594 | 1774 | 4 + ============================================================= + + Bakers, boot and shoe makers, gold and silver workers, brass workers, + tin plate and tin ware makers, box makers, cabinet makers, marble and + stone cutters, book-binders, clock and watch makers, confectioners, + engravers, glass workers, hat and cap makers, and others--not more than + nineteen in any one occupation, nor a higher per cent than four in a + thousand. + +When Mr. Stone wrote of the Southern States as the only place in which +the Negro could "earn his bread in the sweat of his face," side by side +with the white man, he must especially have been thinking of workers in +the skilled trades. Unskilled laborers in New York are drenched in a +common grimy fellowship. But in this last division the Negro is +conspicuous by his absence. Only four in every thousand where there +should be eighteen! In Atlanta, under this division, the race reaches +almost its due proportion, 279 in a thousand instead of 351. The largest +number in any trade in New York is 189 men among the Cuban tobacco +workers. Seventy-five per cent of all the masons in Atlanta are colored +men, while in New York the colored are less than one per cent. Looking +down the list we see that the figures are small and the percentage +insignificant. The highly skilled and best paid trades are seemingly as +far removed from the Negro as the positions of floor-walkers or cashiers +of banks. + +Omitting for the present the professional class, we have reviewed the +Negro as a worker, and neither in wages nor choice of occupation has he +risen far to success. In domestic service he has gone a little down the +ladder, serving in less desirable positions than in former years. Why +has this happened? What good reasons are there for these conditions? + +The first and most obvious reason is race prejudice. No display of +talent, however prodigious, will open certain occupations to the colored +race. As a salesman he could teach courteous manners to some of our +white salesmen in New York, but he is never given a chance. There are a +few Negroes, digging in the tunnels or sweeping down the subway stairs, +who are capable of filling the clerkships that are counted the +perquisites of the whites; but clerkships are only accessible as they +are associated with municipal or federal service. Of course there are +exceptions, and though they do not affect the rule, they show the +existence of a few employers who ignore the color line, and a few +Negroes of inexhaustible perseverance. + +Mr. Stone argues that the Negro in the South profits by the strict +drawing of the color line, since the white man, always considered the +superior, is not lowered in the eyes of the community by working with +the black man. The Southern white may lay bricks on the same wall with +the Southern black, secure in his superior social position. But this +seems fanciful as an explanation of labor conditions. The black doctor, +for instance, in those localities where the color line is most rigid, +may not ask the white doctor to consult with him; or if he does, his +prompt removal from the community is requested. Colored postal clerks +are in disfavor in the South, though not colored postmen. North or +South, _the Negro gets an opportunity to work where he is imperatively +needed_. Constituting one-third of the working population, he can make a +place for himself in the laboring world of Atlanta as he cannot in New +York. Pick up the 20,000 New York Negroes and drop them in Liberia, and +in two or three weeks Ellis Island could empty out sufficient men to +fill their places; but remove a third of the male workers from Atlanta, +and the city for years would suffer from the calamity. If they are the +only available source of labor, colored men can work by the side of +white men; but where the white man strongly dominates the labor +situation, he tries to push his black brother into the jobs for which he +does not care to compete. + +We have seen, however, that in some occupations in New York the Negroes +appear in such proportion as should be sufficient to secure them +excellent positions; the most conspicuous instance being that of the +200 colored waiters out of every thousand. Why, then, do we not see +Negroes serving in the best hotels the city affords? + +It has been an ideal of American democracy, a part of its strenuous +individualism, that each member of the community should have full +liberty in the pursuit of wealth. The ambitious, capable boy who walks +bare-footed into the city, and at the end of twenty years has +outdistanced his country school-mates, becoming a multi-millionaire +while they are still farm drudges, is the example of American +opportunity. But this ability to separate one's self from the rest of +one's fellows and attain individual greatness is rarely possible to a +segregated race. In domestic service individual colored men have shown +ambition and high capability, but they have never been able to get away +from their fellows like the country boy--to leave the farm drudges and +take a place among the most proficient of their profession. They must +always work in a race group. And this Negro group is like the small +college that tries to win at football against a competitor with four +times the number of students and a better coach. The two hundred +colored waiters, competing against the eight hundred white ones, lose in +the game and are given a second place, which the best must accept with +the worst. When, then, we criticize a capable colored man for failing to +keep a superior position we must remember that he is tied to his group +and has little chance of advancement on his individual merit. + +The census division of mechanical pursuits shows only a few colored men +working at trades, and the paucity of the numbers is often attributed by +the Negro to a third obstacle in the way of his progress, the +trade-union. + +To the colored man who has overcome race prejudice sufficiently to be +taken into a shop with white workmen, the walking delegate who appears +and asks for his union card seems little short of diabolical; and all +the advantages that collective bargaining has secured, the higher wage +and shorter working-day, are forgotten by him. I have heard the most +distinguished of Negro educators, listening to such an incident as this, +declare that he should like to see every labor union in America +destroyed. But unionism has come to stay, and the colored man who is +asked for his card had better at once get to work and endeavor to secure +it. Many have done this already, and organized labor in New York, its +leaders tell us, receives an increasing number of colored workmen. Miss +Helen Tucker, in a careful study of Negro craftsmen in the West +Sixties,[6] found among 121 men who had worked at their trades in the +city, 32, or 26 per cent in organized labor. The majority of these had +joined in New York. Eight men, out of the 121, had applied for entrance +to unions and not been admitted. This does not seem a discouraging +number, though we do not know whether the other 81 could have been +organized or not. Many, probably, were not sufficiently competent +workmen. In 1910, according to the best information that I could secure, +there were 1358 colored men in the New York unions. Eighty of these were +in the building trades, 165 were cigar makers, 400 were teamsters, 350 +asphalt workers, and 240 rock-drillers and tool sharpeners.[7] + +Entrance to some of the local organizations is more easily secured than +to others, for the trade-union, while part of a federation, is +autonomous, or nearly so. In some of the highly skilled trades, to +which few colored men have the necessary ability to demand access, the +Negro is likely to be refused, while the less intelligent and well-paid +forms of labor press a union card upon him. Again, strong organizations +in the South, as the bricklayers, send men North with union membership, +who easily transfer to New York locals. Miss Tucker finds the +carpenters', masons', and plasterers' organizations easy for the Negro +to enter. There is in New York a colored local, the only colored local +in the city, among a few of the carpenters, with regular representation +in the Central Federated Union. The American Federation of Labor in 1881 +declared that "the working people must unite irrespective of creed, +color, sex, nationality, or politics." This cry is for self-protection, +and where the Negroes have numbers and ability in a trade, their +organization becomes important to the white. It may be fairly said of +labor organization in New York that it finds and is at times unable to +destroy race prejudice, but that it does not create it.[8] + +A fourth obstacle, and a very important one, is the lack of opportunity +for the colored boy. The only trade that he can easily learn is that of +stationary engineer, an occupation at which the Negroes do very well. +Colored boys in small numbers are attending evening trade schools, but +their chance of securing positions on graduation will be small. The +Negro youth who is not talented enough to enter a profession, and who +cannot get into the city or government service, has slight opportunity. +Nothing is so discouraging in the outlook in New York as the crowding +out of colored boys from congenial remunerative work. + +The last obstacle in the way of the Negro's advancement into higher +occupations is his inefficiency. Race prejudice denies him the +opportunity to prove his ability in many occupations, and the same +spirit forces him to work in a race group; but the colored men +themselves are often unfitted for any labor other than that they +undertake. + +The picture that is sometimes drawn of many thousands of highly skilled +Southern colored men forced in New York to give up their trades and to +turn to menial labor is not a correct one. Richard R. Wright, Jr., who +has made a careful study of the Negro in Philadelphia,[9] finds that +the majority of colored men who come to that city are from the class of +unskilled city laborers and country hands; the minority are the more +skilful artisans and farmers and domestic servants, with a number also +of the vagrant and criminal classes. + +In New York the untrained Negroes not only form a very large class, but +coming in contact, as they do, with foreigners who for generations have +been forced to severe, unremitting toil, they suffer by comparison. The +South in the days of slavery demanded chiefly routine work in the fields +from its Negroes.[10] The work was under the direction either of the +master, the overseer, or a foreman; and there has been no general +advance in training for the colored men of the South since that time. +Contrast the intensive cultivation of Italy or Switzerland with the +farms of Georgia or Alabama, or the hotels of France with those of +Virginia, and you will see the disadvantages from which the Negro +suffers. America is young and crude, but opportunity has brought to her +great cities workmen from all over the world. In New York these men are +driven at a pace that at the outset distracts the colored man who +prefers his leisurely way. Moreover, the foreign workmen have learned +persistence; they are punctual and appear regularly each morning at +their tasks. "The Italians are better laborers than any other people we +have, are they not?" I asked a man familiar with many races and +nationalities. "No," was his answer, "they do not work better than +others, but when the whistle blows, they are always there." Mr. Stone, +whose book I have already quoted a number of times, shows the +irresponsible, fanciful wanderings of his Mississippi tenants, whom he +endeavored, unsuccessfully, to establish in a permanent tenantry. The +colored men in New York are far in advance of these farm hands, who are +described as moving about simply because they desire a change, but they +are also far from the steady, unswerving attitude of their foreign +competitors. Inadequately educated, too often they come to New York with +little equipment for tasks they must undertake successfully or +starve--unless, puerile, they live by the labor of some industrious +woman. + +I have tried to depict the New York colored wage earners as they labor +in the city today. They are not a remarkable group, and were they white +men, distinguished by some mark of nationality, they would pass without +comment. But the Negro is on trial, and witnesses are continually called +to tell of his failures and successes. We have seen that both in the +attitude of the world about him, and in his own untutored self, there +are many obstacles to prevent his advance; and his natural sensitiveness +adds to these difficulties. He minds the coarse but often good-natured +joke of his fellow laborer, and he remembers with a lasting pain the +mortification of an employer's curt refusal of work. Had he the +obtuseness of some Americans he would prosper better. As we have seen, +many positions are completely closed to him, leading him to idleness and +consequent crime. Just as not every able-bodied white man, who is out of +work and impoverished, will go to the charities wood-yard and saw wood, +so not every colored man will accept the menial labor which may be the +only work open to him. Instead, he may gamble or drift into a vagabond +life. A well-known Philadelphia judge has said that "The moral and +intellectual advance of a race is governed by the degree of its +industrial freedom. When that freedom is restricted there is unbounded +tendency to drive the race discriminated against into the ranks of the +criminal." Discrimination in New York has led many Negroes into these +ranks. But as we look back at the occupations of our colored men we see +a large number who secure regular hours, and if a poor, yet a fairly +steady pay. For the mass of the Negroes coming into the city these +positions are an advance over their former work. Employment in a great +mercantile establishment, though it be in the basement, carries dignity +with it, and educating demands of punctuality, sobriety, and swiftness. +Richard R. Wright, Jr., whose right to speak with authority we have +already noted, believes that the "North has taught the Negro the value +of money; of economy; it has taught more sustained effort in work, +punctuality, and regularity." It has also, I believe, in its more +regular hours of work, aided in the upbuilding of the home. + +I remember once waiting in the harbor of Genoa while our ship was +taking on a cargo. The captain walked the deck impatiently, and, as the +Italians went in leisurely fashion about their task, declared, "If I had +those men in New York I could get twice the amount of work out of them." +That is what New York does; it works men hard and fast; sometimes it +mars them; but it pays a better wage than Genoa, and there is an +excitement and dash about it that attracts laborers from all parts of +the earth. The black men come, insignificant in numbers, ready to do +their part. They work and play and marry and bring up children, and as +we watch them moving to and from their tasks the North seems to have +brought to the majority of them something of liberty and happiness. + + +FOOTNOTES: + +[1] Alfred Holt Stone, "Studies in the American Race Problem," p. 164. + +[2] New York _Age_, August 24, 1905. + +[3] Occupations in 1907 of 716 colored men (secured from records of the +Young Men's Christian Association and personal visits) compared with +census figures of occupations in 1900. + + ============================================================== + | 716 Men | Census + -------------------------------------------+---------+-------- + Agricultural pursuits | -- | 1.2 + | | + Professional service, 27 men | 3.8 | 3.6 + | | + Domestic and personal service, 363 men | 50.6 | 58.1 + 5 barbers, 5 caterers, 24 cooks, | | + 30 general utility men, 41 hotel men, | | + 76 waiters and butlers, 8 valets, | | + 35 janitors and sextons, 29 longshoremen, | | + 5 laborers in tunnels, 7 asphalt | | + workers, 57 elevator men, 41 laborers. | | + | | + Trade and transportation, 279 men | 39.0 | 28.4 + 10 chauffeurs, 35 drivers, 13 expressmen, | | + 8 hostlers, 12 messengers, 14 municipal | | + employees, 127 porters in stores, | | + 15 porters on trains, 24 clerks, | | + 21 merchants. | | + | | + Manufacturing and mechanical | | + pursuits, 47 men | 6.6 | 8.7 + +---------+------- + | 100.0 | 100.0 + ============================================================= + +[4] Kelly Miller's "Race Adjustment," p. 129. + +[5] It is difficult to get accurate figures as no official record is +kept of color. + +[6] _Southern Workman_, October, 1907, to March, 1908. + +[7] In 1906, and again in 1910, I secured a counting of the New York +colored men in organized labor. The lists run as follows: + + 1906 1910 + + Asphalt workers 320 350 + Teamsters 300 400 + Rock-drillers and tool sharpeners 250 240 + Cigar makers 121 165 + Bricklayers 90 21 + Waiters 90 not obtainable + Carpenters 60 40 + Plasterers 45 19 + Double drum hoisters 30 37 + Safety and portable engineers 26 35 + Eccentric firemen 15 0 + Letter carriers 10 30 + Pressmen 10 not obtainable + Printers 6 8 + Butchers 3 3 + Lathers 3 7 + Painters 3 not obtainable + Coopers 1 2 + Sheet metal workers 1 1 + Rockmen 1 not obtainable + ---- ---- + Total 1385 1358 + +The large number of bricklayers in 1906 is questioned by the man, +himself a bricklayer, who made the second counting. However, the number +greatly decreased in 1908 when the stagnation in business compelled many +men to seek work in other cities. + +[8] The comment of the Negro bricklayer who secured my figures is +important. "A Negro," he says, "has to be extra fit in his trade to +retain his membership, as the eyes of all the other workers are +watching every opportunity to disqualify him, thereby compelling a +superefficiency. Yet at all times he is the last to come and the first +to go on the job, necessitating his seeking other work for a living, and +keeping up his card being but a matter of sentiment. While all the +skilled trades seem willing to accept the Negro with his travelling +card, yet there are some which utterly refuse him; for instance, the +house smiths and bridge men who will not recognize him at all. While +membership in the union is necessary to work, yet the hardest part of +the battle is to secure employment. In some instances intercession has +been made by various organizations interested in his industrial progress +for employment at the offices of various companies, and favorable +answers are given, but hostile foremen with discretionary power carry +out their instructions in such a manner as to render his employment of +such short duration that he is very little benefited. Of course, there +are some contractors who are very friendly to a few men, and whenever +any work is done by them, they are certain of employment. Unfortunately, +these are too few." + +[9] R. R. Wright, Jr.'s "Migration of Negroes to the North," Annals of +the American Academy, May, 1906. + +[10] See Ulrich B. Phillips' "Origin and Growth of the Southern Black +Belts," _American Historical Review_, July, 1906. + + + + +CHAPTER V + +EARNING A LIVING--BUSINESS AND THE PROFESSIONS + + +If we walk west on Fifty-ninth Street, at Eighth Avenue, we come upon +one of the colored business sections of New York. Here, for a block's +length, are employment and real estate agents, restaurant keepers, +grocers, tailors, barbers, printers, expressmen, and undertakers, all +small establishments occupying the first floor or basement of some +tenement or lodging house, and with the exception of the employment +agency all patronized chiefly by the colored race. Another such section +and a more prosperous one is in Harlem, on West One Hundred and +Thirty-third, One Hundred and Thirty-fourth, and One Hundred and +Thirty-fifth Streets. From the point of view of the whole business of +the city such concerns are insignificant, but they are important from +the viewpoint of Negro progress, since they represent the accumulation +of capital, experience in business methods, and hard work. Very slowly +the New York Negro is meeting the demanding power of his people and is +securing neighborhood trade that has formerly gone to the Italian and +the Jew. Husband and wife, father and son, work in their little +establishments and make a beginning in the mercantile world. + +The Negro, as we have seen, has conducted businesses in New York in the +past, businesses patronized chiefly by whites. Barbering and catering +were his successes, and in both of these he has lost, despite the fact +that one of the city's wealthiest colored men is a caterer. But if he +has lost here, he has gained along other lines. Among a number of +photographers he has one who is well-known for his excellent +architectural work. Two manufacturers have brought out popular goods, +the Haynes's razor strop, and the Howard shoe polish. These men, one a +barber and one a Pullman car porter, improved upon implements used in +their daily work and then turned to manufacture. The headquarters of +the Howard shoe polish is in Chicago, where the firm employs thirty +people, the New York branch giving employment to twelve. + +A wise utilization of labor already trained and at hand is seen in the +Manhattan House Cleaning and Renovating Bureau. This firm contracts for +the cleaning of houses and places of business and has also been +successful in securing work on new buildings, entering as the builders +leave and arranging everything for occupancy. In one week the Bureau has +given employment to sixty men. + +In those businesses in which he comes in contact with the white, the +most pronounced success of the colored man has been real estate +brokerage. The New York Negro business directory names twenty-two real +estate brokers, and though a dozen of them probably handle altogether no +more business than one white firm, a few put through important +operations. The ablest of these brokers, recently clearing twenty +thousand dollars at a single transaction, turned his operations to +Liberia, where he went for a few months to look into land concessions. +This broker has aided the Negroes materially in their efforts to rent +apartments on better streets. His energy, and that of many more like +him, is also needed to open up places for colored businesses, better +office and workroom facilities for the able professional and business +men and women. In New York as in the South the Negro needs to obtain a +hold upon the land. In this he is aided not only by his brokers, but by +realty companies. The largest of these, the Metropolitan Realty Company, +in operation since 1900, is capitalized at a million dollars, and had in +1910 $400,000 paid in stock, and $400,000 subscribed and being paid for +on instalment. This company operates in the suburban towns, and has +quite a colony in Plainfield, New Jersey, where it owns 150 lots. It has +built eighty cottages for its members, and has bought eighteen. + +Among the businesses that cater directly to the colored, probably none +is more successful than undertaking. The Negroes of the city die in +great numbers, and the funeral is all too common a function. Formerly +this business went to white men, but increasingly it is coming into the +hands of the colored. The Negro business directory gives twenty-two +undertakers, one of them, by common report, the richest colored man in +New York. Profitable real estate investment, combined with one of the +largest undertaking establishments in the city, has given him a +comfortable fortune. Another large and increasingly important Negro +business is the hotel and boarding-house. As the colored men of the +South and West accumulate wealth, they will come in increasing numbers +to visit in New York, and the colored hotel, now little more than a +boarding-house, may become a spacious building, with private baths, +elevator service, and a well-equipped restaurant. In today's modestly +equipped buildings the catering is often excellent, and good, +well-cooked food is sold at reasonable prices. Occasionally the Hotel +Maceo advertises a southern dinner, and its guests sit down to Virginia +sugar-cured ham, sweet potato pie, and perhaps even opossum. + +Printing establishments, tailors' shops,[1] express and van companies, +and many other small enterprises help to make up the Negro business +world. One colored printer brings out an important white magazine. There +are seven weekly colored newspapers, of which the New York _Age_ is the +most important, and two musical publishing companies. All these +enterprises are useful, not only to the proprietor and his patrons, but +especially to the clerks and assistants who thus are able to secure some +training in mercantile work. In the white man's office, white and +colored boys start out together, but as their trousers lengthen and +their ambitions quicken, the former secures promotion while the latter +is still given the letters to put into the mail box. If the Negro lad, +discouraged at lack of advancement, leaves the white man and ventures +with a tiny capital into some business of his own, his ignorance is +almost certain to lead to his disaster. He is indeed fortunate if he can +first work in the office of a successful colored man.[2] + +We have one more census division to consider, Professional Service. The +table runs as follows: + + PROFESSIONAL SERVICE + + Key to column headers-- + A: Total number of males in each occupation. + B: Number of Negroes in each occupation. + C: Number of Negroes to each 1000 workers in occupation. + + ======================================================== + | A | B | C + ------------------------------------+--------+-----+---- + Actors, professional showmen, etc. | 4,733 | 254 | 54 + Architects, designers, draftsmen | 3,966 | 2 | 0 + Artists, teachers of art | 2,924 | 13 | 4 + Clergymen | 2,833 | 90 | 32 + Dentists | 1,509 | 25 | 16 + Physicians and surgeons | 6,577 | 32 | 5 + Veterinary surgeons | 320 | 2 | 6 + Electricians | 8,131 | 18 | 2 + Engineers (civil) and surveyors | 3,321 | 7 | 2 + Journalists | 2,833 | 7 | 2 + Lawyers | 7,811 | 26 | 3 + Literary and scientific | 1,709 | 10 | 5 + Musicians | 6,429 | 195 | 30 + Officials (government) | 3,934 | 9 | 2 + Teachers and professors in colleges | 3,409 | 32 | 9 + | | | + Total including some occupations | | | + not specified | 60,853 | 729 | 12 + ======================================================== + +Examining these figures we find few colored architects[3] or engineers, +and a very small proportion of electricians, though among the latter +there is a highly skilled workman. The New York Negro has no position in +the mechanical arts. It may be that, as we so often hear, the African +does not possess mechanical ability.[4] You do not see Negro boys +pottering over machinery or making toy inventions of their own. But +another and powerful reason for the colored youth's failing to take up +engineering or kindred studies is the slight chance he would later have +in securing work. No group of men in America have opposed his progress +more persistently than skilled mechanics, and, should he graduate from +some school of technology, he would be refused in office or workshop. So +he turns to those professions in which he sees a likelihood of +advancement. + +Colored physicians and dentists are increasing in number in New York and +throughout the country. The Negro is sympathetic, quick to understand +another's feelings, and when added to this he has received a thorough +medical training he makes an excellent physician. New York State +examinations prevent the practice of ignorant doctors from other states, +and the city can count many able colored practitioners. These doctors +practise among white people as well as among colored. As surgeons they +are handicapped in New York by lack of hospital facilities, having no +suitable place in which they may perform an operation. The colored +student who graduates from a New York medical college must go for +hospital training to Philadelphia or Chicago or Washington.[5] + +Colored lawyers are obtaining a firm foothold in New York. From +twenty-six in the 1900 census they now, in 1911, number over fifty, +though not all of these by any means rely entirely upon their profession +for support. Some of our lawyers are descendants of old New York +families, others have come here recently from the South. + +Turning to our census figures again we see that the three professions in +which the colored man is conspicuous are those of actor, musician, and +minister. Instead of the average eighteen, he here shows fifty-four in +every thousand actors, thirty in every thousand musicians, and +thirty-two in every thousand clergymen. And since the pulpit and the +stage are two places in which the black man has found conspicuous +success it may be well in this connection to consider, not only the +economic significance of these institutions, but their place in the life +of the colored world. + +The Negro minister was born with the Negro Christian, and the colored +church, in which he might tell of salvation, is over a century old in +New York. Today the Boroughs of Manhattan and Brooklyn have twenty-eight +colored churches besides a number of missions. Some of the societies own +valuable property, usually, however, encumbered with heavy mortgages, +and yearly budgets mount up to ten, twelve, and sixteen thousand +dollars. The Methodist churches lead in number, next come the Baptist, +and next the Episcopalian. There are Methodist Episcopal, African +Methodist Episcopal, and African Methodist Episcopal Zion. Bethel +African Methodist Episcopal Church, as we have seen, is one of the +oldest and is still one of the largest and most useful Negro churches in +New York. Mount Olivet, a Baptist church on West Fifty-third Street, has +a seating capacity of 1600, taxed to its full on Sunday evenings. St. +Philip's gives the Episcopal service with dignity and devoutness, and +its choir has many sweet colored boy singers. At St. Benedict, the Moor, +the black faces of the boy acolytes contrast with the benignant +white-haired Irish priest, and without need of words preach good-will +to men. Only in this Catholic church does one find white and black in +almost equal numbers worshipping side by side. + +The great majority of the colored churches are supported by their +congregations, and the minister or elder, or both, twice a Sunday, must +call for the pennies and nickels, dimes and quarters, that are dropped +into the plate at the pulpit's base. Contributors file past the table on +which they place their offering, emulation becoming a spur to +generosity. These collections are supplemented by sums raised at +entertainments and fairs, and it is in this way, by the constant +securing of small gifts, that the thousands are raised. + +The church is a busy place and retains its members, not only by its +preaching, but by midweek meetings. There are the class meetings of the +Methodists, the young people's societies, the prayer meetings, and the +sermons preached to the secret benefit organizations. Visiting sisters +and brothers attend to relief work, and standing at a side table, +sometimes picturesque with lighted lantern, ask for dole for the poor. + +The Sunday-schools, while not so large as the church attendance would +lead one to expect, involve much time and labor in their conduct. A +colored church member finds all his or her leisure occupied in church +work. I know a young woman engaged in an exacting, skilled profession +who spends her day of rest attending morning service, teaching in +Sunday-school, taking part in the young people's lyceum in the late +afternoon, and listening to a second sermon in the evening. Occasionally +she omits her dinner to hear an address at the colored Young Men's +Christian Association. On hot summer afternoons you may see colored boys +and girls and men and women crowded in an ill-ventilated hall, giving +ear to a fervid exhortation that leads the speaker, at the sentence's +end, to mop his swarthy face. The woods, the salt-smelling sea, the +tamer prettiness of the lawns of the city's park, have not the impelling +call of sermon or hymn. If the whole of the Negro's summer Sunday is to +be given to direct religious teaching, one wishes that it might take +place at the old time camp meeting, where there is fresh air and space +in which to breathe it. The first of Edward Everett Hale's three rules +of life as he gave them to the Hampton students was, "Live all you can +out in the open air." The religious-minded New York Negro succumbs +easily to disease, and yet elects to spend his day of leisure within +doors. + +With the exception of the Episcopalians, the churches undertake little +institutional work. Money is lacking, and there is only a feeble +conviction of the value of the gymnasium, pool table, and girls' and +boys' clubs. The colored branches of the Young Men's Christian +Association, however, are places for recreation and instruction. The +lines that Evangelical Americans draw regarding amusements, prohibiting +cards and welcoming dominos, allowing bagatelle and frowning upon +billiards, must be interpreted by some folk-lore historian to show their +reasonableness. Doubtless the extent to which a game is used for +gambling purposes has much to do with its good or bad savor, and pool +and cards for this reason are tabooed. Dancing is also frowned upon by +many of the churches, while temperance societies make active campaign +for prohibition. To New York's black folk, the church-goers and they who +stand without are the sheep and the goats, and the gulf between them is +digged deep. + +Of the five colored Episcopal churches, St. Philip's and St. Cyprian's +have parish houses. St. Philip's has moved into a new parish house on +West One Hundred and Thirty-Fourth Street, where with its large, +well-arranged rooms, its gymnasium, and its corps of enthusiastic +workers it will soon become a powerful force in the Harlem Negro's life. +St. Cyprian's is under the City Episcopal Mission, and has unusual +opportunity for helpfulness since it is separated only by Amsterdam +Avenue from the San Juan Hill district and yet stands amid the whites. +Its clubs and classes, its employment agency, its gymnasium, its +luncheons for school children, its beautiful church, are all primarily +for the Negroes; but the colored rector has a friendly word for his +white neighbors, tow-headed Irish and German boys and girls sit upon his +steps, and his ministry has lessened the belligerent feeling between +the east and the west sides of Amsterdam Avenue. St. David's Episcopal +Church in the Bronx has a fresh air home at White Plains, cared for +personally by the rector and his wife, who spend their vacation with +tenement mothers and their children, the tired but grateful recipients +of their good-will. + +If there were ninety colored clergymen in New York in 1900, as the +census says, a number must have been without churches, itinerant +preachers or directors of small missions, supporting themselves by +other labor during the day. Those men who now fill the pulpits of +well-established churches have been trained in theological schools of +good standing, for the ignorant "darky" of the story who leaves the hot +work of the cotton field because he feels a "call" to preach does not +receive another from New York. The colored minister in this city works +hard and long, and finds a wearying number of demands upon his time. The +wedding and the funeral, the word of counsel to the young, and of +comfort to the aged, a multiplicity of meetings, two sermons every +Sunday, the continual strain of raising money, these are some of his +duties. With a day from fourteen to seventeen hours long he earns as few +men earn the meagre salary put into his hand. But his position among +his people is a commanding one, and carries with it respect and +responsibility. + +Strangers who visit colored churches to be amused by the vociferations +of the preacher and the responses of the congregation will be +disappointed in New York. Others, however, who attend, desiring to +understand the religious teaching of the thoughtful Negro, find much of +interest. They hear sermons marked by great eloquence. In the +Evangelical church the preacher is not afraid to give his imagination +play, and in finely chosen, vivid language, pictures his thought to his +people. Especially does he love to tell the story of a future life, of +Paradise with its rapturous beauty of color and sound, its golden +streets, its gates of precious stones, effulgent, radiant. He dwells not +upon the harshness, but rather upon the mercy of God. + +A theological library connected with a Calvinistic church, when recently +catalogued, disclosed two long shelves of books upon Hell and two slim +volumes upon Heaven. No such unloving Puritanism dominates the Negro's +thought. Hell's horrors may be portrayed at a revival to bring the +sinner to repentance, but only as an aid to a clearer vision of the +glories of Heaven. + +The Negro churches lay greater stress than formerly upon practical +religion; they try to turn a fine frenzy into a determination for +righteousness. This was strikingly exemplified lately in one of New +York's colored Baptist churches. During the solemn rite of immersion the +congregation began to grow hysterical, or "happy," as they would have +phrased it; there were cries of "Yes, Jesus," "We're comin', Lord," and +swayings of the body backward and forward. The minister with loud and +stirring appeal for a time encouraged these emotions. Then in a moment +he brought quiet to his congregation and called them to the consecration +of labor. Faith without works was vain. Baptism was not the end, but +only the beginning of their salvation. "You-all bleege ter work," he +said, "if yer gwine foller der Lord. Ain't Jesus work in der carpenter +shop till he nigh on thirty year old? Den one day he stood up (he ain't +none er yer two-by-fo' men) an' he tak off his blue apun (I reckon he +wore er apun like we-alls) an' he goes on down ter der wilderness, an' +John der Baptist baptize him." + +From oratory one turns naturally to music. The feeling for rhythm, for +melodious sound, that leads the Negro to use majestic words of which he +has not always mastered the meaning, leads him also to musical +expression. He has an instinct for harmony, and, when within hearing +distance of any instrument, will whistle, not the melody, however +assertive, but will add a part.[6] Those who have visited colored +schools, and especially the colored schools of the far South where the +pupils are unfamiliar with other music than their own, can never forget +the exquisite, haunting singing. When a foreman wants to get energetic +work from his black laborers he sets them to singing stirring tunes. The +Negro has his labor songs as the sailor has his chanties, and it would +be impossible to measure the joy coming to both through musical +expression. + +In New York, despite their poverty, few Negroes fail to possess some +musical instrument--a banjo perhaps, or a guitar, a mandolin or zither, +or it may be the highly prized piano. Visiting of an evening in the +Phipps model tenement, one hears a variety of gay tinkling sounds. And +besides the mechanical instruments there is always the great natural +instrument, the human voice. Singing, though not as common in the city +as in the country, is still often heard, especially in the summer, and +remains musical, though New York's noise and cheap and vulgar +entertainments have an unhappy fashion of roughening her children's +voices. + +Music furnishes a means of livelihood to many Negroes and supplements +the income of many others. Boys contribute to the family support by +singing cheap songs in saloons or even in houses of prostitution. A boy +"nightingale" will earn the needed money for rent while learning, all +too quickly, the ways of viciousness. Others, more carefully reared, +sing at church or secret society concert, perhaps receiving a little +pay. Men form male quartettes that for five or ten dollars furnish a +part of an evening's entertainment. There are many Negro musicians and +elocutionists who largely support themselves by their share in the +receipts from concerts and social gatherings. + +We speak of men crossing the line when they intermarry with the whites, +but there is another crossing of the line when some Negro by his genius +makes the world forget his race. Such a man is the artist, Henry Tanner; +and New York has such Negro musicians. Mr. Harry Burleigh, the baritone +at St. George's, has won high recognition, not only as an interpreter, +but as a composer of music; and one of the richest synagogues of the +city has a Negro for its assistant organist. There are five colored +orchestras in New York, the one conducted by Mr. Walter A. Craig having +toured successfully in New England and many other northern states. + +But the colored musician has usually found his opportunity for +expression and for a living wage upon the stage. Probably many of the +actors noted on the census list are musicians, and many of the +musicians, actors; the writer of the topical song having himself sung it +in vaudeville or musical comedy. Few New Yorkers appreciate how many of +the tunes hummed in the street or ground out on the hand-organ, have +originated in Negro brains. "The Right Church but the Wrong Pew," +"Teasing," "Nobody," "Under the Bamboo Tree," which Cole and Johnson, +the composers, heard the last thing as they left the dock in New York, +and the first thing when they arrived in Paris, these are a few of the +popular favorites. Handsome incomes have been netted by the shrewder +among these composers, and the demand for their songs is continuous. + +With a bright song and a jolly dance comes success. Picking up the copy +of the New York _Age_, that lies on my desk, I find jottings of +twenty-four colored troupes in vaudeville in the larger cities of the +North and West. Three are at Proctor's and three at Keith's. Their +economic outlook is not so hilarious as their songs, for transportation +is expensive and bookings are uncertain; yet pecuniarily these actors +are far better off than their more sober brothers who stick to their +elevators or their porters' jobs. + +Twenty years ago the Negro performer probably had little anticipation of +advancing beyond minstrel work, in which he sang loud, danced hard, and +told a funny story. S. H. Dudley, the leading comedian in the "Smart +Set" colored company, said in 1909: "When I started in business I had no +idea of getting as high as I am now. A minstrel company came to the +little town in Texas where I was raised, and at once my ambition fired +me to become a musician. So I bought a battered horn and began to toot, +to the great annoyance of my neighbors. Then I secured an engagement +with a minstrel company whose cornet player had fallen into the hands of +the law; and now here I am with one of the best colored shows ever +gotten together and a starring tour arranged for next season." The +movement from the minstrel show to the musical comedy, from the cheapest +form of buffoonery to attractive farce, and even to good comedy, has +been accomplished by a number of colored comedians. Williams and Walker +may be considered the pioneers in this movement, and the story of their +success, as Walker has told it, is a fine example of what the Negro can +do along the line of decided natural aptitude. And it is important to +notice this, for today, in the education of the race, æsthetic instincts +are often suppressed with Puritan vigor, and labor is made ugly and +unwelcome. + +Bert Williams and George Walker, one a British West Indian, the other a +Westerner, met in California where each was hanging around a box +manager's office, looking for a job. Hardly more than boys, they secured +employment at seven dollars a week. That was in 1889. In 1908 they made +each $250 a week, and in later times they have doubled and quadrupled +this. Their first stage manager expected them to perform as the +blacked-up white minstrels were performing, but the two boys soon saw +that the Negro himself was far more entertaining than the buffoon +portrayed by the white man. They wanted to show the true Negro, and +billing themselves as the "real coons" (their white rivals called +themselves "coons") they played in San Francisco with some success. +Later they came to New York, and at Koster and Bial's made their first +hit. + +"Long before our run terminated," Walker said in telling of those early +days, "we discovered an important fact: that the hope of the colored +performer must be in making a radical departure from the old time +'darky' style of singing and dancing. So we set ourselves the task of +thinking along new lines. + +"The first move was to hire a flat in Fifty-third Street, furnish it, +and throw our doors open to all colored men who possessed theatrical and +musical ability and ambition. The Williams and Walker flat soon became +the headquarters of all the artistic young men of our race who were +stage-struck. We entertained the late Paul Lawrence Dunbar, who wrote +lyrics for us. By having these men about us we had the opportunity to +study the musical and theatrical ability of the most talented members of +our race." + +In 1893 the World's Fair was held at Chicago, and on the "Midway" the +visitor saw races from all over the world. Here was a Dahomey village, +with strange little huts, representative of the African home life. The +Dahomeyans themselves were late in arriving, and American Negroes, +sometimes with an added coat of black, were employed to represent them. +Among them were Williams and Walker, who played their parts until the +real Dahomeyans arriving, they became in turn spectators and studied the +true African. This contact with the dancing and singing of the primitive +people of their own race had an important effect upon their art. Their +lyrics recalled African songs, their dancing took on African movements, +especially Walker's. Any one who saw Walker in "Abyssinia," the most +African and the most artistic of their plays, must have recognized the +savage beauty of his dancing when he was masquerading as an African +king. + +After the Dahomey episode the success of the two men was continuous. "In +1902 and 1903," Walker said, "we had all New York and London doing the +cake walk." In February, 1908, they appeared in "Bandanna Land," at the +Majestic Theatre, and remained there for six months. Only those colored +men who have made a steady, uphill struggle for the chance to play good +comedy, know how important such recognition was for the Negro. "Bandanna +Land" was probably the most popular light opera in New York that winter +next to "The Merry Widow." The singing, especially that of the male +chorus, was often beautiful. Mrs. Walker's dancing and charming acting +were delightful, the chorus girls were above the average in beauty +and musical expression, and the two men who made the piece were +spontaneously, irresistibly funny; added to this, unlike its successful +rival, "Bandanna Land" was without a vulgar scene or word. + +This was the last time the two men played together. Walker became +seriously ill, and died in January, 1911. After their company disbanded, +Williams went back to the one-piece act of vaudeville, but as a star in +a white troupe. His position as a permanent actor in the "Follies of +1910" marks a new departure for the colored comedian, a departure won by +great talent combined with character and tact. + +Since 1908 the Majestic has seen another colored company, Cole and +Johnson's, presenting a half-Negro, half-Indian, musical comedy, the +"Red Moon." These two men, for years in vaudeville, have written songs +for Lillian Russell, Marie Cahill, Anna Held, and other popular musical +comedy and vaudeville singers. They have played for six months +continuously at the Palace Theatre, London. Accustomed to writing for +white actors, their own plays are not so distinctively African as +Williams and Walker's. Both Johnson and Cole are of the mulatto type, +and neither blackens his face. Cole is one of the most amusing men in +comedy in New York. He is tall and very thin, with a genius for finding +lank and grotesque costumes that are delightfully incongruous with his +grave face. The words of the musical comedies are his, the music, +Johnson's. He, too, has become seriously ill, and his company has +disbanded. In three years the colored stage has suffered serious loss, +but we see forming new and successful companies whose reputation will +soon be assured. + +Comedy has always furnished a medium for criticism of the foibles of the +times, and there are many sly digs at the white man in the colored play. +Ernest Hogan, now deceased, better than any one else played the rural +southern darky. In the "Oysterman" we saw him in contact with a white +scamp who was intent upon getting his recently acquired money. He was +urged to take stock in a land company, to buy where watermelons grew as +thick as potatoes, and chickens were as common as sparrows. The audience +hated the white man heartily and sided with the simple, kindly, black +youth, sitting with his dog at his side, on his cabin steps. Behind +boisterous laughter and raillery the writers of these comedies often +gain the sympathy of their hearers for the black race. + +In this attempt to show the occupational life of the Negro, we have +found that race prejudice often proves a bar to complete success, to +full manhood. Something of this is true with the actor as well as with +the laborer and the business man. In securing entrance in vaudeville, +color is at first an advantage. The "darky" to the white man is +grotesquely amusing, and by rolling his eyes, showing a glistening +smile, and wearing shoes that make a monstrosity of his feet, the Negro +may create a laugh where the man with a white skin would be hooted off +the stage. And since the laugh is so easily won, many colored actors +become indolent and content themselves, year after year, with playing +the part of buffoon. But with the ambition to rise in his profession +comes the difficult struggle to induce the audience to see a new Negro +in the black man of today. The public gives the colored man no +opportunity as a tragedian, demanding that his comedy shall border +always on the farcical. And what is demanded of the actor is also +demanded of the musician. Writers of the scores of some of our musical +comedies are musicians of superior training and ability, but rarely are +they permitted full expression. Mr. Will Marion Cook, the composer of +much of the music of "Bandanna Land," for a few moments gives a piece of +exquisite orchestration. When the colored minister rises and exhorts his +quarrelling friends to be at peace with one another, one hears a +beautiful harmony. I am told that Mr. Cook declares that the next score +he writes shall begin with ten minutes of serious music. If the audience +doesn't like it, they can come in late, but for ten minutes he will do +something worthy of his genius. + +However light-hearted a people, and however worthy of praise the +entertainment that brings a jolly, wholesome laugh, let us hope that in +the near future the Negro will find a more complete expression for his +musical and histrionic gifts. Some actor of commanding talent, whose +claims cannot be ignored, may reveal the larger life of the race. The +nineteenth century knew a great Negro actor, Ira Aldridge, a _protégé_ +and disciple of Edmund Kean. He played Othello to Kean's Iago, and in +the forties toured Europe with his own company, receiving high honors in +Berlin and St. Petersburg.[7] A dark-skinned African, of immense power, +physically and emotionally, he made Desdemona cry out in real fear, and +caused Bassanio instinctively to shrink as he demanded his pound of +flesh. Today's actor must be more subtle in his attack, but it may be +given to him to reveal the thoughts at the back of the black man's mind. +The genius of Zangwill gave us the picture of the children of the +Ghetto; perhaps from the theatre's seat the American will first +understand the despised black race. + + +FOOTNOTES: + +[1] On West 133d Street two former Hampton students have a prosperous +little tailor and upholstering shop. + +[2] Those interested in the Negro in business should look for an +intensive study, shortly to be published, on the wage-earners and +business enterprises among Negroes in New York. It is entitled "The +Negro at Work in New York City," and has been made by George E. Haynes, +under the direction of the Bureau of Social Research of the New York +School of Philanthropy. + +[3] Since going to press the new and very beautiful building of St. +Philips' Episcopal Church, on W. 134th Street, has been opened. This is +a fine example of English Gothic and its architects are two young +colored men, one of whom was for years in the office of a white firm. + +[4] Mary Kingsley has some interesting generalizations on this point. +She speaks of the African mind approaching all things from a spiritual +point of view while the English mind approaches them from a material +point of view, and of "the high perception of justice you will find in +the African, combined with the inability to think out a pulley or a +lever except under white tuition."--_West African Studies_, p. 330. + +[5] Lincoln Hospital in New York, while receiving white and colored +patients, was especially designed to help the colored race. It has a +training school for colored nurses, but neither accepts colored medical +graduates as interns, nor allows colored doctors upon its staff. This is +one of many cases in which the good white people of the city are glad to +assist the poor and ailing Negro, but are unwilling to help the strong +and ambitious colored man to full opportunity. + +[6] See H. J. Wilson, "The Negro and Music," _Outlook_, Dec. 1, 1906. + +[7] William J. Simmons's "Men of Mark." + + + + +CHAPTER VI + +THE COLORED WOMAN AS A BREAD WINNER + + +The life of the Negro woman of New York, if she belong to the laboring +class, differs in some important respects from the life of the white +laboring woman. Generalizations on so comprehensive a subject must, of +course, meet with many exceptions, but the observing visitor, familiar +with white and colored neighborhoods, quickly notes marked contrasts +between the two, contrasts largely the result of different occupational +opportunities. These pertain both to the married woman and the unmarried +working girl. + +The generality of white women in New York, wives of laboring men, +infrequently engage in gainful occupations. In the early years of +married life the wife relies on her husband's wage for support, and +within her tiny tenement-flat bears and rears her children and performs +her household duties--the sewing, cooking, washing, and ironing, and the +daily righting of the contracted rooms. She is a conscientious wife and +mother, and rarely, either by night or by day, journeys far from her own +home. When unemployment visits the family wage earner, she turns to +laundry work and day's cleaning for money to meet the rent and to supply +the household with scanty meals; but as soon as her husband resumes work +she returns to her narrow round of domestic duties. + +After a score of these monotonous years more prosperous times come to +the housewife. Every morning two or three children go out to work, and +their wages make heavier the family purse. Son and daughter, having +entered factory or store, bring home their pay envelopes unbroken on +Saturday nights, and the augmentation of the father's wage gives the +mother an income to administer. After the young people's wants in +clothing and entertainment have been in part supplied, it becomes +possible to buy new furniture on the instalment plan, to hire a piano, +even to move into a better neighborhood. The earnings of a number of +children, supplementing the wage of the head of the family, make life +more tolerable for all. + +These days, however, do not last long. Sons and daughters marry and +assume new responsibilities; the husband, his best strength gone, finds +unemployment increasing; and since saving, except for wasteful +industrial insurance, has seemed impossible without sacrificing the +decencies and pleasures of the children, the end of the woman's married +life is likely to be hard and comfortless. + +This rough description may fairly be taken to represent the life of the +average New York white woman of the laboring class. It is not, however, +the life of the average colored woman. With her, self-sustaining work +usually begins at fifteen, and by no means ceases with her entrance upon +marriage, which only entails new financial burdens. The wage of the +husband, as we have seen, is usually insufficient to support a family, +save in extreme penury, and the wife accepts the necessity of +supplementing the husband's income. This she accomplishes by taking in +washing or by entering a private family to do housework. Sometimes she +is away from her tenement nearly every day in the week; again the bulk +of her earnings comes from home industry. Her day holds more diversity +than that of her white neighbor; she meets more people, becomes familiar +with the ways of the well-to-do,--their household decorations, their +dress, their refinements of manner; but she has but few hours to give to +her children. With her husband she is ready to be friend and helpmate; +but should he turn out a bad bargain, she has no fear of leaving him, +since her marital relations are not welded by economic dependence. An +industrious, competent woman, she works and spends, and in her scant +hours of leisure takes pride in keeping her children well-dressed and +clean. + +At the second period of her married life, when her boys and girls, few +in number if she be a New Yorker, begin to engage in self-supporting +work, her condition shows less improvement than that of the white woman +of her class. Sometimes her children hand her their whole wage, far +oftener they bring her only such part as they choose to spare. The +strict accounting of the minor to the parent, usual among Northerners in +the past, and today common among the immigrant class, is not a part of +the Negro's training. Rather, as the race has attained freedom it has +copied the indulgent attitude of the once familiar "master," and regrets +that its offspring must enter upon any work. Children with this +tradition about them use the money they earn largely for the +gratification of their vanity, not for the lessening of their mother's +tasks. But a more potent factor than lack of discipline keeps the mother +from being the administrator of the family's joint earnings. White boys +and girls in New York enter work that makes it possible and advantageous +for them to dwell at home; Negroes must go out to service, accept long +and irregular hours in hotel or apartment, travel for days on boat or +train. The family home is infrequently available to them, and money +given in to it brings small return. Under these circumstances it is not +strange if the mother must continue her round of washing and scrubbing. + +The last years of life of the Negro woman, probably a little more than +the last years of the white, are likely to bring happiness. With a +mother at work a grandmother becomes an important factor, and elderly +colored women are often seen bringing up little children or helping in +the laundry--that great colored home industry. Accustomed all their +lives to hard labor, it is easy for them to find work that shall repay +their support, and in their children's households they are treated with +respect and consideration. + +The contrast in the lives of the colored and white married women is not +more strongly marked than the contrast in the lives of their unmarried +daughters and sisters. Unable to enter any pursuit except housework, the +unskilled colored girl goes out to service or helps at home with the +laundry or sewing. Factory and store are closed to her, and rarely can +she take a place among other working girls. Her hours are the long, +irregular hours of domestic service. She brings no pay envelope home to +her mother, the two then carefully discussing how much belongs +rightfully for board, and how much may go for the new coat or dress, +but takes the eighteen or twenty dollars given her at the end of the +month, and quite by herself determines all her expenditures. Far oftener +than any class of white girls in the city she lives away from the +parental home. + +These are some of the differences found by the observer who looks into +the Negro and the white tenement. They need not, however, rest alone +upon any observer's testimony. We have in the census abundant statistics +for their verification. Scattered among the volumes on Population, +Occupations, and Women at Work are many facts concerning Negro women +workers of New York, all of them confirmatory of the description just +given. We may note the most important. + +In 1900, whereas 4.2 per cent of the white married women in New York +were engaged in gainful occupations, 31.4 per cent of the Negro married +women were earning their living, over seven times as many in proportion +as the whites.[1] + +Again, in the total population of New York's women workers, 80 per cent +were single, 10 per cent married, and 10 per cent widowed and divorced; +while among the Negroes, the single women were only 53 per cent, the +married 25 per cent, and the widowed 22.[2] + +Statistics of the age period at which women are at work, show the +Negro's long continuing wage-earning activity. Between sixteen and +twenty is a busy time for the women of both races. Among the whites 59 +per cent are in gainful occupations, among the Negroes 66 per cent. But +as the girl arrives at the period when she is likely to marry, the per +cent of workers among the whites drops rapidly, until for white women, +forty-five and over, it is 13.5, about one in seven. With the colored, +among the women forty-five years of age and over, 53 per cent, more +than half, still engage in gainful toil.[3] + +Family life can be studied in the census table. While 59 per cent of the +unmarried white girls at work live at home, this is found to be true +of but 25 per cent of the colored girls; that is, 75 per cent, +three-quarters of all the colored unmarried working women, live with +their employers or board.[4] + +The census volume on occupations reveals at once the narrow range of the +New York colored woman's working life. Personal and domestic service +absorbs 90 per cent of her numbers against 40 per cent among the white. +But before considering more fully the colored girl at work, we need to +notice another statistical fact, the preponderance in the city of Negro +women over Negro men. + +Like the foreigner, the youth of the Negro race comes first to the city +to seek a livelihood. The colored population shows 41 per cent of its +number between the ages of 20 and 35. But unlike the foreigner, the +Negro women find larger opportunity and come in greater numbers than the +men. Their range of work is narrow, but within it they can command +double the wages they receive at home, and if they are possessed of +average ability, they are seldom long out of work. With the immense +growth of wealth in New York the demand for servants continually +increases, and finding little response from the white native born +population, many mistresses receive readily the services of the +English-speaking southern and West Indian blacks. So the boats from +Charleston and Norfolk and the British West Indies bring scores and +hundreds of Negro women from country districts, from cities where they +have spent a short time at service, girls with and girls without +experience, all seeking better wages in a new land. + +Mr. Kelly Miller was the first to call attention to the presence in +American cities of surplus Negro women.[5] The phenomenon is not +peculiar to New York. Baltimore, Washington, New Orleans, all show the +same condition. In Atlanta the women number 143 to every hundred colored +men. New York shows 123 to every masculine one hundred. These surplus +women account in part for the number of Negro women workers in New York +not living at home. Some are with their employers, but others lodge in +the already crowded tenements, for the southern servant, unaccustomed to +spending the night at her employer's, in New York also, frequently +arranges to leave her mistress when her work is done. In their hours of +leisure the surplus women are known to play havoc with their neighbors' +sons, even with their neighbors' husbands, for since lack of men makes +marriage impossible for about a fifth of New York's colored girls, +social disorder results. Surplus Negro women, able to secure work, +support idle, able-bodied Negro men. The lounger at the street corner, +the dandy in the parlor thrumming on his banjo, means a Malindy of the +hour at the kitchen washboard. In a town in Germany, where men were +sadly scarce, I was told that a servant girl paid as high as a mark to +a soldier to walk with her in the Hofgarten on a Sunday afternoon. +Colored men in New York command their "mark," and girls are found who +keep them in polished boots, fashionable coats, and well-creased +trousers. Could the Negro country boy be as certain as his sister of +lucrative employment in New York, or could he oftener persuade her to +remain with him on the farm, he would better city civilization. But the +demand for servants increases, and the colored girl continues to be +attracted to the city where she can earn and spend. + +The table on the following page shows in condensed form the occupations +of the Negro women in New York. As we see, the Negro women number +forty-four in every thousand women workers. + + FEMALES TEN YEARS OF AGE AND OVER, ENGAGED IN GAINFUL OCCUPATIONS IN + NEW YORK + + ============================================================ + | | | Number to + | Total | Negro | every 1000 + | | | workers + ----------------------------+---------+--------+------------ + Professional service | 22,422 | 281 | 12 + | | | + Domestic and personal | | | + service | 146,722 | 14,586 | 100 + Laundresses | 16,102 | 3,224 | 200 + Servants and waitresses | 103,963 | 10,297 | 99 + All others | 24,657 | 1,065 | 43 + | | | + Trade and transportation | 65,318 | 106 | Between one + | | | and two + Manufacturing and | | | + mechanical pursuits | 132,535 | 1,138 | 7 + Dressmakers | 37,514 | 813 | 22 + Seamstresses | 18,108 | 249 | 14 + All others | 76,913 | 76 | 1 + | | | + Total including some | | | + occupations not specified | 367,437 | 16,114 | 44 + ============================================================ + + Federal Census 1900: Occupations, Table 43, p. 638 + +Ninety per cent of all the Negro women workers of New York are in +domestic and personal service. This includes a variety of positions. +Some Negro girls work in stores, dusting stock, taking charge of cloak +or toilet rooms, scrubbing floors. Their hours are regular, but the pay, +five or six, or very occasionally eight dollars a week, means a scanty +livelihood without hope of advancement. The position of maid in a +theatre where perquisites are larger is prized, and a new and pleasant +place is that of a maid on a limited train. But the bulk of the girls +are servants in boarding-houses, or are with private families as nurses, +waitresses, cooks, laundresses, maids-of-all-work, earning from sixteen +and eighteen to twenty-five and even thirty dollars a month. +Occasionally a very skilful cook can command as high a monthly wage as +fifty dollars. + +The colored girl is frequently found engaged at general housework in a +small apartment. Her desire to return to her lodging at night makes her +popular with families living in contracted space. With the conveniences +of a New York flat, dumb-waiter, clothes-dryer, gas, and electricity, +general housework is not severe. Work begins early, seven at the latest, +and lasts until the dinner is cleared away, at half-past eight or nine. +Released then from further tasks, the young girl goes to her tiny inner +tenement room, dons a fresh dress, and then, as chance or her training +determines, walks the streets, goes to the theatre, or attends the class +meeting at her church. Entertainments among the Negroes are rarely under +way until ten o'clock, and short hours of sleep in ill-ventilated rooms +soon weaken the vitality of the new-comer. Housework under these +conditions does not create much ambition; the mistress moves, flitting, +in New York fashion, from one flat to another, and the girl also flits +among employers, changing with the whim of the moment. + +Few subjects present so fascinating a field for discussion as domestic +service, and the housewife of today enters into it with energy, +sometimes decrying the modern working girl, again planning household +economics that shall lure her from factory or shop. The only point we +need to consider now is the dissatisfaction that results when 64 per +cent of the women of a race are forced by circumstances into one +occupation. Those with native ability along this line succeed and make +others and themselves happy. The faithful, patient, loyal Negro servant +is well-known, the black mammy has passed into American literature, but +not every colored woman can wisely be given this position. Some of the +Negro girls who take up housework in New York are capable of more +intelligent labor, and chafe under their limitations; others have not +the ability to do good housework; for domestic service requires more +mental capacity than is demanded in many factories. In short, a great +many colored girls in New York are round pegs in square holes, and the +community is the loser by it. + +Among these round pegs are girls who, determining no longer to drudge in +lonely kitchens, contrive, as we shall see later, to find positions at +other more attractive reputable work. Others, deciding in favor of +material betterment at whatever cost, lower their moral standard and +secure easier and more remunerative jobs. A well-paying place, with +short hours and high tips, at once offers itself to the colored girl who +is willing to work for a woman of the demi-monde. In the sporting house +also she is preferred as a servant, her dark complexion separating her +from other inmates. In 1858, Sanger wrote in his "History of +Prostitution," "The servants (in these houses) are almost always colored +women. Their wages are liberal, their perquisites considerable, and +their work light." Untrained herself, bereft of home influence, with an +ancestry that sometimes cries out her parent's weakness in the contour +and color of her face, the Negro girl in New York, more even than the +foreign immigrant, is subject to degrading temptation. The good people, +who are often so exacting, want her for her willingness to work long +hours at a lower wage than the white; and the bad people, who are often +so carelessly kind, offer her light labor and generous pay. It is small +wonder that she sometimes chooses the latter. + +Not all the colored girls who work in questionable places and with +questionable people take the jobs from choice; some are sent without +knowing the character of the house they enter. A few years ago an +agitation was started for the protection of helpless Negro immigrants +who had fallen into the hands of unscrupulous employment agencies. A +system existed, and still exists, by which employment agencies were able +to advance the travelling expenses of southern girls, who on their +arrival in New York were held in debt until the cost of the journey had +been many times repaid. Helpless in the power of the agent, the +new-comer was forced to work where he wished. Under the city's +department of licenses some of the more unscrupulous of these agencies +have been closed, and philanthropy has placed a visitor at the docks to +give aid and advice to unprotected girls. But the danger is by no means +over. Those familiar with the subject assert that there is a +proportionately larger black slave than white slave traffic. + +There is a gainful occupation for women, black and white, too important +to be left unnoticed. The census does not tabulate it. The best people +strive to ignore it, and carefully sheltered girls grow up unconscious +of its existence. But the employment agent understands its commercial +value, and little children in the red light neighborhood are as familiar +with it as with the vending of peanuts on the street. To the poor it is +always an open door affording at least a temporary respite from +dispossession and starvation. How many of the colored turn to it, we do +not know--certainly not a few. Some gain from it a meagre livelihood, +but others, for a time at least, achieve comfort and even luxury. + +Among the round pegs that the square holes so uncomfortably chafe are +colored girls of intelligence and charm who deliberately join the +anti-social class. Probably a few in any case would lead this life, but +the history of many shows an unsuccessful struggle for congenial work, +ending with a choice of material comfort however high the moral cost. In +One Hundred and Thirty-fourth and One Hundred and Thirty-fifth Streets +are apartments where such girls live, two or three together, surrounded +by comforts that their respectable neighbors who go out to cook, wash, +and iron may fruitlessly long for all their lives. A colored +philanthropic worker, stopping by chance at the door of one of these +places, saw an old college friend. "How can you do it!" she cried as she +recognized the life the girl was leading, "How can you do it! I would +rather kill myself scrubbing!" "There is the difference between us," +came the answer, "I am not willing to die, and I cannot and will not +scrub." + +It is pleasant and encouraging to turn from colored women who have given +up the struggle, to ambitious, successful workers. Some among these are +in the domestic service group and enjoy with heartiness their tasks as +nurse-maid or cook. "This is my piano day," an expert colored +washerwoman says of a Monday morning. Among the domestic service +workers, as classified by the census, is the trained nurse, filling an +increasingly important position in New York. In 1909, Lincoln Hospital +graduated twenty-one colored nurses, some of whom remain in New York to +do excellent work. + +In the professions, with the women as with the men, the first place +numerically is occupied by performers upon the stage. So much has been +said of the Negro as an actor that there is little to add. A rather +better class of colored than of white women join musical comedy chorus +troupes, for fifteen or eighteen dollars a week that will attract a +Negro to the stage can be made by a white girl in a dozen other ways. +Lightness of color seems a requisite for a stage position, unless a dark +skin is offset by very great ability, as in the case of Aida Walker, one +of the most graceful and charming women in musical comedy. + +No record is kept of the number of colored teachers in the city's public +schools, but each year Negro graduates from the normal college secure +positions. These are found from the kindergarten through the primary +and up to the highest grammar grade. The colored girl with intellectual +ability, particularly if she comes of an old New York family, is apt to +turn to teaching. Her novitiate is long, but a permanent certificate +secured, she is sure of a good salary, increasing with her years of +service, and ending in a pension. This path of security has perhaps +tended to keep New York colored girls from going into other lines of +work. I have not yet found one who has graduated from a university. +Pratt Institute and the Teachers' College have colored normal students, +but they are usually from the South or West, not New Yorkers born. + +Philanthropy is opening up important lines of opportunity to the Negro +woman in New York. In 1903, a colored graduate nurse secured an +interview with the Secretary of the New York Charity Organization +Society, and so ably presented to him the need of Negro visitors among +Negroes that she was appointed visiting nurse for the colored sick who +came under the notice of the Society. In time the position changed into +that of a colored district visitor, other colored nurses entering in +numbers into district nursing work. In 1910, three nurses were employed +by the Nurses' Settlement, two by the Association for Improving the +Condition of the Poor of Manhattan, and two by the District Nursing +Association of Brooklyn. With increased knowledge of the sickness and +suffering amid the Negro poor, and of their need of proper care in their +homes, the number of these nurses will doubtless increase. Colored women +rank high among the trained nurses of New York. + +Other philanthropic work lately has been undertaken by Negro women in +New York. In 1910, besides the nurses of whom we have spoken, there were +at the head of societies in salaried positions, two settlement workers, +two matrons of day nurseries, two matrons of homes in which much social +work was carried on, many employees in colored orphan asylums, a teacher +of domestic science in a home-keeping flat, a traveller's aid visitor, +a playground instructor, besides workers in various religious +organizations. This does not include the many colored women doing +social and recreation work in the public schools and on the city's +playgrounds. Indeed, the difficulty in New York is to secure trained +colored women for philanthropic work, the Negro's attitude still being +that of the great majority of white women a few years ago, that love for +children and a sentimental kindness constitute the requisites for work +among the poor. But the school of experience is training workers, and as +the schools of philanthropy of New York, Boston, and Chicago also +graduate colored students, we shall have in the North the intelligent, +trained workers whom we need. + +The little kindergarten girl who, with head erect, walked past the +jeering line of boys to the green trees and soft grass of the park has +her counterpart in many young women of New York. In 1909, a colored girl +graduated from one of the city's dental colleges, the first woman of her +race to take this degree in the state. From the first her success was +remarkable. Colored girls with ability and steady purpose and dogged +determination have won success in clerical and business work; but the +last large and efficient group is that classified in the census under +mechanical and manufacturing pursuits: the dressmakers, seamstresses, +milliners. + +Colored women have always been known as good sewers, and recently they +have studied at their trade in some of the best schools. From 1904 to +1910, the Manhattan Trade School graduated thirty-four colored girls in +dressmaking, hand sewing, and novelty making. The public night school on +West Forty-sixth Street, under its able colored principal, Dr. W. L. +Bulkley, since 1907, has educated hundreds of women in sewing, +dressmaking, millinery, and artificial flower-making. While the majority +of the pupils have taken the courses for their private use, a large +minority are entering the business world. They meet with repeated +difficulties; white girls refuse to work in shops with them, private +employers object to their color, but they have, nevertheless, made +creditable progress. The census reports the number of Negro dressmakers +to have quadrupled in the United States from 1890 to 1900. Something +comparable to this increase in dressmaking and allied trades has taken +place among the Negroes of New York, and it has come through education +and persistence, and the increase of trade among the colored group +itself. Numbers of these dressmakers and milliners earn a livelihood, +though often a scanty one, from the patronage of the people of their own +race. + +But despite her efforts and occasional successes, the colored girl in +New York meets with severer race prejudice than the colored man, and is +more persistently kept from attractive work. _She gets the job that the +white girl does not want._ It may be that the white girls want the wrong +thing, and that the jute mill and tobacco shop and flower factory are +more dangerous to health and right living than the mistress's kitchen, +but she knows her mind, and follows the business that brings her liberty +of action when the six o'clock whistle blows. What she desires for +herself, however, she refuses to her colored neighbor. Occasionally an +employer objects to colored girls, but the Manhattan Trade School +repeatedly, in trying to place its graduates, has found that opposition +to the Negro has come largely from the working girls. Race prejudice +has even gone so far as to prevent a colored woman from receiving home +work when it entailed her waiting in the same sitting-room with white +women. Of course, this is not the universal attitude. In friendly talks +with hundreds of New York's white women workers, I have found the +majority ready to accept the colored worker. Jewish girls are especially +tolerant. They believe that good character and decent manners should +count, not color; but an aggressive, combative minority is quite sure +that no matter how well educated or virtuous she may be, no black woman +is as good as a white one. So the few but belligerent aristocrats +triumph over the many half-ashamed, timid democrats. + +The shirtwaist makers' strike of 1910 was so profoundly important in its +breaking down of feeling between nationalities, its union of all working +women in a common cause, that the colored girl, while very slightly +concerned in the strike itself, may profit by the more generous feeling +it engendered. Certainly an entrance into store and workshop would be to +her immense advantage. She needs the discipline of regular hours, of +steady training, of order and system. She needs also to become part of a +strong labor group, to share its working class ideal, to feel the weight +of its moral opinion; instead of looking into the mirror of her wealthy +mistress, she needs to reflect the aspirations of the strong, earnest +women who toil. + +Before bringing the story of the life of the New York colored working +woman to a close, it may not be amiss to look closely at the +discrimination practised against her, not only in her work, but in her +daily life. The Negro comes North and finds himself half a man. Does the +woman, too, come to be but half a woman? What is her status in the city +to which she turns for opportunity and larger freedom? + +Four years ago, within a few hours' time, two stories were told me, +illustrative of the colored woman's status. Neither occurred in the city +of New York, but both are indicative of its temper. The first I heard +from a woman skilled in a difficult profession, a Canadian now residing +in the United States, and the descendant of a fugitive slave. Her +youthful companions had all been white, and while an African in the +darkness of her skin and her musical voice, her rearing had been that of +an Englishwoman. "Shortly after coming to New York, I went for the first +time," she told me, "to a little resort on the Jersey coast. A board +walk flanked the ocean, and on the other side were shops and places of +amusement. Going out one morning with two companions, a colored man and +woman, we turned into an enclosure to examine a gaily painted +merry-go-round. The place was open to the public, and a few nursery +maids with their charges were seated about. The man in our party, +interested in the mechanism of the machine, went up to it and began to +explain it to us. Quite suddenly a rough fellow, in charge of the place, +walked over and called out, 'Get out of here! We don't allow niggers.' +The attack, to me at least, was so overwhelming that I did not move at +once. Thereupon I was again called 'nigger,' and ordered out. + +"When I reached the beach, I asked my companions to leave me, and I sat +on a bench looking upon the waves. After a time an old woman came to my +side, and said a little timidly, 'What are you thinking about, dearie?' +Looking in her face I saw that she feared that I would commit suicide. +'I am thinking,' I said turning to her, 'that I wish the ocean might +rise up and drown every white person on the face of the earth.' 'Oh, you +mustn't say that,' she cried horrified, and left me. After I cannot tell +how many minutes or hours, I returned to my boarding-house, and then to +my home in New York. I had had a great many white friends in my native +home; I had played with them, eaten with them, slept with them. Now I +destroyed their letters, and resolved never to know them again. That was +my first affront in the United States, and while I have learned to feel +somewhat differently, a little to discriminate, I can never forget that +the white people in the North stand for the insult which was cast upon +me." + +On the evening of the same day I had learned of this happening, a man +from a prominent college in New York State told me of a Negro classmate. +"He was a pleasant, intelligent fellow from the South," he said, "and +while I never knew him well, I was always glad to see him. One day, at +commencement time, when we were all having our relatives about, he +boarded my car with a young colored woman, evidently his sister. Without +a thought I rose, lifted my hat, and gave her my seat. Never again shall +I see such a look of gratitude as that which lighted up his face when he +bowed in acknowledgment of my courtesy. It revealed the race question to +me, and yet I had performed only the simplest act of a gentleman." + +In these two incidents we see the undecided, perplexing position of the +Negro woman in New York. Today she may be turned out of a public resort +as a "nigger," tomorrow she may receive the dues of a gentlewoman. And +since, while I write, I hear the cry of a class in the community who +adjudge the expulsion necessary since the other course must lead at once +to social equality, I make haste to add that the second story did not +end in wedlock. As far as I have seen, it never does. Intermarriage of +white and black in New York is so slight as to be a negligible quantity, +but amalgamation between the two races is not uncommon. And this we may +say with certainty, the man most blatant against the "nigger" in New +York as all over the country is the man most ready to enter into illicit +relationship with the woman whom he claims to despise. The raising of +the hat to the colored woman brings a diminution in sexual immorality. + +If the Negro civilization of New York is to be lifted to a higher level, +the white race must consistently play a finer and more generous part +toward the colored woman. There are many inherent difficulties against +which she must contend. Slavery deprived her of family life, set her to +daily toil in the field, or appropriated her mother's instincts for the +white child. She has today the difficult task of maintaining the +integrity and purity of the home. Many times she has succeeded, often +she has failed, sometimes she has not even tried. A vicious environment +has strengthened her passions and degraded her from earliest girlhood. +Beyond any people in the city she needs all the encouragement that +philanthropy, that human courtesy and respect, that the fellowship of +the workers can give,--she needs her full status as a woman. + + +FOOTNOTES: + +[1] These figures are obtained by a combination of tables, one in +Population, Vol. II, Part II, p. 332, describing the whole of Greater +New York, the other in Women at Work, pp. 266 to 275, describing +Manhattan, the Bronx, and Brooklyn. The error through the omission of +Richmond and Queens is probably negligible. + +[2] Federal Census 1900: Women at Work, Table 28, pp. 266 to 274. Among +800 married and widowed colored women whom I myself visited, I found +only 150, 19 per cent, who were not engaged in gainful occupations. + +[3] Federal Census 1900: Women at Work, Table 10, pp. 147 to 151. + +[4] Federal Census 1900: Women at Work, Table 28, pp. 266 to 275. + +[5] This is incorporated in a chapter in Mr. Miller's volume on "Race +Adjustment." + + + + +CHAPTER VII + +RICH AND POOR + + +Of the many nations and races that dwell in New York none, with the +exception of the Chinese, is so aloof from us in its social life as the +Negro. The childish recollection of an old school friend, recently +related to me, well illustrates this. Across the way from where she +lived there was a house occupied by a family of mulattoes. They were the +quietest and least obtrusive people on the block, and the wife, who was +known to be very beautiful, on the rare occasions when she left her +home, was always veiled. The husband was little seen, and the child, a +shy boy, never played on the street. For years the family lived aloof +from their neighbors, the subject of hushed and mysterious questioning. + +Probably had one of the white women dropped in some day to say +good-morning or to borrow a recipe book, the mystery would have been +wholly dispelled,--a pity surely for the children. Few of New York's +citizens are so American as the colored, few show so little that is +unusual or picturesque. The educated Italian might have in his home some +relic of his former country, the Jew might show some symbol of his +religion; but the Negro, to the seeker of the unusual, would seem +commonplace. The colored man in New York has no associations with his +ancient African home, no African traditions, no folk lore. The days of +slavery he wishes completely to forget, even to the loss of his +exquisite plantation music. He is ambitious to be conventional in his +manners, his customs, striving as far as possible to be like his +neighbor--a distinctly American ambition. In consequence, after +indicating the lines along which he has achieved economic success, one +finds little to describe in the lives of the well-to-do that will be of +interest. And yet this sketch would be open to criticism if, after so +long a survey of the working class, it gave no space to those Negroes +who have achieved a fair degree of wealth and leisure; and perhaps the +very recital of the likeness of these people to those about them may be +of importance, for the great mass of white Americans are like a +vivacious Kentuckian of my acquaintance, who, on learning something of a +well-to-do Negro family, assured me that she knew less of such people +than she did of the Esquimaux. + +Mr. William Archer, in his book, "Through Afro-America," describes a +round of visits to southern Negro homes, where, with touching pride, his +hostesses show their material wealth, or rather the material wealth of +their race as embodied in drawing-room, dining-room, and bedroom. There +seemed to be nothing remarkable about the rooms unless their very +existence was remarkable. So the interiors of colored homes in New York +would reveal nothing to mark them from the homes of their neighbors, +save perhaps the universal presence of some musical instrument. In +Brooklyn, the Bronx, and in the Jersey suburbs, Negroes buy and rent +houses, sometimes with a few of their race in close proximity, sometimes +with white neighbors only on the block. Brooklyn seems always to have +shown less race antagonism than Manhattan (where, indeed, anything but +the apartment is beyond the pocket-book of people of modest means), and +it has been in Brooklyn for the past three generations that the +well-to-do colored families with their children have chiefly been found. + +Much pleasant hospitality and entertainment take place behind these +modest doors. Visitors are common, relatives from the east and west and +south, and little dinner and supper parties are numerous. If church +discipline does not interfere, the women have their afternoons of +whist, and despite church discipline, dancing is very common, few +entertainments proving successful without it. To play well upon some +musical instrument is almost a universal accomplishment, and, as with +the Germans, families and friends meet the oftener for this harmonious +bond. + +The social life of the well-to-do colored family generally centres about +the church, and with a regularity unusual among the white people, father +and mother and children attend the Sunday and week-day meetings. +Colored society is also at the period of the bazaar and fair, the +concert and dramatic entertainment. Money is raised by this means for +the church, the private charity, or to supplement the dues of the mutual +benefit society. There are a number of Negroes in the different large +cities who support themselves by concerts and readings, appearing at +benefits in the North and South, where they receive a third or a half of +the receipts. Amateur performances are also common. A young New York +college man, one winter evening, saw two refined, remarkably +well-dressed colored women turn in at the entrance of the Grand Central +Palace. Purchasing a ticket for the benefit, as it proved, of a colored +day nursery (the entertainment netted $2300), he followed them to find +himself in the Afro-American social world. For while the amateur dancing +and singing upon the stage were pretty and attractive, the young man was +far more interested in the audience. "And the disappointing thing about +it," he remarked in telling of it afterwards, "was that they were +exactly like other people." To use the newspaper phrase, "there was no +'story.'" They were a group of Americans, trained in the social +conventions of their own land. + +There are many secret and benefit societies among the Negroes in New +York. The Masons have nine meeting places; the Elks, ten lodges. The Odd +Fellows have twenty-two places of meeting. The United Order of True +Reformers, a strong Negro organization in the South, where it conducts +large business enterprises, has forty-four head-quarters in church and +hall and private house, where meetings are held twice a month. Many +benefit societies are closely associated with the churches. Colored men +and women are very busy with their multitudinous church and society and +benefit meetings. I remember once attending an evening service at a +colored church when the minister preached the sermon to the benefit +orders of St. Luke's and the Galilean Fishermen. The officers, some of +them carrying spears with blue and red and white trimmings, marched down +the aisle and took their seats at the front of the pulpit. Their leader +was in purple, wearing a huge badge like a breastplate with yellow and +green stones. The women, equally prominent with the men, were dressed +one in yellow with green over it, and broad purple bands, two in white +with golden crowns. The pageant was very pretty, even beautiful, but too +artless in its simple enjoyment of color and display for the +conventional society of New York, and the colored "four hundred" were +not in it. + +Who are the four hundred in New York's colored society? An outsider +would be very bold who should attempt to answer. Twenty-five years ago +the New Yorker born, especially the descendant of some prominent +anti-slavery worker, would have held foremost social position. The taint +of slavery was far removed from these people, who looked with scorn upon +arrivals from the South. Many were proud of their Indian blood, and told +of the freedom that came to their black ancestors who married Long +Island Indians. But these old New York colored families, sometimes +bearing historic Dutch and English names, have diminished in size and +importance as have the old white families beside them. The younger +generation has gone west, or has died and left no issue. And into the +city has come a continual stream of Southerners and more recently West +Indians, some among them educated, ambitious men and women, full of the +energy and determination of the immigrant who means to attain to +prominence in his new home. These new-comers occupy many of the pulpits, +are admitted to the bar, practise medicine, and become leaders in +politics, and their wives are quite ready to take a prominent part in +the social world. They meet the older residents, and the various groups +intermingle, though not without some friction. Like a country village, +the New York Negro social world knows the happenings of its neighbors, +gossips over their shortcomings, rejoices, though with something of +jealousy, over their successes, and has its cliques, its many leaders, +but also its broad-minded spirits who strive to bring the whole village +life into harmony. + +As we have learned from a study of the occupational life of the Negro, +the majority of men and women of means are in the professional class, or +in the city or federal service. Such positions do not carry with them +large incomes, and remembering the high cost of living in New York, and +the exorbitant rental paid by black men, we can see that, gauged by the +white man's standard, the Negro with his two or three or four thousand +dollars a year is poor. Yet with his very limited income the demands +upon him are enormous. In the first place, he must educate his children, +and this means a large expenditure, for only in the technical schools or +the college can his boy or girl be prepared for a successful career. The +white boy may find some business firm that will give him a chance of +advancement, but the colored boy must receive such an education as shall +fit him to start an enterprise by himself, unless he enters public +service. So the trade or professional school or college absorbs the +savings of many years. + +The church is another large recipient of the Negro's slender means. +Watching the dimes and quarters drop into the contribution plate as the +dark-faced congregation files past the pulpit on a Sunday evening, one +wonders whether any other people in America willingly give so large an +amount of their income to their religious organizations. And not only +will money be requested for the church's need, but special offerings +will be given to home and foreign mission work. In 1907, the African +Methodist Church alone raised $36,000 for home and foreign missions. The +Baptists raised $44,000. Educational work demands a share: the African +Methodists support twenty schools, the African Zion twelve, and the +Negro Baptists one hundred and twenty. The other denominations do their +share, and the Negroes also give to the schools conducted by white +churches for their people. This money comes from all over the country, +and the well-to-do New York Negro must contribute his part. + +Home charities also help to drain the Negro's purse. Manhattan and +Brooklyn have a number of colored philanthropies, orphan asylums, old +people's homes, rescue missions, Young Men's and Young Women's Christian +Associations, and social settlements. Some are supported entirely by +white people, but the greater number receive some contributions from the +colored, and a few are dependent for money upon that race alone. +Thousands of dollars are raised yearly, among the well-to-do New York +Negroes, for these institutions. + +Yet, with all these various philanthropic activities, one too frequently +hears that the Negro does not support his own charities. As though +anything of the sort could be expected of him! A little time ago, in +asking for money for settlement work among Negroes, I was asked in turn +by the exquisitely dressed woman before me, whose furs and gown and +jewels must have represented a year's salary of a school-teacher, the +type of wealthy woman among the colored, why the well-to-do Negroes did +not support the settlement themselves. No such question is asked when we +demand money for work among the Italians or the Jews, who have +incomparably larger means. Indeed, one may question whether the Negro is +not too generous for the materialistic city of New York, whether his +successes would not be greater were he niggardly toward himself and +others. He lives well, dresses well, enjoys a good play, strives to give +every advantage to his children, helps the poor of his race. To hold his +own today in this civilization, he needs to be taught to seek first +riches, waiting until much treasure has been laid up before he allows +philanthropy to draw upon his bank account. + +The traveller to the British West Indies finds three divisions among the +inhabitants, white, colored, and black, each group having a distinct +social status. In the United States, on the other hand, there are but +two groups, white and colored, or as the latter is now more frequently +designated, Negro, the term thus losing its original meaning, and +becoming a designation for a race. But while the white race usually +makes no social distinction between the light and the dark Negro, +classing all alike, social lines are drawn within the color line. Years +ago these were more common than they are now. Charles W. Chesnutt, the +novelist, tells some amusing and pathetic stories of distinctions +between colored and black. One of his mulatto heroes, upon finding, as +he thinks, that the congressman who is to call upon his daughter is a +jet black Negro instead of the mulatto he was supposed to be, to prevent +a breach of hospitality, invents a case of diphtheria in the family +and quarantines the house, only to learn later, to his intense +mortification, that he has committed a mistake of identification, and +that the congressman is light after all. But this story belongs with the +last generation. Black men, if they are distinguished citizens, can +enter any colored society, and they not infrequently marry light wives. +Success, a position of probity and importance, these are attributes that +count favorably for the suitor, and as they are quite as often in the +man of strong African lineage as in the mulatto, they gain the desired +end. + +Within this little colored world of a few thousand souls, a drop in the +city's human sea, there is great upheaval and turmoil. The North is the +Negro's centre for controversy regarding his rightful position in the +commonwealth; and in the large cities, in Boston and Chicago, +Philadelphia and New York, the battle rages. The little society is +often divided into hostile camps regarding party politics or the +acceptance of a government position that brings the suspicion of a +bribe. Political, economic, educational matters as they affect the black +race, these are the subjects that fill the mind of the thoughtful +colored man and woman. + +In his "Souls of Black Folk," Dr. Du Bois describes the white man's +tactlessness when, as always, he approaches the Negro with a question +regarding his race. But the Negro, apart from his personal home +affairs, impresses the outsider as having little else as subject for +conversation. World politics, these concern him only as they affect the +race question. Australia is a country where the government excludes +Africans. England rules in South Africa and has lately recognized the +right of African disfranchisement. Germany in Africa is cruel to black +men. The Latin people know no color line. At home, the conflict of +capital and labor is important as the Negro wins or loses in the +economic struggle; the enfranchisement of woman is wise or unwise as it +would affect Negro enfranchisement, one colored thinker arguing against +it since it would double the white vote in the South where the Negro has +no political rights; literature is the poetry of Dunbar, the writing of +Washington and Du Bois, the literature of the Negro question, and art is +largely comprised in Tanner's paintings. + +This picture should not imply that the colored people of means are +without the possibility of wide culture and sympathy. They are perhaps +more sympathetic by nature than the white people about them. But each +year, as the white American grows increasingly conscious of race, as he +argues on racial differences, the Negro feels his dark face, is +sensitive to every disdainful look, and separates himself from the +people about him and their problems. + +There is a struggle against this. The majority of white people have +heard, in a vague way, that there is a difference of opinion in the +Negro world; and again, vaguely, that it takes the form of opposition to +Dr. Booker T. Washington and industrial training. But the difference of +opinion among the Negroes is a difference of ideals, and reaches far +beyond the controversy of industrial or cultural training, or the +question of individual leadership. It is difficult to formulate, +inasmuch as few, if any, Negroes hold logically to one ideal wholly to +the exclusion of the other. They cannot be logical and live. But their +division into radical and conservative is too important to omit; +especially since, as we have seen, there is nothing in their social life +to distinguish them from their neighbors; only in their thoughts are +they aloof from us--aliens upon whose shoulders is the problem of a +race. + +How can one explain these two ideals? Roughly, they accept or reject +segregation. The first looks upon the black man in America, for many +generations at least, as a race apart. Recognizing this, the race must +increasingly grow in self-efficiency. It must run its own businesses, +own its banks, its groceries, its restaurants, have its dressmakers, +milliners, tailors; it must establish factories where it shall employ +only colored men and women; its children shall be brought into the +world by colored doctors, taught by colored teachers, buried by colored +undertakers. Education, along industrial lines, shall help train the +worker to this efficiency, and a proper race pride shall give him the +patronage of the Negroes about him. When, as will of course happen in +the majority of cases, the Negro works for the white man, he must +consider himself and his race. He must not go out on strike when the +white man strives for higher wages; he is justified, if he is willing to +risk a broken head, in filling the place of the striking workman, for he +has to look after his own concerns. + +The second point of view resists segregation. It believes that the Negro +should never cease to struggle against being treated as a race apart, +that he should demand the privileges of a citizen, free access to all +public institutions, full civil and political rights. As a workman, he +should have the opportunity of other workmen, his training should be the +training of his white neighbor, and in business and the professions he +should strive to serve white as well as black. And just as in the +battle-field he fights in a common cause with his white comrade, so in +the struggle for better working class conditions he should stand by the +side of the laborer, regardless of race. Believing these things and +finding that America fails to meet his demands, he thinks it should be +his part to struggle for his ideal, vigorously to protest against +discrimination, and never, complacent, to submit to the position of +inferiority. + +As I have said, few men hold logically to either of these ideals, and as +that of acquiescence to present conditions is naturally popular with the +whites, who are themselves responsible for discrimination, material +success sometimes means a departure from the aggressive to the +submissive attitude. However, the whole question of the Negro as a wage +earner is yet scarcely understood by this small professional and +business class. They are in turmoil, in a virile struggle, harsh, +bewildering, baffling. + +"I cannot conceive what it would mean not to be a Negro," a prominent +New York colored man once said to me. "The white people think and feel +so little; their life lacks an absorbing interest." + +This is the characteristic fact of the life of the well-to-do Negro in +New York. He is not permitted to go through the city streets in easy +comfort of body or mind. Some personal rebuff, some harsh word in +newspaper or magazine, quickens his pulse and rouses him from the +lethargy that often overtakes his comfortable white neighbor. Looking +into the past of slavery, watching the coming generation, the most +careless of heart is forced into serious questioning. A comfortable +income and the intelligence to enjoy the culture of a great city do not +bring to the Negro any smug self-satisfaction; only a greater +responsibility toward the problem that moves through the world with his +dark face. + +Before turning to our last topic, the Negro and the Municipality, we +ought to note two further characteristics of the Negro in New York. + +There are certain statistics quoted by every writer upon the Negro, +statistics of mortality and crime. We have noted these for the child, +but not as yet for the Negroes as a whole. They have been left until +this point in our study that we may view them in relation to what we +have learned of the Negro's economic condition and his environment. + +Looking for criminal statistics first, we find them difficult to obtain +in New York. The courts' reports do not classify by color, but we can +learn something from the census enumeration of 1904 of the prisoners in +the New York County Penitentiary and the New York County Workhouse. +These are short term offenders sent up from the city of New York. The +enumeration is as follows: + + NEW YORK COUNTY PENITENTIARY (BLACKWELL'S ISLAND) + + ======================================================== + | Total | Males | Females | Per cent | Per cent + | | | | Total | Females + --------+--------+-------+---------+----------+--------- + White | 582 | 533 | 49 | 91.8 | 8.4 + Colored | 52 | 33 | 19 | 8.2 | 36.5 + ======================================================== + + NEW YORK COUNTY WORKHOUSE + + ======================================================== + White | 1126 | 870 | 256 | 96.5 | 22.7 + Colored | 41 | 12 | 29 | 3.5 | 70.7 + ======================================================== + +In view of the proportion of Negroes to whites in Manhattan, two per +cent, we find the percentage of colored prisoners high, but no higher +than we expect when we remember that the Negro occupies the lowest plane +in the industrial community, "the plane which everywhere supplies the +jail, the penitentiary, the gallows."[1] But the very large percentage +of crime among colored women calls for grave consideration. In the +workhouse, imprisoned for fighting, for drunkenness, for prostitution, +the colored women more than double in number the colored men. Here is a +condition that we noted in the Children's Court records: an unduly large +percentage of disorderly and depraved colored female offenders. + +We have already touched upon the subject of morality among colored +women. Various causes, some of which we have noted, go to the making up +of this high percentage of crime. The Negroes themselves believe the +basic cause to be their recent enslavement with its attendant unstable +marriage and parental status. They point to the centuries of healthful +home relationships among Americans and Europeans, and contrast them +with the thousands upon thousands of yearly sales of slaves that but two +generations ago disrupted the Negro's attempts at family life. With this +heritage they believe that it is inevitable that numbers of their women +should be slow to recognize the sanctity of home and the importance of +feminine virtue. + +The mortality figures for the New York Negro are more striking than the +figures for crime. In 1908 the death rate for whites in the city was +16.6 in every thousand; for colored (including Chinese), 28.9, almost +double the white rate. The Negroes' greatest excess over the white was +in tuberculosis, congenital debility, and venereal diseases as the table +on the following page shows. + +The Negro's inherent weakness, his inability to resist disease, is a +favorite topic today with writers on the color question. A high +mortality is indeed a matter for grave concern, but we may question +whether these figures show inherent weakness. If a new disease attacks +any group of people, it causes terrible decimation, and tuberculosis and +venereal diseases, the white man's plagues, have proved terribly +destructive to the black man. But recalling the conditions under which +the great majority of the colored race lives in New York, the long hours +of labor, the crowded rooms, the insufficient food, we find abundant +cause for a high death rate. For poverty and death go hand in hand, and +the proportion of Negroes in New York who, live in great poverty far +exceeds the proportion of whites.[2] + + ===================================================== + New York, 1908. | White. | Colored. + ----------------------------------+--------+--------- + Number of deaths from all causes | | + per 1000 population | 16.6 | 28.9 + Number of deaths per 1000 deaths: | | + Tuberculosis | 136. | 232.8 + Pneumonia | 126. | 136.3 + Diarrhoea and enteritis | 91.8 | 79. + Bright's disease | 78.3 | 56.5 + Heart disease | 76.7 | 83.4 + Cancer | 45.5 | 24.8 + Congenital debility | 24.5 | 34.1 + Diphtheria and croup | 23.7 | 15. + Scarlet fever | 19. | 3.2 + Typhoid | 7.3 | 6.9 + Venereal diseases | 4. | 13.4 + All others | 367.2 | 314.6 + +--------+--------- + | 1000.0 | 1000.0 + ===================================================== + +The students at Hampton Institute sing an old plantation song that runs +like this: + + "If religion was a thing that money could buy, + The rich would live and the poor would die. + But my good Lord has fixed it so + The rich and the poor together must go." + +Some of our rich men seem to have fixed it with religion to escape from +the condition the poem describes, but it depicts a reality in the +Negro's life. Rich and poor, as we saw when we left our old New Yorkers, +competent and inefficient, pure and diseased, good and bad, all go +together. Much of the recent literature written by Negroes, and +especially that by Dr. Booker T. Washington, attempts to separate in the +minds of the community the thrifty and prosperous colored men from the +helpless and degraded; but the effort meets with a limited success. When +we can have a statistical study of some thousands of the well-to-do +Negroes compared with an equal number of well-to-do whites, we may find +striking similarity. From my own observations I find that the well-to-do +Negroes bear and rear children, refrain from committing crimes that put +them into jail, and live to an old age with the same success as their +white neighbors. But they get little credit for it. Willy-nilly, the +strong, intellectual Negro is linked to his unfortunate fellow. Whether +an increase in material prosperity will break this bond, or whether it +will continue until it ceases to be a bond as humanity comes into its +own, is a secret of the future. For today the song rings true, and the +rich and the poor go together. + + +FOOTNOTES: + +[1] Quincy Ewing, "The Heart of the Race Problem," _Atlantic Monthly_, +March, 1909. + +[2] The statistician, Mr. I. B. Rubinow, in a discussion of high death +rates (American Statistical Association, December, 1905) quotes the rate +in five agricultural districts in a province of Russia, districts +inhabited by peasantry of a common stock. With almost mathematical +certainty, prosperity brings longer life. He divides his peasants into +six groups showing their death rate as follows: + + Death Rate + Having no land 34.7 + Less than 13.5 acres 32.7 + 13.5 to 40.5 acres 30.1 + 40.5 to 67.5 acres 25.4 + 67.5 acres to 135 acres 23.1 + More than 135 acres 19.2 + +Mr. Rubinow suggests that the high Negro death rate may be explained by +noting the poorly paid occupations in which the Negro engages. + + + + +CHAPTER VIII + +THE NEGRO AND THE MUNICIPALITY + + +A capricious mood, varying with the individual, considerate today and +offensive tomorrow, this, as far as our observations have led us, has +been New York's attitude toward the Negro. Is it possible to find any +principle underlying this shifting position? The city expresses itself +through the individual actions of its changing four millions of people, +but also through its government, its courts of justice, its manifold +public activities. Out of these various manifestations of the +community's spirit can we find a Negro policy? Has New York any +principle of conduct toward these her colored citizens? This question +should be worth our consideration, for New York's attitude means its +environmental influence, and helps determine for the newly arrived +immigrant and the growing generation whether justice or intolerance +shall mark their dealings with the black race. + +The first matter of civic importance to the Negro, as to every other New +York resident, is his position in the commonwealth; is he a participant +in the government under which he lives, or a subject without political +rights? The law since 1873 has been explicit on this matter, wiping out +former property qualifications, and giving full manhood suffrage. +Probably, even with a much larger influx of colored people, the city +will never agitate this question again. Since the death of the +Know-nothing Party, New York has ceased any organized attempt to lessen +the power of the foreigner, and the growing cosmopolitan character of +the population strengthens the Negro in his rights. Only in those states +where the white population is homogeneous can Negro disfranchisement +successfully take place. + +With the vote the Negro has entered into politics and has maintained +successful political organizations. The necessity of paying for rent and +food out of eight or ten dollars a week is the Negro's immediate issue +in New York, and he tries to meet it by securing a congenial and more +lucrative job. The city in 1910 showed some consideration for him in +this matter. An Assistant District Attorney and an Assistant Corporation +Counsel were colored, and scattered throughout the city departments were +nine clerks making from $1200 to $1800 apiece, and a dozen more acting +as messengers, inspectors, drivers, attendants, receiving salaries +averaging $1275. Three doctors served the Board of Health, and there +were six men on the police force (none given patrol duty), and one first +grade fireman, while the departments of docks, parks, street cleaning, +and water supply employed 470 colored laborers. Altogether 511 colored +men figure among the city's employees.[1] + +In her communal gifts the city acts toward the Negro with a fair degree +of impartiality. At the public schools and libraries, the parks and +playgrounds, the baths, hospitals, and, last, the almshouse, the blacks +have equal rights with the whites. Occasionally individual public +servants show color prejudice, but again, occasionally, especial +kindness attends the black child. The rude treatment awaiting them, +however, from other visitors keeps many Negro children, and men and +women, from enjoying the city's benefactions. Particularly is this true +with the public baths and with some of the playgrounds. The employment +by the city of at least one colored official in every neighborhood where +the Negroes are in great numbers would do much to remedy this condition. + +One department of the city might be cited as having been an exception to +the rule of reasonably fair treatment to the colored man. Harshness, for +no cause but his black face, has been too frequently bestowed upon the +Negro by the police. This has been especially noticeable in conflicts +between white and colored, when the white officer, instead of dealing +impartially with offenders, protected his own race. + +There have been two conflicts between the whites and Negroes in New York +in recent years, the first in 1900, on the West Side, in the forties, +the second in 1905, on San Juan Hill. Each riot was local, representing +no wide-spread excitement comparable to the draft riots of 1863, and in +each case the police might easily in the beginning have stopped all +fighting. Instead, they showed themselves ready to aid, even to +instigate the conflict. + +The riot of 1900 was caused by the death of a policeman at the hands of +a Negro. The black man declared that he was defending his life, but the +officer was popular, and after his funeral riots began. Black men ran to +the police for protection, and were thrown back by them into the hands +of the mob.[2] + +The riot of 1905 commenced on San Juan Hill one Friday evening in July +with a fracas between a colored boy and a white peddler; both races took +a hand in the matter until the side streets showed a rough scrambling +fight. Saturday and Sunday were comparatively quiet; men, black and +white, stood on street corners and scowled at one another, but nothing +further need have occurred, had each race been treated with justice. +The police, however, instead of keeping the peace, angered the Negroes, +urged on their enemies, and by Monday night found that they had helped +create a riot, this time bitter and dangerous. Overzealous to proceed +against the "niggers," officers rushed into places frequented by +peaceable colored men, whom they placed under arrest. Dragging their +victims to the station-house they beat them so unmercifully that before +long many needed to be handed over to another city department--the +hospital. Little question was made as to guilt or innocence, and some of +the worst offenders, colored as well as white, were never brought to +justice.[3] "If," as a colored preacher whose church was the centre of +the storm district pointed out, "the police would only differentiate +between the good and the bad Negroes, and not knock on the head every +colored man they saw in a riot, we should be quite satisfied. As it is, +there is no safety for any Negro in this part of the city at any +time."[4] + +The result of these two riots was the bringing to justice of one +policeman and the placing of a humane and tactful captain on San Juan +Hill. But for some time the colored man felt little protection in the +Department of Police, finding that he was liable to arrest and clubbing +for a trivial offence. Often the officer's club fell with cruel force. +This, however, was before the administration of Mayor Gaynor, who has +commanded humane treatment, and the brutal clubbing of the New York +Negro has now ceased. + +From the police one turns naturally to the courts. What is their +attitude toward the Negro offender? Is there any race prejudice, or do +black and white enjoy an impartial and judicial hearing? + +As the Negro comes before the magistrates of the city courts, he learns +to know that judges differ greatly in their conceptions of justice. To +the Southerner, let us say from Richmond, where the black man is +arrested for small offences and treated with considerable roughness and +harshness, New York courts seem lenient.[5] To the West Indian, +accustomed to British rule, justice in New York is noticeable for its +variability, the likelihood that if it is severe tonight, it will be +generous tomorrow. + +"Three months," the listener at court hears given as sentence to a +respectable-looking colored servant girl who has begged to be allowed to +return to her place which she has held for five years. "I never was up +for drinking before," she pleads; "I have learnt my lesson; please give +me a chance; I will not do this again." + +"What should you two be fighting for?" another judge, another morning, +says to two very battered women, one white and one colored, who come +before him in court. And talking kindly to both, but with greater +seriousness to the Irish offender, his own countrywoman, he sends them +away with a reprimand. + +How much of this unequal treatment comes from color prejudice or +caprice or temperament, the Negro is unable to decide, but he soon +learns one curious fact: while his black skin marks him as inheriting +Republican politics, it is the Democratic magistrate, the Tammany +henchman whose name is a byword to the righteous, who is the more +lenient when he has committed a trifling offence. + +"Didn't I play craps with the nigger boys when I was a kid?" one of +these well-known politicians says, "and am I going back on the poor +fellows now?" Of course, the Negro is assured such men only want his +vote, but he believes real sympathy actuates the Tammany leader, who is +too busy to bother whether the man before him is black or white. The +reformer, on the other hand, big with dignity, at times makes him vastly +uncomfortable as he lectures upon the Negro problem from the eminence of +the superior race. + +But whether Republican or Democrat, the Negro learns that it is well to +have a friend at court; that helplessness is the worst of all +disabilities, worse than darkness of skin or poverty. So he soon +becomes acquainted with his local politician, and if his friend is in +trouble, or his wife or son is locked up, pounds vigorously at the +politician's door. It may be midnight, but the man of power will dress, +and together they will turn from the dark tenement hall into the lighted +street and on to the police-station or magistrate's court to seek +release for the offender. That too often the gravity of the offence +weighs little in the securing of lenient treatment is part of the muddle +of New York justice. The Negro finds that he has taken the most direct +way to secure relief. + +As far as we have followed, we have found the municipality of New York +generally ready to treat her black citizens with the same justice or +injustice with which she treats her whites. Exceptions occur, but she +does not often draw the color line. Perhaps, in this connection, it +might be well to stop a moment and see what return the black man makes, +whether by his vote he helps secure to the city honest and efficient +government. + +Walking through a Negro quarter on election day, the most careful +search fails to reveal any such far-sighted altruism. With a great +majority of colored voters the choice of a municipal candidate is based +on the argument of a two-dollar bill or the promise of a job, combined +with the sentiment, decreasing every year, for the Republican Party--the +party that once helped the colored man and, he hopes, may help him +again. The public standing of the mayoralty candidate, his ability to +choose wise heads of departments, the building of new subways, the +ownership of public utilities, these are unimportant issues. The matter +of immediate moment is what this vote is going to mean to the black +voter himself. + +Such a selfish and unpatriotic attitude, not unknown perhaps to white +voters, leads some of our writers and reformers to doubt the value of +universal manhood suffrage. Mr. Ray Stannard Baker tells us that the +Negro and the poor white in New York, through their venality, are +practically without a vote. "While the South is disfranchising by +legislation," he says, "the North is doing it by cash." "What else is +the meaning of Tammany Hall and the boss and machine system in other +cities?"[6] New York's noted ethical culture teacher argues against +agitation for woman's suffrage on the ground that so many of those who +now have the vote do not know how to use it. But looking closely at +these unaltruistic citizens, we see that after all they are putting the +ballot to its primary use, the protection of their own interests. The +Negro in New York has one vital need, steady, decent work. He dickers +and plays with politics to get as much of this as he can. It is very +insufficient relief for an intolerable situation, but it is partial +relief. In another city, Atlanta for instance, he might find education +the most important civic gift for which to strive. Atlanta is a +fortunate city to choose for an example of the power of the suffrage, +for since the Negro's loss of the vote in Georgia, educational funds +have been turned chiefly to white schools, and 5,000 colored children +are without opportunities for public education. 1885 saw the last school +building erected for Negroes, the result of a bargain between the +colored voters and the prohibitionists.[7] Should a colored teacher in +New York be refused her certificate, a colored consumptive be denied a +place in the city's hospital, a colored child meet with a rebuff in the +city park, the colored citizen would find his vote an important means +of redress. Then, too, while there are so many men to buy, it is +important to have a vote to sell, lest the other citizens secure the +morning's bargains. Venality in high and low places will not disappear +until we are dominated by the ideal of social, not individual +advancement. Before that time, it is well for the weak that they are +able, at least in the political field, to bargain with the strong. + +The importance to the Negro of the vote is quickly appreciated when we +consider New York's attitude unofficially expressed. With the franchise +behind him the colored man can secure for himself and his children the +municipality's advantages of education, health, amusement, philanthropy. +He is here a citizen, a contributor to the city treasury, if not +directly as a taxpayer, as a worker and renter. But as a private +individual, seeking to use the utilities managed by other private +individuals, he continually encounters race discrimination. Private +doors are closed, and were the state not so wealthy and generous, +disabilities still graver than at present would follow. + +A few examples will show the condition. A Negro applies by letter for +admission to an automobile school, and is accepted; but on appearing +with his fee his color debars his entrance. Carrying the case to court, +the complaint is dismissed on the ground that the law which forbade +exclusion from places of education on account of race and color is +applicable only to public schools. Private institutions may do as they +desire. + +Again, a colored man tries to get a meal. At the first restaurant he is +told that all the tables are engaged; at the next no one will serve him. +Fearful of further rebuffs, he has to turn to the counter of a railway +station. He wants to go to the theatre. Like Tommy Atkins, he is sent to +the gallery or round the music halls. The white barber whose shop he +enters will not shave him; and when night comes, he searches a long time +before the hotel appears that will give him a bed. The sensitive man, +still more the sensitive woman, often finds the city's attitude +difficult to endure. + +American Negroes have become familiar with racial lines, but the +foreigner of African descent, a visitor to the city, meets with rebuffs +that fill him with surprise as well as rage. Haytians and South +Americans, men of continental education and wide culture, have been +ordered away as "niggers" from restaurant doors, and at the box office +of the theatre refused an orchestra seat. English Negroes from the West +Indies, men and women of character and means, learn that New York is a +spot to be avoided, and cross the ocean when they wish to taste of city +life. In short, the stranger of Negro descent, if he be rash of temper, +hurls anathemas at the villainously mannered Americans; or, if he be +good-natured, shrugs his shoulders and counts New York a provincial +settlement of four million people. + +Northern Negroes believe this discrimination in public places against +the black man to be increasing in New York. One, who came here fifteen +years ago, tells of the simple and adequate test by which he learned +that he had reached the northern city. Born in South Carolina, as he +attained manhood he desired larger self-expression, broader human +relations--he wanted "to be free," as he again and again expressed it. +So leaving the cotton fields he started one morning to walk to New York. +After a number of days he entered a large city and, uncertain in his +geography, decided that this was his journey's end. "I'll be free here," +he thought, and opening the door of a brightly lighted restaurant +started to walk in. The white men at the tables looked up in +astonishment, and the proprietor, laying his hand on the youth's +shoulder, invited him, in strong southern accent, to go into the +kitchen. "I reckon I'm not North yet," the Negro said, smiling a bright, +boyish smile. Interested in his visitor's appearance, the proprietor +took him into another room, gave him a good supper, and talked with him +far into the night, urging the advantages of his staying in the South. +But the youth shook his head, and the next morning trudged on. At length +he reached a rushing city, tumultuous with humanity, and entering an +eating-house was served a meal. To him it was almost a sacrament. He +belonged not to a race but to humanity. He tasted the freedom of +passing unnoticed. But it is doubtful if the same restaurant would serve +him today. + +Color lines, on these matters of entertainment as on others, are not +hard and fast. A few hotels, chiefly those frequented by Latin people, +receive colored guests; and while the foreign Negro meets with rudeness, +he is rebuffed less than the native. "I can't get into that place as a +southern darky," a black man laughingly says, pointing to a fashionable +restaurant, "I'll be the Prince of Abyssinia." But as Prince or American +his status is shifting and uncertain; here, preeminently, he is half a +man. + +Discrimination against any man because of his color is contrary to the +law of the state. After the fifteenth amendment became a law, New York +passed a civil rights bill, which as it stands, re-enacted in 1909, is +very explicit. All persons within the jurisdiction of the state are +entitled to the accommodation of hotels, restaurants, theatres, music +halls, barbers' shops, and any person refusing such accommodation is +subject to civil and penal action. The offence may be punished by fine +or imprisonment or both.[8] + +In 1888, the attempt to exclude three colored men from a skating-rink at +Binghamton, N. Y., led to a suit against the owner of the rink, and his +conviction. The case[9] reached the Court of Appeals, where the +constitutionality of the civil rights bill was upheld. "It is evident," +said Justice Andrews in his decision, "that to exclude colored people +from places of public resort on account of their race is to fix upon +them a brand of inferiority, and tends to fix their position as a +servile and dependent people." + +But despite the law and precedent, the civil rights bill is violated in +New York. Occasionally colored men bring suit, but the magistrate +dismisses the complaint. Usually the evidence is declared insufficient. +A case of a colored man refused orchestra seats at a theatre is +dismissed on the ground that not the proprietor but his employees turned +the man away. A keeper of an ice-cream parlor, wishing to prevent the +colored man from patronizing him, charges a Negro a dollar for a +ten-cent plate. The customer pays the dollar, keeps the check, and +brings the case to court. Ice-cream parlors are then declared not to +come under the list of places of public entertainment and amusement. A +bootblack refuses to polish the shoes of a Negro, and the court decides +that a bootblack-stand is not a place of public accommodation, and +refusal to shine the shoes of a colored man does not subject its +proprietor to the penalties imposed by the law.[10] This last case was +carried to the Court of Appeals, and the adverse judgment has led many +of the thoughtful colored men of the city to doubt the value of +attempting to push a civil rights suit. Litigation is expensive, and +money spent in any personal rights case that attacks private business, +whether the plaintiff be white or colored, is usually wasted. The civil +rights law is on the books, and the psychological moment may arrive to +insist successfully on its enforcement. + +If there is an increase in discrimination against the Negro in New York +solely because of his color, it is a serious matter to the city as well +as to the race. Every community has its social conscience built up of +slowly accumulated experiences, and it cannot without disaster lose its +ideal of justice or generosity. New York has never been tender to its +people, but it has a rough hospitality, what Stevenson describes as +"uncivil kindness," and welcomes new-comers with a friendly shove, +bidding them become good Americans. After the war, the Negro entered +more than formerly into this general welcome. He was unnoticed, allowed +to go his way without questioning word or stare, the position which +every right-minded man and woman desires. But today New York has become +conscious that he is dark-skinned, and her attitude affects her growing +children. "I never noticed colored people," an old abolitionist said to +me, "I never realized there were white and black until, when a boy of +twelve, I entered a church and found Negroes occupying seats alone in +the gallery." As New York returns to the gallery seats, her boys and +girls return to consciousness of color and, from fisticuffs at school, +move on to the race riots upon the streets with bullets among the +stones. + +The municipality, as we have seen, treats the Negro on the whole with +justice; its standard is higher than the standard of the average +citizen. It cherishes the ideal of democracy, and strives for +impartiality toward its many nationalities and races. And the New York +Negro in his turn does not allow his liberties to be tampered with +without protest. But the New York citizen can hardly be described as +friendly to the Negro. What catholicity he has is negative. He fails to +give the black man a hearty welcome. "Do you know where I stayed the +four weeks of my first trip abroad?" a colored clergyman once asked me. +I refused to make a guess. "Well," he said a little shamefacedly, "it +was in Paris. Paris may be a wicked city--any city has wickedness if you +want to look for it--but I found it a place of kindliness and good-will. +Every one seemed glad to be courteous, to assist me in my stumbling +French, to show me the way on omnibus or boat, or through the difficult +streets. It was so different from America; I was never wanted in the +southern city of my youth. In Paris I was welcome." + +"How is it in New York?" I asked. + +"In New York?" He stopped to consider. "In New York I am tolerated." + + +FOOTNOTES: + +[1] The total number of municipal employees is 55,006--Negro employees, +511--Percentage of Negro to whole, 0.9. + +[2] "Story of the Riot," published by Citizens Protective League. + +[3] New York _Age_, July 27, 1905. + +[4] New York _Tribune_, July 24, 1905. + +[5] A southern student says, "The Negro in Richmond is arrested for +small offences and fined in the city courts. He is treated with +considerable roughness and harshness in his punishment for these +offences. It looks as though he were being imposed upon as an individual +of the lower strata of society. But the Negro responds so impulsively to +what appeals, that constant fear, dread, and impressiveness of the +police act well as resistants to temptations." + +[6] Ray Stannard Baker, "Following the Color Line," p. 269. + +[7] The following story of Athens, Georgia, told by a Northerner +teaching in the South, illustrates this point. "The city of Athens was +planning to inaugurate a public school system, and also wished to 'go +dry.' It made a proposal to the colored voters promising that if their +combined vote would carry the city, two schools should be built, of +equal size and similar structure for each race. I visited Athens shortly +after the two buildings were built, and I found two beautiful brick +buildings very similar in all their appointments. At an interval of +several years I again visited the little city and again spent an hour in +the same brick school-house of the colored folk. + +"At my third visit, I found my colored friends occupying a wooden +structure on the edge of the city, and not only inconveniently located, +but much less of a building than the one hitherto occupied. Upon inquiry +I found that in the growth of the school population of the whites, it +was cheaper to seize the building formerly occupied by the colored +children, and to build for them a cheap wooden structure on the +outskirts of the town. + +"The colored school was still occupying this inadequate building at my +visit this last September, 1909. A second wooden structure has been +added to the colored equipment on the east side of the town." + +This story of the Athenians well illustrates what will be done when the +Negro counts for something politically, and also what may be undone if +his value as a political asset is reduced. + +[8] Civil Rights Law, State of New York. Chapter 14 of the Laws of +1909, being Chapter 6 of the Consolidated Laws. + +"Article 4.--Equal rights in places of public amusement. + +"Section 40.--All persons within the jurisdiction of this state shall be +entitled to the full and equal accommodations, advantages, facilities, +and privileges of inns, restaurants, hotels, eating houses, bath houses, +barber shops, theatres, music halls, public conveyances on land and +water, and all other places of public accommodation or amusement, +subject only to the conditions and limitations, established by the law +and applicable alike to all citizens. + +"Section 41.--Penalty for violation. Any person who shall violate any of +the provisions of the foregoing section by denying to any citizen, +except for reasons applicable alike to all citizens of every race, creed +and color, and regardless of race, creed and color, the full enjoyment +of any of the accommodations, advantages, facilities or privileges in +said section enumerated, or by aiding or inciting such denial, shall, +for every such offence, forfeit and pay a sum not less than one hundred +dollars nor more than five hundred dollars to the person aggrieved +thereby, to be recovered in a court of competent jurisdiction in the +County where said offence was committed, and shall also, for every such +offence, be deemed guilty of a misdemeanor, and upon conviction thereof +shall be fined not less than one hundred dollars nor more than five +hundred dollars, or shall be imprisoned not less than thirty days nor +more than ninety days, or both such fine and imprisonment." + +[9] People _vs._ King, 110 N. Y., 418, 1888. + +[10] Burke _vs._ Bosso, 180 N. Y., 341, 1905. + + + + +CHAPTER IX + +CONCLUSION + + +A new little boy came two years ago into our story-book world. When Miss +North, taking Ezekiel by the hand, led him into her school-room,[1] we +met a child full of what we call temperament; dreaming quaint stories, +innocently friendly, anxious to please for affection's sake, in his +queer, unconscious way something of a genius. We saw his big musing eyes +looking out upon a world in which his teacher stood serene and +reasoning, but a little cold like her name; his friend, Miss Jane, kind +and very practical; his employer, Mr. Rankin, amused and contemptuous; +all watching him with the impersonal interest with which one might view +a new species in the animal world. For Ezekiel, unlike our other +story-book boys, had a double being, he was first Ezekiel Jordan, a +little black boy, and second, a Representative of the Negro Race. + +Ezekiel was too young to understand his position, but the white world +about him never forgot it. When he arrived late to school, he was a +dilatory representative; when, obliging little soul, he promised three +people to weed their gardens all the same afternoon, he was a +prevaricating representative. He never happened to steal ice-cream from +the hoky-poky man or to play hookey, but if he had, he would have been a +thieving and lazy representative. Always he was something remote and +overwhelming, not a natural growing boy. + +Ezekiel's position is that of each Negro child and man and woman in the +United States today. I think we have seen this as we have reviewed the +position of the race in New York; indeed, the very fact of our +attempting such a review is patent that we see and feel it. We white +Americans do not generalize concerning ourselves, we individualize, +leaving generalizations to the chance visitor, but we generalize +continually concerning colored Americans; we classify and measure and +pass judgment, a little more with each succeeding year. + +Now if we are going to do this, let us be fair; let us try as much as +possible to dismiss prejudice, and to look at the Ezekiels entering our +school of life, with the same impartiality and the same understanding +sympathy with which we look upon our own race. And if we are to place +them side by side with the whites, let us be impartial, not cheating +them out of their hard-earned credits, or condemning them with undue +severity. Let us try, if we can, to be just. + +When we begin to make this effort to judge fairly our colored world, we +need to remember especially two things: First, that we cannot yet +measure with any accuracy the capability of the colored man in the +United States, because he has not yet been given the opportunity to show +his capability. If we deny full expression to a race, if we restrict its +education, stifle its intellectual and æsthetic impulses, we make it +impossible fairly to gauge its ability. Under these circumstances to +measure its achievements with the more favored white race is +unreasonable and unjust, as unreasonable as to measure against a man's +a disfranchised woman's capabilities in directing the affairs of a +state.[2] + +The second thing is difficult for us to remember, difficult for us at +first to believe; that we, dominant, ruling Americans, may not be the +persons best fitted to judge the Negro. We feel confident that we are, +since we have known him so long and are so familiar with his +peculiarities; but in moments of earnest reflection may it not occur to +us that we have not the desire or the imagination to enter into the life +emotions of others? "We are the intellect and virtue of the airth, the +cream of human natur', and the flower of moral force," Hannibal Chollup +still says, and glowers at the stranger who dares to suggest a different +standard from his own. Hannibal Chollup and his ilk are ill-fitted to +measure the refinements of feeling, the differences in ideals among +people. + +This question of our fitness to sit in the judgment seat must come with +grave insistence when we read carefully the literature published in this +city of New York within the past two years. Our writers have assumed +such pomposity, have so revelled in what Mr. Chesterton calls "the +magnificent buttering of one's self all over with the same stale butter; +the big defiance of small enemies," as to make their conclusions +ridiculous. Ezekiel entering their school is at once pushed to the +bottom of the class, while the white boy at the head, Hannibal Chollup's +descendant, sings a jubilate of his own and butters himself so copiously +as to be as shiny as his English cousin, Wackford Squeers. Then the +writer, the judge, begins. Ezekiel is shown as the incorrigible boy of +the school. He is a lazy, good-for-nothing vagabond. Favored with the +chance to exercise his muscles twelve hours a day for a disinterested +employer, he fails to appreciate his opportunity. He is diseased, +degenerate. His sisters are without chastity, every one, polluting the +good, pure white men about them. He is a rapist, and it is his criminal +tendencies that are degrading America. The pale-faced ones of his family +steal into white society, marry, and insinuate grasping, avaricious +tendencies into the noble, generous men of white blood, causing them to +cheat in business and to practise political corruption. In short there +is nothing evil that Ezekiel is not at the bottom of. Sometimes, poor +little chap, he tries to sniffle out a word, to say that his family is +doing well, that he has an uncle who is buying a home, and a rich cousin +in the undertaking business, but such extenuating circumstances receive +scant attention, and we are not surprised to find, the class dismissed, +that Ezekiel and the millions whom he represents, are swiftly shuffled +off the earth, victims of "disease, vice, and profound discouragement." + +Now this is not an exaggerated picture of much that has recently been +printed in newspaper and magazine, and does it not make us feel the +paradox that if we are to judge the Negro fairly, we must not judge him +at all, so little are we temperamentally capable of meeting the first +requirement? + +"My brother Saxons," says Matthew Arnold, "have a terrible way with them +of wanting to improve everything but themselves off the face of the +earth." And he adds, "I have no such passion for finding nothing but +myself everywhere." Among our American writers a few, like Arnold, do +not care to find only themselves everywhere, and these have told us a +different story of the American Negro. They are poets and writers of +fiction, men and women who are happy in meeting and appreciating +different types of human beings.[3] If these writers were to instruct +us, they would say that we must individualize more when we think of the +black people about us, must differentiate. That, too, we must remember +that when we pass judgment, we need to know whether our own standard is +the best, whether we may not have something to learn from the standards +of others. Supposing Ezekiel is deliberate and slow to make changes or +to take risks; are we who are "acceleration mad," who acquire heart +disease hustling to catch trains, who mortgage our farms to buy +automobiles, who seek continually new sensations, really better than he? +Is it not a matter of difference, just as we may each place in different +order our desires, the one choosing struggle for power and the +accumulation of wealth, the other preferring serenity and pleasure in +the immediate present? And lastly, after having praised our own virtues +and our own ideals, must we not beware that we do not blame the Negro +when he adopts them, that we do not turn upon him and fiercely demand +only servile virtues, the virtues that make him useful not to himself +but to us?[4] + +No one can talk for long of the Negro in America without propounding the +all-embracing question, What will become of him, what will be the +outcome of all this racial controversy? It is a daring person who +attempts to answer. We, who have studied the Negro in New York, may +perhaps venture to predict a little regarding his future in this city, +his possible status in the later years of the century; whether he will +lose in opportunity and social position, or whether he will advance in +his struggle to be a man. + +Looking upon the great population of the city, its varied races and +nationalities, I confess that his outlook to me begins to be bright. New +York is still to a quite remarkable extent dominated socially by its old +American stock, its Dutch and Anglo-Saxon element. Few things strike the +foreign visitor so forcibly as that despite its enormous European +population, American society is homogeneous. But this is not likely to +continue for very long. When the present demand for exhausting +self-supporting work becomes less insistent, we shall feel in a deeper, +more vital way the influence of our vast foreign life. With a million +Jews and nearly a million Latin people, we cannot for long be held in +the provincialism of to-day. I suspect that to many Europeans New York +seems still a great overgrown village in "a nation of villagers," +pronouncing with narrow, dogmatic assurance upon the deep unsolved +problems of life. But in the future it may take on a larger, more +cosmopolitan spirit. Its Italians may bring a finer feeling for beauty +and wholesome gayety, its Jews may continue to add great intellectual +achievements, and its people of African descent, perhaps always few in +number, may show with happy spontaneity their best and highest gifts. If +New York really becomes a cosmopolitan city, let us believe the Negro +will bring to it his highest genius and will walk through it simply, +quietly, unnoticed, a man among men. + + +FOOTNOTES: + +[1] Lucy Pratt, "Ezekiel." + +[2] "The world of modern intellectual life is in reality a white man's +world. Few women and perhaps no blacks have entered this world in the +fullest sense. To enter it in the fullest sense would be to be in it at +every moment from the time of birth to the time of death, and to absorb +it unconsciously and consciously, as the child absorbs language. When +something like this happens we shall be in a position to judge of the +mental efficiency of women and the lower races. At present we seem +justified in inferring that the differences in mental expression between +the higher and lower races and between men and women are no greater than +they should be in view of the existing differences in opportunity." W. +I. Thomas, "Sex and Society," p. 312. + +[3] Note especially the stories of Alice MacGowan and Grace MacGowan +Cooke, and the poems of Rosalie M. Jonas. + +[4] Careful readers of economic Negro studies by white writers will +notice this tendency to look upon the Negro as belonging to a servile +class. Emphasis is laid upon his responsibilities to the white man, not +upon the white man's responsibilities to him. Any one familiar with the +sympathetic attitude toward the workers in such a study as the +_Pittsburg Survey_ will notice at once the difference in attitude in +Negro surveys by whites, the slight emphasis laid upon the black +laborers' long hours and poor pay, and the failure to emphasize the +white man's responsibility. Negro laborers are still studied from the +viewpoint of the capitalist. There is one notable exception to this, the +study by the governor of Jamaica, Sir Sidney Olivier, on "White Capital +and Coloured Labor." + + + + +APPENDIX + + +The federal census in 1900 contained a volume on the Negro in the United +States, a source of information quoted by nearly every writer on the +American Negro. The tables in that volume, however, do not classify by +cities, and any one desiring information regarding the Negro in some +especial city must search through other volumes. As this is a lengthy +task, I am affixing a list of the tables in the census of 1900, treating +of the Negro in New York City, believing that it may also be a guide to +students of the new census of 1910, who wish to find New York Negro +statistics. + + Population. Vol. I, Part I. Published 1901. + + Page 868, Table 57. Aggregate, white, and colored population + distributed according to native or foreign parentage, for cities + having 25,000 inhabitants or more: 1900. + + Page 934, Table 81. Total males twenty-one years of age and over, + classified by general nativity, color, and literacy, for cities + having 25,000 inhabitants or more: 1900. + + Vol. II. Published 1902. + + Page 163, Table 19. Persons of school age, five to twenty years, + inclusive, by general nativity and color, for cities having 25,000 + inhabitants or more: 1900. Also, pages 165 and 167, Tables 20 and + 21. + + Page 332, Table 32. Conjugal condition of the aggregate population, + classified by sex, general nativity, color, and age periods, for + cities having 100,000 inhabitants or more: 1900. + + Page 397, Table 54. Negro persons attending school during the + census year, classified by sex and age periods, for cities having + 25,000 inhabitants or more: 1900. + + Page 737, Table 111. Persons owning and hiring their homes, + classified by color, for cities having 100,000 inhabitants or more: + 1900. + + Vital Statistics. Vol. III. Published 1902. + + Page 458, Table 19. Population, births, deaths, and death rates at + certain ages, and deaths from certain causes, by sex, color, + general nativity, and parent nativity: census year 1900. + + Occupations. Published 1904. + + Pages 634 to 642, Table 43. Total males and females, ten years of + age and over, engaged in selected groups of occupations, classified + by general nativity, color, conjugal condition, months unemployed, + age periods, and parentage, for cities having 50,000 inhabitants or + more: 1900. + + Supplementary Analysis. Published 1906. + + Page 262, Table 87. Per cent Negro in total population, 1900, 1890, + and 1880, per cent male and female in Negro population, per cent + illiterate in Negro population at least ten years of age, and among + negro males of voting age, and per 10,000 distribution of Negro + population by age periods. + + Women at Work. Published 1907. + + Page 146, Table 9. Number and percentage of breadwinners in female + population, sixteen years of age and over, classified by race and + nativity, for cities having at least 50,000 inhabitants: 1900. + + Pages 147 to 151, Table 10. Number and percentage of breadwinners + in the female population, sixteen years and over, classified by + age, race, and nativity. + + Pages 266 to 275, Table 28. Female breadwinners, sixteen years of + age and over, classified by family relationship, and by race, + nativity, marital condition, and occupation, for selected cities: + 1900. + + Pages 354 to 365, Table 29. Female breadwinners, sixteen years of + age and over, living at home, classified by the number of other + breadwinners in the family, and by race, nativity, marital + condition, and occupation, for selected cities: 1900. + + Mortality Statistics. Published 1908. + + Page 28. Number of deaths from all causes per 1,000 of population. + + Page 376, Table 2. Deaths in each registration area, by age: 1908. + + Pages 566 to 568, Table 8. Deaths in each city having 100,000 + population or over in 1900, from certain causes and classes of + causes, by age: 1908. + + + + +INDEX + + + Aldridge, Ira, 137. + + Amalgamation, 168. + + Andrews, Charles, civil rights of Negroes, 214. + + Andrews, Chas. C., on education, 14; + on industrial opportunity, 27. + + Archer, William, 172. + + Arnold, Matthew, 224. + + Arthur, Chester A., 23. + + Association for Improving the Condition of the Poor, 159. + + Athens, Ga., 207. + + Atlanta, Negroes in occupations in, 77, 91, 93; + proportion of Negro women to men in, 148; + suffrage in, 206. + + + Baker, Ray Stannard, on suffrage, 205. + + Benefit societies, 175. + + Birthplaces, 35. + + Boese, Thomas, 15. + + Brokers, real estate, 45, 108. + + Brown, William, 14. + + Bulkley, W. L., 161. + + Burke _v._ Bosso, 215. + + Burleigh, Harry, 126. + + Businesses, 106-112. + + + Cahill, Marie, 133. + + Charity Organization Society, 158. + + Chesnutt, Charles W., 181. + + Chesterton, Gilbert K., 222. + + Churches: + Baptist, 20, 116, 123; + Catholic, 116; + Congregational, 20; + Episcopal, 20, 113, 116, 120; + Methodist, 20, 116. + + City and Suburban Homes, 41. + + Civil rights: + state bill, 213; + violations of, 209, 210. + + Clarkson, Thomas, 32. + + Cleveland, Grover, 17. + + Clinton, De Witt, 14. + + Cole and Johnson, 127, 133. + + Constitutional conventions, state, 11-13. + + Cook, Will Marion, 136. + + Cooke, Grace MacGowan, 224. + + Court: + children's, 66; + magistrate's, 202-204. + + Craig, Walter A., 126. + + Crime: + among children, 66-68; + among adults, 189. + + + Dahomeyans, 131. + + District Nursing Association of Brooklyn, 159. + + Dix, Morgan, 25. + + Domestic Service, 80-83, 149-153. + + Downing, Thomas, 27. + + Du Bois, W. E. B., 183. + + Dudley, S. H., 128. + + Dunbar, Paul Lawrence, 71, 83, 131. + + + East Side, 42-44. + + Education: + colored teacher, 17, 18; + private colored schools, 14; + public colored schools, 15-19. + + Emancipation, 8. + + Ewing, Quincy, 190. + + + Fall River, mortality among infants, 59. + + Finley, H. M., 32. + + Frazier, S. E., 18. + + + Gaynor, William J., 201. + + Government service, Negroes in, 88. + + Greenwich Village, 33-35. + + + Hale, Edward Everett, 119. + + Hamilton, Alexander, 14. + + Hampton Institute, 110, 119, 193. + + Hansell, George H., 20. + + Haynes, George E., 112. + + Health Department, 40, 53, 197. + + Held, Anna, 133. + + Hell's Kitchen, 37, 85. + + Hogan, Ernest, 134. + + Horsmanden, Daniel, 7. + + Housing, 34, 36, 40, 45-51. + + Hunt, John H., against Negro suffrage, 13. + + + Janvier, Thomas, 8, 33. + + Jay, John, on emancipation, 8; + interest in education, 14. + + Jay, Peter, on Negro suffrage, 11. + + Jennings, Elizabeth, 21. + + Jonas, Rosalie M., 224. + + Jones, Edward, 14. + + + Kean, Edmund, 137. + + Kent, Chancellor, favors Negro suffrage, 11. + + Kidd, Dudley, 52. + + King _v._ Gallagher, 16. + + Kingsley, Mary, 70, 113. + + + Lanier, Sidney, 31. + + Lincoln, Charles Z., 13. + + Lincoln Hospital: + attitude towards Negro doctors, 114; + graduates of, 157. + + Livingston, against Negro suffrage, 11. + + London, Jack, 63. + + + MacGowan, Alice, 224. + + Manhattan Trade School, 161, 162. + + Manumission society, 14. + + Middle West Side, 35-38. + + Miller, Kelly, 86, 147. + + Morris, Gouverneur, on emancipation, 8. + + Mortality: + among infants, 53-60; + death rate by diseases, 192. + + Municipal service, Negroes in, 197. + + Music, 125-127. + + + New York Conspiracy, 7. + + New York Milk Committee, 54. + + Newman, G., infant mortality, 55, 58. + + Nurses' Settlement, 159. + + + Olivier, Sidney, 226. + + + Palmer, A. Emerson, 18. + + Patten, S. N., 38. + + People _v._ King, 213. + + Phillips, Ulrich B., 101. + + Phipps, Henry, 41. + + Phipps tenement, 42, 51, 125. + + Pittsburg Survey, 225. + + Police department, 198-201. + + Poole, Ernest, 84. + + Population, Negro, 9; + total, 31. + + Pratt, Lucy, 218. + + Prostitution, 155, 156. + + + Ray, Charles B., 24. + + Reason, Patrick, 27. + + Religion (see Churches). + + Riots: + draft riots, 25; + riot of 1900, 199; + riot of 1905, 199-201. + + Roosevelt, Theodore, 18. + + Rubinow, I. B., relation of death rate to poverty, 193. + + Russell, John L., 12. + + Russell, Lillian, 133. + + Russia, infant mortality in, 54; + mortality and poverty, 193. + + Russworm, John B., 14. + + + Sanger, William W., 153. + + San Juan Hill, 39-42. + + Schools (see Education). + + Scottron, Samuel R., on industrial opportunities, 26; + on occupations, 78. + + Segregation: + churches, 19; + dwelling-places, 48-50; + schools, 15-19. + + Shirtwaist makers' strike, 163. + + Simmons, William J., 137. + + Slave ships, 32. + + Slaves, brutality towards, 5; + insurrections of, 6-8. + + Smith, Gerritt, 24. + + Smith, James McC., 27. + + Smith, William G., 14. + + Stage, 127-137. + + Stevenson, Robert Louis, 215. + + Stone, Alfred Holt, on Negro in occupations in South, 75; + color line in South, 89, 92; + irresponsibility of Negroes, 102. + + Straus, Nathan, 59. + + Street cars, discrimination, 21-23. + + Suffrage: + past, 11-13; + present, 196; + Negro's use of suffrage, 204-208; + in Athens, Ga., 207. + + + Tanner, Henry, 126. + + Tenements (see Housing). + + Thomas, W. I., 221. + + Trade-unions, 95-99. + + Trinity Church, 25. + + Tucker, Helen, on Negro craftsmen, 96, 98. + + + Underground Railroad, 24. + + Upper West Side, 45-48. + + + Varick, James, 20. + + + Walker, Aida, 157. + + Washington, Booker T., 184, 194. + + Waterbury, Daniel S., 12. + + West Indies, arrivals from, 48. + + Wheeler, B. F., 20. + + White, Philip A., 27. + + Williams, Peter, 20. + + Williams and Walker, 129-133. + + Wilson, H. J., 124. + + Wilson, J. G., 8. + + Winterbottom, 25. + + Wright, Richard R., on the city Negro, 100, 104. + + Wright, Theodore S., 14. + + + Zangwill, Israel, 137. + + + + + Transcriber's notes: + + The date of the case of King _v._ Gallagher, given in the text + as 1862, and in Footnote 6 as 1882, is 1883. + + The following is a list of changes made to the original. + The first line is the original line, the second the corrected one. + + their positive as well as there relative number + their positive as well as their relative number + + See H. J. Wilson. "The Negro and Music," _Outlook_, + See H. J. Wilson, "The Negro and Music," _Outlook_, + + peoples, receive colored guests; and while + people, receive colored guests; and while + + trains, who mortgate our farms to buy automobiles, + trains, who mortgage our farms to buy automobiles, + + nearly a million Latin peoples, we cannot for + nearly a million Latin people, we cannot for + + pupulation by age periods. + population by age periods. + + Keane, Edmund, 137. + Kean, Edmund, 137. + + + + + +End of Project Gutenberg's Half a Man, by Mary White Ovington and Franz Boas + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK HALF A MAN *** + +***** This file should be named 39742-8.txt or 39742-8.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + http://www.gutenberg.org/3/9/7/4/39742/ + +Produced by David Edwards, Paul Clark and the Online +Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net (This +file was produced from images generously made available +by The Internet Archive) + + +Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions +will be renamed. + +Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no +one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation +(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without +permission and without paying copyright royalties. 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You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: Half a Man + The Status of the Negro in New York + +Author: Mary White Ovington + Franz Boas + +Release Date: May 20, 2012 [EBook #39742] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1 + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK HALF A MAN *** + + + + +Produced by David Edwards, Paul Clark and the Online +Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net (This +file was produced from images generously made available +by The Internet Archive) + + + + + + +</pre> + +<div class="transnote"> +<p> +Transcriber's Note: +</p> + +<p> +Every effort has been made to replicate this text as faithfully as +possible, including inconsistencies in spelling and hyphenation. +Some changes of spelling and punctuation have been made. They are +listed at the end of the text. +</p> +</div> +<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_i" id="Page_i">[Pg i]</a></span></p> + + + +<h1>HALF A MAN</h1> + +<p class="center">THE STATUS OF THE NEGRO<br /> +IN NEW YORK +</p> +<hr class="chap" /><p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_iii" id="Page_iii">[Pg iii]</a></span></p> +<p class="center"> +HALF A MAN +</p> + +<p class="center"> +THE STATUS OF THE NEGRO<br /> +IN NEW YORK +</p> +<p class="center">BY<br /> +MARY WHITE OVINGTON +</p> +<p class="center"> +<i>WITH A FOREWORD BY DR. FRANZ BOAS<br /> +OF COLUMBIA UNIVERSITY</i> +</p> +<p class="center"> +LONGMANS, GREEN, AND CO.<br /> +FOURTH AVENUE & 30TH STREET, NEW YORK<br /> +LONDON, BOMBAY, AND CALCUTTA<br /> +1911 +</p><hr class="chap" /><p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_iv" id="Page_iv">[Pg iv]</a></span></p> + +<p class="center"> +<i>Copyright, 1911, by</i><br /> +<span class="smcap">Longmans, Green, and Co.</span> +</p> +<p class="center"> +THE · PLIMPTON · PRESS<br /> +[W · D · O]<br /> +NORWOOD · MASS · U · S · A<br /> +</p><hr class="chap" /><p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_v" id="Page_v">[Pg v]</a></span></p> + +<p class="center"> +TO<br /> +THE MEMORY OF MY FATHER<br /> +THEODORE TWEEDY<br /> +OVINGTON<br /> +</p> +<hr class="chap" /><p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_vii" id="Page_vii">[Pg vii]</a></span></p> + + + + +<h2><a name="FOREWORD" id="FOREWORD">FOREWORD</a></h2> + + +<p>Miss Ovington's description of the status +of the Negro in New York City is based on +a most painstaking inquiry into his social +and economic conditions, and brings out in +the most forceful way the difficulties under +which the race is laboring, even in the large +cosmopolitan population of New York. It +is a refutation of the claims that the Negro +has equal opportunity with the whites, and +that his failure to advance more rapidly +than he has, is due to innate inability.</p> + +<p>Many students of anthropology recognize +that no proof can be given of any material +inferiority of the Negro race; that without +doubt the bulk of the individuals composing +the race are equal in mental aptitude to +the bulk of our own people; that, although +their hereditary aptitudes may lie in slightly +different directions, it is very improbable +that the majority of individuals composing<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_viii" id="Page_viii">[Pg viii]</a></span> +the white race should possess greater ability +than the Negro race.</p> + +<p>The anthropological argument is invariably +met by the objection that the achievements +of the two races are unequal, while +their opportunities are the same. Every +demonstration of the inequality of opportunity +will therefore help to dissipate +prejudices that prevent the best possible +development of a large number of our +citizens.</p> + +<p>The Negro of our times carries even more +heavily the burden of his racial descent +than did the Jew of an earlier period; and +the intellectual and moral qualities required +to insure success to the Negro are infinitely +greater than those demanded from the white, +and will be the greater, the stricter the +segregation of the Negro community.</p> + +<p>The strong development of racial consciousness, +which has been increasing during +the last century and is just beginning to +show the first signs of waning, is the gravest +obstacle to the progress of the Negro race, +as it is an obstacle to the progress of all +strongly individualized social groups. The<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_ix" id="Page_ix">[Pg ix]</a></span> +simple presentation of observations, like +those given by Miss Ovington, may help us +to overcome more quickly that self-centred +attitude which can see progress only in the +domination of a single type.</p> + +<p>This investigation was carried on by +Miss Ovington under the auspices of the +Greenwich House Committee on Social +Investigations, of which she was a Fellow.<a name="FNanchor_1_1" id="FNanchor_1_1"></a><a href="#Footnote_1_1" class="fnanchor">[1]</a></p> + +<p class="right"> +<span class="smcap">Franz Boas.</span><br /> +</p> + + +<div class="footnotes"><h3>FOOTNOTES:</h3> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_1_1" id="Footnote_1_1"></a><a href="#FNanchor_1_1"><span class="label">[1]</span></a> The Greenwich House Committee on Social Investigations +is composed of Edwin R. A. Seligman, Chairman, +Franz Boas, Edward T. Devine, Livingston Farrand, +Franklin H. Giddings, Henry R. Seager, Vladimir G. +Simkhovitch, Secretary. +</p> +<p> +Miss Ovington's is the second publication of the Committee, +the first being Mrs. Louise Bolard More's "Wage-Earners' +Budgets," published by Henry Holt & Co.</p></div></div> +<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_xi" id="Page_xi">[Pg xi]</a></span></p> + + + + +<h2><a name="CONTENTS" id="CONTENTS">CONTENTS</a></h2> + + +<table width="80%" summary="Contents"> +<tr> +<td class="tdl smaller" colspan="2">CHAPTER</td> +<td class="right smaller">PAGE</td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td class="right">I</td> +<td class="smcap">"Up from Slavery"</td> +<td class="right"><a href="#Page_5">5</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td class="right">II</td> +<td class="smcap">Where the Negro Lives</td> +<td class="right"><a href="#Page_31">31</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td class="right">III</td> +<td class="smcap">The Child of the Tenement</td> +<td class="right"><a href="#Page_52">52</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td class="right">IV</td> +<td class="smcap">Earning a Living—Manual Labor +and the Trades</td> +<td class="right"><a href="#Page_75">75</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td class="right">V</td> +<td class="smcap">Earning a Living—Business and the +Professions</td> +<td class="right"><a href="#Page_106">106</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td class="right">VI</td> +<td class="smcap">The Colored Woman as a Bread +Winner</td> +<td class="right"><a href="#Page_138">138</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td class="right">VII</td> +<td class="smcap">Rich and Poor</td> +<td class="right"><a href="#Page_170">170</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td class="right">VIII</td> +<td class="smcap">The Negro and the Municipality</td> +<td class="right"><a href="#Page_195">195</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td class="right">IX</td> +<td class="smcap">Conclusion</td> +<td class="right"><a href="#Page_218">218</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td /> +<td class="smcap">Appendix</td> +<td class="right"><a href="#Page_229">229</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td /> +<td class="smcap">Index</td> +<td class="right"><a href="#Page_233">233</a></td> +</tr> +</table> +<hr class="chap" /><p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_1" id="Page_1">[Pg 1]</a></span></p> + + + +<h2><a name="HALF_A_MAN" id="HALF_A_MAN">HALF A MAN</a></h2> + + + + +<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_3" id="Page_3">[Pg 3]</a></span></p> +<h2><a name="INTRODUCTION" id="INTRODUCTION">INTRODUCTION</a></h2> + + +<p>Six years ago I met a young colored man, +a college student recently returned from +Germany where he had been engaged in +graduate work. He was born, he told me, +in one of the Gulf States, and I questioned +him as to whether he intended going back +to the South to teach. His answer was in +the negative. "My father has attained success +in his native state," he said, "but when +I ceased to be a boy, he advised me to live +in the North where my manhood would be +respected. He himself cannot continually +endure the position in which he is placed, +and in the summer he comes North to be a +man. No," correcting himself, "to be half +a man. A Negro is wholly a man only in +Europe."</p> + +<p>Half a man! During the six years that I +have been in touch with the problem of the +Negro in New York this characterization has<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_4" id="Page_4">[Pg 4]</a></span> +grown in significance to me. I have endeavored +to know the life of the Negro as I know +the life of the white American, and I have +learned that while New York at times gives +full recognition to his manhood, again, its +race prejudice arrests his development as +certainly as severe poverty arrests the development +of the tenement child. Perhaps +a study of this shifting attitude on the part +of the dominant race, and of the Negro's +reaction under it, may not be unimportant; +for the color question cannot be ignored in +America, nor should the position taken by +her largest city be overlooked. And those +who love their fellows may be glad, among +New York's four millions—its Slavs and +Italians, its Russians and Asiatics—to meet +these dark people who speak our language +and who for many generations have made +this country their home.</p><p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_5" id="Page_5">[Pg 5]</a></span></p> + + + + +<hr class="chap" /><h2><a name="CHAPTER_I" id="CHAPTER_I">CHAPTER I</a><br /> +"<span class="smcap">Up from Slavery</span>"</h2> + + +<p>The status of the Negro in New Amsterdam, +a slave in a pioneer community, differed +fundamentally from his position today +in New York. His history from the seventeenth +to the twentieth century contains +many exciting incidents, but those only +need be considered here that show a progress +or a retardation in his attainment to +manhood. What were his struggles in the +past to secure his rights as a man?</p> + +<p>Slavery in the early days of the colonies +was more brutal than at the time of final +emancipation. Savages recently arrived +from Africa lacked the docility of blacks +reared in bondage, and burning and torturing, +as well as whipping, were recognized +modes of punishment. Masters looked upon +their Negroes, bought at the Wall Street<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_6" id="Page_6">[Pg 6]</a></span> +market from among the cargo of a recently +arrived slaver, with some suspicion and +fear. Nor were their apprehensions entirely +without reason. In 1712 some of +the discontented among the New York +slaves met in an orchard in Maiden Lane +and set fire to an outhouse. Defending +themselves against the citizens who ran to +put out the flames, they fired, killing nine +men and wounding six. Retribution soon +followed. They were pursued when they +attempted flight, captured and executed—some +hanged, some burned at the stake, +some left suspended in chains to starve to +death.</p> + +<p>Perhaps it was the memory of this small +revolt that caused the people of New York +in 1741 to lay the blame for a series of conflagrations +upon their slaves. Nine fires +that seemed to be incendiary came one upon +another, and a robbery was committed. +To escape death herself, a worthless white +servant girl gave testimony against the +Negroes who frequented a tavern where she +was employed, declaring that a plot had +been conceived whereby the slaves would<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_7" id="Page_7">[Pg 7]</a></span> +kill all the white men and take control +of the city. New York was aflame with +fear, and evidence that at another time +would have been rejected, was listened to +by the judges with grave attention. The +slaves were allowed no defence, and before +the city had recovered from its fright, it +had burned fourteen Negroes, hanged eighteen, +and transported seventy-one.<a name="FNanchor_2_1" id="FNanchor_2_1"></a><a href="#Footnote_2_1" class="fnanchor">[1]</a></p> + +<p>Historians today think that the slaves +were in no way concerned in this so-called +"plot." The two thousand blacks in the +city might have done much mischief to the +ten thousand whites, but their servile condition +made an organized movement among +them impossible. We may infer, however, +from the fear which they provoked, that +they were not all docile servants. In a +letter written at the port of New York in +1756, an English naval officer says of the +city, "The laborious people in general are +Guinea Negroes who lie under particular +restraints from the attempts they have +made to massacre the inhabitants for their<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_8" id="Page_8">[Pg 8]</a></span> +liberty."<a name="FNanchor_3_2" id="FNanchor_3_2"></a><a href="#Footnote_3_2" class="fnanchor">[2]</a> Janvier in his "Old New York" +thinks, "that the alarm bred by the so-called +Negro plot of 1741 was most effective +in checking the growth of slavery in that +city." Probably the restlessness of the slaves, +their efforts toward manhood, in a community +where there was little economic justification +for slavery, contributed to the movement +for emancipation that began in 1777.</p> + +<p>Emancipation came gradually to the New +York Negro. Gouverneur Morris at the +state constitutional convention of 1776-1777 +recommended that "the future legislature +of the state of New York take the most +effectual measures consistent with the public +safety and the private property of individuals +for abolishing domestic slavery within +the same, so that in future ages every human +being who breathes the air of this state shall +enjoy the privileges of a freeman." The +postponement of action to a future legislature +was keenly regretted by John Jay, +who was absent from the convention when +the slavery question arose, but who had<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_9" id="Page_9">[Pg 9]</a></span> +hoped that New York might be a leader in +emancipation. The state's initial measure +for abolishing slavery was in 1785, when it +prohibited the sale of slaves in New York. +This was followed in 1799 by an act giving +freedom to the children of slaves, and in +1817 by a further act providing for the abolition +of slavery throughout the state in +1827. This law went into effect July 4, +1827, the emancipation day of the Negroes +in New York.</p> + +<p>With gradual emancipation and the cessation +of the sale of slaves, the Negroes numerically +became unimportant in the city. In +1800 they constituted ten and a half per +cent of the population. Half a century +later, while they had doubled their numbers, +the immense influx of foreign immigrants +brought their proportion down to two and +seven-tenths per cent. In 1850 and 1860 +their positive as well as <a name="tn2" id="tn2"></a>their relative number +decreased, and it was not until twenty +years ago that they began to show some +gain. The last census returns of 1900 give +Greater New York (including Brooklyn) +60,666 Negroes in a population of 3,437,202,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_10" id="Page_10">[Pg 10]</a></span> +one and eight-tenths per cent. It seems probable +that the census of 1910 will show a large +positive and a slight relative Negro increase.<a name="FNanchor_4_3" id="FNanchor_4_3"></a><a href="#Footnote_4_3" class="fnanchor">[3]</a></p> + +<p>The relative decrease in the number of +Negroes did not, however, produce a decrease +in the agitation upon their presence +and position in the city. Their political +status was a subject for heated discussion +even before their complete emancipation.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_11" id="Page_11">[Pg 11]</a></span> +The first state constitution, drafted in 1777, +was without color discrimination, since it +based the suffrage upon a property qualification +requiring voters for governor and +senators to be freeholders owning property +worth £100. A Negro with such a holding +was a phenomenon, a curiosity. But by +1821, when the framing of the second constitution +was in progress, Negroes of some +education were an appreciable element in +the population, and with them ignorant, +recently emancipated slaves. Should they +be admitted to the full manhood suffrage +contemplated for the whites? Those who +favored the new democratic movement were +doubtful of its applicability to colored people. +Livingston, a champion of universal white +manhood suffrage, was against giving the +black man the vote. On the other hand, +the conservative Chancellor Kent, apprehending +in the new constitution "a disposition +to encroach on private rights,—to +disturb chartered privileges and to weaken, +degrade, and overawe the administration of +justice," would yet have made no color +discrimination, and Peter A. Jay, who did<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_12" id="Page_12">[Pg 12]</a></span> +not believe in universal white manhood +suffrage, urged that colored men, natives of +the country, should derive from its institutions +the same privileges as white persons. +The second constitution when adopted enfranchised +practically all white men, but +gave the Negroes a property qualification of +$250. The issue of the revolution, however, +was not far from men's thoughts, and "taxation +without representation" was not permitted; +for while no colored man might vote +without a freehold estate valued at 250 dollars, +<i>no person of color was subject to direct +taxation unless he should be possessed of such +real estate</i>.</p> + +<p>In 1846 a third constitutional convention +was held, and the same matter came up for +debate. John L. Russell of St. Lawrence +declared that "the Almighty had created +the black man inferior to the white man," +while Daniel S. Waterbury of Delaware +County believed that "the argument that +because a race of men is marked by a peculiarity +of color and crooked hair they are not +endowed with a mind equal to another class +who have other peculiarities is unworthy<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_13" id="Page_13">[Pg 13]</a></span> +of men of sense." John H. Hunt of New +York City proclaimed that "We want no +masters, least of all no Negro masters.... +Negroes are aliens." And he predicted that +the practical effect of their admission to the +suffrage would be their exclusion from Manhattan +Island. A delegation of colored men +appeared at Albany before the suffrage committee, +but their arguments and those of +their friends produced no effect. The new +constitution contained the same Negro property +qualification, and it was not until 1874, +after the passage of the fifteenth amendment +to the Constitution of the United +States, that legislation placed the Negro +voter of New York upon the same footing +as the white.<a name="FNanchor_5_4" id="FNanchor_5_4"></a><a href="#Footnote_5_4" class="fnanchor">[4]</a></p> + +<p>Had New York sincerely desired to keep +the Negro in an inferior position, it could +have accomplished this by refusing him an +education. This it never did, though it +suffered much tribulation regarding the place +and manner of his instruction. Before the<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_14" id="Page_14">[Pg 14]</a></span> +establishment of a public school system, the +Manumission society, an association composed +largely of Friends, though including +in its membership John Jay, De Witt Clinton, +and Alexander Hamilton, undertook +the education of the Negro. In 1787 it +opened a school for Africans on Cliff Street. +One of the early teachers was Charles C. +Andrews, whose little book on "The African +Free Schools," published in 1830, shows +a kindly tolerance for the black race. "As +a result of forty years' experience," he writes, +"the idea respecting the capacity of the +African race to receive a respectable and +even a liberal education has not been visionary." +And he recites the names of some +of his pupils: "Rev. Theodore S. Wright, +graduate of Princeton Theological Seminary; +John B. Russworm, graduate of Bowdoin; +Edward Jones, graduate of Amherst; William +Brown and William G. Smith, students +of the medical department, Columbia College: +all of them persons of color." Describing +an annual exhibition of his school on +May 12, 1824, he quotes from the <i>Commercial +Advertiser</i> of the same date: "We never<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_15" id="Page_15">[Pg 15]</a></span> +beheld a white school, of the same age (of +and under the age of fifteen), in which, without +exception, there was more order and +neatness of dress and cleanliness of person. +And the exercises were performed with a +degree of promptness and accuracy which +was surprising."</p> + +<p>In 1834 the public school association took +over the schools of the Manumission society, +but before this time the Negroes +had begun to assert themselves regarding +the method and place of instruction for +their children. They clamored for colored +teachers and succeeded in displacing Charles +Andrews himself. In 1838, at their desire, +the word African was changed to colored in +describing the race; but of chief importance +to their educational future, they began a +protest, only to end in 1900, against segregation.</p> + +<p>Removed from the care of the Manumission +society, the colored schools deteriorated. +Their grade was reduced,<a name="FNanchor_6_5" id="FNanchor_6_5"></a><a href="#Footnote_6_5" class="fnanchor">[5]</a> and owing to +the growth of the city, their attendance was<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_16" id="Page_16">[Pg 16]</a></span> +very irregular, the severe winter weather +often keeping children who lived at a distance +at home. A Brooklyn man tells me +that, when a boy, he used to walk from his +home at East New York to Fulton Ferry, +passing inferior Brooklyn colored schools, +and after crossing the river, on up to Mulberry +Street to be instructed by the popular +colored teacher, John Peterson. Here he +received a good education; but few boys +would have endured a daily trip of fourteen +miles. Increasingly parents, if the colored +school of their neighborhood was not of +the best, sent their boys and girls to be +instructed with the white boys and girls of +their district.</p> + +<p>The state law declared that any city or +incorporated village might establish separate +schools for the instruction of African +youths, provided the facilities were equal to +those of white schools, and when, in <a name="tn1" id="tn1"></a>1862, +a colored parent brought a case against the +city for forcing her child to go to a colored +school, the case was lost.<a name="FNanchor_7_6" id="FNanchor_7_6"></a><a href="#Footnote_7_6" class="fnanchor">[6]</a> Nevertheless, +during the nineteenth century Negroes in<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_17" id="Page_17">[Pg 17]</a></span> +some numbers attended white schools in +both Brooklyn and New York, and Negro +parents continued in their quiet but persistent +efforts against segregation. Then again, +New York grew too rapidly to segregate +any race. The Negro boys and girls were +scattered through many districts, and the attendance +at colored schools fell off; in 1879 +it was less than in 1878, and in 1880 less +than in 1879; so that the Board of Education +in 1883 decided to disestablish three +colored schools.</p> + +<p>But this involved another factor. If the +colored schools were disestablished, what +would become of the colored teachers? The +Negroes met this issue by delaying disestablishment +for a year, while the teachers +went about among the parents of the ward, +making friends and urging that children, +<i>white or colored</i>, be sent to their schools. +Numbers of new pupils of both races were +brought in within the year, and at the end +of the time, after a hearing before the +governor, then Grover Cleveland, a bill was +passed prohibiting the abolition of two of +the three colored schools, but also making<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_18" id="Page_18">[Pg 18]</a></span> +them open to all children regardless of +color.<a name="FNanchor_8_7" id="FNanchor_8_7"></a><a href="#Footnote_8_7" class="fnanchor">[7]</a></p> + +<p>Occasionally a colored girl graduated from +the normal college of the city, but if there +was no vacancy for her in the four colored +schools she received no appointment. In +1896, however, a normal graduate, Miss +S. E. Frazier, insisted upon her right to be +appointed as teacher in any school in which +there was a vacancy. She visited the ward +trustees and the members of the Board of +Education, and represented to them the +injustice done her and her race in refusing +her the chance to prove her ability as a +teacher in the first school that should need +a normal graduate. She was finally appointed +to a position in a white school. +Her success with her pupils was immediate, +and since then the question of race or color +has not been considered in the appointment +of teachers in New York.</p> + +<p>Until 1900, the state law permitted the +establishment of separate colored schools. +In that year, however, on the initiative +of Theodore Roosevelt, then governor, the<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_19" id="Page_19">[Pg 19]</a></span> +legislature passed a bill providing that no +person should be refused admission or be +excluded from any public school in the state +on account of race or color.<a name="FNanchor_9_8" id="FNanchor_9_8"></a><a href="#Footnote_9_8" class="fnanchor">[8]</a> This closed +the question of compulsory segregation in +the state, though before this it had ceased +in New York. Public education was thus +democratized for the New York Negroes, +their persistent efforts bringing at the end +complete success.</p> + +<p>While the colored people in New York +started with segregated schools and attained +to mixed schools, the movement in the +churches was the reverse. At first the +Negroes were attendants of white churches, +sitting in the gallery or on the rear seats, +and waiting until the white people were +through before partaking of the communion; +but as their number increased they chafed +under their position. Why should they be +placed apart to hear the doctrine of Christ, +and why, too, should they not have full +opportunity to preach that doctrine? The +desire for self-expression was perhaps the +greatest factor in leading them to separate<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_20" id="Page_20">[Pg 20]</a></span> +from the white church. In 1796 about +thirty Negroes, under the leadership of +James Varick,<a name="FNanchor_10_9" id="FNanchor_10_9"></a><a href="#Footnote_10_9" class="fnanchor">[9]</a> withdrew from the John +Street Methodist Episcopal Church, and +formed the first colored church of New York. +Varick had been denied a license to preach, +but now as pastor of his own people, he +was recognized by the whites and helped +by some of them. He was the founder +of the African Methodist Episcopal Zion +Church.</p> + +<p>The Abyssinian Baptist Church was organized +in 1800 by a few colored members who +withdrew from the First Baptist Church, +then in Gold Street, to establish themselves +on Worth Street,<a name="FNanchor_11_10" id="FNanchor_11_10"></a><a href="#Footnote_11_10" class="fnanchor">[10]</a> and in 1818 the colored +Episcopalians organized St. Philip's Church. +In 1820 one of their race, Peter Williams, +for six years deacon, became their preacher.</p> + +<p>Another prominent church was the colored +Congregational, situated, in 1854, on +Sixth Street; and it was the determined +effort of its woman organist to reach the +church in time to perform her part in the<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_21" id="Page_21">[Pg 21]</a></span> +Sunday morning service that led to an important +Negro advance in citizenship.</p> + +<p>In the middle of the last century the right +of the Negro to ride in car or omnibus +depended on the sufferance of driver, conductor, +and passenger. Sometimes a car +stopped at a Negro's signal, again the driver +whipped up his horses, while the conductor +yelled to the "nigger" to wait for the next +car. Entrance might always be effected if +in the company of a white person, and the +small child of a kindly white household +would be delegated to accompany the homeward +bound black visitor into her car where, +after a few minutes, conductor and passengers +having become accustomed to her +presence, the young protector might slip +away. Such a situation was very galling +to the self-respecting negro.</p> + +<p>In July, 1854, Elizabeth Jennings, a colored +school-teacher and organist at the Congregational +Church, attempted to board a +Third Avenue car at Pearl and Chatham +Streets. She was hurrying to reach the +church to perform her part in the service. +The conductor stopped, but as Miss Jen<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_22" id="Page_22">[Pg 22]</a></span>nings +mounted the platform, he told her that +she must wait for the next car, which was +reserved for her people. "I have no people," +Miss Jennings said. "I wish to go to church +as I have for six months past, and I do not +wish to be detained." The altercation continued +until the car behind came up, and the +driver there declaring that he had less room +than the car in front, the woman was grudgingly +allowed to enter the car. "Remember," +the conductor said, "if any passenger +objects, you shall go out, whether or no, or +I'll put you out."</p> + +<p>"I am a respectable person, born and +brought up in New York," said Miss Jennings, +"and I was never insulted so before."</p> + +<p>This again aroused the conductor. "I +was born in Ireland," he said, "and you've +got to get out of this car."</p> + +<p>He attempted to drag her out. The woman +clung to the window, the conductor called +in the driver to help him, and together they +dragged and pulled and at last threw her +into the street. Badly hurt, she nevertheless +jumped back into the car. The driver +galloped his horses down the street, passing<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_23" id="Page_23">[Pg 23]</a></span> +every one until a policeman was found who +pushed the woman out, not, however, until +she had taken the number of the car. She +then made her way home.</p> + +<p>Elizabeth Jennings took the case into court, +and it came before the Supreme Court of +the State in February, 1855, Chester A. +Arthur, afterwards President of the United +States, being one of the lawyers for the +plaintiff. The judge's charge was clear +on the point that common carriers were +bound to carry all respectable people, white +or colored, and the plaintiff was given $225 +damages, to which the court added ten per +cent and costs; and to quote the New York +<i>Tribune's</i> comment on the case,<a name="FNanchor_12_11" id="FNanchor_12_11"></a><a href="#Footnote_12_11" class="fnanchor">[11]</a> "Railroads, +steamboats, omnibuses, and ferryboats will +be admonished from this as to the rights of +respectable colored people."<a name="FNanchor_13_12" id="FNanchor_13_12"></a><a href="#Footnote_13_12" class="fnanchor">[12]</a></p> + +<p>When you talk with the elderly educated +colored people of New York today, they tell +you that before the War were "dark days." +The responsibility felt by the thoughtful<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_24" id="Page_24">[Pg 24]</a></span> +Negroes was very great. They had not only +their own battles to wage, but there were +the fugitives who were entering the city +by the Underground Railroad, whom they +must assist though it cost them their own +liberty. In 1835 a Vigilance Committee +was formed in New York City to take charge +of all escaping slaves, and also to prevent +the arrest and return to slavery of free men +of color. Colored men served on this Committee, +and its secretary was the minister +of the church to which Elizabeth Jennings +was endeavoring to make her way that +Sunday morning, the Reverend Charles B. +Ray. In 1850 the New York State Vigilance +Committee was formed with Gerritt +Smith as President and Ray as Secretary. +Ray's home was frequently used to shelter +fugitives.<a name="FNanchor_14_13" id="FNanchor_14_13"></a><a href="#Footnote_14_13" class="fnanchor">[13]</a> Once a young man, stepping up +to the door and learning that it was Charles +Ray's house, whistled to his companions in +the darkness, and fourteen black men made +their appearance and received shelter. There +would also come the task of negotiating for +the purchase of a slave, or this proving<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_25" id="Page_25">[Pg 25]</a></span> +impossible, for the careful working out of a +means for his escape. Dark days, indeed, +but made memorable to the Negro by heroic +work and the friendship of great men. +Perhaps the two races have never worked +together in such fine companionship as at +the unlawful and thrilling task of protecting +and aiding the fugitive.</p> + +<p>The hardest year of the century for the +Negro was 1863, when the draft riot imperilled +every dark face. Many Negroes +fled from the city. Colored homes were +fired, the Orphan Asylum for colored children +on Fifth Avenue was burned, and even +the dead might not be buried save at the +peril of undertaker and priest. Elizabeth +Jennings, now Mrs. Graham, lost a child +when the rioting was at its height. An +undertaker named Winterbottom, a white +man, was brave enough to give his services, +winning the lasting gratitude and patronage +of the colored people. With the danger +of violence about them, the father and +mother went to Greenwood Cemetery, where +the Reverend Morgan Dix of Trinity Church +read the burial service at the grave.</p><p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_26" id="Page_26">[Pg 26]</a></span></p> + +<p>With the end of the War and the passage +of the fourteenth and fifteenth amendments +came a revulsion of feeling for the race. +"I remember," an old time friend of the +Negro tells me, "when the fifteenth amendment +was passed. The colored people stood +in great numbers on the streets, and on their +faces was a look of gratitude and thanksgiving +that I shall never forget." Following +the amendment came the State Civil +Rights Bill in 1873, declaring that all persons +should be entitled to full and equal +accommodations in all public places; and +discrimination for a time largely ceased.</p> + +<p>While the colored people were winning +citizenship, their progress in industry was +also considerable. Until 1860 the race was +infrequently segregated, and black and white +were neighbors, not only in their homes, but +in business. Samuel R. Scottron, a careful +Negro writer, compiled a long list of the +trades in which Negroes engaged before +the War. Besides the various lines of domestic +service, in which they were more +frequently seen than today—coachmen, +cooks, waitresses, seamstresses, barbers<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_27" id="Page_27">[Pg 27]</a></span>—there +were many craftsmen, ship-builders, +trimmers, riggers, coopers, caulkers, printers, +tailors, carpenters. "Second-hand clothing +shops were everywhere kept by colored men. +All the caterers and restaurant keepers of +the high order, as well as small places, were +kept by colored men.... Varick and +Peters kept about the most pretentious barber +shop in the city. Patrick Reason was +one of the most capable engravers. The +greatest among the restaurateurs was +Thomas Downing, who kept a restaurant +under what is now the Drexel Building, +corner of Wall and Broad Streets. The +drug stores of Dr. James McCune Smith on +West Broadway, and Dr. Philip A. White +on Frankfort Street, were not outclassed by +any kept by white men in their day."<a name="FNanchor_15_14" id="FNanchor_15_14"></a><a href="#Footnote_15_14" class="fnanchor">[14]</a></p> + +<p>And so the list goes on. It is perhaps +somewhat exaggerated in the importance +in the city's business life which it gives to +the colored race. Charles Andrews, in 1837, +says of the pupil who graduates from his +school, "He leaves with every avenue closed +against him—doomed to encounter as much<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_28" id="Page_28">[Pg 28]</a></span> +prejudice and contempt as if he were not +only destitute of that education which distinguishes +the civilized from the savage, but +as if he were incapable of receiving it." +And he goes on to tell of those few who have +been able to learn trades, and their subsequent +difficulties in finding employment in +good shops. White journeymen object to +working in the same shop with them, and +many of the best lads go to sea or become +waiters, barbers, coachmen, servants, laborers. +But he is writing of an early date, +and the opinion of the colored people seems +to be that, before our large foreign immigration, +the Negro was more needed in New +York than today and received a large share +of satisfactory employment. His chief competitor +was the Irish immigrant, like himself +an agricultural laborer, without previous +training in business, and he was frequently +able to hold his own in his shop. His long +experience in domestic service, moreover, +made him a better caterer than the representatives +of any other nationality that had +yet entered the city. His churches were +flourishing, thus securing a profession for<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_29" id="Page_29">[Pg 29]</a></span> +which he had natural ability, and as we have +seen, colored men and women taught in the +New York schools.</p> + +<p>The city grew rapidly after 1875, and the +colored society, the little group that had +attained to modest means and education, +bought homes, chiefly in Brooklyn, where +land was easier to secure than in Manhattan, +and strove to enlarge the opportunities for +those who were to come after them. Color +prejudice had waned, and they often met +with especial consideration because of their +race. Had they been white they would +have slipped into the population and been +lost, as happened to the Germans and the +Irish, who had been their competitors. As +it was, they formed a society apart from the +rest of the city, meeting it occasionally in +work or through the friendship of children, +who, left to themselves, know no race. +They had battled against prejudice and had +won their rights as citizens.</p> + +<p>As we look at the life of a segregated +people, however, we see that we tend always +to regard not the individual but the group. +The Negro is a man in Europe, because<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_30" id="Page_30">[Pg 30]</a></span> +there he is an individual, standing or falling +by his own merits. But in America, +even in so cosmopolitan a city as New York, +he is judged, not by his own achievements, +but by the achievements of every other +New York black man. So we will leave +these able colored Americans, who won much +both for themselves and for their race, and +turn to the mass of the Negroes, the toiling +poor, who dwell in our tenements today.</p> + + +<div class="footnotes"><h3>FOOTNOTES:</h3> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_2_1" id="Footnote_2_1"></a><a href="#FNanchor_2_1"><span class="label">[1]</span></a> Daniel Horsmanden, "New York Conspiracy, or a History +of the Negro Plot."</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_3_2" id="Footnote_3_2"></a><a href="#FNanchor_3_2"><span class="label">[2]</span></a> James Grant Wilson, "History of New York," Vol. II, +p. 314.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_4_3" id="Footnote_4_3"></a><a href="#FNanchor_4_3"><span class="label">[3]</span></a> +</p> +<table summary="Population of New York from 1800 to 1900"> +<caption class="smcap"> +Population of New York from 1800 to 1900: Total and Negro. +</caption> +<tr><td colspan="4" class="tdc"> +BOROUGH OF MANHATTAN +</td></tr> +<tr> +<td /> +<td class="tdc"> Total </td> +<td class="tdc"> Negro </td> +<td class="tdc"> Percentage<br />of Negroes </td></tr> +<tr><td>1800</td><td class="tdr">60,515</td> +<td class="tdr">6,382</td><td class="tdr">10.5</td></tr> +<tr><td>1810</td><td class="tdr">96,373</td> +<td class="tdr">9,823</td><td class="tdr">10.2</td></tr> +<tr><td>1820</td><td class="tdr">123,706</td> +<td class="tdr">10,886</td><td class="tdr">8.8</td></tr> +<tr><td>1830</td><td class="tdr">202,589</td> +<td class="tdr">13,976</td><td class="tdr">6.9</td></tr> +<tr><td>1840</td><td class="tdr">312,710</td> +<td class="tdr">16,358</td><td class="tdr">5.2</td></tr> +<tr><td>1850</td><td class="tdr">515,547</td> +<td class="tdr">13,815</td><td class="tdr">2.7</td></tr> +<tr><td>1860</td><td class="tdr">805,658</td> +<td class="tdr">12,574</td><td class="tdr">1.6</td></tr> +<tr><td>1870</td><td class="tdr">942,292</td> +<td class="tdr">13,072</td><td class="tdr">1.5</td></tr> +<tr><td colspan="4" class="tdc"> +BOROUGHS OF MANHATTAN AND BRONX +</td></tr> +<tr><td>1880</td><td class="tdr">1,206,299</td> +<td class="tdr">19,663</td><td class="tdr">1.6</td></tr> +<tr><td>1890</td><td class="tdr">1,515,301</td> +<td class="tdr">23,601</td><td class="tdr">1.6</td></tr> +<tr><td>1900</td><td class="tdr">2,050,600</td> +<td class="tdr">38,616</td><td class="tdr">1.9</td></tr> +<tr><td colspan="4" class="tdc"> +GREATER NEW YORK +</td></tr> +<tr><td>1900</td><td>3,437,202</td><td class="tdr">60,666</td> +<td class="tdr">1.8</td></tr> +</table> +</div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_5_4" id="Footnote_5_4"></a><a href="#FNanchor_5_4"><span class="label">[4]</span></a> For a full account of the Negro's political status in New +York consult Charles Z. Lincoln's "Constitutional History of +New York."</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_6_5" id="Footnote_6_5"></a><a href="#FNanchor_6_5"><span class="label">[5]</span></a> Thomas Boese's "Public Education in the City of New +York," p. 227.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_7_6" id="Footnote_7_6"></a><a href="#FNanchor_7_6"><span class="label">[6]</span></a> King <i>v.</i> Gallagher, 1882.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_8_7" id="Footnote_8_7"></a><a href="#FNanchor_8_7"><span class="label">[7]</span></a> A. Emerson Palmer, "The New York Public School."</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_9_8" id="Footnote_9_8"></a><a href="#FNanchor_9_8"><span class="label">[8]</span></a> Laws of New York, Chapter 492.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_10_9" id="Footnote_10_9"></a><a href="#FNanchor_10_9"><span class="label">[9]</span></a> B. F. Wheeler, D.D., "The Varick Family."</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_11_10" id="Footnote_11_10"></a><a href="#FNanchor_11_10"><span class="label">[10]</span></a> Geo. H. Hansell, "Reminiscences of New York Baptists."</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_12_11" id="Footnote_12_11"></a><a href="#FNanchor_12_11"><span class="label">[11]</span></a> <i>New York Tribune</i>, February 23, 1855.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_13_12" id="Footnote_13_12"></a><a href="#FNanchor_13_12"><span class="label">[12]</span></a> "The Story of an Old Wrong," in <i>The American Woman's +Journal</i>, July, 1895.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_14_13" id="Footnote_14_13"></a><a href="#FNanchor_14_13"><span class="label">[13]</span></a> Life of the Reverend Charles B. Ray.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_15_14" id="Footnote_15_14"></a><a href="#FNanchor_15_14"><span class="label">[14]</span></a> <i>Colored American Magazine</i>, October, 1907.</p></div> +</div> + + +<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_31" id="Page_31">[Pg 31]</a></span></p> +<h2><a name="CHAPTER_II" id="CHAPTER_II">CHAPTER II</a><br /> +<span class="smcap">Where the Negro Lives</span></h2> + + +<p>It is thirty-five years since, in his Symphony, +Sidney Lanier told of</p> + +<blockquote> +<p> +<span style="margin-left: 14em;">"The poor</span><br /> +That stand by the inward opening door<br /> +Trade's hand doth tighten evermore,<br /> +And sigh their monstrous foul air sigh<br /> +For the outside hills of liberty." +</p> +</blockquote> + +<p>Were Lanier writing this today, we should +wonder whether New York's crowded tenements +had not served as inspiration for his +figure. The island of Manhattan, about +eight miles long by two miles wide, with an +additional slender triangle of five miles at +the north end, in 1905, housed two million +one hundred and twelve thousand people. +These men and women and children were not +scattered uniformly throughout the island, +but were placed in selected corners, one thousand +to the acre, while a mile or so away +large comfortable homes held families of two<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_32" id="Page_32">[Pg 32]</a></span> +or three. This was Manhattan's condition +in 1905, and with each succeeding year more +congestion takes place, and more pressure is +felt upon the inward opening door.<a name="FNanchor_16_1" id="FNanchor_16_1"></a><a href="#Footnote_16_1" class="fnanchor">[1]</a></p> + +<p>The Negro with the rest of the poor of +New York has his part in this excessive +overcrowding. The slaver in which he made +his entrance to this land provided in floor +space six feet by one-foot-four for a man, +five feet by one-foot-four for a woman, and +four feet by one-foot-four for a child.<a name="FNanchor_17_2" id="FNanchor_17_2"></a><a href="#Footnote_17_2" class="fnanchor">[2]</a> This +outdoes any overcrowding New York can +produce, but an ever increasing cost in food +and rent is bringing into her interior bedrooms +a mass of humanity approximating +that of the slaver's ship. These new-comers, +however, are not unwilling occupants, since +unlike the slaves they may spend their day +and much of their night amid an ocean of +changing and exciting incidents. If you are +young and strong, you care less where you +sleep than where you may spend your +waking hours.</p> + +<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_33" id="Page_33">[Pg 33]</a></span></p> +<p>From among the millions of New York's +poor, can we pick out the Negroes in their +tenements? This is not so difficult a task +as it would have proved fifty years ago when +the colored were scattered throughout the +city; today we find them confined to fairly +definite quarters. A black face on the lower +East Side is viewed with astonishment, while +on the middle West Side it is no more +noticeable than it would be in Atlanta or +New Orleans. Roughly we may count five +Negro neighborhoods in Manhattan: Greenwich +Village, the middle West Side, San +Juan Hill, the upper East, and the upper +West sides. Brooklyn has a large Negro +population, but it is more widely distributed +and less easily located than that of +Manhattan.</p> + +<p>Of the five Manhattan neighborhoods the +oldest is Greenwich Village, according to +Janvier once the most attractive part of +New York, where the streets "have a tendency +to sidle away from each other and to +take sudden and unreasonable turns." Here +one finds such fascinating names as Minetta +Lane and Carmine and Cornelia Streets.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_34" id="Page_34">[Pg 34]</a></span> +These and neighboring thoroughfares grow +daily more grimy, however, and no longer +merit Janvier's praise for cleanliness, moral +and physical. The picturesque, friendly old +houses are giving way to factories with high, +monotonous fronts, where foreigners work +who crowd the ward and destroy its former +American aspect.</p> + +<p>Among the old time aristocracy bearing +Knickerbocker names there are a few colored +people who delight in talking of the fine +families and past wealth of old Greenwich +Village. Scornful of the gibberish-speaking +Italians, they sigh, too, at their own race as +they see it, for the ambitious Negro has +moved uptown, leaving this section largely +to widowed and deserted women and degenerates. +The once handsome houses, altered +to accommodate many families, are rotten +and unwholesome, while the newer tenements +of West Third Street are darkened by the +elevated road, and shelter vice that knows +no race. Altogether, this is not a neighborhood +to attract the new-comer. Here alone +in New York I have found the majority of +the adults northern born, men and women<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_35" id="Page_35">[Pg 35]</a></span> +who, unsuccessful in their struggle with city +life, have been left behind in these old forgotten +streets.<a name="FNanchor_18_3" id="FNanchor_18_3"></a><a href="#Footnote_18_3" class="fnanchor">[3]</a></p> + +<p>The second section, north of the first, lies +between West Fourteenth and West Fifty-ninth +Streets, and Sixth Avenue and the +Hudson River. In 1880 this was the centre +of the Negro population, but business has +entered some of the streets, the Pennsylvania +Railroad has scooped out acres for its +terminal, and while the colored houses do<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_36" id="Page_36">[Pg 36]</a></span> +not diminish in number, they show no decided +increase. No one street is given over +to the Negro, but a row of two or three or +six or even eight tenements shelter the black +man. The shelter afforded is poorer than +that given the white resident whose dwelling +touches the black, the rents are a little +higher, and the landlord fails to pay attention +to ragged paper, or to a ceiling which +scatters plaster flakes upon the floor. In +the Thirties there are rear tenements reached +by narrow alley-ways. Crimes are committed +by black neighbor against black +neighbor, and the entrance to the rear yard +offers a tempting place for a girl to linger at +night. A rear tenement is New York's only +approach to the alley of cities farther south.</p> + +<p>There are startling and happy surprises in +all tenement neighborhoods, and I recall +turning one afternoon from a dark yard +into a large beautiful room. Muslin curtains +concealed the windows, the brass bed +was covered with a thick white counterpane, +and on either side of the fireplace, where +coal burned brightly in an open grate, were +two rare engravings. It was a workroom,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_37" id="Page_37">[Pg 37]</a></span> +and the mistress of the house, steady, capable, +and very black, was at her ironing-board. +By her sat the colored mammy of the story +book rocking lazily in her chair. She explained +to me that her daughter had found +her down south, two years ago, and brought +her to this northern home, where she had +nothing to do, for her daughter could make +fifty dollars a month. This home picture +was made lastingly memorable by the younger +woman's telling me softly as she went with +me to the door, "I was sold from my mother, +down in Georgia, when I was two years old. +I ain't sure she's my mother. <i>She</i> thinks so; +but I can't ever be sure."</p> + +<p>Homes beautiful both in appearance and +in spirit can rarely occur where people must +dwell in great poverty, but there are many +efforts at attractive family life on these +streets. A few of the blocks are orderly +and quiet. Thirty-seventh Street, between +Eighth and Ninth Avenues, is largely given +over to the colored and is rough and noisy. +Here and down by the river at Hell's Kitchen +the rioting in 1900 between the Irish and the +Negro took place. Men are ready for a<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_38" id="Page_38">[Pg 38]</a></span> +fight today, and the children see much of +hard drinking and quick blows.</p> + +<p>"The poorer the family, the lower is the +quarter in which it must live, and the more +enviable appears the fortune of the anti-social +class."<a name="FNanchor_19_4" id="FNanchor_19_4"></a><a href="#Footnote_19_4" class="fnanchor">[4]</a> A vicious world dwells in +these streets and makes notorious this section +of New York. For this is a part of the +Tenderloin district, and at night, after the +children's cries have ceased, and the fathers +and mothers who have worked hard during +the day have put out their lights, the automobiles +rush swiftly past, bearing the men +of the "superior race." Temptation is continuous, +and the child that grows up pure +in thought and deed does so in spite of his +surroundings.</p> + +<p>Before reaching West Fifty-ninth Street, +the beginning of our third district, we come +upon a Negro block at West Fifty-third +Street. When years ago the elevated railroad +was erected on this fashionable street, +white people began to sell out and rent to +Negroes; and today you find here three +colored hotels, the colored Young Men's and<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_39" id="Page_39">[Pg 39]</a></span> +Young Women's Christian Associations, the +offices of many colored doctors and lawyers, +and three large beautiful colored churches. +The din of the elevated drowns alike the +doctor's voice and his patient's, the client's +and the preacher's.</p> + +<p>From Fifty-ninth Street, walking north on +Tenth Avenue, we begin to ascend a hill +that grows in steepness until we reach Sixty-second +Street. The avenue is lined with +small stores kept by Italians and Germans, +but to the left the streets, sloping rapidly to +the Hudson River, are filled with tenements, +huge double deckers, built to within ten feet +of the rear of the twenty-five foot lot, accommodating +four families on each of the five +floors. We can count four hundred and +seventy-nine homes on one side of the street +alone!</p> + +<p>This is our third district, San Juan Hill, so +called by an on-looker who saw the policemen +charging up during one of the once +common race fights. It is a bit of Africa, as +Negroid in aspect as any district you are +likely to visit in the South. A large majority +of its residents are Southerners and<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_40" id="Page_40">[Pg 40]</a></span> +West Indians, and it presents an interesting +study of the Negro poor in a large northern +city. The block on Sixtieth Street has some +white residents, but the blocks on Sixty-first, +Sixty-second, and Sixty-third are given +over entirely to colored. On the square +made by the north side of Sixty-first, the +south side of Sixty-second Streets, and Tenth +and West End Avenues, 5.4 acres, the state +census of 1905 showed 6173 inhabitants.<a name="FNanchor_20_5" id="FNanchor_20_5"></a><a href="#Footnote_20_5" class="fnanchor">[5]</a> +All but a few of these must have been Negroes, +as the avenue sides of the block, occupied +by whites, are short and with low houses. +It is the long line of five-story tenements, +running eight hundred feet down the two +streets, that brings up the enumeration. +The dwellings on Sixty-first and Sixty-second +Streets are human hives, honeycombed with +little rooms thick with human beings. Bedrooms +open into air shafts that admit no<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_41" id="Page_41">[Pg 41]</a></span> +fresh breezes, only foul air carrying too often +the germs of disease.</p> + +<p>The people on the hill are known for their +rough behavior, their readiness to fight, their +coarse talk. Vice is abroad, not in insidious +form as in the more well-to-do neighborhood +farther north, but open and cheap. Boys +play at craps unmolested, gambling is prevalent, +and Negro loafers hang about the street +corners and largely support the Tenth Avenue +saloons.</p> + +<p>But San Juan Hill has many respectable +families, and within the past five years it has +taken a decided turn for the better. The +improvement has been chiefly upon Sixty-third +Street where two model tenements, one +holding one hundred, the other one hundred +and sixty-one families, have been opened +under the management of the City and +Suburban Homes Company, the larger one +having been erected by Mr. Henry Phipps. +Planning for a four per cent return on their +investment, these landlords have rented only +to respectable families, and their rule has +changed the character of the block.<a name="FNanchor_21_6" id="FNanchor_21_6"></a><a href="#Footnote_21_6" class="fnanchor">[6]</a> Old<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_42" id="Page_42">[Pg 42]</a></span> +houses have been remodelled to compete with +the newer dwellings, street rows have ceased, +and the police captain of the district, we are +told, now counts this as one of the peaceful +and law-abiding blocks of the city. When +its other blocks show a like improvement, +San Juan Hill will no longer merit its belligerent +name.</p> + +<p>The lower East Side of Manhattan, a many-storied +mass of tenements and workshops, +where immigrants labor and sleep in their +tiny crowded rooms, was once a fashionable +American district. At that time Negroes +dwelt near the whites as barbers, caterers, +and coachmen, as laundresses and waiting-maids. +But with the removal of the people +whom they served, the colored men and<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_43" id="Page_43">[Pg 43]</a></span> +women left also, and it is difficult to find an +African face among the hundreds of thousands +of Europeans south of Fourteenth +Street. On Pell Street, in the Chinese quarter, +there used to be two colored families on +friendly terms with their neighbors, who, +however, went uptown for their pleasures +and their church.</p> + +<p>It is not until we reach Third Avenue and +Forty-third Street that we come to the East +Side Negro tenement. From this point, +such houses run, a straggling line, chiefly +between Second and Third Avenues, to the +Bronx where the more well-to-do among the +colored live. At Ninety-seventh Street, and +on up to One Hundredth Street, dark faces +are numerous. About six hundred and fifty +Negro families live on these four streets and +around the corner on Third Avenue. Occasionally +they live in houses occupied by +Jews or Italians. Above this section there +are a number of Negro tenements in the One +Hundred and Thirties, between Madison +and Fifth Avenues—almost a West Side +neighborhood, since it adjoins the large +colored quarter to the west of Fifth Avenue.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_44" id="Page_44">[Pg 44]</a></span> +On the whole, the East Side is not often +sought by the colored as a place of residence. +Their important churches are in another part +of the city, and every New Yorker knows the +difficulty in making a way across Central +Park. Yet, the neighborhood is not uncivil +to them, and one rarely reads here of race +friction. Doubtless this is in part owing to +the smallness of the population, all of Manhattan +east of Fifth Avenue containing but +fourteen per cent of the apartments occupied +by colored in the city; but it is partly, too, +that Jews and Italians prove less belligerent +tenement neighbors than Irish.</p> + +<p>Five years ago, those of us who were interested +in the Negro poor continually heard of +their difficulty in securing a place to live. +Not only were they unable to rent in neighborhoods +suitable for respectable men and +women, but dispossession, caused perhaps by +the inroad of business, meant a despairing +hunt for any home at all. People clung to +miserable dwellings, where no improvements +had been made for years, thankful to have a +roof to shelter them. Yet all the time new-law +tenements were being built, and Gentile<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_45" id="Page_45">[Pg 45]</a></span> +and Jew were leaving their former apartments +in haste to get into these more attractive +dwellings. At length the Negro got his +chance; not a very good one, but something +better than New York had yet offered him—a +chance to follow into the houses left +vacant by the white tenants. Owing in part +to the energy of Negro real estate agents, in +part to rapid building operations, desirable +streets, near the subway and the elevated +railroad, were thrown open to the colored. +This Negro quarter, the last we have to note +and the newest, has been created in the past +eight years. When the Tenement House +Department tabulated the 1900 census figures +for the Borough of Manhattan, and +showed the nationalities and races on each +block, it found only 300 colored families in +a neighborhood that today accommodates +4473 colored families.<a name="FNanchor_22_7" id="FNanchor_22_7"></a><a href="#Footnote_22_7" class="fnanchor">[7]</a> This large increase +is on six streets, West Ninety-ninth, between +Eighth and Ninth Avenues, West One Hundred +and Nineteenth, between Seventh and +Eighth Avenues, and West One Hundred and<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_46" id="Page_46">[Pg 46]</a></span> +Thirty-third to One Hundred and Thirty-sixth +Streets, between Fifth and Seventh +Avenues, with a few houses between Seventh +and Eighth, and on Lenox Avenues. There +are colored tenements north and south of +this; and while these figures are correct +today,<a name="FNanchor_23_8" id="FNanchor_23_8"></a><a href="#Footnote_23_8" class="fnanchor">[8]</a> they may be wrong tomorrow, for +new tenements are continually given over to +the Negro people. Moreover, on all of these +streets are colored boarding and lodging +houses, crowded with humanity. Houses +today fall into the hands of the Negro as a +child's blocks, placed on end, tumble when +a push is given to the first in the line. The +New York <i>Times</i>, in August, 1905, gives a +graphic account of the entrance of the +colored tenant on West Ninety-ninth Street. +Two houses had been opened for a short time +to Negroes when the other house-owners +capitulated, and the colored influx came: +"The street was so choked with vehicles +Saturday that some of the drivers had to +wait with their teams around the corners for +an opportunity to get into it. A constant +stream of furniture trucks loaded with the<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_47" id="Page_47">[Pg 47]</a></span> +household effects of a new colony of colored +people who are invading the choice locality +is pouring into the street. Another equally +long procession, moving in the other direction, +is carrying away the household goods +of the whites from their homes of years." +The movement is not always so swift as this, +but it is continuous.</p> + +<p>This last colored neighborhood perhaps +ought not to be spoken of as belonging to the +poor; not to Lanier's poor whose door pressed +so tighteningly inward. Here are homes +where it is possible, with sufficient money, +to live in privacy, and with the comforts of +steam heat and a private bath. But rents +are high, and if money is scarce, the apartment +must be crowded and privacy lost. +Moreover, vice has made its way into these +newly acquired streets. The sporting class +will always pay more and demand fewer +improvements than the workers, and, unable +to protect himself, the respectable tenant +finds his children forced to live in close +propinquity to viciousness. Each of these +new streets has this objectionable element in +its population, for while some agents make<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_48" id="Page_48">[Pg 48]</a></span> +earnest efforts to keep the property they +handle respectable, they find the owner wants +money more than respectability.</p> + +<p>In our walk up and down Manhattan, +turning aside and searching for Negro-tenanted +streets, we ought to see one thing +with clearness—that the majority of the +colored population live on a comparatively +few blocks. This is a new and important +feature of their New York life, and in certain +parts of the city it develops a color problem, +for while you seem an inappreciable quantity +when you constitute two per cent of the +population in the borough, you are of importance +when you form one hundred per cent +of the population of your street. This congestion +is accompanied by a segregation of +the race. The dwellers in these tenements +are largely new-comers, men and women +from the South and the West Indies,<a name="FNanchor_24_9" id="FNanchor_24_9"></a><a href="#Footnote_24_9" class="fnanchor">[9]</a> seeking +the North for greater freedom and +for economic opportunity. Like any other<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_49" id="Page_49">[Pg 49]</a></span> +strangers they are glad to make their home +among familiar faces, and they settle in the +already crowded places on the West Side. +Freedom to live on the East Side next door +to a Bohemian family may be very well, but +sociability is better. The housewife who timidly +hangs her clothes on the roof her first +Monday morning in New York is pleased +to find the next line swinging with the laundry +of a Richmond acquaintance, who instructs +her in the perplexing housekeeping +devices of her flat. No chattering foreigner +could do that. And while to be welcome in +a white church is inspiring, to find the girl +you knew at home, in the next pew to you, is +still more delightful when you have arrived, +tired and homesick, at the great city of New +York. So the colored working people, like +the Italians and Jews and other nationalities, +have their quarter in which they live very +much by themselves, paying little attention +to their white neighbors. If the white +people of the city have forced this upon +them, they have easily accepted it. Should +this two per cent of the population be compelled +to distribute itself mathematically<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_50" id="Page_50">[Pg 50]</a></span> +over the city, each ward and street having its +correct quota, it would evince dissatisfaction. +This is not true of the well-to-do +element, but of the mass of the Negro +workers whose homes we have been visiting. +Loving sociability, these new-comers to the +city—and it is in the most segregated districts +that the greater number of southern +and British born Negroes are found—keep +to their own streets and live to themselves. +If they occupy all the sidewalk as they talk +over important matters in front of their +church, the outsider passing should recognize +that he is an intruder and take to the curb. +He would leave the sidewalk entirely were +he on Hester Street or Mulberry Bend. +New-comers to New York usually segregate, +and the Negro is no exception.</p> + +<p>While congestion and segregation seem +important to us as we look at these colored +quarters, I suspect that the matter most +pertinent to the Negro new-comer is, not +where he will live nor how he will live, but +whether he will be able to live in New York +at all, whether he can meet the landlord's +agent the day he comes to the door. For<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_51" id="Page_51">[Pg 51]</a></span> +New York rents have mounted upwards as +have her tenements. The Phipps model +houses, built especially to benefit the poor, +charge twenty-five dollars a month for four +tiny rooms and bath; and while this is a +little more than the dark old time rooms +would bring, it takes about all of the twenty-five +dollars you make running an elevator, to +get a flat in New York. What wonder that, +once secured, it is overrun with lodgers, or +that, if privacy is maintained, there is not +enough money left to feed and clothe the +growing household. The once familiar song +of the colored comedian still rings true in +New York:</p> + +<blockquote> +<p> +"Rufus Rastus Johnson Brown,<br /> +What you gwine ter do when de rent comes roun'?" +</p> +</blockquote> + + +<div class="footnotes"><h3>FOOTNOTES:</h3> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_16_1" id="Footnote_16_1"></a><a href="#FNanchor_16_1"><span class="label">[1]</span></a> Harold M. Finley in <i>Federation</i>, May, 1908.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_17_2" id="Footnote_17_2"></a><a href="#FNanchor_17_2"><span class="label">[2]</span></a> Thomas Clarkson, "History of the Abolition of the Slave +Trade," p. 378.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_18_3" id="Footnote_18_3"></a><a href="#FNanchor_18_3"><span class="label">[3]</span></a></p> +<p> +Place of birth of 1036 New York Negro tenement dwellers. +These figures were obtained chiefly from personal visits: +</p> +<table class="ruled" summary="Place of birth of 1036 New York Negro tenement dwellers."> +<tr class="bb"> +<td /> +<td>Totals</td><td class="tdc">East Side</td><td class="tdc">Greenwich Village</td><td class="tdc">Middle West Side</td><td class="tdc">San Juan Hill</td><td class="tdc">Upper West Side +</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tdl">New England</td><td class="tdr">18</td><td class="tdr">1</td><td class="tdr">4</td><td class="tdr">7</td><td class="tdr">5</td><td class="tdr">1</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tdl">West</td><td class="tdr">11</td><td class="tdr">1</td><td class="tdr">0</td><td class="tdr">5</td><td class="tdr">4</td><td class="tdr">1</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tdl">New York</td><td class="tdr">157</td><td class="tdr">6</td><td class="tdr">47</td><td class="tdr">42</td><td class="tdr">55</td><td class="tdr">7</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tdl">New Jersey</td><td class="tdr">18</td><td class="tdr">1</td><td class="tdr">4</td><td class="tdr">3</td><td class="tdr">9</td><td class="tdr">1</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tdl">Pennsylvania</td><td class="tdr">19</td><td class="tdr">0</td><td class="tdr">3</td><td class="tdr">3</td><td class="tdr">12</td><td class="tdr">1</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tdl">Maryland</td><td class="tdr">37</td><td class="tdr">1</td><td class="tdr">0</td><td class="tdr">6</td><td class="tdr">27</td><td class="tdr">3</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tdl">District of Columbia</td><td class="tdr">26</td><td class="tdr">0</td><td class="tdr">1</td><td class="tdr">5</td><td class="tdr">16</td><td class="tdr">4</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tdl">Virginia</td><td class="tdr">375</td><td class="tdr">8</td><td class="tdr">15</td><td class="tdr">71</td><td class="tdr">244</td><td class="tdr">37</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tdl">Carolinas</td><td class="tdr">217</td><td class="tdr">6</td><td class="tdr">16</td><td class="tdr">64</td><td class="tdr">127</td><td class="tdr">4</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tdl">Gulf States</td><td class="tdr">65</td><td class="tdr">0</td><td class="tdr">2</td><td class="tdr">23</td><td class="tdr">39</td><td class="tdr">1</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tdl">Canada</td><td class="tdr">2</td><td class="tdr">0</td><td class="tdr">1</td><td class="tdr">1</td><td class="tdr">0</td><td class="tdr">0</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tdl">West Indies</td><td class="tdr">87</td><td class="tdr">1</td><td class="tdr">6</td><td class="tdr">13</td><td class="tdr">67</td><td class="tdr">0</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tdl">Europe</td><td class="tdr">4</td><td class="tdr">0</td><td class="tdr">1</td><td class="tdr">0</td><td class="tdr">3</td><td class="tdr">0</td></tr> +<tr class="bt"> +<td /><td class="tdr">1036</td><td class="tdr">25</td><td class="tdr">100</td><td class="tdr">243</td><td class="tdr">608</td><td class="tdr">60</td> +</tr> +</table></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_19_4" id="Footnote_19_4"></a><a href="#FNanchor_19_4"><span class="label">[4]</span></a> S. N. Patten, "New Basis of Civilization," p. 52.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_20_5" id="Footnote_20_5"></a><a href="#FNanchor_20_5"><span class="label">[5]</span></a> Some doubt is cast upon this figure. The New York +Health Department in an enumeration of its own, in 1905, +found a population of 3833. There is no question, however, +of the great congestion of this block and the one north and +south of it. The erection of new tenements has gone on +rapidly since 1905, sweeping away the children's playgrounds, +and making this one of the most crowded centres of New +York.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_21_6" id="Footnote_21_6"></a><a href="#FNanchor_21_6"><span class="label">[6]</span></a> Too much cannot be said of the beneficial effect of good +housing in a colored neighborhood, when under such able +management as the City and Suburban Homes Company. +Decent homes under competent management are absolutely +necessary to an improvement in the Negro quarters of Manhattan +and of Brooklyn as well. I can speak with some +authority of the good done by the Phipps houses on West +Sixty-third Street, as I lived, for eight months, the only white +tenant in the one hundred and sixty-one apartments. Church +and philanthropy had done and are doing excellent work on +these blocks, but a sudden and marked improvement came +from good housing, from the building of clean, healthful +homes for law-abiding people.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_22_7" id="Footnote_22_7"></a><a href="#FNanchor_22_7"><span class="label">[7]</span></a> The Tenement House Department tabulated the number +of Negro families living in tenements on these streets. I have +counted the number of flats rented to colored people.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_23_8" id="Footnote_23_8"></a><a href="#FNanchor_23_8"><span class="label">[8]</span></a> July 15, 1910.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_24_9" id="Footnote_24_9"></a><a href="#FNanchor_24_9"><span class="label">[9]</span></a> The yearly arrivals of "African blacks" at the port of +New York, secured from the Immigration Commissioner, +are as follows: 1902-03, 110; 1903-04, 547; 1904-05, 1189; +1905-06, 1757; 1906-07, 2054; 1907-08, 1820; 1908-09, +2119. The year runs from July 1 to June 30.</p></div></div> + + + +<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_52" id="Page_52">[Pg 52]</a></span></p> +<h2><a name="CHAPTER_III" id="CHAPTER_III">CHAPTER III</a><br /> +<span class="smcap">The Child of the Tenement</span></h2> + + +<p>Within the last few years white Americans, +many of whom were formerly ignorant +of their condition, have been taught that +they are possessed of a racial antipathy for +human beings whose color is not their own. +They have a "natural contrariety," "a dislike +that seems constitutional" toward the +dark tint that they see on another's face. +But however well they may have conned +their lesson, it breaks down or is likely to be +forgotten in the presence of a Negro baby; +for a healthy colored baby is a subject, not +for natural contrariety, but for sympathetic +cuddling. They are most engaging new-comers, +these "delicate bronze statuettes,"<a name="FNanchor_25_1" id="FNanchor_25_1"></a><a href="#Footnote_25_1" class="fnanchor">[1]</a> +only warm with life, and smiling good will +upon their world.</p> + +<p>Not many colored babies are born in New +York, at least not enough to keep pace with<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_53" id="Page_53">[Pg 53]</a></span> +the deaths. The year 1908 saw in all the +boroughs 1973 births as against 2212 deaths +at all ages.<a name="FNanchor_26_2" id="FNanchor_26_2"></a><a href="#Footnote_26_2" class="fnanchor">[2]</a></p> + +<p>In this same year the colored births for +Manhattan and the Bronx were 1459, and +the deaths under one year of age 424, an +infant mortality rate of 290 to every thousand.<a name="FNanchor_27_3" id="FNanchor_27_3"></a><a href="#Footnote_27_3" class="fnanchor">[3]</a> +That is, two babies in every seven +died under one year of age. The white +infant mortality rate was 127.7, a little less +than half that of the colored.</p> + +<p>Why should we have in New York this +enormous colored infant death rate? Many +physicians believe it indicates a lack of +physical stamina in the Negro, an inability +to resist disease. This may be so, but before +falling back upon race as an explanation of +high infant mortality, we need to exhaust +other possible causes. We do not question +the vitality of the white race when we read<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_54" id="Page_54">[Pg 54]</a></span> +that in parts of Russia 500 babies out of +every thousand die within the year; nor do +we believe the people of Fall River, a factory +town in Massachusetts, have an inherent +inability to resist disease, though their +infant mortality rate in 1900 was 260 in +one thousand births. We look in these +latter cases, as we should in the former, to +see if we find those conditions which careful +students of the subject tell us accompany +a high infant death rate.</p> + +<p>Among the first of the accepted causes +of infant mortality is the overcrowding of +cities. We have viewed overcrowding as +a usual condition among the Negroes of +New York, and have seen the small, ill-ventilated +bedroom where the baby spends +much of its life. Heat, with its accompanying +growth of bacteria and swift process +of decomposition, is a second cause. New +York's high infant mortality comes in the +summer months when in the poorest quarters +it has been known to reach four hundred +in the thousand.<a name="FNanchor_28_4" id="FNanchor_28_4"></a><a href="#Footnote_28_4" class="fnanchor">[4]</a> In the hot, crowded<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_55" id="Page_55">[Pg 55]</a></span> +tenements, and no place can be so hot as +New York in one of its July record-breaking +weeks, the babies die like flies, and yet +not like flies, for the flies buzz in hundreds +about the little hot faces. Excitement, +late hours, constant restlessness, these, too, +cause infant mortality. On a city block +tenanted by hundreds of men and women +and little children, no hour of the night is +free from some disturbance. Children whimper +as they wake from the heat, babies cry +shrilly, and the brightly-lighted streets are +rarely without the sound of human footsteps. +The sensitive new-born organism +knows nothing of the quiet and restful darkness +of nature's night.</p> + +<p>But the most important cause of infant +mortality<a name="FNanchor_29_5" id="FNanchor_29_5"></a><a href="#Footnote_29_5" class="fnanchor">[5]</a> is improper infant feeding. And +here we meet with a condition that confronts +the Negro babies of New York far more +than it confronts the white. For a properly +fed baby is a breast fed baby, or else one +whose food has been prepared with great +care, and mothers forced by necessity to go<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_56" id="Page_56">[Pg 56]</a></span> +out to work, cannot themselves give their +babies this proper food. It is among the +infants of mothers at work that mortality is +high. Mr. G. Newman, an English authority +on this subject, gives an interesting example +of this in Lancashire, where, during +the American civil war, many of the cotton +operatives were out of employment and +many more worked only half time. Privation +was great. A quarter of the mill hands +were in receipt of poor relief, the general +death rate increased, but <i>the infant mortality +rate decreased</i>. The mothers, forced by circumstances +to remain away from the factory, +though in a state of semi-starvation, by +their nursing and by their care of the home +preserved the lives of their infants. Negro +mothers, owing to the low wage earned by +their husbands, for the general welfare of the +family and to avoid semi-starvation, like the +Lancashire women, leave their homes, but +they thereby sacrifice the lives of many of +their babies. The percentage for 1900 of +Negro married women in New York engaging +in self-supporting work was 31.4 in every +hundred; of white married women 4.2 in<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_57" id="Page_57">[Pg 57]</a></span> +every hundred, seven times as many in proportion +among the Negroes as among the +whites.<a name="FNanchor_30_6" id="FNanchor_30_6"></a><a href="#Footnote_30_6" class="fnanchor">[6]</a> The Negro also shows a large percentage +of widows, a quarter of all the female +population over ten years of age. Some of +these, we have no means of knowing how +many, are widows only in name, and have +babies for whom they must in some way provide +support. The colored mother who has +no husband often takes a position in domestic +service and boards her baby, paying usually +by the month, and finding the opportunity +to visit her infant perhaps once a week. +Sometimes she secures a "baby tender" who +can give kindly, intelligent care; but under +the best conditions her child will be bottle +fed and in tenement surroundings inimical +to health, while sometimes the woman to +whom she intrusts her infant will be ignorant +of the simplest matters of hygiene.</p> + +<p>I remember an old colored woman, she +must be dead by this time, who kept a baby +farm. Her health was poor, and when I +saw her, she had taken to her bed and lay<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_58" id="Page_58">[Pg 58]</a></span> +in a dark room with two infants at her side. +They were indescribably puny, with sunken +cheeks and skinny arms and hands, weighing +what a normal child should weigh at +birth, and yet six and seven months old. +The woman talked to me enthusiastically +of salvation and gave filthy bottles to her +charges. She was exceptionally incompetent, +but there are others doing her work, +too old or too ignorant properly to attend +to the babies under their care.</p> + +<p>Mothers who go out to day's-work are +also unable to nurse their babies or to prepare +all their food. The infant is placed +in the care of some neighbor or of a growing +daughter, who may be the impatient "little +mother" of a number of charges. When the +hot summer comes, such a baby is likely to +fall the victim of epidemic diarrhœa, caused +by pollution of the milk. Newman has a +striking chart of infant death rates in Paris +in which he pictures a rate mounting in +one week as high as 256 in the thousand +among the artificially fed infants, while for +the same week, among the breast fed babies, +the mortality is 32. The Negro mother,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_59" id="Page_59">[Pg 59]</a></span> +seeking self-support by keeping clean another's +house or caring for another's children, +finds her own offspring swiftly taken +from her by a disease that only her nourishing +care could forestall.<a name="FNanchor_31_7" id="FNanchor_31_7"></a><a href="#Footnote_31_7" class="fnanchor">[7]</a></p> + +<p>Remedial measures have for some time +been taken in New York to check infant +mortality, and they have met with some +success. The distribution of pasteurized +milk by Mr. Nathan Straus, the establishment +of milk stations during the summer +months in New York and Brooklyn where +mothers at slight cost may secure proper +infant food, and where much educative +work is done by the visiting nurse, the multiplication +of day nurseries, all these have +helped to decrease the death rate. The +Negroes have been benefited by these remedial +agencies, but their percentage of 290 +is still a matter for grave attention.</p> + +<p>Two out of seven of New York's Negro +babies die in the first year, but the other +five grow up, some with puny arms and<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_60" id="Page_60">[Pg 60]</a></span> +ricketty legs, others again too hardy for +bad food or bad air to harm.</p> + +<p>Like the babies these children suffer from +their mother's absence at work. Family +ties are loose, and more than other children +they are handicapped by lack of proper +home care. In an examination of the records +of the Children's Court for three years +I found that out of 717 arraignments of +colored children, 221 were for improper +guardianship, 30.8 per cent of the whole. +Among the Russian children of the East +Side, Tenth and Eleventh Wards, only +15 per cent of arraignments were on this +complaint, indicating twice as many children +without parental care among the colored +as among the children of the Tenth and +Eleventh Wards. Rough colored girls, also, +whose habits were too depraved to permit of +their remaining without restraint, were frequently +committed to reformatories.</p> + +<p>Truancy is not uncommon in colored +neighborhoods, though few cases come before +the courts. Sometimes the boy or girl is +kept at home to care for the younger children, +but again, lacking the mother's over<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_61" id="Page_61">[Pg 61]</a></span>sight, +he remains on the street when he +should be in school, or arrives late with ill +prepared lessons.</p> + +<p>Asking a teacher of long experience among +colored and white children concerning their +respective scholarship, he assured me that +the colored child could do as well as the +white, but didn't. "From 20 to 50 per +cent of the mothers of my colored children," +he said, "go out to work. There is +no one to oversee the child's tasks, and +consequently little conscientious study."</p> + +<p>One can scarcely blame the children; and +certainly one cannot blame the mothers for +toiling for their support. And the fathers, +though they work faithfully, are rarely +able to earn enough unaided to support their +families. Perhaps in time the city may improve +matters by opening its school-rooms +for a study period in the afternoon.</p> + +<p>But meanwhile the children are without +proper care. This is not hard to endure in +the summer, but in winter it is very trying +to be without a home. Poor little cold +boys and girls, some of them mere babies! +You see them in the late afternoon sitting<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_62" id="Page_62">[Pg 62]</a></span> +on the tenement stairs, waiting for the long +day to be done. It seems a week since +they were inside eating their breakfast. +The city has not pauperized them with a +luncheon, and they have had only cold food +since morning. Sometimes they have been +all day without nourishment. When the +door is opened at last, there are many helpful +things for them to do for their mother, +and reading and arithmetic are relegated +to so late an hour that their problem is +only temporarily solved by sleep.</p> + +<p>Not all the colored working women, however, +go out for employment. Laundry +work is an important home industry, and +one may watch many mothers at their +tubs or ironing-boards from Monday morning +until Saturday night. This makes the +tenement rooms, tiny enough at best, sadly +cluttered, but it does not deprive the children +of the presence of their mother, who +accepts a smaller income to remain at home +with them. For after we have made full +allowance for the lessening of family ties +among the Negroes by social and economic +pressure, we find that the majority of the<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_63" id="Page_63">[Pg 63]</a></span> +colored boys and girls receive a due share +of proper parental oversight. They are +fed on appetizing food, cleanly and prettily +dressed, they are encouraged to study +and to improve their position, and they +are given all the advantages that it is possible +for their mothers and fathers to +secure.</p> + +<p>Jack London tells in the "Children of +the Abyss" of the East Side of London, +where "they have dens and lairs into which +to crawl for sleeping purposes, and that is +all. One can not travesty the word by +calling such dens and lairs 'homes.'" I +have seen thousands of Negro dwelling-places, +but I cannot think of half a dozen, +however great their poverty, where this +description would be correct. No matter +how dingy the tenement, or how long the +hours of work, the mother, and the father, +too, try to make the "four walls and a +ceiling" to which they return, home. Visitors +among the New York poor, in the past +and in the present, testify that given the +same income or lack of income, the colored +do not allow their surroundings to become<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_64" id="Page_64">[Pg 64]</a></span> +so cheerless or so filthy as the white, and +that when there is an opportunity for the +mother to spend some time in the house, +the rooms take on an air of pleasant refinement. +Pictures decorate the walls, the sideboard +contains many pretty dishes, and the +table is set three times a day. Meals are not +eaten out of the paper bag common on New +York's East Side, but there is something of +formality about the dinner, and good table +manners are taught the children. The tenement +dwelling becomes a home, and the +boys and girls pass a happy childhood in +it.</p> + +<p>Watching the colored children for many +months in their play and work, I have +looked for possible distinctive traits. The +second generation of New Yorkers greatly +resembles the "Young America" of all nationalities +of the city, shrill-voiced, disrespectful, +easily diverted, whether at work +or at play, shrewd, alert, and mischievous—the +New York street child. I remember +once helping with a club of eight boys where +seven nationalities were represented, and +where no one could have distinguished Irish<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_65" id="Page_65">[Pg 65]</a></span> +from German or Jew from Italian, with his +eyes shut. Had a Negro been brought up +among them he would quickly have taken +on their ways. Of the colored children who +model their lives after their mischievous +young white neighbors, many outdo the +whites in depravity and lawlessness; but +among the boys and girls who live by themselves, +as on San Juan Hill, one sees occasional +interesting traits.</p> + +<p>The records of the Children's Court of +New York (Boroughs of Manhattan and +the Bronx) throw a little light on this matter, +and are sufficiently important to quote +with some fulness. For the three years +studied, 1904, 1905, 1906, I tabulated the +cases of the colored children brought before +the court, and also the cases of the children +of the Tenth and Eleventh Wards, chiefly +Hungarians and Russian Jews, expecting to +find, in two such dissimilar groups, interesting +comparisons. The following table +shows the result of this study. The court +in its annual report gives the figures for the +total number of arrests which I have incorporated +in my table:</p> +<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_66" id="Page_66">[Pg 66]</a></span></p> + +<table class="ruled" +summary="Record of Arrests in Children's Court of Manhattan +and the Bronx for 1904, 1905, 1906"> +<caption class="smcap">Record of Arrests in Children's Court of Manhattan +and the Bronx for 1904, 1905, 1906</caption> +<tr class="bb"><td class="nobottom" /> +<td colspan="2" class="tdc">Negro Arrests</td> +<td colspan="2" class="tdc">10th and 11th Wards Arrests</td> +<td colspan="2" class="tdc">Total arrests for all children in Manhattan and Bronx</td> +</tr> +<tr class="bb"><td /> +<td class="tdc">No. of children</td> +<td class="tdc">Arrests per cent</td> +<td class="tdc">No. of children</td> +<td class="tdc">Arrests per cent</td> +<td class="tdc">No. of children</td> +<td class="tdc">Arrests per cent</td> +</tr> +<tr><td class="tdl">Petit larceny</td> +<td class="tdr">56</td><td class="tdr">7.8</td><td class="tdr">139</td><td class="tdr">6.8</td><td class="tdr">2,697</td><td class="tdr">10.1</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tdl">Grand larceny</td> +<td class="tdr">27</td><td class="tdr">3.8</td><td class="tdr">108</td><td class="tdr">5.3</td><td class="tdr">878</td><td class="tdr">3.3</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tdl">Burglary--Robbery</td> +<td class="tdr">27</td><td class="tdr">3.8</td><td class="tdr">116</td><td class="tdr">5.7</td><td class="tdr">1,383</td><td class="tdr">5.2</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tdl">Assault</td> +<td class="tdr">27</td><td class="tdr">3.8</td><td class="tdr">61</td><td class="tdr">3.0</td><td class="tdr">669</td><td class="tdr">2.5</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tdl">Improper guardianship</td> +<td class="tdr">221</td><td class="tdr">30.8</td><td class="tdr">305</td><td class="tdr">15.0</td><td class="tdr">6,386</td><td class="tdr">23.9</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tdl">Disorderly child--ungovernable child</td> +<td class="tdr">90</td><td class="tdr">12.6</td><td class="tdr">124</td><td class="tdr">6.1</td><td class="tdr">1,980</td><td class="tdr">7.4</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tdl">Depraved girl</td> +<td class="tdr">33</td><td class="tdr">4.6</td><td class="tdr">21</td><td class="tdr">1.1</td><td class="tdr">312</td><td class="tdr">1.2</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tdl">Violation of labor law</td> +<td class="tdr">0</td><td class="tdr">0.0</td><td class="tdr">73</td><td class="tdr">3.5</td><td class="tdr">592</td><td class="tdr">2.1</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tdl">Unlicensed peddling<a name="FNanchor_32_8" id="FNanchor_32_8"></a><a href="#Footnote_32_8" class="fnanchor">[8]</a></td> +<td class="tdr">0</td><td class="tdr">0.0</td><td class="tdr">130</td><td class="tdr">6.4</td><td class="tdr">0</td><td class="tdr">0.0</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tdl">Truancy</td> +<td class="tdr">5</td><td class="tdr">0.7</td><td class="tdr">23</td><td class="tdr">1.0</td><td class="tdr">298</td><td class="tdr">1.1</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tdl">Malicious mischief</td> +<td class="tdr">1</td><td class="tdr">0.1</td><td class="tdr">9</td><td class="tdr">0.4</td><td class="tdr">179</td><td class="tdr">0.7</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tdl">Violation of Park Corporation ordinances</td> +<td class="tdr">0</td><td class="tdr">0.0</td><td class="tdr">25</td><td class="tdr">1.2</td><td class="tdr">175</td><td class="tdr">0.7</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tdl">Mischief, including craps, throwing stones, +building bonfires, fighting, etc.</td> +<td class="tdr">214</td><td class="tdr">29.8</td><td class="tdr">896</td><td class="tdr">43.7</td><td class="tdr">10,267</td><td class="tdr">38.4</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tdl">Unclassified felonies, misdemeanors</td> +<td class="tdr">13</td><td class="tdr">1.8</td><td class="tdr">16</td><td class="tdr">0.7</td><td class="tdr">799</td><td class="tdr">3.0</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tdl">All others</td> +<td class="tdr">3</td><td class="tdr">0.4</td><td class="tdr">3</td><td class="tdr">0.1</td><td class="tdr">90</td><td class="tdr">0.4</td></tr> +<tr class="bt"><td /><td class="tdr">717</td><td class="tdr">100.0</td><td class="tdr">2049</td><td class="tdr">100.0</td><td class="tdr">26,705</td><td class="tdr">100.0</td></tr> +</table> +<blockquote><p> +Percentage of Negro to total, 1904-1907 2.7<br /> +Percentage of Negro to total, 1907-1910 1.9<br /> +</p></blockquote> +<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_67" id="Page_67">[Pg 67]</a></span></p> +<p>Our table shows us that which we have +already noted, the high percentage of improper +guardianship among the Negroes and +the grave number of depraved Negro girls. +For the sins of petit larceny, grand larceny, +and burglary, putting the three together, +the colored child shows a slightly smaller +percentage than the East Side white, a +noticeably smaller percentage than the total +number of children. The sin of theft is +often swiftly attributed to a black face, but +this percentage indicates that the colored +child has no "innate tendency" to steal. +Ten per cent of the arrests among the East +Side children are for unlicensed peddling +and violation of the labor law, but no little +Negro boys plunge into the business world +before their time. They have no keen commercial +sense to lead them to undertake +transactions on their own account, and they +are not desired by purchasers of boy labor +in the city.</p> + +<p>The most important heading, numerically,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_68" id="Page_68">[Pg 68]</a></span> +is that of mischief, and here the Negro falls +far behind the Eastsider, behind the average +for the whole. While depravity among +the girls and improper guardianship are the +race's most serious defects, as shown by the +arrests among its children in New York, +tractability and a decent regard for law are +among its merits. The colored child, especially +if he is in a segregated neighborhood, +is not greatly inclined to mischief. My own +experience has shown me that life in a tenement +on San Juan Hill is devoid of the ingenious, +exasperating deviltry of an Irish or +German-American neighborhood. No daily +summons calls one to the door only to hear +wildly scurrying footsteps on the stairs. +Mail boxes are left solely for the postman's +use, and hallways are not defaced by obscene +writing. There is plenty of crap shooting, +rarely interfered with by the police, but there +is little impertinent annoyance or destructiveness.</p> + +<p>An observer, watching the little colored +boys and girls as they play on the city streets, +finds much that is attractive and pleasant. +They sing their songs, learned at school and<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_69" id="Page_69">[Pg 69]</a></span> +on the playground, fly their kites, spin their +tops, run their races. They usually finish +what they begin, not turning at the first +interruption to take up something else. +They move more deliberately than most +children, and their voices are slower to adopt +the New York screech than those of their +Irish neighbors on the block above them. +Altogether they are attractive children, +particularly the smaller ones, who are more +energetic than their big brothers and sisters. +Good manners are often evident. +While receiving an afternoon call from two +girls, aged four and five, I was invited by +the older to partake of half a peanut, the +other half of which she split in two and generously +shared with her companion. "Gim'me +five cents," I once heard a Negro boy of +twelve say to his mother who walked past +him on the street. She did not seem to +hear, but the boy's companion, a youth of +the same age, reproved him severely for +his rude speech. When walking with an +Irish friend, who had worked among the +children of her own race, I saw a colored +boy run swiftly up the block to meet his<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_70" id="Page_70">[Pg 70]</a></span> +mother. He kissed her, took her bundle +from her, and carrying it under his arm, +walked quietly by her side to their home. +"There are many boys here," I said, "who +are just as courteous as that." "Is that +so?" she retorted quickly, "Then you +needn't be explaining to me any further +the reason for the high death rate."</p> + +<p>The gentle, chivalrous affection of the +child for its mother is daily to be seen among +these boys and girls. "Your African," said +Mary Kingsley, "is little better than a +slave to his mother, whom he loves with a +love he gives to none other. This love of +his mother is so dominant a factor in his +life that it must be taken into consideration +in attempting to understand the true +Negro."<a name="FNanchor_33_9" id="FNanchor_33_9"></a><a href="#Footnote_33_9" class="fnanchor">[9]</a> And if the child lavishes affection +upon its parent, the mother in turn +gives untiringly to her child. She is the +"mammy" of whom we have so often heard, +but with her loving care bestowed, as it +should be, upon her own offspring. She +tries to keep her child clean in body and spirit +and to train it to be gentle and good; and<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_71" id="Page_71">[Pg 71]</a></span> +in return usually she receives a stanch +devotion. I once found fault with a colored +girl of ten years for her rude behavior +with her girl companions, adding that perhaps +she did not know any better, at which +she turned on me almost fiercely and said, +"It's our fault; we know better. Our +mothers learn us. It's we that's bold." +As one watches the boys and girls walking +quietly up the street of a Sunday afternoon +to their Sunday-school, neatly and cleanly +dressed, one appreciates the anxious, maternal +care that strives as best it knows how, +to rear honest and God-fearing men and +women.</p> + +<p>Paul Lawrence Dunbar has painted the +Negro father, his "little brown baby wif +sparklin' eyes," nestling close in his arms. +Working at unusual hours, the colored man +often has a part of the day to give to his +family, and one sees him wheeling the baby +in its carriage, or playing with the older +boys and girls.</p> + +<p>Negroes seem naturally a gentle, loving +people. As you live with them and watch +them in their homes, you find some coarse<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_72" id="Page_72">[Pg 72]</a></span>ness, +but little real brutality. Rarely does +a father or mother strike a child. Travellers +in Central and West Africa describe +them as the most friendly of savage folk, +and where, as in our city, they live largely +to themselves, they keep something of these +characteristics. But it is only a step in +New York from Africa into Italy or Ireland; +and the step may bring a sad jostling to +native friendliness. To hold his own with +his white companions on the street or in +school, the Negro must become pugnacious, +callous to insult, ready to hit back when +affronted. Many are like the little girl who +told me that she did not care to play with +white children, "because," she explained, +"my mother tells me to smack any one +who calls me nigger, and I ain't looking for +trouble." The colored children aren't looking +for trouble. They have a tendency to +run away from it if they see it in the form of +a gang of boys coming to them around the +corner. They believe if they had a fight, it +wouldn't be a fair one, and that if the policeman +came, he would arrest them and not +their Irish enemies. So they grow up on<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_73" id="Page_73">[Pg 73]</a></span> +streets through which few white men pass, +leading their own lives with their own people +and thinking not overmuch of the other race +that surrounds them. But the day comes +when school is over, and the outside world, +however indifferent they may be to it, must +be met. They must go out and grapple +with it for the means to hire a cooking +stove and a dark bedroom of their own; they +must think of making money. So they stand +at the corner of their street, looking out, +and then move slowly on to find what opportunity +is theirs to come to a full manhood. +The way ahead does not seem very bright, +and some move so timidly that failure is +sure to meet them at the first turning. But +some have the courage of the little colored +girl, aged four, who led a line of kindergarten +children up their street and then on +to the unknown country that lay between +them and Central Park. At the first block +a mob of Irish boys fell upon them, running +between the lines, throwing sticks, and +calling "nigger" with screams and jeers. +The leader held her head high, paying no +attention to her persecutors. She neither<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_74" id="Page_74">[Pg 74]</a></span> +quickened nor slowed her pace, and when +the child at her side fell back, she pulled her +hand and said, "Don't notice them. Walk +straight ahead."</p> + + +<div class="footnotes"><h3>FOOTNOTES:</h3> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_25_1" id="Footnote_25_1"></a><a href="#FNanchor_25_1"><span class="label">[1]</span></a> Dudley Kidd's, "Savage Childhood," a delightful book.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_26_2" id="Footnote_26_2"></a><a href="#FNanchor_26_2"><span class="label">[2]</span></a> Report of the Department of Health, City of New York, +1908, pp. 844, 849. The returns for births, the report states, +are incomplete.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_27_3" id="Footnote_27_3"></a><a href="#FNanchor_27_3"><span class="label">[3]</span></a> This per cent is obtained from two sources, the births from +the Department of Health report, and the deaths from the +Mortality Statistics of the United States Census, 1908. +"Colored" includes Chinese, a negligible quantity in the infant +population.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_28_4" id="Footnote_28_4"></a><a href="#FNanchor_28_4"><span class="label">[4]</span></a> Third Annual Report of the New York Milk Committee, +1909.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_29_5" id="Footnote_29_5"></a><a href="#FNanchor_29_5"><span class="label">[5]</span></a> See G. Newman, "Infant Mortality," for a careful study +of this whole subject.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_30_6" id="Footnote_30_6"></a><a href="#FNanchor_30_6"><span class="label">[6]</span></a> Census, 1900, combination of Population table and +Women at Work.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_31_7" id="Footnote_31_7"></a><a href="#FNanchor_31_7"><span class="label">[7]</span></a> It is interesting to see that the married women of Fall +River, where we found a very high infant death rate, show +a percentage of married women at work of twenty in a +hundred.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_32_8" id="Footnote_32_8"></a><a href="#FNanchor_32_8"><span class="label">[8]</span></a> My tabulations of the Negro and Tenth and Eleventh +Ward Children are from the Court's unpublished records to +which I was allowed access. The absence of any figures for +Unlicensed Peddling in the Total indicates that in its printed +reports the Court has included Unlicensed Peddling with +Unclassified Misdemeanors.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_33_9" id="Footnote_33_9"></a><a href="#FNanchor_33_9"><span class="label">[9]</span></a> Mary Kingsley, "West African Studies," p. 319.</p></div> +</div> + + + +<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_75" id="Page_75">[Pg 75]</a></span></p> +<h2><a name="CHAPTER_IV" id="CHAPTER_IV">CHAPTER IV</a><br /> +<span class="smcap">Earning a Living—Manual Labor and +the Trades</span></h2> + + +<p>In "The American Race Problem," one of +our recent important books upon the Negro, +the author, Mr. Alfred Holt Stone of Mississippi, +after a survey of the world, declares +that "to me, it seems the plainest fact confronting +the Negro is that there is but one +area of any size wherein his race may obey +the command to eat its bread in the sweat of +its face side by side with the white man. +That area is composed of the Southern +United States."<a name="FNanchor_34_1" id="FNanchor_34_1"></a><a href="#Footnote_34_1" class="fnanchor">[1]</a></p> + +<p>On examination we find that only men of +English and North European stock are +"white" to Mr. Stone, and that his statement +is too sweeping by a continent or two, +but as applying to the United States, it will<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_76" id="Page_76">[Pg 76]</a></span> +usually meet with unqualified approval. It +is generally believed that discrimination continually +retards the Negro in his search for +employment in the North, while in the South +"he is given a man's chance in the commercial +world." Northern men visiting southern +colored industrial schools advise the pupils +to remain where they are, and restless spirits +among the race are assured that it is better +to submit to some personal oppression than +to go to a land of uncertain employment. +The past glory of the North is dwelt upon, +its days of black waiters, and barbers, and +coachmen, but the present is painted in +harsh colors.</p> + +<p>There is some truth in this comparison of +economic conditions among the Negroes in +the North and in the South, but it must not +be taken too literally. Today's tendency +to minimize southern and maximize northern +race difficulties, while strengthening the +bonds between white Americans, sometimes +obscures the real issues regarding colored +labor in this country. We need to look carefully +at conditions in numbers of selected +localities, and we can find no northern<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_77" id="Page_77">[Pg 77]</a></span> +city more worthy of our study than New +York.</p> + +<p>The New York Negro constitutes today +but two per cent of the population of Manhattan, +one and eight-tenths per cent of that +of Greater New York; and, as many workers +in Manhattan live in Brooklyn, the larger +area is the better one to consider. In 1900, +the census volume on occupations gives the +number of males over ten years of age engaged +in gainful occupations in Greater New +York at 1,102,471, and of that number +20,395 or 1.8 per cent, eighteen in every +thousand, are Negroes. In Atlanta, to take +a southern commercial centre, 351 out of +every thousand male workers are Negroes. +This enormous difference in the proportion +of colored workers to white must never be +forgotten in considering the labor situation +North and South. We cannot expect in the +North to see the Negro monopolizing an +industry which demands a larger share of +workers than he can produce, nor need we +admit that he has lost an occupation when +he does not control it.</p> + +<p>We often come upon such a statement as<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_78" id="Page_78">[Pg 78]</a></span> +that of Samuel R. Scottron, a colored business +man, who, writing in 1905, said, "The +Italian, Sicilian, Greek, occupy quite every +industry that was confessedly the Negro's +forty years ago. They have the bootblack +stands, the news stands, barbers' shops, +waiters' situations, restaurants, janitorships, +catering business, stevedoring, steamboat +work, and other situations occupied by +Negroes."<a name="FNanchor_35_2" id="FNanchor_35_2"></a><a href="#Footnote_35_2" class="fnanchor">[2]</a> Did the colored men have all +this forty years ago when they were only one +and a half per cent of the population? If +so, there were giants in those days, or New +York was much simpler in its habits than +now. At present the control by the colored +people of any such an array of industries +would be quite impossible. To take four +out of the nine occupations enumerated: the +census of 1900 gives the number of waiters +at 31,211; barbers, 12,022; janitors, 6184; +bootblacks, 2648; a total of 52,065. But in +1900 there were only 20,395 Negro males +engaged in gainful occupations in New York. +Without a vigorous astral body the 20,000-odd +colored men could not occupy half these<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_79" id="Page_79">[Pg 79]</a></span> +jobs. If they dominated in the field of +waiters they must abandon handling the +razor, and not all the colored boys could +muster 2684 strong to black the boots of +Greater New York. We must at the outset +recognize that as a labor factor the Negro in +New York is insignificant.</p> + +<p>The volume of the federal census for 1900 +on occupations shows us how the Negroes +are employed in New York City. There are +five occupational divisions, and the Negroes +and whites are divided among them as +follows:</p> + +<table class="ruled" summary="Division of employment among Negroes and whites"> +<tr class="bb"><td /> +<td class="tdc">White</td><td class="tdc">Per cent</td><td class="tdc">Negro</td><td class="tdc">Per cent</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tdl">Agricultural pursuits</td><td class="tdr">9,853</td><td class="tdr">.9</td><td class="tdr">251</td><td class="tdr">1.2</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tdl">Professional service</td><td class="tdr">60,037</td><td class="tdr">5.6</td><td class="tdr">729</td><td class="tdr">3.6</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tdl">Domestic and personal service</td><td class="tdr">189,282</td><td class="tdr">17.6</td><td class="tdr">11,843</td><td class="tdr">58.1</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tdl">Trade and transportation</td><td class="tdr">398,997</td><td class="tdr">37.1</td><td class="tdr">5,798</td><td class="tdr">28.4</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tdl">Manufacturing and mechanical pursuits</td><td class="tdr">417,634</td><td class="tdr">38.8</td><td class="tdr">1,774</td><td class="tdr">8.7</td></tr> +<tr class="bt"><td class="tdl">Total</td><td class="tdr">1,075,803</td><td class="tdr">100.0</td><td class="tdr">20,395</td><td class="tdr">100.0</td></tr> +</table> + +<p>But in examining in detail the occupations +under these different headings, we get a +clearer view of the place the Negro maintains +as a laborer by finding out how many<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_80" id="Page_80">[Pg 80]</a></span> +workers he supplies to every thousand workers +in a given occupation. He should average +eighteen if he is to occupy the same economic +status as the white man. Taking the first +(numerically) important division, Domestic +and Personal Service, we get the following +table:</p> + +<table class="ruled" summary="Domestic and Personal Service"> +<caption class="smcap">Domestic and Personal Service</caption> +<tr class="bb"><td /> +<td class="tdc">Total number of males in each occupation.</td> +<td class="tdc">Number of Negroes in each occupation.</td> +<td class="tdc">Number of Negroes to each 1000 workers in occupation.</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tdl">Barbers and hairdressers</td> +<td class="tdr">12,022</td><td class="tdr">215</td><td class="tdr">18</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tdl">Bootblacks</td> +<td class="tdr">2,648</td><td class="tdr">51</td><td class="tdr">20</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tdl">Launderers</td> +<td class="tdr">6,881</td><td class="tdr">70</td><td class="tdr">10</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tdl">Servants and waiters</td> +<td class="tdr">31,211</td><td class="tdr">6,280</td><td class="tdr">201</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tdl">Stewards</td> +<td class="tdr">1,366</td><td class="tdr">140</td><td class="tdr">103</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tdl">Nurses</td> +<td class="tdr">1,342</td><td class="tdr">22</td><td class="tdr">16</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tdl">Boarding and lodging house keepers</td> +<td class="tdr">474</td><td class="tdr">10</td><td class="tdr">21</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tdl">Hotel keepers</td> +<td class="tdr">3,139</td><td class="tdr">23</td><td class="tdr">7</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tdl">Restaurant keepers</td> +<td class="tdr">2,869</td><td class="tdr">116</td><td class="tdr">40</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tdl">Saloon keepers and bartenders</td> +<td class="tdr">17,656</td><td class="tdr">111</td><td class="tdr">6</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tdl">Janitors and sextons</td> +<td class="tdr">6,184</td><td class="tdr">800</td><td class="tdr">129</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tdl">Watchmen, firemen, policemen</td> +<td class="tdr">16,093</td><td class="tdr">116</td><td class="tdr">7</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tdl">Soldiers, sailors, marines</td> +<td class="tdr">3,707</td><td class="tdr">56</td><td class="tdr">15</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tdl">Laborers (including elevator tenders, laborers in coal yards, longshoremen, and stevedores)</td> +<td class="tdr">98,531</td><td class="tdr">3,719</td><td class="tdr">38</td></tr> +<tr class="bt"><td class="tdl">Total, including some occupations not specified</td> +<td class="tdr">206,215</td><td class="tdr">11,843</td><td class="tdr">57</td></tr> +</table><p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_81" id="Page_81">[Pg 81]</a></span></p> +<p>The most important of these groups, not +only in absolute numbers, but in proportion +to the whole working population, is the +servants and waiters. Two hundred out of +every thousand (we must remember that the +proportion to the population would be eighteen +out of every thousand) are holding +positions with which they have long been +identified in America. We cannot tell from +the census how many "live out," or how +many are able to go nightly to their homes, +how many have good jobs, and how many +are in second and third rate places. A +study of my own of 716 colored men helps +to answer one of these questions. Out of +176 men coming under the servants' and +waiters' classification, I found 5 caterers, +24 cooks, 26 butlers, 30 general utility men, +41 hotel men, and 50 waiters. Sixty per +cent of the 176 lived in their own homes, not +in their masters'. Some of the cooks and +waiters were on Pullman trains or on river +boats or steamers; only a few were in first-class +positions in New York. In the summer +many of these men are likely to go to country +hotels, and with the winter, if New York<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_82" id="Page_82">[Pg 82]</a></span> +offers nothing, migrate to Palm Beach or +stand on the street corner while their wives +go out to wash and scrub.<a name="FNanchor_36_3" id="FNanchor_36_3"></a><a href="#Footnote_36_3" class="fnanchor">[3]</a> "An' it don't +do fer me ter complain," one of them tells +me, "else he gits 'high' an' goes off fer good." +Waiters in restaurants sometimes do not +make more than six dollars a week, to be +supplemented by tips, bringing the sum up +to nine or ten dollars. Hall men make about<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_83" id="Page_83">[Pg 83]</a></span> +the same, but both waiters and hall men in +clubs and hotels receive large sums in tips +or in Christmas money. The Pullman car +waiters have small wages but large fees.</p> + +<p>Looking again at the census, we see that +129 out of every thousand janitors and +sextons are colored. The janitor's position +varies from the impecunious place in a tenement, +where the only wage is the rent, to the +charge of a large office or apartment building. +Then come the laborers, nearly four thousand +strong, with the elevator boy as a familiar +figure. Forty per cent of the 139 laborers in +my own tabulation were elevator boys, for, +except in office buildings and large stores +and hotels, this occupation is given over to +the Negro, who spends twelve hours a day +drowsing in a corner or standing to turn a +wheel. Paul Lawrence Dunbar wrote poetry +while he ran an elevator, and ambitious if +less talented colored boys today study civil +service examinations in their unoccupied +time; but the situation as a life job is not +alluring. Twenty-five dollars a month for +wage, with perhaps a half this sum in tips, +twelve hours on duty, one week in the night<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_84" id="Page_84">[Pg 84]</a></span> +time and the next in the day—no wonder +the personnel of this staff changes frequently +in an apartment house. A bright boy will +be taken by some business man for a better +job, and a lazy one drifts away to look for +an easier task, or is dismissed by an irate +janitor.</p> + +<p>Quite another group of laborers are the +longshoremen who, far from lounging indolently +in a hallway, are straining every +muscle as they heave some great crate into +a ship's hold. The work of the New York +dockers has been admirably described by +Mr. Ernest Poole, who says of the thirty +thousand longshoremen on the wharves of +New York—Italians, Germans, Negroes, +and Swedes, "Far from being the drunkards +and bums that some people think them, they +are like the men of the lumber camps come +to town—huge of limb and tough of muscle, +hard-swearing, quick-fisted, big of heart." +Their tasks are heavy and irregular. When +the ship comes in, the average stretch of +work for a gang is from twelve to twenty +hours, and sometimes men go to a second +gang and labor thirty-five hours without<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_85" id="Page_85">[Pg 85]</a></span> +sleep. Their pay for this dangerous, exhausting +toil averages eleven dollars a week. +"There are thousands of Negroes on the +docks of New York," Mr. Poole writes me, +"and they must be able to work long hours +at a stretch or they would not have their +jobs." At dusk, Brooklynites see these +black, huge-muscled men, many of them +West Indians, walking up the hill at Montague +Street. In New York they live among +the Irish in "Hell's Kitchen" and on San +Juan Hill. They are usually steady supporters +of families.</p> + +<p>New York demands strong, unskilled laborers. +To some she pays a large wage, +and Negroes have gone in numbers into the +excavations under the rivers, though a lingering +death may prove the end of their two +and a half or perhaps six or seven dollar a +day job. Many colored men worked in the +subway during its construction. One sees +them often employed at rock-drilling or +clearing land for new buildings. About a +third of the asphalt workers, making their +two dollars and a half a day, are colored. +Some educated, refined Negroes choose the<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_86" id="Page_86">[Pg 86]</a></span> +laborer's work rather than pleasanter but +poorly paid occupations. A highly trained +colored man, a shipping clerk, making seven +dollars a week, left his employer to take a +job of concreting in the subway at $1.80 a +day. His decision was in favor of dirty, +severe labor, but a living wage.</p> + +<p>When the next census is published, those +of us who are carefully watching the economic +condition of the Negro expect to find a movement +from domestic service into the positions +of laborers, including the porters in +stores, who belong in our second census +division.</p> + +<p>Kelly Miller<a name="FNanchor_37_4" id="FNanchor_37_4"></a><a href="#Footnote_37_4" class="fnanchor">[4]</a> describes the massive buildings +and sky-seeking structures of our northern +city, and finds no status for the Negro +above the cellar floor. One can see the +colored youth gazing wistfully through the +office window at the clerk, whose business +reaches across the ocean to bewilderingly +wonderful continents, knowing as he does +that the employment he may find in that +office will be emptying the white man's waste +paper basket.</p> +<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_87" id="Page_87">[Pg 87]</a></span></p> + +<table class="ruled" summary="Trade and Transportation"> +<caption class="smcap">Trade and Transportation</caption> +<tr class="bb"><td /> +<td class="tdc">Total number of males in each occupation.</td> +<td class="tdc">Number of Negroes in each occupation.</td> +<td class="tdc">Number of Negroes to each 1000 workers in occupation.</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tdl">Agents—commercial travellers</td> +<td class="tdr">27,456</td><td class="tdr">67</td><td class="tdr">2</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tdl">Bankers, brokers, and officials of banks and companies</td> +<td class="tdr">11,472</td><td class="tdr">7</td><td class="tdr">0</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tdl">Bookkeepers—accountants</td> +<td class="tdr">22,613</td><td class="tdr">33</td><td class="tdr">1</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tdl">Clerks, copyists (including shipping clerks, letter and mail carriers)</td> +<td class="tdr">80,564</td><td class="tdr">423</td><td class="tdr">5</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tdl">Merchants (wholesale and retail)</td> +<td class="tdr">72,684</td><td class="tdr">162</td><td class="tdr">2</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tdl">Salesmen</td> +<td class="tdr">45,740</td><td class="tdr">94</td><td class="tdr">2</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tdl">Typewriters</td> +<td class="tdr">3,225</td><td class="tdr">36</td><td class="tdr">11</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tdl">Boatmen and sailors</td> +<td class="tdr">8,188</td><td class="tdr">145</td><td class="tdr">18</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tdl">Foremen and overseers</td> +<td class="tdr">3,111</td><td class="tdr">18</td><td class="tdr">6</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tdl">Draymen, hackmen, teamsters</td> +<td class="tdr">51,063</td><td class="tdr">1439</td><td class="tdr">28</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tdl">Hostlers</td> +<td class="tdr">5,891</td><td class="tdr">633</td><td class="tdr">107</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tdl">Livery stable keepers</td> +<td class="tdr">967</td><td class="tdr">9</td><td class="tdr">9</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tdl">Steam railway employees</td> +<td class="tdr">11,831</td><td class="tdr">70</td><td class="tdr">6</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tdl">Street railway employees</td> +<td class="tdr">7,375</td><td class="tdr">11</td><td class="tdr">1</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tdl">Telegraph and telephone operators</td> +<td class="tdr">2,430</td><td class="tdr">6</td><td class="tdr">2</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tdl">Hucksters and peddlers</td> +<td class="tdr">12,635</td><td class="tdr">69</td><td class="tdr">5</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tdl">Messengers, errand and office boys</td> +<td class="tdr">13,451</td><td class="tdr">335</td><td class="tdr">25</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tdl">Porters and helpers (in stores, etc.)</td> +<td class="tdr">11,322</td><td class="tdr">2143</td><td class="tdr">188</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tdl">Undertakers</td><td class="tdr">1,572</td> +<td class="tdr">15</td><td class="tdr">9</td></tr> +<tr class="bt"><td class="tdl">Total, including some occupations not specified</td> +<td class="tdr">405,675</td><td class="tdr">5798</td><td class="tdr">14</td></tr> +</table> +<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_88" id="Page_88">[Pg 88]</a></span></p> +<p>This, however, does not apply to government +positions, and a large number of the +423 colored clerks in 1900 were probably in +United States and municipal service. The +latter we shall consider later as we study the +Negro and the municipality. Of the former, +in 1909 there were about 176 in the New +York post-offices.<a name="FNanchor_38_5" id="FNanchor_38_5"></a><a href="#Footnote_38_5" class="fnanchor">[5]</a> Ambitious boys work +industriously at civil service examinations, +and a British West Indian will even become +an American citizen for the chance of a congenial +occupation. The clerkship, that to a +white man is only a stepping-stone, to a +Negro is a highly coveted position.</p> + +<p>I have made two divisions of this census +list; the first includes those occupations requiring +intellectual skill and carrying with +them some social position, the second, those +demanding only manual work. It is in the +second that the colored man finds a place, +and as a porter he numbers 2143, and reaches +almost as high a percentage as the waiter +and servant. Porters' positions are paid +from five to fifteen dollars a week, the man<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_89" id="Page_89">[Pg 89]</a></span> +receiving the latter wage performing also the +duties of shipping clerk. There is some +opportunity for advance, always within the +basement, and there are regular hours and a +fairly steady job.</p> + +<p>The heading of draymen, hackmen, and +teamsters, with 28 colored in every thousand, +shows that the Negro has not lost his place +as a driver. The chauffeur does not appear +in the census, but the Negro is steadily +increasing in numbers in this occupation, and +conducts three garages of his own.</p> + +<p>The last census division to be considered +in this chapter is that of Manufacturing and +Mechanical Pursuits.</p> + +<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_90" id="Page_90">[Pg 90]</a></span></p> +<table class="ruled" summary="Manufacturing and Mechanical Pursuits"> +<caption class="smcap">Manufacturing and Mechanical Pursuits</caption> +<tr class="bb"><td /> +<td class="tdc">Total number of males in each occupation.</td> +<td class="tdc">Number of Negroes in each occupation.</td> +<td class="tdc">Number of Negroes to each 1000 workers in occupation.</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tdl">Engineers, firemen (not locomotive)</td> +<td class="tdr">16,579</td><td class="tdr">227</td><td class="tdr">14</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tdl">Masons (brick and stone)</td> +<td class="tdr">12,913</td><td class="tdr">94</td><td class="tdr">7</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tdl">Painters, glaziers, and varnishers</td> +<td class="tdr">27,135</td><td class="tdr">177</td><td class="tdr">6</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tdl">Plasterers</td> +<td class="tdr">4,019</td><td class="tdr">51</td><td class="tdr">12</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tdl">Blacksmiths</td> +<td class="tdr">7,289</td><td class="tdr">29</td><td class="tdr">4</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tdl">Butchers</td> +<td class="tdr">12,643</td><td class="tdr">31</td><td class="tdr">2</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tdl">Carpenters and joiners</td> +<td class="tdr">29,904</td><td class="tdr">94</td><td class="tdr">3</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tdl">Iron and steel workers</td> +<td class="tdr">10,372</td><td class="tdr">40</td><td class="tdr">4</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tdl">Paper hangers</td> +<td class="tdr">962</td><td class="tdr">18</td><td class="tdr">19</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tdl">Photographers</td> +<td class="tdr">1,590</td><td class="tdr">22</td><td class="tdr">14</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tdl">Plumbers, gas and steam fitters</td> +<td class="tdr">16,614</td><td class="tdr">31</td><td class="tdr">2</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tdl">Printers, lithographers, and pressmen</td> +<td class="tdr">21,521</td><td class="tdr">53</td><td class="tdr">2</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tdl">Tailors</td> +<td class="tdr">56,094</td><td class="tdr">69</td><td class="tdr">1</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tdl">Tobacco and cigar factory operators</td> +<td class="tdr">11,689</td><td class="tdr">189</td><td class="tdr">16</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tdl">Fishermen and oystermen</td> +<td class="tdr">1,439</td><td class="tdr">65</td><td class="tdr">45</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tdl">Miners and quarrymen</td> +<td class="tdr">326</td><td class="tdr">21</td><td class="tdr">64</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tdl">Machinists</td> +<td class="tdr">17,241</td><td class="tdr">47</td><td class="tdr">3</td></tr> +<tr class="bt"><td class="tdl">Total, including some occupations not specified</td> +<td class="tdr">419,594</td><td class="tdr">1774</td><td class="tdr">4</td></tr> +</table><blockquote> +<p>Bakers, boot and shoe makers, gold and silver workers, +brass workers, tin plate and tin ware makers, box makers, +cabinet makers, marble and stone cutters, book-binders, +clock and watch makers, confectioners, engravers, glass +workers, hat and cap makers, and others—not more than +nineteen in any one occupation, nor a higher per cent than +four in a thousand.</p> +</blockquote> + +<p>When Mr. Stone wrote of the Southern +States as the only place in which the Negro +could "earn his bread in the sweat of his +face," side by side with the white man, he +must especially have been thinking of workers +in the skilled trades. Unskilled laborers +in New York are drenched in a common +grimy fellowship. But in this last division +the Negro is conspicuous by his absence. +Only four in every thousand where there +should be eighteen! In Atlanta, under this +<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_91" id="Page_91">[Pg 91]</a></span>division, the race reaches almost its due +proportion, 279 in a thousand instead of 351. +The largest number in any trade in New +York is 189 men among the Cuban tobacco +workers. Seventy-five per cent of all the +masons in Atlanta are colored men, while in +New York the colored are less than one +per cent. Looking down the list we see that +the figures are small and the percentage insignificant. +The highly skilled and best paid +trades are seemingly as far removed from +the Negro as the positions of floor-walkers +or cashiers of banks.</p> + +<p>Omitting for the present the professional +class, we have reviewed the Negro as a +worker, and neither in wages nor choice of +occupation has he risen far to success. In +domestic service he has gone a little down +the ladder, serving in less desirable positions +than in former years. Why has this happened? +What good reasons are there for +these conditions?</p> + +<p>The first and most obvious reason is race +prejudice. No display of talent, however +prodigious, will open certain occupations to +the colored race. As a salesman he could<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_92" id="Page_92">[Pg 92]</a></span> +teach courteous manners to some of our +white salesmen in New York, but he is never +given a chance. There are a few Negroes, +digging in the tunnels or sweeping down the +subway stairs, who are capable of filling the +clerkships that are counted the perquisites +of the whites; but clerkships are only accessible +as they are associated with municipal or +federal service. Of course there are exceptions, +and though they do not affect the rule, +they show the existence of a few employers +who ignore the color line, and a few Negroes +of inexhaustible perseverance.</p> + +<p>Mr. Stone argues that the Negro in the +South profits by the strict drawing of the +color line, since the white man, always considered +the superior, is not lowered in the +eyes of the community by working with the +black man. The Southern white may lay +bricks on the same wall with the Southern +black, secure in his superior social position. +But this seems fanciful as an explanation of +labor conditions. The black doctor, for instance, +in those localities where the color +line is most rigid, may not ask the white +doctor to consult with him; or if he does, his<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_93" id="Page_93">[Pg 93]</a></span> +prompt removal from the community is +requested. Colored postal clerks are in disfavor +in the South, though not colored postmen. +North or South, <i>the Negro gets an +opportunity to work where he is imperatively +needed</i>. Constituting one-third of the working +population, he can make a place for himself +in the laboring world of Atlanta as he +cannot in New York. Pick up the 20,000 +New York Negroes and drop them in Liberia, +and in two or three weeks Ellis Island could +empty out sufficient men to fill their places; +but remove a third of the male workers from +Atlanta, and the city for years would suffer +from the calamity. If they are the only +available source of labor, colored men can +work by the side of white men; but where +the white man strongly dominates the labor +situation, he tries to push his black brother +into the jobs for which he does not care to +compete.</p> + +<p>We have seen, however, that in some occupations +in New York the Negroes appear in +such proportion as should be sufficient to +secure them excellent positions; the most +conspicuous instance being that of the 200<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_94" id="Page_94">[Pg 94]</a></span> +colored waiters out of every thousand. Why, +then, do we not see Negroes serving in the +best hotels the city affords?</p> + +<p>It has been an ideal of American democracy, +a part of its strenuous individualism, +that each member of the community should +have full liberty in the pursuit of wealth. +The ambitious, capable boy who walks bare-footed +into the city, and at the end of twenty +years has outdistanced his country school-mates, +becoming a multi-millionaire while +they are still farm drudges, is the example of +American opportunity. But this ability to +separate one's self from the rest of one's +fellows and attain individual greatness is +rarely possible to a segregated race. In +domestic service individual colored men have +shown ambition and high capability, but +they have never been able to get away from +their fellows like the country boy—to leave +the farm drudges and take a place among the +most proficient of their profession. They +must always work in a race group. And this +Negro group is like the small college that +tries to win at football against a competitor +with four times the number of students and<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_95" id="Page_95">[Pg 95]</a></span> +a better coach. The two hundred colored +waiters, competing against the eight hundred +white ones, lose in the game and are given a +second place, which the best must accept +with the worst. When, then, we criticize a +capable colored man for failing to keep a +superior position we must remember that +he is tied to his group and has little chance +of advancement on his individual merit.</p> + +<p>The census division of mechanical pursuits +shows only a few colored men working at +trades, and the paucity of the numbers is often +attributed by the Negro to a third obstacle +in the way of his progress, the trade-union.</p> + +<p>To the colored man who has overcome race +prejudice sufficiently to be taken into a shop +with white workmen, the walking delegate +who appears and asks for his union card +seems little short of diabolical; and all the +advantages that collective bargaining has +secured, the higher wage and shorter working-day, +are forgotten by him. I have heard +the most distinguished of Negro educators, +listening to such an incident as this, declare +that he should like to see every labor union +in America destroyed. But unionism has<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_96" id="Page_96">[Pg 96]</a></span> +come to stay, and the colored man who is +asked for his card had better at once get to +work and endeavor to secure it. Many have +done this already, and organized labor in +New York, its leaders tell us, receives an +increasing number of colored workmen. Miss +Helen Tucker, in a careful study of Negro +craftsmen in the West Sixties,<a name="FNanchor_39_6" id="FNanchor_39_6"></a><a href="#Footnote_39_6" class="fnanchor">[6]</a> found among +121 men who had worked at their trades in +the city, 32, or 26 per cent in organized labor. +The majority of these had joined in New +York. Eight men, out of the 121, had +applied for entrance to unions and not been +admitted. This does not seem a discouraging +number, though we do not know whether +the other 81 could have been organized or +not. Many, probably, were not sufficiently +competent workmen. In 1910, according to +the best information that I could secure, +there were 1358 colored men in the New +York unions. Eighty of these were in the +building trades, 165 were cigar makers, 400 +were teamsters, 350 asphalt workers, and +240 rock-drillers and tool sharpeners.<a name="FNanchor_40_7" id="FNanchor_40_7"></a><a href="#Footnote_40_7" class="fnanchor">[7]</a></p> +<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_97" id="Page_97">[Pg 97]</a></span></p> +<p>Entrance to some of the local organizations +is more easily secured than to others, +for the trade-union, while part of a federation, +is autonomous, or nearly so. In some<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_98" id="Page_98">[Pg 98]</a></span> +of the highly skilled trades, to which few +colored men have the necessary ability to +demand access, the Negro is likely to be +refused, while the less intelligent and well-paid +forms of labor press a union card upon +him. Again, strong organizations in the +South, as the bricklayers, send men North +with union membership, who easily transfer +to New York locals. Miss Tucker finds the +carpenters', masons', and plasterers' organizations +easy for the Negro to enter. There +is in New York a colored local, the only +colored local in the city, among a few of the +carpenters, with regular representation in +the Central Federated Union. The American +Federation of Labor in 1881 declared +that "the working people must unite irrespective +of creed, color, sex, nationality, or +politics." This cry is for self-protection, and +where the Negroes have numbers and ability +in a trade, their organization becomes important +to the white. It may be fairly said +of labor organization in New York that it +finds and is at times unable to destroy race +prejudice, but that it does not create it.<a name="FNanchor_41_8" id="FNanchor_41_8"></a><a href="#Footnote_41_8" class="fnanchor">[8]</a></p> +<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_99" id="Page_99">[Pg 99]</a></span></p> +<p>A fourth obstacle, and a very important +one, is the lack of opportunity for the colored +boy. The only trade that he can easily learn +is that of stationary engineer, an occupation +at which the Negroes do very well. Colored +boys in small numbers are attending evening +trade schools, but their chance of securing +positions on graduation will be small. The +Negro youth who is not talented enough to +enter a profession, and who cannot get into<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_100" id="Page_100">[Pg 100]</a></span> +the city or government service, has slight +opportunity. Nothing is so discouraging in +the outlook in New York as the crowding +out of colored boys from congenial remunerative +work.</p> + +<p>The last obstacle in the way of the Negro's +advancement into higher occupations is his +inefficiency. Race prejudice denies him the +opportunity to prove his ability in many +occupations, and the same spirit forces him +to work in a race group; but the colored men +themselves are often unfitted for any labor +other than that they undertake.</p> + +<p>The picture that is sometimes drawn of +many thousands of highly skilled Southern +colored men forced in New York to give up +their trades and to turn to menial labor +is not a correct one. Richard R. Wright, +Jr., who has made a careful study of the +Negro in Philadelphia,<a name="FNanchor_42_9" id="FNanchor_42_9"></a><a href="#Footnote_42_9" class="fnanchor">[9]</a> finds that the majority +of colored men who come to that city +are from the class of unskilled city laborers +and country hands; the minority are the +more skilful artisans and farmers and domes<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_101" id="Page_101">[Pg 101]</a></span>tic +servants, with a number also of the +vagrant and criminal classes.</p> + +<p>In New York the untrained Negroes not +only form a very large class, but coming in +contact, as they do, with foreigners who for +generations have been forced to severe, unremitting +toil, they suffer by comparison. +The South in the days of slavery demanded +chiefly routine work in the fields from its +Negroes.<a name="FNanchor_43_10" id="FNanchor_43_10"></a><a href="#Footnote_43_10" class="fnanchor">[10]</a> The work was under the direction +either of the master, the overseer, or a +foreman; and there has been no general +advance in training for the colored men of +the South since that time. Contrast the +intensive cultivation of Italy or Switzerland +with the farms of Georgia or Alabama, or +the hotels of France with those of Virginia, +and you will see the disadvantages from +which the Negro suffers. America is young +and crude, but opportunity has brought to +her great cities workmen from all over the +world. In New York these men are driven +at a pace that at the outset distracts the +colored man who prefers his leisurely way.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_102" id="Page_102">[Pg 102]</a></span> +Moreover, the foreign workmen have learned +persistence; they are punctual and appear +regularly each morning at their tasks. "The +Italians are better laborers than any other +people we have, are they not?" I asked a +man familiar with many races and nationalities. +"No," was his answer, "they do not +work better than others, but when the +whistle blows, they are always there." Mr. +Stone, whose book I have already quoted a +number of times, shows the irresponsible, +fanciful wanderings of his Mississippi tenants, +whom he endeavored, unsuccessfully, to establish +in a permanent tenantry. The colored +men in New York are far in advance of these +farm hands, who are described as moving +about simply because they desire a change, +but they are also far from the steady, unswerving +attitude of their foreign competitors. +Inadequately educated, too often they +come to New York with little equipment for +tasks they must undertake successfully or +starve—unless, puerile, they live by the +labor of some industrious woman.</p> + +<p>I have tried to depict the New York colored +wage earners as they labor in the city today.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_103" id="Page_103">[Pg 103]</a></span> +They are not a remarkable group, and were +they white men, distinguished by some mark +of nationality, they would pass without +comment. But the Negro is on trial, and +witnesses are continually called to tell of +his failures and successes. We have seen +that both in the attitude of the world about +him, and in his own untutored self, there +are many obstacles to prevent his advance; +and his natural sensitiveness adds to these +difficulties. He minds the coarse but often +good-natured joke of his fellow laborer, and +he remembers with a lasting pain the mortification +of an employer's curt refusal of +work. Had he the obtuseness of some +Americans he would prosper better. As we +have seen, many positions are completely +closed to him, leading him to idleness and +consequent crime. Just as not every able-bodied +white man, who is out of work and +impoverished, will go to the charities wood-yard +and saw wood, so not every colored +man will accept the menial labor which may +be the only work open to him. Instead, he +may gamble or drift into a vagabond life. +A well-known Philadelphia judge has said<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_104" id="Page_104">[Pg 104]</a></span> +that "The moral and intellectual advance +of a race is governed by the degree of its +industrial freedom. When that freedom is +restricted there is unbounded tendency to +drive the race discriminated against into the +ranks of the criminal." Discrimination in +New York has led many Negroes into these +ranks. But as we look back at the occupations +of our colored men we see a large number +who secure regular hours, and if a poor, +yet a fairly steady pay. For the mass of the +Negroes coming into the city these positions +are an advance over their former work. +Employment in a great mercantile establishment, +though it be in the basement, carries +dignity with it, and educating demands of +punctuality, sobriety, and swiftness. Richard +R. Wright, Jr., whose right to speak with +authority we have already noted, believes +that the "North has taught the Negro the +value of money; of economy; it has taught +more sustained effort in work, punctuality, +and regularity." It has also, I believe, in +its more regular hours of work, aided in the +upbuilding of the home.</p> + +<p>I remember once waiting in the harbor of<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_105" id="Page_105">[Pg 105]</a></span> +Genoa while our ship was taking on a cargo. +The captain walked the deck impatiently, +and, as the Italians went in leisurely fashion +about their task, declared, "If I had those +men in New York I could get twice the +amount of work out of them." That is what +New York does; it works men hard and fast; +sometimes it mars them; but it pays a better +wage than Genoa, and there is an excitement +and dash about it that attracts laborers from +all parts of the earth. The black men come, +insignificant in numbers, ready to do their +part. They work and play and marry and +bring up children, and as we watch them +moving to and from their tasks the North +seems to have brought to the majority of +them something of liberty and happiness.</p> + + +<div class="footnotes"><h3>FOOTNOTES:</h3> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_34_1" id="Footnote_34_1"></a><a href="#FNanchor_34_1"><span class="label">[1]</span></a> Alfred Holt Stone, "Studies in the American Race Problem," +p. 164.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_35_2" id="Footnote_35_2"></a><a href="#FNanchor_35_2"><span class="label">[2]</span></a> New York <i>Age</i>, August 24, 1905.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_36_3" id="Footnote_36_3"></a><a href="#FNanchor_36_3"><span class="label">[3]</span></a> +Occupations in 1907 of 716 colored men (secured from +records of the Young Men's Christian Association and personal +visits) compared with census figures of occupations in +1900. +</p> +<table class="ruled" summary="Occupations of 716 colored men in 1907 +compared with census figures in 1900"> +<tr class="bb"><td /><td class="tdr">716 Men</td> +<td class="tdr">Census</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tdl">Agricultural pursuits</td> +<td class="tdr">—</td><td class="tdr">1.2</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tdl">Professional service, 27 men</td> +<td class="tdr">3.8</td><td class="tdr">3.6</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tdl tdb"><p> +Domestic and personal service, 363 men<br /> +5 barbers, 5 caterers, 24 cooks, +30 general utility men, 41 hotel men, +76 waiters and butlers, 8 valets, +35 janitors and sextons, 29 longshoremen, +5 laborers in tunnels, 7 asphalt +workers, 57 elevator men, 41 laborers. +</p></td> +<td class="tdr tdb">50.6</td><td class="tdr tdb">58.1</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tdl tdb"><p> +Trade and transportation, 279 men<br /> +10 chauffeurs, 35 drivers, 13 expressmen, +8 hostlers, 12 messengers, 14 municipal +employees, 127 porters in stores, +15 porters on trains, 24 clerks, +21 merchants. +</p></td> +<td class="tdr tdb">39.0</td><td class="tdr tdb">28.4</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tdl">Manufacturing and mechanical pursuits, 47 men</td><td class="tdr">6.6</td><td class="tdr">8.7</td></tr> +<tr class="bt"><td /><td class="tdr">100.0</td><td class="tdr">100.0</td></tr> +</table> +</div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_37_4" id="Footnote_37_4"></a><a href="#FNanchor_37_4"><span class="label">[4]</span></a> Kelly Miller's "Race Adjustment," p. 129.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_38_5" id="Footnote_38_5"></a><a href="#FNanchor_38_5"><span class="label">[5]</span></a> It is difficult to get accurate figures as no official record +is kept of color.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_39_6" id="Footnote_39_6"></a><a href="#FNanchor_39_6"><span class="label">[6]</span></a> <i>Southern Workman</i>, October, 1907, to March, 1908.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_40_7" id="Footnote_40_7"></a><a href="#FNanchor_40_7"><span class="label">[7]</span></a> In 1906, and again in 1910, I secured a counting of the +New York colored men in organized labor. The lists run as +follows: +</p> +<table summary="New York colored men in organized labor"> +<tr><td /><td class="tdr">1906</td><td> </td><td class="tdr">1910</td> +<td> </td></tr> +<tr><td class="tdl">Asphalt workers</td> +<td class="tdr">320</td><td /><td class="tdr">350</td><td /></tr> +<tr><td class="tdl">Teamsters</td> +<td class="tdr">300</td><td /><td class="tdr">400</td><td /></tr> +<tr><td class="tdl">Rock-drillers and tool sharpeners</td> +<td class="tdr">250</td><td /><td class="tdr">240</td><td /></tr> +<tr><td class="tdl">Cigar makers</td> +<td class="tdr">121</td><td /><td class="tdr">165</td><td /></tr> +<tr><td class="tdl">Bricklayers</td> +<td class="tdr">90</td><td /><td class="tdr">21</td><td /></tr> +<tr><td class="tdl">Waiters</td> +<td class="tdr">90</td><td class="tdl" colspan="3">not obtainable</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tdl">Carpenters</td> +<td class="tdr">60</td><td /><td class="tdr">40</td><td /></tr> +<tr><td class="tdl">Plasterers</td> +<td class="tdr">45</td><td /><td class="tdr">19</td><td /></tr> +<tr><td class="tdl">Double drum hoisters</td> +<td class="tdr">30</td><td /><td class="tdr">37</td><td /></tr> +<tr><td class="tdl">Safety and portable engineers +</td><td class="tdr">26</td><td /><td class="tdr">35</td><td /></tr> +<tr><td class="tdl">Eccentric firemen</td> +<td class="tdr">15</td><td /><td class="tdr">0</td><td /></tr> +<tr><td class="tdl">Letter carriers</td> +<td class="tdr">10</td><td /><td class="tdr">30</td><td /></tr> +<tr><td class="tdl">Pressmen</td> +<td class="tdr">10</td><td class="tdl" colspan="3">not obtainable</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tdl">Printers</td> +<td class="tdr">6</td><td /><td class="tdr">8</td><td /></tr> +<tr><td class="tdl">Butchers</td> +<td class="tdr">3</td><td /><td class="tdr">3</td><td /></tr> +<tr><td class="tdl">Lathers</td> +<td class="tdr">3</td><td /><td class="tdr">7</td><td /></tr> +<tr><td class="tdl">Painters</td> +<td class="tdr">3</td><td class="tdl" colspan="3">not obtainable</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tdl">Coopers</td> +<td class="tdr">1</td><td /><td class="tdr">2</td><td /></tr> +<tr><td class="tdl">Sheet metal workers</td> +<td class="tdr">1</td><td /><td class="tdr">1</td><td /></tr> +<tr><td class="tdl">Rockmen</td> +<td class="tdr">1</td><td class="tdl" colspan="3">not obtainable</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tdl"><span class="indent">Total</span></td> +<td class="tdr"><span class="bt">1385</span></td><td /> +<td class="tdr"><span class="bt">1358</span></td><td /></tr> +</table><p> +The large number of bricklayers in 1906 is questioned by +the man, himself a bricklayer, who made the second counting. +However, the number greatly decreased in 1908 when the +stagnation in business compelled many men to seek work in +other cities.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_41_8" id="Footnote_41_8"></a><a href="#FNanchor_41_8"><span class="label">[8]</span></a> The comment of the Negro bricklayer who secured my +figures is important. "A Negro," he says, "has to be extra +fit in his trade to retain his membership, as the eyes of all the +other workers are watching every opportunity to disqualify +him, thereby compelling a superefficiency. Yet at all times +he is the last to come and the first to go on the job, necessitating +his seeking other work for a living, and keeping up his +card being but a matter of sentiment. While all the skilled +trades seem willing to accept the Negro with his travelling +card, yet there are some which utterly refuse him; for instance, +the house smiths and bridge men who will not recognize him +at all. While membership in the union is necessary to work, +yet the hardest part of the battle is to secure employment. +In some instances intercession has been made by various +organizations interested in his industrial progress for employment +at the offices of various companies, and favorable +answers are given, but hostile foremen with discretionary +power carry out their instructions in such a manner as to +render his employment of such short duration that he is very +little benefited. Of course, there are some contractors who +are very friendly to a few men, and whenever any work is +done by them, they are certain of employment. Unfortunately, +these are too few."</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_42_9" id="Footnote_42_9"></a><a href="#FNanchor_42_9"><span class="label">[9]</span></a> R. R. Wright, Jr.'s "Migration of Negroes to the North," +Annals of the American Academy, May, 1906.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_43_10" id="Footnote_43_10"></a><a href="#FNanchor_43_10"><span class="label">[10]</span></a> See Ulrich B. Phillips' "Origin and Growth of the Southern +Black Belts," <i>American Historical Review</i>, July, 1906.</p></div> +</div> + + + +<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_106" id="Page_106">[Pg 106]</a></span></p> +<h2><a name="CHAPTER_V" id="CHAPTER_V">CHAPTER V</a><br /> +<span class="smcap">Earning a Living—Business and +the Professions</span></h2> + + +<p>If we walk west on Fifty-ninth Street, +at Eighth Avenue, we come upon one of the +colored business sections of New York. +Here, for a block's length, are employment +and real estate agents, restaurant keepers, +grocers, tailors, barbers, printers, expressmen, +and undertakers, all small establishments +occupying the first floor or basement +of some tenement or lodging house, and with +the exception of the employment agency all +patronized chiefly by the colored race. +Another such section and a more prosperous +one is in Harlem, on West One Hundred +and Thirty-third, One Hundred and Thirty-fourth, +and One Hundred and Thirty-fifth +Streets. From the point of view of the whole +business of the city such concerns are insignificant, +but they are important from the<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_107" id="Page_107">[Pg 107]</a></span> +viewpoint of Negro progress, since they +represent the accumulation of capital, experience +in business methods, and hard +work. Very slowly the New York Negro +is meeting the demanding power of his +people and is securing neighborhood trade +that has formerly gone to the Italian and +the Jew. Husband and wife, father and son, +work in their little establishments and make +a beginning in the mercantile world.</p> + +<p>The Negro, as we have seen, has conducted +businesses in New York in the past, +businesses patronized chiefly by whites. +Barbering and catering were his successes, +and in both of these he has lost, despite the +fact that one of the city's wealthiest colored +men is a caterer. But if he has lost here, +he has gained along other lines. Among a +number of photographers he has one who is +well-known for his excellent architectural +work. Two manufacturers have brought +out popular goods, the Haynes's razor strop, +and the Howard shoe polish. These men, +one a barber and one a Pullman car porter, +improved upon implements used in their +daily work and then turned to manufac<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_108" id="Page_108">[Pg 108]</a></span>ture. +The headquarters of the Howard +shoe polish is in Chicago, where the firm +employs thirty people, the New York branch +giving employment to twelve.</p> + +<p>A wise utilization of labor already trained +and at hand is seen in the Manhattan House +Cleaning and Renovating Bureau. This +firm contracts for the cleaning of houses +and places of business and has also been +successful in securing work on new buildings, +entering as the builders leave and arranging +everything for occupancy. In one week the +Bureau has given employment to sixty men.</p> + +<p>In those businesses in which he comes in +contact with the white, the most pronounced +success of the colored man has been real estate +brokerage. The New York Negro business +directory names twenty-two real estate +brokers, and though a dozen of them probably +handle altogether no more business +than one white firm, a few put through important +operations. The ablest of these +brokers, recently clearing twenty thousand +dollars at a single transaction, turned his +operations to Liberia, where he went for +a few months to look into land concessions.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_109" id="Page_109">[Pg 109]</a></span> +This broker has aided the Negroes materially +in their efforts to rent apartments on +better streets. His energy, and that of many +more like him, is also needed to open up +places for colored businesses, better office +and workroom facilities for the able professional +and business men and women. In +New York as in the South the Negro needs +to obtain a hold upon the land. In this he +is aided not only by his brokers, but by +realty companies. The largest of these, the +Metropolitan Realty Company, in operation +since 1900, is capitalized at a million +dollars, and had in 1910 $400,000 paid in +stock, and $400,000 subscribed and being +paid for on instalment. This company operates +in the suburban towns, and has quite +a colony in Plainfield, New Jersey, where it +owns 150 lots. It has built eighty cottages +for its members, and has bought eighteen.</p> + +<p>Among the businesses that cater directly +to the colored, probably none is more successful +than undertaking. The Negroes of +the city die in great numbers, and the funeral +is all too common a function. Formerly +this business went to white men, but in<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_110" id="Page_110">[Pg 110]</a></span>creasingly +it is coming into the hands of the +colored. The Negro business directory gives +twenty-two undertakers, one of them, by +common report, the richest colored man in +New York. Profitable real estate investment, +combined with one of the largest +undertaking establishments in the city, has +given him a comfortable fortune. Another +large and increasingly important Negro business +is the hotel and boarding-house. As +the colored men of the South and West accumulate +wealth, they will come in increasing +numbers to visit in New York, and the +colored hotel, now little more than a boarding-house, +may become a spacious building, +with private baths, elevator service, and a +well-equipped restaurant. In today's modestly +equipped buildings the catering is often +excellent, and good, well-cooked food is sold +at reasonable prices. Occasionally the Hotel +Maceo advertises a southern dinner, and its +guests sit down to Virginia sugar-cured ham, +sweet potato pie, and perhaps even opossum.</p> + +<p>Printing establishments, tailors' shops,<a name="FNanchor_44_1" id="FNanchor_44_1"></a><a href="#Footnote_44_1" class="fnanchor">[1]</a><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_111" id="Page_111">[Pg 111]</a></span> +express and van companies, and many other +small enterprises help to make up the Negro +business world. One colored printer brings +out an important white magazine. There +are seven weekly colored newspapers, of +which the New York <i>Age</i> is the most important, +and two musical publishing companies. +All these enterprises are useful, not only to +the proprietor and his patrons, but especially +to the clerks and assistants who thus are +able to secure some training in mercantile +work. In the white man's office, white and +colored boys start out together, but as their +trousers lengthen and their ambitions quicken, +the former secures promotion while the latter +is still given the letters to put into the +mail box. If the Negro lad, discouraged at +lack of advancement, leaves the white man +and ventures with a tiny capital into some +business of his own, his ignorance is almost +certain to lead to his disaster. He is indeed +fortunate if he can first work in the office +of a successful colored man.<a name="FNanchor_45_2" id="FNanchor_45_2"></a><a href="#Footnote_45_2" class="fnanchor">[2]</a></p> +<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_112" id="Page_112">[Pg 112]</a></span></p> +<p>We have one more census division to +consider, Professional Service. The table +runs as follows:</p> + +<table class="ruled" summary="Professional Service"> +<caption class="smcap">Professional Service</caption> +<tr class="bb"><td class="tdl"></td><td class="tdc">Total number of males in each occupation.</td><td class="tdc">Number of negroes in each occupation.</td><td class="tdc">Negroes to each 1000 workers in occupation.</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tdl">Actors, professional showmen, etc.</td><td class="tdr">4,733</td><td class="tdr">254</td><td class="tdr">54</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tdl">Architects, designers, draftsmen</td><td class="tdr">3,966</td><td class="tdr">2</td><td class="tdr">0</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tdl">Artists, teachers of art</td><td class="tdr">2,924</td><td class="tdr">13</td><td class="tdr">4</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tdl">Clergymen</td><td class="tdr">2,833</td><td class="tdr">90</td><td class="tdr">32</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tdl">Dentists</td><td class="tdr">1,509</td><td class="tdr">25</td><td class="tdr">16</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tdl">Physicians and surgeons</td><td class="tdr">6,577</td><td class="tdr">32</td><td class="tdr">5</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tdl">Veterinary surgeons</td><td class="tdr">320</td><td class="tdr">2</td><td class="tdr">6</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tdl">Electricians</td><td class="tdr">8,131</td><td class="tdr">18</td><td class="tdr">2</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tdl">Engineers (civil) and surveyors</td><td class="tdr">3,321</td><td class="tdr">7</td><td class="tdr">2</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tdl">Journalists</td><td class="tdr">2,833</td><td class="tdr">7</td><td class="tdr">2</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tdl">Lawyers</td><td class="tdr">7,811</td><td class="tdr">26</td><td class="tdr">3</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tdl">Literary and scientific</td><td class="tdr">1,709</td><td class="tdr">10</td><td class="tdr">5</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tdl">Musicians</td><td class="tdr">6,429</td><td class="tdr">195</td><td class="tdr">30</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tdl">Officials (government)</td><td class="tdr">3,934</td><td class="tdr">9</td><td class="tdr">2</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tdl">Teachers and professors in colleges</td><td class="tdr">3,409</td><td class="tdr">32</td><td class="tdr">9</td></tr> +<tr class="bt"><td class="tdl">Total including some occupations not specified</td><td class="tdr">60,853</td><td class="tdr">729</td><td class="tdr">12</td></tr> +</table> + +<p>Examining these figures we find few colored +architects<a name="FNanchor_46_3" id="FNanchor_46_3"></a><a href="#Footnote_46_3" class="fnanchor">[3]</a> or engineers, and a very<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_113" id="Page_113">[Pg 113]</a></span> +small proportion of electricians, though +among the latter there is a highly skilled +workman. The New York Negro has no +position in the mechanical arts. It may be +that, as we so often hear, the African does +not possess mechanical ability.<a name="FNanchor_47_4" id="FNanchor_47_4"></a><a href="#Footnote_47_4" class="fnanchor">[4]</a> You do +not see Negro boys pottering over machinery +or making toy inventions of their own. +But another and powerful reason for the +colored youth's failing to take up engineering +or kindred studies is the slight +chance he would later have in securing +work. No group of men in America have +opposed his progress more persistently than +skilled mechanics, and, should he graduate +from some school of technology, he would +be refused in office or workshop. So he<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_114" id="Page_114">[Pg 114]</a></span> +turns to those professions in which he sees +a likelihood of advancement.</p> + +<p>Colored physicians and dentists are increasing +in number in New York and throughout +the country. The Negro is sympathetic, quick +to understand another's feelings, and when +added to this he has received a thorough +medical training he makes an excellent +physician. New York State examinations +prevent the practice of ignorant doctors from +other states, and the city can count many +able colored practitioners. These doctors +practise among white people as well as among +colored. As surgeons they are handicapped +in New York by lack of hospital facilities, +having no suitable place in which they may +perform an operation. The colored student +who graduates from a New York medical +college must go for hospital training to Philadelphia +or Chicago or Washington.<a name="FNanchor_48_5" id="FNanchor_48_5"></a><a href="#Footnote_48_5" class="fnanchor">[5]</a></p> +<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_115" id="Page_115">[Pg 115]</a></span></p> +<p>Colored lawyers are obtaining a firm foothold +in New York. From twenty-six in +the 1900 census they now, in 1911, number +over fifty, though not all of these by any +means rely entirely upon their profession +for support. Some of our lawyers are +descendants of old New York families, +others have come here recently from the +South.</p> + +<p>Turning to our census figures again we +see that the three professions in which the +colored man is conspicuous are those of +actor, musician, and minister. Instead of +the average eighteen, he here shows fifty-four +in every thousand actors, thirty in +every thousand musicians, and thirty-two +in every thousand clergymen. And since +the pulpit and the stage are two places in +which the black man has found conspicuous +success it may be well in this connection +to consider, not only the economic +significance of these institutions, but their +place in the life of the colored world.</p> + +<p>The Negro minister was born with the +Negro Christian, and the colored church, +in which he might tell of salvation, is over<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_116" id="Page_116">[Pg 116]</a></span> +a century old in New York. Today the +Boroughs of Manhattan and Brooklyn have +twenty-eight colored churches besides a +number of missions. Some of the societies +own valuable property, usually, however, +encumbered with heavy mortgages, and +yearly budgets mount up to ten, twelve, +and sixteen thousand dollars. The Methodist +churches lead in number, next come +the Baptist, and next the Episcopalian. +There are Methodist Episcopal, African +Methodist Episcopal, and African Methodist +Episcopal Zion. Bethel African Methodist +Episcopal Church, as we have seen, is +one of the oldest and is still one of the +largest and most useful Negro churches in +New York. Mount Olivet, a Baptist church +on West Fifty-third Street, has a seating +capacity of 1600, taxed to its full on Sunday +evenings. St. Philip's gives the Episcopal +service with dignity and devoutness, +and its choir has many sweet colored boy +singers. At St. Benedict, the Moor, the +black faces of the boy acolytes contrast +with the benignant white-haired Irish priest, +and without need of words preach good-<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_117" id="Page_117">[Pg 117]</a></span>will +to men. Only in this Catholic church +does one find white and black in almost +equal numbers worshipping side by side.</p> + +<p>The great majority of the colored churches +are supported by their congregations, and +the minister or elder, or both, twice a Sunday, +must call for the pennies and nickels, +dimes and quarters, that are dropped into +the plate at the pulpit's base. Contributors +file past the table on which they place +their offering, emulation becoming a spur +to generosity. These collections are supplemented +by sums raised at entertainments +and fairs, and it is in this way, by the +constant securing of small gifts, that the +thousands are raised.</p> + +<p>The church is a busy place and retains +its members, not only by its preaching, but +by midweek meetings. There are the class +meetings of the Methodists, the young people's +societies, the prayer meetings, and +the sermons preached to the secret benefit +organizations. Visiting sisters and brothers +attend to relief work, and standing at a +side table, sometimes picturesque with lighted +lantern, ask for dole for the poor.</p> +<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_118" id="Page_118">[Pg 118]</a></span></p> +<p>The Sunday-schools, while not so large +as the church attendance would lead one +to expect, involve much time and labor in +their conduct. A colored church member +finds all his or her leisure occupied in church +work. I know a young woman engaged in +an exacting, skilled profession who spends +her day of rest attending morning service, +teaching in Sunday-school, taking part in +the young people's lyceum in the late afternoon, +and listening to a second sermon in +the evening. Occasionally she omits her +dinner to hear an address at the colored +Young Men's Christian Association. On +hot summer afternoons you may see colored +boys and girls and men and women crowded +in an ill-ventilated hall, giving ear to a fervid +exhortation that leads the speaker, at +the sentence's end, to mop his swarthy face. +The woods, the salt-smelling sea, the tamer +prettiness of the lawns of the city's park, +have not the impelling call of sermon or +hymn. If the whole of the Negro's summer +Sunday is to be given to direct religious +teaching, one wishes that it might take +place at the old time camp meeting, where<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_119" id="Page_119">[Pg 119]</a></span> +there is fresh air and space in which to +breathe it. The first of Edward Everett +Hale's three rules of life as he gave them +to the Hampton students was, "Live all +you can out in the open air." The religious-minded +New York Negro succumbs +easily to disease, and yet elects to spend +his day of leisure within doors.</p> + +<p>With the exception of the Episcopalians, +the churches undertake little institutional +work. Money is lacking, and there is only +a feeble conviction of the value of the gymnasium, +pool table, and girls' and boys' clubs. +The colored branches of the Young Men's +Christian Association, however, are places +for recreation and instruction. The lines +that Evangelical Americans draw regarding +amusements, prohibiting cards and welcoming +dominos, allowing bagatelle and +frowning upon billiards, must be interpreted +by some folk-lore historian to show their +reasonableness. Doubtless the extent to +which a game is used for gambling purposes +has much to do with its good or bad savor, +and pool and cards for this reason are +tabooed. Dancing is also frowned upon<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_120" id="Page_120">[Pg 120]</a></span> +by many of the churches, while temperance +societies make active campaign for prohibition. +To New York's black folk, the +church-goers and they who stand without +are the sheep and the goats, and the gulf +between them is digged deep.</p> + +<p>Of the five colored Episcopal churches, St. +Philip's and St. Cyprian's have parish houses. +St. Philip's has moved into a new parish +house on West One Hundred and Thirty-Fourth +Street, where with its large, well-arranged +rooms, its gymnasium, and its corps +of enthusiastic workers it will soon become +a powerful force in the Harlem Negro's life. +St. Cyprian's is under the City Episcopal +Mission, and has unusual opportunity for +helpfulness since it is separated only by +Amsterdam Avenue from the San Juan Hill +district and yet stands amid the whites. +Its clubs and classes, its employment agency, +its gymnasium, its luncheons for school +children, its beautiful church, are all primarily +for the Negroes; but the colored rector +has a friendly word for his white neighbors, +tow-headed Irish and German boys and girls +sit upon his steps, and his ministry has<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_121" id="Page_121">[Pg 121]</a></span> +lessened the belligerent feeling between the +east and the west sides of Amsterdam +Avenue. St. David's Episcopal Church in +the Bronx has a fresh air home at White +Plains, cared for personally by the rector +and his wife, who spend their vacation with +tenement mothers and their children, the +tired but grateful recipients of their good-will.</p> + +<p>If there were ninety colored clergymen +in New York in 1900, as the census says, a +number must have been without churches, +itinerant preachers or directors of small +missions, supporting themselves by other +labor during the day. Those men who now +fill the pulpits of well-established churches +have been trained in theological schools of +good standing, for the ignorant "darky" of +the story who leaves the hot work of the +cotton field because he feels a "call" to +preach does not receive another from New +York. The colored minister in this city +works hard and long, and finds a wearying +number of demands upon his time. The +wedding and the funeral, the word of counsel +to the young, and of comfort to the aged,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_122" id="Page_122">[Pg 122]</a></span> +a multiplicity of meetings, two sermons +every Sunday, the continual strain of raising +money, these are some of his duties. +With a day from fourteen to seventeen hours +long he earns as few men earn the meagre +salary put into his hand. But his position +among his people is a commanding one, and +carries with it respect and responsibility.</p> + +<p>Strangers who visit colored churches to +be amused by the vociferations of the +preacher and the responses of the congregation +will be disappointed in New York. +Others, however, who attend, desiring to +understand the religious teaching of the +thoughtful Negro, find much of interest. +They hear sermons marked by great eloquence. +In the Evangelical church the +preacher is not afraid to give his imagination +play, and in finely chosen, vivid language, +pictures his thought to his people. +Especially does he love to tell the story of +a future life, of Paradise with its rapturous +beauty of color and sound, its golden streets, +its gates of precious stones, effulgent, radiant. +He dwells not upon the harshness, +but rather upon the mercy of God.</p> +<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_123" id="Page_123">[Pg 123]</a></span></p> +<p>A theological library connected with a +Calvinistic church, when recently catalogued, +disclosed two long shelves of books +upon Hell and two slim volumes upon +Heaven. No such unloving Puritanism dominates +the Negro's thought. Hell's horrors +may be portrayed at a revival to bring the +sinner to repentance, but only as an aid to +a clearer vision of the glories of Heaven.</p> + +<p>The Negro churches lay greater stress +than formerly upon practical religion; they +try to turn a fine frenzy into a determination +for righteousness. This was strikingly exemplified +lately in one of New York's colored +Baptist churches. During the solemn +rite of immersion the congregation began to +grow hysterical, or "happy," as they would +have phrased it; there were cries of "Yes, +Jesus," "We're comin', Lord," and swayings +of the body backward and forward. The +minister with loud and stirring appeal for +a time encouraged these emotions. Then +in a moment he brought quiet to his congregation +and called them to the consecration +of labor. Faith without works was vain. +Baptism was not the end, but only the begin<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_124" id="Page_124">[Pg 124]</a></span>ning +of their salvation. "You-all bleege +ter work," he said, "if yer gwine foller der +Lord. Ain't Jesus work in der carpenter +shop till he nigh on thirty year old? Den +one day he stood up (he ain't none er yer +two-by-fo' men) an' he tak off his blue apun +(I reckon he wore er apun like we-alls) an' +he goes on down ter der wilderness, an' +John der Baptist baptize him."</p> + +<p>From oratory one turns naturally to +music. The feeling for rhythm, for melodious +sound, that leads the Negro to use +majestic words of which he has not always +mastered the meaning, leads him also to +musical expression. He has an instinct +for harmony, and, when within hearing distance +of any instrument, will whistle, not +the melody, however assertive, but will +add a part.<a name="FNanchor_49_6" id="FNanchor_49_6"></a><a href="#Footnote_49_6" class="fnanchor">[6]</a> Those who have visited colored +schools, and especially the colored +schools of the far South where the pupils +are unfamiliar with other music than their +own, can never forget the exquisite, haunting +singing. When a foreman wants to get<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_125" id="Page_125">[Pg 125]</a></span> +energetic work from his black laborers he +sets them to singing stirring tunes. The +Negro has his labor songs as the sailor has +his chanties, and it would be impossible to +measure the joy coming to both through +musical expression.</p> + +<p>In New York, despite their poverty, few +Negroes fail to possess some musical instrument—a +banjo perhaps, or a guitar, a +mandolin or zither, or it may be the highly +prized piano. Visiting of an evening in +the Phipps model tenement, one hears a +variety of gay tinkling sounds. And besides +the mechanical instruments there is always +the great natural instrument, the human +voice. Singing, though not as common in +the city as in the country, is still often heard, +especially in the summer, and remains musical, +though New York's noise and cheap +and vulgar entertainments have an unhappy +fashion of roughening her children's voices.</p> + +<p>Music furnishes a means of livelihood to +many Negroes and supplements the income +of many others. Boys contribute to the +family support by singing cheap songs in +saloons or even in houses of prostitution.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_126" id="Page_126">[Pg 126]</a></span> +A boy "nightingale" will earn the needed +money for rent while learning, all too quickly, +the ways of viciousness. Others, more carefully +reared, sing at church or secret society +concert, perhaps receiving a little pay. +Men form male quartettes that for five or +ten dollars furnish a part of an evening's +entertainment. There are many Negro +musicians and elocutionists who largely +support themselves by their share in the +receipts from concerts and social gatherings.</p> + +<p>We speak of men crossing the line when +they intermarry with the whites, but there +is another crossing of the line when some +Negro by his genius makes the world forget +his race. Such a man is the artist, +Henry Tanner; and New York has such +Negro musicians. Mr. Harry Burleigh, the +baritone at St. George's, has won high recognition, +not only as an interpreter, but as +a composer of music; and one of the richest +synagogues of the city has a Negro for its +assistant organist. There are five colored +orchestras in New York, the one conducted +by Mr. Walter A. Craig having toured<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_127" id="Page_127">[Pg 127]</a></span> +successfully in New England and many other +northern states.</p> + +<p>But the colored musician has usually +found his opportunity for expression and +for a living wage upon the stage. Probably +many of the actors noted on the census list +are musicians, and many of the musicians, +actors; the writer of the topical song having +himself sung it in vaudeville or musical +comedy. Few New Yorkers appreciate how +many of the tunes hummed in the street +or ground out on the hand-organ, have originated +in Negro brains. "The Right Church +but the Wrong Pew," "Teasing," "Nobody," +"Under the Bamboo Tree," which Cole and +Johnson, the composers, heard the last +thing as they left the dock in New York, and +the first thing when they arrived in Paris, +these are a few of the popular favorites. +Handsome incomes have been netted by the +shrewder among these composers, and the +demand for their songs is continuous.</p> + +<p>With a bright song and a jolly dance +comes success. Picking up the copy of the +New York <i>Age</i>, that lies on my desk, I find +jottings of twenty-four colored troupes in<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_128" id="Page_128">[Pg 128]</a></span> +vaudeville in the larger cities of the North +and West. Three are at Proctor's and three +at Keith's. Their economic outlook is not +so hilarious as their songs, for transportation +is expensive and bookings are uncertain; +yet pecuniarily these actors are far +better off than their more sober brothers +who stick to their elevators or their porters' +jobs.</p> + +<p>Twenty years ago the Negro performer +probably had little anticipation of advancing +beyond minstrel work, in which he sang +loud, danced hard, and told a funny story. +S. H. Dudley, the leading comedian in the +"Smart Set" colored company, said in +1909: "When I started in business I had +no idea of getting as high as I am now. A +minstrel company came to the little town in +Texas where I was raised, and at once my +ambition fired me to become a musician. +So I bought a battered horn and began to +toot, to the great annoyance of my neighbors. +Then I secured an engagement with a minstrel +company whose cornet player had +fallen into the hands of the law; and now +here I am with one of the best colored shows<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_129" id="Page_129">[Pg 129]</a></span> +ever gotten together and a starring tour +arranged for next season." The movement +from the minstrel show to the musical comedy, +from the cheapest form of buffoonery to +attractive farce, and even to good comedy, +has been accomplished by a number of +colored comedians. Williams and Walker +may be considered the pioneers in this +movement, and the story of their success, +as Walker has told it, is a fine example of +what the Negro can do along the line of +decided natural aptitude. And it is important +to notice this, for today, in the education +of the race, æsthetic instincts are often +suppressed with Puritan vigor, and labor is +made ugly and unwelcome.</p> + +<p>Bert Williams and George Walker, one a +British West Indian, the other a Westerner, +met in California where each was hanging +around a box manager's office, looking for a +job. Hardly more than boys, they secured +employment at seven dollars a week. That +was in 1889. In 1908 they made each +$250 a week, and in later times they have +doubled and quadrupled this. Their first +stage manager expected them to perform as<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_130" id="Page_130">[Pg 130]</a></span> +the blacked-up white minstrels were performing, +but the two boys soon saw that the +Negro himself was far more entertaining than +the buffoon portrayed by the white man. +They wanted to show the true Negro, and +billing themselves as the "real coons" (their +white rivals called themselves "coons") they +played in San Francisco with some success. +Later they came to New York, and at Koster +and Bial's made their first hit.</p> + +<p>"Long before our run terminated," Walker +said in telling of those early days, "we discovered +an important fact: that the hope of +the colored performer must be in making a +radical departure from the old time 'darky' +style of singing and dancing. So we set +ourselves the task of thinking along new +lines.</p> + +<p>"The first move was to hire a flat in +Fifty-third Street, furnish it, and throw our +doors open to all colored men who possessed +theatrical and musical ability and ambition. +The Williams and Walker flat soon +became the headquarters of all the artistic +young men of our race who were stage-struck. +We entertained the late Paul Law<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_131" id="Page_131">[Pg 131]</a></span>rence +Dunbar, who wrote lyrics for us. +By having these men about us we had the +opportunity to study the musical and theatrical +ability of the most talented members +of our race."</p> + +<p>In 1893 the World's Fair was held at +Chicago, and on the "Midway" the visitor +saw races from all over the world. Here +was a Dahomey village, with strange little +huts, representative of the African home +life. The Dahomeyans themselves were late +in arriving, and American Negroes, sometimes +with an added coat of black, were +employed to represent them. Among them +were Williams and Walker, who played +their parts until the real Dahomeyans arriving, +they became in turn spectators and +studied the true African. This contact +with the dancing and singing of the primitive +people of their own race had an important +effect upon their art. Their lyrics +recalled African songs, their dancing took +on African movements, especially Walker's. +Any one who saw Walker in "Abyssinia," +the most African and the most artistic of +their plays, must have recognized the<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_132" id="Page_132">[Pg 132]</a></span> +savage beauty of his dancing when he was +masquerading as an African king.</p> + +<p>After the Dahomey episode the success +of the two men was continuous. "In 1902 +and 1903," Walker said, "we had all New +York and London doing the cake walk." In +February, 1908, they appeared in "Bandanna +Land," at the Majestic Theatre, and +remained there for six months. Only those +colored men who have made a steady, uphill +struggle for the chance to play good comedy, +know how important such recognition was +for the Negro. "Bandanna Land" was +probably the most popular light opera in +New York that winter next to "The Merry +Widow." The singing, especially that of +the male chorus, was often beautiful. Mrs. +Walker's dancing and charming acting were +delightful, the chorus girls were above the +average in beauty and musical expression, +and the two men who made the piece were +spontaneously, irresistibly funny; added +to this, unlike its successful rival, "Bandanna +Land" was without a vulgar scene +or word.</p> + +<p>This was the last time the two men played<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_133" id="Page_133">[Pg 133]</a></span> +together. Walker became seriously ill, and +died in January, 1911. After their company +disbanded, Williams went back to the one-piece +act of vaudeville, but as a star in a +white troupe. His position as a permanent +actor in the "Follies of 1910" marks a new +departure for the colored comedian, a departure +won by great talent combined with +character and tact.</p> + +<p>Since 1908 the Majestic has seen another +colored company, Cole and Johnson's, presenting +a half-Negro, half-Indian, musical +comedy, the "Red Moon." These two men, +for years in vaudeville, have written songs +for Lillian Russell, Marie Cahill, Anna Held, +and other popular musical comedy and +vaudeville singers. They have played for six +months continuously at the Palace Theatre, +London. Accustomed to writing for white +actors, their own plays are not so distinctively +African as Williams and Walker's. +Both Johnson and Cole are of the mulatto +type, and neither blackens his face. Cole +is one of the most amusing men in comedy +in New York. He is tall and very thin, +with a genius for finding lank and gro<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_134" id="Page_134">[Pg 134]</a></span>tesque +costumes that are delightfully incongruous +with his grave face. The words of +the musical comedies are his, the music, +Johnson's. He, too, has become seriously +ill, and his company has disbanded. In +three years the colored stage has suffered +serious loss, but we see forming new and +successful companies whose reputation will +soon be assured.</p> + +<p>Comedy has always furnished a medium +for criticism of the foibles of the times, and +there are many sly digs at the white man +in the colored play. Ernest Hogan, now +deceased, better than any one else played +the rural southern darky. In the "Oysterman" +we saw him in contact with a white +scamp who was intent upon getting his recently +acquired money. He was urged to +take stock in a land company, to buy where +watermelons grew as thick as potatoes, +and chickens were as common as sparrows. +The audience hated the white man heartily +and sided with the simple, kindly, black +youth, sitting with his dog at his side, on +his cabin steps. Behind boisterous laughter +and raillery the writers of these comedies<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_135" id="Page_135">[Pg 135]</a></span> +often gain the sympathy of their hearers +for the black race.</p> + +<p>In this attempt to show the occupational +life of the Negro, we have found that race +prejudice often proves a bar to complete +success, to full manhood. Something of this +is true with the actor as well as with the +laborer and the business man. In securing +entrance in vaudeville, color is at first an +advantage. The "darky" to the white man +is grotesquely amusing, and by rolling his +eyes, showing a glistening smile, and wearing +shoes that make a monstrosity of his +feet, the Negro may create a laugh where +the man with a white skin would be hooted +off the stage. And since the laugh is so +easily won, many colored actors become +indolent and content themselves, year after +year, with playing the part of buffoon. +But with the ambition to rise in his profession +comes the difficult struggle to induce +the audience to see a new Negro in the black +man of today. The public gives the colored +man no opportunity as a tragedian, +demanding that his comedy shall border +always on the farcical. And what is de<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_136" id="Page_136">[Pg 136]</a></span>manded +of the actor is also demanded of the +musician. Writers of the scores of some +of our musical comedies are musicians of +superior training and ability, but rarely +are they permitted full expression. Mr. +Will Marion Cook, the composer of much of +the music of "Bandanna Land," for a few +moments gives a piece of exquisite orchestration. +When the colored minister rises +and exhorts his quarrelling friends to be at +peace with one another, one hears a beautiful +harmony. I am told that Mr. Cook +declares that the next score he writes shall +begin with ten minutes of serious music. +If the audience doesn't like it, they can come +in late, but for ten minutes he will do something +worthy of his genius.</p> + +<p>However light-hearted a people, and however +worthy of praise the entertainment +that brings a jolly, wholesome laugh, let +us hope that in the near future the Negro +will find a more complete expression for +his musical and histrionic gifts. Some actor +of commanding talent, whose claims cannot +be ignored, may reveal the larger life of +the race. The nineteenth century knew a<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_137" id="Page_137">[Pg 137]</a></span> +great Negro actor, Ira Aldridge, a <i>protégé</i> +and disciple of Edmund Kean. He played +Othello to Kean's Iago, and in the forties +toured Europe with his own company, +receiving high honors in Berlin and St. +Petersburg.<a name="FNanchor_50_7" id="FNanchor_50_7"></a><a href="#Footnote_50_7" class="fnanchor">[7]</a> A dark-skinned African, of +immense power, physically and emotionally, +he made Desdemona cry out in real fear, +and caused Bassanio instinctively to shrink +as he demanded his pound of flesh. Today's +actor must be more subtle in his attack, +but it may be given to him to reveal the +thoughts at the back of the black man's +mind. The genius of Zangwill gave us the +picture of the children of the Ghetto; perhaps +from the theatre's seat the American +will first understand the despised black race.</p> + + +<div class="footnotes"><h3>FOOTNOTES:</h3> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_44_1" id="Footnote_44_1"></a><a href="#FNanchor_44_1"><span class="label">[1]</span></a> On West 133d Street two former Hampton students have +a prosperous little tailor and upholstering shop.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_45_2" id="Footnote_45_2"></a><a href="#FNanchor_45_2"><span class="label">[2]</span></a> Those interested in the Negro in business should look +for an intensive study, shortly to be published, on the wage-earners +and business enterprises among Negroes in New York. +It is entitled "The Negro at Work in New York City," and +has been made by George E. Haynes, under the direction of +the Bureau of Social Research of the New York School of +Philanthropy.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_46_3" id="Footnote_46_3"></a><a href="#FNanchor_46_3"><span class="label">[3]</span></a> Since going to press the new and very beautiful building +of St. Philips' Episcopal Church, on W. 134th Street, has been +opened. This is a fine example of English Gothic and its +architects are two young colored men, one of whom was for +years in the office of a white firm.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_47_4" id="Footnote_47_4"></a><a href="#FNanchor_47_4"><span class="label">[4]</span></a> Mary Kingsley has some interesting generalizations on +this point. She speaks of the African mind approaching all +things from a spiritual point of view while the English mind +approaches them from a material point of view, and of +"the high perception of justice you will find in the African, +combined with the inability to think out a pulley or +a lever except under white tuition."—<i>West African Studies</i>, +p. 330.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_48_5" id="Footnote_48_5"></a><a href="#FNanchor_48_5"><span class="label">[5]</span></a> Lincoln Hospital in New York, while receiving white and +colored patients, was especially designed to help the colored +race. It has a training school for colored nurses, but neither +accepts colored medical graduates as interns, nor allows +colored doctors upon its staff. This is one of many cases in +which the good white people of the city are glad to assist the +poor and ailing Negro, but are unwilling to help the strong +and ambitious colored man to full opportunity.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_49_6" id="Footnote_49_6"></a><a href="#FNanchor_49_6"><span class="label">[6]</span></a> See H. J. Wilson, "The Negro and Music," <i>Outlook</i>, +Dec. 1, 1906.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_50_7" id="Footnote_50_7"></a><a href="#FNanchor_50_7"><span class="label">[7]</span></a> William J. Simmons's "Men of Mark."</p></div> +</div> + + + + +<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_138" id="Page_138">[Pg 138]</a></span></p> +<h2><a name="CHAPTER_VI" id="CHAPTER_VI">CHAPTER VI</a><br /> +<span class="smcap">The Colored Woman as a Bread Winner</span></h2> + + +<p>The life of the Negro woman of New York, +if she belong to the laboring class, differs in +some important respects from the life of the +white laboring woman. Generalizations on +so comprehensive a subject must, of course, +meet with many exceptions, but the observing +visitor, familiar with white and colored +neighborhoods, quickly notes marked contrasts +between the two, contrasts largely the +result of different occupational opportunities. +These pertain both to the married woman +and the unmarried working girl.</p> + +<p>The generality of white women in New +York, wives of laboring men, infrequently +engage in gainful occupations. In the early +years of married life the wife relies on her +husband's wage for support, and within her +tiny tenement-flat bears and rears her chil<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_139" id="Page_139">[Pg 139]</a></span>dren +and performs her household duties—the +sewing, cooking, washing, and ironing, +and the daily righting of the contracted +rooms. She is a conscientious wife and +mother, and rarely, either by night or by day, +journeys far from her own home. When unemployment +visits the family wage earner, +she turns to laundry work and day's cleaning +for money to meet the rent and to supply the +household with scanty meals; but as soon as +her husband resumes work she returns to +her narrow round of domestic duties.</p> + +<p>After a score of these monotonous years +more prosperous times come to the housewife. +Every morning two or three children +go out to work, and their wages make heavier +the family purse. Son and daughter, having +entered factory or store, bring home their +pay envelopes unbroken on Saturday nights, +and the augmentation of the father's wage +gives the mother an income to administer. +After the young people's wants in clothing +and entertainment have been in part supplied, +it becomes possible to buy new furniture +on the instalment plan, to hire a piano, +even to move into a better neighborhood.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_140" id="Page_140">[Pg 140]</a></span> +The earnings of a number of children, supplementing +the wage of the head of the +family, make life more tolerable for all.</p> + +<p>These days, however, do not last long. +Sons and daughters marry and assume new +responsibilities; the husband, his best strength +gone, finds unemployment increasing; and +since saving, except for wasteful industrial +insurance, has seemed impossible without +sacrificing the decencies and pleasures of +the children, the end of the woman's married +life is likely to be hard and comfortless.</p> + +<p>This rough description may fairly be taken +to represent the life of the average New +York white woman of the laboring class. It +is not, however, the life of the average colored +woman. With her, self-sustaining work +usually begins at fifteen, and by no means +ceases with her entrance upon marriage, +which only entails new financial burdens. +The wage of the husband, as we have seen, +is usually insufficient to support a family, +save in extreme penury, and the wife accepts +the necessity of supplementing the husband's +income. This she accomplishes by taking +in washing or by entering a private family<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_141" id="Page_141">[Pg 141]</a></span> +to do housework. Sometimes she is away +from her tenement nearly every day in the +week; again the bulk of her earnings comes +from home industry. Her day holds more +diversity than that of her white neighbor; +she meets more people, becomes familiar +with the ways of the well-to-do,—their +household decorations, their dress, their refinements +of manner; but she has but few +hours to give to her children. With her +husband she is ready to be friend and helpmate; +but should he turn out a bad bargain, +she has no fear of leaving him, since +her marital relations are not welded by +economic dependence. An industrious, competent +woman, she works and spends, and in +her scant hours of leisure takes pride in keeping +her children well-dressed and clean.</p> + +<p>At the second period of her married life, +when her boys and girls, few in number if +she be a New Yorker, begin to engage in +self-supporting work, her condition shows +less improvement than that of the white +woman of her class. Sometimes her children +hand her their whole wage, far oftener +they bring her only such part as they choose<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_142" id="Page_142">[Pg 142]</a></span> +to spare. The strict accounting of the minor +to the parent, usual among Northerners in +the past, and today common among the +immigrant class, is not a part of the Negro's +training. Rather, as the race has attained +freedom it has copied the indulgent attitude +of the once familiar "master," and regrets +that its offspring must enter upon any work. +Children with this tradition about them use +the money they earn largely for the gratification +of their vanity, not for the lessening of +their mother's tasks. But a more potent +factor than lack of discipline keeps the +mother from being the administrator of the +family's joint earnings. White boys and +girls in New York enter work that makes it +possible and advantageous for them to dwell +at home; Negroes must go out to service, +accept long and irregular hours in hotel or +apartment, travel for days on boat or train. +The family home is infrequently available +to them, and money given in to it brings +small return. Under these circumstances it +is not strange if the mother must continue +her round of washing and scrubbing.</p> + +<p>The last years of life of the Negro woman,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_143" id="Page_143">[Pg 143]</a></span> +probably a little more than the last years of +the white, are likely to bring happiness. +With a mother at work a grandmother +becomes an important factor, and elderly +colored women are often seen bringing up +little children or helping in the laundry—that +great colored home industry. Accustomed +all their lives to hard labor, it is easy +for them to find work that shall repay their +support, and in their children's households +they are treated with respect and consideration.</p> + +<p>The contrast in the lives of the colored and +white married women is not more strongly +marked than the contrast in the lives of their +unmarried daughters and sisters. Unable to +enter any pursuit except housework, the +unskilled colored girl goes out to service or +helps at home with the laundry or sewing. +Factory and store are closed to her, and +rarely can she take a place among other +working girls. Her hours are the long, irregular +hours of domestic service. She brings +no pay envelope home to her mother, the +two then carefully discussing how much +belongs rightfully for board, and how much<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_144" id="Page_144">[Pg 144]</a></span> +may go for the new coat or dress, but takes +the eighteen or twenty dollars given her at +the end of the month, and quite by herself +determines all her expenditures. Far oftener +than any class of white girls in the city she +lives away from the parental home.</p> + +<p>These are some of the differences found by +the observer who looks into the Negro and +the white tenement. They need not, however, +rest alone upon any observer's testimony. +We have in the census abundant +statistics for their verification. Scattered +among the volumes on Population, Occupations, +and Women at Work are many facts +concerning Negro women workers of New +York, all of them confirmatory of the description +just given. We may note the most +important.</p> + +<p>In 1900, whereas 4.2 per cent of the white +married women in New York were engaged +in gainful occupations, 31.4 per cent of the +Negro married women were earning their +living, over seven times as many in proportion +as the whites.<a name="FNanchor_51_1" id="FNanchor_51_1"></a><a href="#Footnote_51_1" class="fnanchor">[1]</a></p> +<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_145" id="Page_145">[Pg 145]</a></span></p> +<p>Again, in the total population of New +York's women workers, 80 per cent were +single, 10 per cent married, and 10 per cent +widowed and divorced; while among the +Negroes, the single women were only 53 +per cent, the married 25 per cent, and the +widowed 22.<a name="FNanchor_52_2" id="FNanchor_52_2"></a><a href="#Footnote_52_2" class="fnanchor">[2]</a></p> + +<p>Statistics of the age period at which women +are at work, show the Negro's long continuing +wage-earning activity. Between sixteen and +twenty is a busy time for the women of both +races. Among the whites 59 per cent are +in gainful occupations, among the Negroes +66 per cent. But as the girl arrives at the +period when she is likely to marry, the +per cent of workers among the whites +drops rapidly, until for white women, +forty-five and over, it is 13.5, about one +in seven. With the colored, among the +women forty-five years of age and over, 53<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_146" id="Page_146">[Pg 146]</a></span> +per cent, more than half, still engage in +gainful toil.<a name="FNanchor_53_3" id="FNanchor_53_3"></a><a href="#Footnote_53_3" class="fnanchor">[3]</a></p> + +<p>Family life can be studied in the census +table. While 59 per cent of the unmarried +white girls at work live at home, this is +found to be true of but 25 per cent of the +colored girls; that is, 75 per cent, three-quarters +of all the colored unmarried working +women, live with their employers or board.<a name="FNanchor_54_4" id="FNanchor_54_4"></a><a href="#Footnote_54_4" class="fnanchor">[4]</a></p> + +<p>The census volume on occupations reveals +at once the narrow range of the New York +colored woman's working life. Personal and +domestic service absorbs 90 per cent of her +numbers against 40 per cent among the +white. But before considering more fully +the colored girl at work, we need to notice +another statistical fact, the preponderance +in the city of Negro women over Negro +men.</p> + +<p>Like the foreigner, the youth of the Negro +race comes first to the city to seek a livelihood. +The colored population shows 41 per +cent of its number between the ages of 20<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_147" id="Page_147">[Pg 147]</a></span> +and 35. But unlike the foreigner, the Negro +women find larger opportunity and come in +greater numbers than the men. Their range +of work is narrow, but within it they can +command double the wages they receive at +home, and if they are possessed of average +ability, they are seldom long out of work. +With the immense growth of wealth in New +York the demand for servants continually +increases, and finding little response from the +white native born population, many mistresses +receive readily the services of the +English-speaking southern and West Indian +blacks. So the boats from Charleston and +Norfolk and the British West Indies bring +scores and hundreds of Negro women from +country districts, from cities where they have +spent a short time at service, girls with and +girls without experience, all seeking better +wages in a new land.</p> + +<p>Mr. Kelly Miller was the first to call +attention to the presence in American cities +of surplus Negro women.<a name="FNanchor_55_5" id="FNanchor_55_5"></a><a href="#Footnote_55_5" class="fnanchor">[5]</a> The phenomenon +is not peculiar to New York. Baltimore,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_148" id="Page_148">[Pg 148]</a></span> +Washington, New Orleans, all show the same +condition. In Atlanta the women number +143 to every hundred colored men. New +York shows 123 to every masculine one hundred. +These surplus women account in part +for the number of Negro women workers in +New York not living at home. Some are +with their employers, but others lodge in the +already crowded tenements, for the southern +servant, unaccustomed to spending the night +at her employer's, in New York also, frequently +arranges to leave her mistress when +her work is done. In their hours of leisure +the surplus women are known to play havoc +with their neighbors' sons, even with their +neighbors' husbands, for since lack of men +makes marriage impossible for about a fifth +of New York's colored girls, social disorder +results. Surplus Negro women, able to secure +work, support idle, able-bodied Negro +men. The lounger at the street corner, the +dandy in the parlor thrumming on his banjo, +means a Malindy of the hour at the kitchen +washboard. In a town in Germany, where +men were sadly scarce, I was told that a +servant girl paid as high as a mark to a<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_149" id="Page_149">[Pg 149]</a></span> +soldier to walk with her in the Hofgarten +on a Sunday afternoon. Colored men in +New York command their "mark," and girls +are found who keep them in polished boots, +fashionable coats, and well-creased trousers. +Could the Negro country boy be as certain +as his sister of lucrative employment in New +York, or could he oftener persuade her to +remain with him on the farm, he would +better city civilization. But the demand for +servants increases, and the colored girl continues +to be attracted to the city where she +can earn and spend.</p> + +<p>The table on the following page shows in +condensed form the occupations of the Negro +women in New York. As we see, the Negro +women number forty-four in every thousand +women workers.</p> + +<table class="ruled" summary="Females Ten Years of Age and over, Engaged in +Gainful Occupations in New York"> +<caption class="smcap">Females Ten Years of Age and over, Engaged in +Gainful Occupations in New York +</caption> +<tr class="bb"><td /> +<td class="tdc">Total</td><td class="tdc">Negro</td> +<td class="tdc">Number to every<br />1000 workers</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tdl">Professional service</td> +<td class="tdr">22,422</td><td class="tdr">281</td><td class="tdr">12</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tdl">Domestic and personal service</td> +<td class="tdr">146,722</td><td class="tdr">14,586</td><td class="tdr">100</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tdl"><span class="indent">Laundresses</span></td> +<td class="tdr">16,102</td><td class="tdr">3,224</td><td class="tdr">200</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tdl"><span class="indent">Servants and waitresses</span></td> +<td class="tdr">103,963</td><td class="tdr">10,297</td><td class="tdr">99</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tdl"><span class="indent">All others</span></td> +<td class="tdr">24,657</td><td class="tdr">1,065</td><td class="tdr">43</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tdl">Trade and transportation</td> +<td class="tdr">65,318</td><td class="tdr">106</td><td class="tdc">Between one<br />and two</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tdl">Manufacturing and mechanical pursuits</td> +<td class="tdr">132,535</td><td class="tdr">1,138</td><td class="tdr">7</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tdl"><span class="indent">Dressmakers</span></td> +<td class="tdr">37,514</td><td class="tdr">813</td><td class="tdr">22</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tdl"><span class="indent">Seamstresses</span></td> +<td class="tdr">18,108</td><td class="tdr">249</td><td class="tdr">14</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tdl"><span class="indent">All others</span></td> +<td class="tdr">76,913</td><td class="tdr">76</td><td class="tdr">1</td></tr> +<tr class="bt"><td class="tdl">Total including some occupations not specified</td> +<td class="tdr">367,437</td><td class="tdr">16,114</td><td class="tdr">44</td></tr> +</table> +<blockquote><p> +Federal Census 1900: Occupations, Table 43, p. 638 +</p></blockquote> + +<p>Ninety per cent of all the Negro women +workers of New York are in domestic and +personal service. This includes a variety of +positions. Some Negro girls work in stores, +dusting stock, taking charge of cloak or +toilet rooms, scrubbing floors. Their hours +are regular, but the pay, five or six, or very +occasionally eight dollars a week, means a<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_150" id="Page_150">[Pg 150]</a></span> +scanty livelihood without hope of advancement. +The position of maid in a theatre +where perquisites are larger is prized, and a +new and pleasant place is that of a maid on +a limited train. But the bulk of the girls +are servants in boarding-houses, or are with +private families as nurses, waitresses, cooks, +laundresses, maids-of-all-work, earning from<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_151" id="Page_151">[Pg 151]</a></span> +sixteen and eighteen to twenty-five and even +thirty dollars a month. Occasionally a very +skilful cook can command as high a monthly +wage as fifty dollars.</p> + +<p>The colored girl is frequently found engaged +at general housework in a small apartment. +Her desire to return to her lodging +at night makes her popular with families +living in contracted space. With the conveniences +of a New York flat, dumb-waiter, +clothes-dryer, gas, and electricity, general +housework is not severe. Work begins early, +seven at the latest, and lasts until the dinner +is cleared away, at half-past eight or nine. +Released then from further tasks, the young +girl goes to her tiny inner tenement room, +dons a fresh dress, and then, as chance or her +training determines, walks the streets, goes +to the theatre, or attends the class meeting +at her church. Entertainments among the +Negroes are rarely under way until ten +o'clock, and short hours of sleep in ill-ventilated +rooms soon weaken the vitality of +the new-comer. Housework under these +conditions does not create much ambition; +the mistress moves, flitting, in New York<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_152" id="Page_152">[Pg 152]</a></span> +fashion, from one flat to another, and the +girl also flits among employers, changing +with the whim of the moment.</p> + +<p>Few subjects present so fascinating a field +for discussion as domestic service, and the +housewife of today enters into it with energy, +sometimes decrying the modern working girl, +again planning household economics that +shall lure her from factory or shop. The +only point we need to consider now is the +dissatisfaction that results when 64 per cent +of the women of a race are forced by circumstances +into one occupation. Those with native +ability along this line succeed and make +others and themselves happy. The faithful, +patient, loyal Negro servant is well-known, +the black mammy has passed into American +literature, but not every colored woman can +wisely be given this position. Some of the +Negro girls who take up housework in New +York are capable of more intelligent labor, +and chafe under their limitations; others +have not the ability to do good housework; +for domestic service requires more mental +capacity than is demanded in many factories. +In short, a great many colored girls in<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_153" id="Page_153">[Pg 153]</a></span> +New York are round pegs in square holes, +and the community is the loser by it.</p> + +<p>Among these round pegs are girls who, +determining no longer to drudge in lonely +kitchens, contrive, as we shall see later, to +find positions at other more attractive reputable +work. Others, deciding in favor of +material betterment at whatever cost, lower +their moral standard and secure easier and +more remunerative jobs. A well-paying +place, with short hours and high tips, at once +offers itself to the colored girl who is willing +to work for a woman of the demi-monde. +In the sporting house also she is preferred +as a servant, her dark complexion separating +her from other inmates. In 1858, Sanger +wrote in his "History of Prostitution," "The +servants (in these houses) are almost always +colored women. Their wages are liberal, +their perquisites considerable, and their +work light." Untrained herself, bereft of +home influence, with an ancestry that sometimes +cries out her parent's weakness in the +contour and color of her face, the Negro girl +in New York, more even than the foreign +immigrant, is subject to degrading tempta<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_154" id="Page_154">[Pg 154]</a></span>tion. +The good people, who are often so +exacting, want her for her willingness to +work long hours at a lower wage than the +white; and the bad people, who are often so +carelessly kind, offer her light labor and +generous pay. It is small wonder that she +sometimes chooses the latter.</p> + +<p>Not all the colored girls who work in +questionable places and with questionable +people take the jobs from choice; some are +sent without knowing the character of the +house they enter. A few years ago an agitation +was started for the protection of helpless +Negro immigrants who had fallen into the +hands of unscrupulous employment agencies. +A system existed, and still exists, by which +employment agencies were able to advance +the travelling expenses of southern girls, who +on their arrival in New York were held in +debt until the cost of the journey had been +many times repaid. Helpless in the power +of the agent, the new-comer was forced to +work where he wished. Under the city's +department of licenses some of the more +unscrupulous of these agencies have been +closed, and philanthropy has placed a visitor<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_155" id="Page_155">[Pg 155]</a></span> +at the docks to give aid and advice to unprotected +girls. But the danger is by no +means over. Those familiar with the subject +assert that there is a proportionately +larger black slave than white slave traffic.</p> + +<p>There is a gainful occupation for women, +black and white, too important to be left +unnoticed. The census does not tabulate it. +The best people strive to ignore it, and carefully +sheltered girls grow up unconscious of +its existence. But the employment agent +understands its commercial value, and little +children in the red light neighborhood are as +familiar with it as with the vending of peanuts +on the street. To the poor it is always +an open door affording at least a temporary +respite from dispossession and starvation. +How many of the colored turn to it, we do +not know—certainly not a few. Some gain +from it a meagre livelihood, but others, for +a time at least, achieve comfort and even +luxury.</p> + +<p>Among the round pegs that the square +holes so uncomfortably chafe are colored girls +of intelligence and charm who deliberately +join the anti-social class. Probably a few<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_156" id="Page_156">[Pg 156]</a></span> +in any case would lead this life, but the history +of many shows an unsuccessful struggle +for congenial work, ending with a choice of +material comfort however high the moral +cost. In One Hundred and Thirty-fourth +and One Hundred and Thirty-fifth Streets +are apartments where such girls live, two or +three together, surrounded by comforts that +their respectable neighbors who go out to +cook, wash, and iron may fruitlessly long +for all their lives. A colored philanthropic +worker, stopping by chance at the door of +one of these places, saw an old college friend. +"How can you do it!" she cried as she recognized +the life the girl was leading, "How can +you do it! I would rather kill myself scrubbing!" +"There is the difference between +us," came the answer, "I am not willing to +die, and I cannot and will not scrub."</p> + +<p>It is pleasant and encouraging to turn from +colored women who have given up the +struggle, to ambitious, successful workers. +Some among these are in the domestic service +group and enjoy with heartiness their +tasks as nurse-maid or cook. "This is my +piano day," an expert colored washerwoman<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_157" id="Page_157">[Pg 157]</a></span> +says of a Monday morning. Among the +domestic service workers, as classified by the +census, is the trained nurse, filling an increasingly +important position in New York. In +1909, Lincoln Hospital graduated twenty-one +colored nurses, some of whom remain in +New York to do excellent work.</p> + +<p>In the professions, with the women as +with the men, the first place numerically is +occupied by performers upon the stage. So +much has been said of the Negro as an actor +that there is little to add. A rather better +class of colored than of white women join +musical comedy chorus troupes, for fifteen or +eighteen dollars a week that will attract a +Negro to the stage can be made by a white +girl in a dozen other ways. Lightness of +color seems a requisite for a stage position, +unless a dark skin is offset by very great +ability, as in the case of Aida Walker, one of +the most graceful and charming women in +musical comedy.</p> + +<p>No record is kept of the number of colored +teachers in the city's public schools, but each +year Negro graduates from the normal college +secure positions. These are found from<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_158" id="Page_158">[Pg 158]</a></span> +the kindergarten through the primary and +up to the highest grammar grade. The +colored girl with intellectual ability, particularly +if she comes of an old New York +family, is apt to turn to teaching. Her +novitiate is long, but a permanent certificate +secured, she is sure of a good salary, +increasing with her years of service, and +ending in a pension. This path of security +has perhaps tended to keep New York colored +girls from going into other lines of +work. I have not yet found one who has +graduated from a university. Pratt Institute +and the Teachers' College have colored +normal students, but they are usually from +the South or West, not New Yorkers born.</p> + +<p>Philanthropy is opening up important lines +of opportunity to the Negro woman in New +York. In 1903, a colored graduate nurse +secured an interview with the Secretary of +the New York Charity Organization Society, +and so ably presented to him the need of +Negro visitors among Negroes that she was +appointed visiting nurse for the colored sick +who came under the notice of the Society. +In time the position changed into that of a<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_159" id="Page_159">[Pg 159]</a></span> +colored district visitor, other colored nurses +entering in numbers into district nursing +work. In 1910, three nurses were employed +by the Nurses' Settlement, two by the Association +for Improving the Condition of the +Poor of Manhattan, and two by the District +Nursing Association of Brooklyn. With increased +knowledge of the sickness and suffering +amid the Negro poor, and of their need +of proper care in their homes, the number of +these nurses will doubtless increase. Colored +women rank high among the trained nurses +of New York.</p> + +<p>Other philanthropic work lately has been +undertaken by Negro women in New York. +In 1910, besides the nurses of whom we have +spoken, there were at the head of societies in +salaried positions, two settlement workers, +two matrons of day nurseries, two matrons of +homes in which much social work was carried +on, many employees in colored orphan +asylums, a teacher of domestic science in a +home-keeping flat, a traveller's aid visitor, a +playground instructor, besides workers in +various religious organizations. This does +not include the many colored women doing<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_160" id="Page_160">[Pg 160]</a></span> +social and recreation work in the public +schools and on the city's playgrounds. Indeed, +the difficulty in New York is to secure +trained colored women for philanthropic +work, the Negro's attitude still being that +of the great majority of white women a few +years ago, that love for children and a sentimental +kindness constitute the requisites +for work among the poor. But the school +of experience is training workers, and as +the schools of philanthropy of New York, +Boston, and Chicago also graduate colored +students, we shall have in the North the +intelligent, trained workers whom we need.</p> + +<p>The little kindergarten girl who, with head +erect, walked past the jeering line of boys +to the green trees and soft grass of the +park has her counterpart in many young +women of New York. In 1909, a colored +girl graduated from one of the city's dental +colleges, the first woman of her race to take +this degree in the state. From the first +her success was remarkable. Colored girls +with ability and steady purpose and dogged +determination have won success in clerical +and business work; but the last large and<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_161" id="Page_161">[Pg 161]</a></span> +efficient group is that classified in the census +under mechanical and manufacturing pursuits: +the dressmakers, seamstresses, milliners.</p> + +<p>Colored women have always been known +as good sewers, and recently they have +studied at their trade in some of the best +schools. From 1904 to 1910, the Manhattan +Trade School graduated thirty-four colored +girls in dressmaking, hand sewing, and novelty +making. The public night school on +West Forty-sixth Street, under its able colored +principal, Dr. W. L. Bulkley, since 1907, +has educated hundreds of women in sewing, +dressmaking, millinery, and artificial flower-making. +While the majority of the pupils +have taken the courses for their private use, +a large minority are entering the business +world. They meet with repeated difficulties; +white girls refuse to work in shops with them, +private employers object to their color, but +they have, nevertheless, made creditable progress. +The census reports the number of +Negro dressmakers to have quadrupled in +the United States from 1890 to 1900. Something +comparable to this increase in dressmaking +and allied trades has taken place<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_162" id="Page_162">[Pg 162]</a></span> +among the Negroes of New York, and it has +come through education and persistence, and +the increase of trade among the colored group +itself. Numbers of these dressmakers and +milliners earn a livelihood, though often a +scanty one, from the patronage of the people +of their own race.</p> + +<p>But despite her efforts and occasional successes, +the colored girl in New York meets +with severer race prejudice than the colored +man, and is more persistently kept from +attractive work. <i>She gets the job that the +white girl does not want.</i> It may be that the +white girls want the wrong thing, and that +the jute mill and tobacco shop and flower +factory are more dangerous to health and +right living than the mistress's kitchen, but +she knows her mind, and follows the business +that brings her liberty of action when the +six o'clock whistle blows. What she desires +for herself, however, she refuses to her colored +neighbor. Occasionally an employer objects +to colored girls, but the Manhattan Trade +School repeatedly, in trying to place its +graduates, has found that opposition to the +Negro has come largely from the working<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_163" id="Page_163">[Pg 163]</a></span> +girls. Race prejudice has even gone so far +as to prevent a colored woman from receiving +home work when it entailed her waiting in +the same sitting-room with white women. +Of course, this is not the universal attitude. +In friendly talks with hundreds of New +York's white women workers, I have found +the majority ready to accept the colored +worker. Jewish girls are especially tolerant. +They believe that good character and decent +manners should count, not color; but an +aggressive, combative minority is quite sure +that no matter how well educated or virtuous +she may be, no black woman is as good +as a white one. So the few but belligerent +aristocrats triumph over the many half-ashamed, +timid democrats.</p> + +<p>The shirtwaist makers' strike of 1910 was +so profoundly important in its breaking +down of feeling between nationalities, its +union of all working women in a common +cause, that the colored girl, while very +slightly concerned in the strike itself, may +profit by the more generous feeling it engendered. +Certainly an entrance into store and +workshop would be to her immense advan<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_164" id="Page_164">[Pg 164]</a></span>tage. +She needs the discipline of regular +hours, of steady training, of order and system. +She needs also to become part of a +strong labor group, to share its working +class ideal, to feel the weight of its moral +opinion; instead of looking into the mirror +of her wealthy mistress, she needs to reflect +the aspirations of the strong, earnest women +who toil.</p> + +<p>Before bringing the story of the life of the +New York colored working woman to a +close, it may not be amiss to look closely at +the discrimination practised against her, not +only in her work, but in her daily life. The +Negro comes North and finds himself half a +man. Does the woman, too, come to be +but half a woman? What is her status in +the city to which she turns for opportunity +and larger freedom?</p> + +<p>Four years ago, within a few hours' time, +two stories were told me, illustrative of the +colored woman's status. Neither occurred +in the city of New York, but both are indicative +of its temper. The first I heard from +a woman skilled in a difficult profession, a +Canadian now residing in the United States,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_165" id="Page_165">[Pg 165]</a></span> +and the descendant of a fugitive slave. +Her youthful companions had all been white, +and while an African in the darkness of her +skin and her musical voice, her rearing had +been that of an Englishwoman. "Shortly +after coming to New York, I went for the +first time," she told me, "to a little resort on +the Jersey coast. A board walk flanked the +ocean, and on the other side were shops +and places of amusement. Going out one +morning with two companions, a colored +man and woman, we turned into an enclosure +to examine a gaily painted merry-go-round. +The place was open to the public, and a few +nursery maids with their charges were seated +about. The man in our party, interested in +the mechanism of the machine, went up to +it and began to explain it to us. Quite suddenly +a rough fellow, in charge of the place, +walked over and called out, 'Get out of here! +We don't allow niggers.' The attack, to me +at least, was so overwhelming that I did not +move at once. Thereupon I was again +called 'nigger,' and ordered out.</p> + +<p>"When I reached the beach, I asked my +companions to leave me, and I sat on a bench<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_166" id="Page_166">[Pg 166]</a></span> +looking upon the waves. After a time an +old woman came to my side, and said a little +timidly, 'What are you thinking about, +dearie?' Looking in her face I saw that she +feared that I would commit suicide. 'I am +thinking,' I said turning to her, 'that I wish +the ocean might rise up and drown every +white person on the face of the earth.' 'Oh, +you mustn't say that,' she cried horrified, +and left me. After I cannot tell how many +minutes or hours, I returned to my boarding-house, +and then to my home in New York. +I had had a great many white friends in my +native home; I had played with them, eaten +with them, slept with them. Now I destroyed +their letters, and resolved never to +know them again. That was my first affront +in the United States, and while I have +learned to feel somewhat differently, a little +to discriminate, I can never forget that the +white people in the North stand for the +insult which was cast upon me."</p> + +<p>On the evening of the same day I had +learned of this happening, a man from a +prominent college in New York State told +me of a Negro classmate. "He was a pleas<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_167" id="Page_167">[Pg 167]</a></span>ant, +intelligent fellow from the South," he +said, "and while I never knew him well, I +was always glad to see him. One day, at +commencement time, when we were all having +our relatives about, he boarded my car +with a young colored woman, evidently his +sister. Without a thought I rose, lifted my +hat, and gave her my seat. Never again +shall I see such a look of gratitude as that +which lighted up his face when he bowed +in acknowledgment of my courtesy. It revealed +the race question to me, and yet I +had performed only the simplest act of a +gentleman."</p> + +<p>In these two incidents we see the undecided, +perplexing position of the Negro +woman in New York. Today she may be +turned out of a public resort as a "nigger," +tomorrow she may receive the dues of a +gentlewoman. And since, while I write, I +hear the cry of a class in the community who +adjudge the expulsion necessary since the +other course must lead at once to social +equality, I make haste to add that the second +story did not end in wedlock. As far as I +have seen, it never does. Intermarriage of<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_168" id="Page_168">[Pg 168]</a></span> +white and black in New York is so slight as +to be a negligible quantity, but amalgamation +between the two races is not uncommon. +And this we may say with certainty, the +man most blatant against the "nigger" in +New York as all over the country is the +man most ready to enter into illicit relationship +with the woman whom he claims to +despise. The raising of the hat to the +colored woman brings a diminution in sexual +immorality.</p> + +<p>If the Negro civilization of New York is +to be lifted to a higher level, the white race +must consistently play a finer and more +generous part toward the colored woman. +There are many inherent difficulties against +which she must contend. Slavery deprived +her of family life, set her to daily toil in the +field, or appropriated her mother's instincts +for the white child. She has today the +difficult task of maintaining the integrity +and purity of the home. Many times she +has succeeded, often she has failed, sometimes +she has not even tried. A vicious +environment has strengthened her passions +and degraded her from earliest girlhood.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_169" id="Page_169">[Pg 169]</a></span> +Beyond any people in the city she needs all +the encouragement that philanthropy, that +human courtesy and respect, that the fellowship +of the workers can give,—she needs her +full status as a woman.</p> + + +<div class="footnotes"><h3>FOOTNOTES:</h3> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_51_1" id="Footnote_51_1"></a><a href="#FNanchor_51_1"><span class="label">[1]</span></a> These figures are obtained by a combination of tables, +one in Population, Vol. II, Part II, p. 332, describing the whole +of Greater New York, the other in Women at Work, pp. 266 +to 275, describing Manhattan, the Bronx, and Brooklyn. +The error through the omission of Richmond and Queens is +probably negligible.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_52_2" id="Footnote_52_2"></a><a href="#FNanchor_52_2"><span class="label">[2]</span></a> Federal Census 1900: Women at Work, Table 28, pp. 266 +to 274. Among 800 married and widowed colored women +whom I myself visited, I found only 150, 19 per cent, who +were not engaged in gainful occupations.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_53_3" id="Footnote_53_3"></a><a href="#FNanchor_53_3"><span class="label">[3]</span></a> Federal Census 1900: Women at Work, Table 10, pp. +147 to 151.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_54_4" id="Footnote_54_4"></a><a href="#FNanchor_54_4"><span class="label">[4]</span></a> Federal Census 1900: Women at Work, Table 28, pp. +266 to 275.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_55_5" id="Footnote_55_5"></a><a href="#FNanchor_55_5"><span class="label">[5]</span></a> This is incorporated in a chapter in Mr. Miller's volume +on "Race Adjustment."</p></div> +</div> + + + + +<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_170" id="Page_170">[Pg 170]</a></span></p> +<h2><a name="CHAPTER_VII" id="CHAPTER_VII">CHAPTER VII</a><br /> +<span class="smcap">Rich and Poor</span></h2> + + +<p>Of the many nations and races that dwell +in New York none, with the exception of +the Chinese, is so aloof from us in its social +life as the Negro. The childish recollection +of an old school friend, recently related +to me, well illustrates this. Across the way +from where she lived there was a house +occupied by a family of mulattoes. They +were the quietest and least obtrusive people +on the block, and the wife, who was known +to be very beautiful, on the rare occasions +when she left her home, was always veiled. +The husband was little seen, and the child, +a shy boy, never played on the street. For +years the family lived aloof from their +neighbors, the subject of hushed and mysterious +questioning.</p> + +<p>Probably had one of the white women +dropped in some day to say good-morning<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_171" id="Page_171">[Pg 171]</a></span> +or to borrow a recipe book, the mystery +would have been wholly dispelled,—a pity +surely for the children. Few of New York's +citizens are so American as the colored, few +show so little that is unusual or picturesque. +The educated Italian might have in his +home some relic of his former country, the +Jew might show some symbol of his religion; +but the Negro, to the seeker of the +unusual, would seem commonplace. The +colored man in New York has no associations +with his ancient African home, no +African traditions, no folk lore. The days +of slavery he wishes completely to forget, +even to the loss of his exquisite plantation +music. He is ambitious to be conventional +in his manners, his customs, striving as far +as possible to be like his neighbor—a distinctly +American ambition. In consequence, +after indicating the lines along which he has +achieved economic success, one finds little +to describe in the lives of the well-to-do +that will be of interest. And yet this sketch +would be open to criticism if, after so long +a survey of the working class, it gave no +space to those Negroes who have achieved<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_172" id="Page_172">[Pg 172]</a></span> +a fair degree of wealth and leisure; and perhaps +the very recital of the likeness of these +people to those about them may be of importance, +for the great mass of white Americans +are like a vivacious Kentuckian of my +acquaintance, who, on learning something of +a well-to-do Negro family, assured me that +she knew less of such people than she did +of the Esquimaux.</p> + +<p>Mr. William Archer, in his book, "Through +Afro-America," describes a round of visits +to southern Negro homes, where, with touching +pride, his hostesses show their material +wealth, or rather the material wealth of +their race as embodied in drawing-room, +dining-room, and bedroom. There seemed +to be nothing remarkable about the rooms +unless their very existence was remarkable. +So the interiors of colored homes in New +York would reveal nothing to mark them +from the homes of their neighbors, save perhaps +the universal presence of some musical +instrument. In Brooklyn, the Bronx, and +in the Jersey suburbs, Negroes buy and rent +houses, sometimes with a few of their race in +close proximity, sometimes with white neigh<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_173" id="Page_173">[Pg 173]</a></span>bors +only on the block. Brooklyn seems +always to have shown less race antagonism +than Manhattan (where, indeed, anything +but the apartment is beyond the pocket-book +of people of modest means), and it +has been in Brooklyn for the past three +generations that the well-to-do colored families +with their children have chiefly been +found.</p> + +<p>Much pleasant hospitality and entertainment +take place behind these modest doors. +Visitors are common, relatives from the east +and west and south, and little dinner and +supper parties are numerous. If church discipline +does not interfere, the women have +their afternoons of whist, and despite church +discipline, dancing is very common, few entertainments +proving successful without it. +To play well upon some musical instrument +is almost a universal accomplishment, and, +as with the Germans, families and friends +meet the oftener for this harmonious bond.</p> + +<p>The social life of the well-to-do colored +family generally centres about the church, +and with a regularity unusual among the +white people, father and mother and chil<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_174" id="Page_174">[Pg 174]</a></span>dren +attend the Sunday and week-day meetings. +Colored society is also at the period +of the bazaar and fair, the concert and +dramatic entertainment. Money is raised +by this means for the church, the private +charity, or to supplement the dues of the +mutual benefit society. There are a number +of Negroes in the different large cities who +support themselves by concerts and readings, +appearing at benefits in the North and +South, where they receive a third or a half of +the receipts. Amateur performances are also +common. A young New York college man, +one winter evening, saw two refined, remarkably +well-dressed colored women turn in at +the entrance of the Grand Central Palace. +Purchasing a ticket for the benefit, as it +proved, of a colored day nursery (the entertainment +netted $2300), he followed them +to find himself in the Afro-American social +world. For while the amateur dancing +and singing upon the stage were pretty +and attractive, the young man was far more +interested in the audience. "And the disappointing +thing about it," he remarked +in telling of it afterwards, "was that they<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_175" id="Page_175">[Pg 175]</a></span> +were exactly like other people." To use the +newspaper phrase, "there was no 'story.'" +They were a group of Americans, trained in +the social conventions of their own land.</p> + +<p>There are many secret and benefit societies +among the Negroes in New York. +The Masons have nine meeting places; the +Elks, ten lodges. The Odd Fellows have +twenty-two places of meeting. The United +Order of True Reformers, a strong Negro +organization in the South, where it conducts +large business enterprises, has forty-four +head-quarters in church and hall and +private house, where meetings are held twice +a month. Many benefit societies are closely +associated with the churches. Colored men +and women are very busy with their multitudinous +church and society and benefit +meetings. I remember once attending an +evening service at a colored church when +the minister preached the sermon to the +benefit orders of St. Luke's and the Galilean +Fishermen. The officers, some of them +carrying spears with blue and red and white +trimmings, marched down the aisle and +took their seats at the front of the pulpit.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_176" id="Page_176">[Pg 176]</a></span> +Their leader was in purple, wearing a huge +badge like a breastplate with yellow and +green stones. The women, equally prominent +with the men, were dressed one in +yellow with green over it, and broad purple +bands, two in white with golden crowns. +The pageant was very pretty, even beautiful, +but too artless in its simple enjoyment +of color and display for the conventional +society of New York, and the colored "four +hundred" were not in it.</p> + +<p>Who are the four hundred in New York's +colored society? An outsider would be +very bold who should attempt to answer. +Twenty-five years ago the New Yorker born, +especially the descendant of some prominent +anti-slavery worker, would have held foremost +social position. The taint of slavery +was far removed from these people, who +looked with scorn upon arrivals from the +South. Many were proud of their Indian +blood, and told of the freedom that came +to their black ancestors who married Long +Island Indians. But these old New York +colored families, sometimes bearing historic +Dutch and English names, have diminished<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_177" id="Page_177">[Pg 177]</a></span> +in size and importance as have the old white +families beside them. The younger generation +has gone west, or has died and left +no issue. And into the city has come a +continual stream of Southerners and more +recently West Indians, some among them +educated, ambitious men and women, full +of the energy and determination of the +immigrant who means to attain to prominence +in his new home. These new-comers +occupy many of the pulpits, are admitted +to the bar, practise medicine, and become +leaders in politics, and their wives are quite +ready to take a prominent part in the social +world. They meet the older residents, and +the various groups intermingle, though not +without some friction. Like a country village, +the New York Negro social world +knows the happenings of its neighbors, +gossips over their shortcomings, rejoices, +though with something of jealousy, over +their successes, and has its cliques, its many +leaders, but also its broad-minded spirits +who strive to bring the whole village life +into harmony.</p> + +<p>As we have learned from a study of the<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_178" id="Page_178">[Pg 178]</a></span> +occupational life of the Negro, the majority +of men and women of means are in the +professional class, or in the city or federal +service. Such positions do not carry with +them large incomes, and remembering the +high cost of living in New York, and the +exorbitant rental paid by black men, we +can see that, gauged by the white man's +standard, the Negro with his two or three or +four thousand dollars a year is poor. Yet +with his very limited income the demands +upon him are enormous. In the first place, +he must educate his children, and this means +a large expenditure, for only in the technical +schools or the college can his boy or girl be +prepared for a successful career. The white +boy may find some business firm that will +give him a chance of advancement, but the +colored boy must receive such an education +as shall fit him to start an enterprise +by himself, unless he enters public service. +So the trade or professional school or college +absorbs the savings of many years.</p> + +<p>The church is another large recipient of +the Negro's slender means. Watching the +dimes and quarters drop into the contribu<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_179" id="Page_179">[Pg 179]</a></span>tion +plate as the dark-faced congregation +files past the pulpit on a Sunday evening, +one wonders whether any other people in +America willingly give so large an amount +of their income to their religious organizations. +And not only will money be requested +for the church's need, but special offerings +will be given to home and foreign mission +work. In 1907, the African Methodist +Church alone raised $36,000 for home and foreign +missions. The Baptists raised $44,000. +Educational work demands a share: the African +Methodists support twenty schools, the +African Zion twelve, and the Negro Baptists +one hundred and twenty. The other denominations +do their share, and the Negroes +also give to the schools conducted by white +churches for their people. This money comes +from all over the country, and the well-to-do +New York Negro must contribute his part.</p> + +<p>Home charities also help to drain the +Negro's purse. Manhattan and Brooklyn +have a number of colored philanthropies, +orphan asylums, old people's homes, rescue +missions, Young Men's and Young Women's +Christian Associations, and social settlements.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_180" id="Page_180">[Pg 180]</a></span> +Some are supported entirely by white people, +but the greater number receive some contributions +from the colored, and a few are +dependent for money upon that race alone. +Thousands of dollars are raised yearly, +among the well-to-do New York Negroes, +for these institutions.</p> + +<p>Yet, with all these various philanthropic +activities, one too frequently hears that the +Negro does not support his own charities. +As though anything of the sort could be +expected of him! A little time ago, in +asking for money for settlement work among +Negroes, I was asked in turn by the exquisitely +dressed woman before me, whose furs +and gown and jewels must have represented +a year's salary of a school-teacher, the type +of wealthy woman among the colored, why +the well-to-do Negroes did not support the +settlement themselves. No such question +is asked when we demand money for work +among the Italians or the Jews, who have +incomparably larger means. Indeed, one +may question whether the Negro is not too +generous for the materialistic city of New +York, whether his successes would not be<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_181" id="Page_181">[Pg 181]</a></span> +greater were he niggardly toward himself +and others. He lives well, dresses well, +enjoys a good play, strives to give every +advantage to his children, helps the poor of +his race. To hold his own today in this +civilization, he needs to be taught to seek +first riches, waiting until much treasure has +been laid up before he allows philanthropy +to draw upon his bank account.</p> + +<p>The traveller to the British West Indies +finds three divisions among the inhabitants, +white, colored, and black, each group having +a distinct social status. In the United +States, on the other hand, there are but two +groups, white and colored, or as the latter +is now more frequently designated, Negro, +the term thus losing its original meaning, +and becoming a designation for a race. +But while the white race usually makes no +social distinction between the light and the +dark Negro, classing all alike, social lines +are drawn within the color line. Years +ago these were more common than they are +now. Charles W. Chesnutt, the novelist, +tells some amusing and pathetic stories of +distinctions between colored and black. One<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_182" id="Page_182">[Pg 182]</a></span> +of his mulatto heroes, upon finding, as he +thinks, that the congressman who is to call +upon his daughter is a jet black Negro instead +of the mulatto he was supposed to be, +to prevent a breach of hospitality, invents a +case of diphtheria in the family and quarantines +the house, only to learn later, to his +intense mortification, that he has committed +a mistake of identification, and that the +congressman is light after all. But this +story belongs with the last generation. +Black men, if they are distinguished citizens, +can enter any colored society, and they not +infrequently marry light wives. Success, a +position of probity and importance, these +are attributes that count favorably for the +suitor, and as they are quite as often in +the man of strong African lineage as in the +mulatto, they gain the desired end.</p> + +<p>Within this little colored world of a few +thousand souls, a drop in the city's human +sea, there is great upheaval and turmoil. +The North is the Negro's centre for controversy +regarding his rightful position in the +commonwealth; and in the large cities, in +Boston and Chicago, Philadelphia and New<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_183" id="Page_183">[Pg 183]</a></span> +York, the battle rages. The little society is +often divided into hostile camps regarding +party politics or the acceptance of a government +position that brings the suspicion +of a bribe. Political, economic, educational +matters as they affect the black race, these +are the subjects that fill the mind of the +thoughtful colored man and woman.</p> + +<p>In his "Souls of Black Folk," Dr. Du Bois +describes the white man's tactlessness when, +as always, he approaches the Negro with a +question regarding his race. But the Negro, +apart from his personal home affairs, impresses +the outsider as having little else as +subject for conversation. World politics, +these concern him only as they affect the +race question. Australia is a country where +the government excludes Africans. England +rules in South Africa and has lately recognized +the right of African disfranchisement. +Germany in Africa is cruel to black men. +The Latin people know no color line. At +home, the conflict of capital and labor is +important as the Negro wins or loses in the +economic struggle; the enfranchisement of +woman is wise or unwise as it would affect<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_184" id="Page_184">[Pg 184]</a></span> +Negro enfranchisement, one colored thinker +arguing against it since it would double the +white vote in the South where the Negro has +no political rights; literature is the poetry +of Dunbar, the writing of Washington and +Du Bois, the literature of the Negro question, +and art is largely comprised in Tanner's +paintings.</p> + +<p>This picture should not imply that the +colored people of means are without the +possibility of wide culture and sympathy. +They are perhaps more sympathetic by +nature than the white people about them. +But each year, as the white American grows +increasingly conscious of race, as he argues +on racial differences, the Negro feels his +dark face, is sensitive to every disdainful +look, and separates himself from the people +about him and their problems.</p> + +<p>There is a struggle against this. The +majority of white people have heard, in a +vague way, that there is a difference of +opinion in the Negro world; and again, +vaguely, that it takes the form of opposition +to Dr. Booker T. Washington and industrial +training. But the difference of opinion<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_185" id="Page_185">[Pg 185]</a></span> +among the Negroes is a difference of ideals, +and reaches far beyond the controversy of +industrial or cultural training, or the question +of individual leadership. It is difficult +to formulate, inasmuch as few, if any, +Negroes hold logically to one ideal wholly +to the exclusion of the other. They cannot +be logical and live. But their division into +radical and conservative is too important to +omit; especially since, as we have seen, there +is nothing in their social life to distinguish +them from their neighbors; only in their +thoughts are they aloof from us—aliens +upon whose shoulders is the problem of a +race.</p> + +<p>How can one explain these two ideals? +Roughly, they accept or reject segregation. +The first looks upon the black man in America, +for many generations at least, as a race +apart. Recognizing this, the race must increasingly +grow in self-efficiency. It must +run its own businesses, own its banks, its +groceries, its restaurants, have its dressmakers, +milliners, tailors; it must establish +factories where it shall employ only colored +men and women; its children shall be brought<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_186" id="Page_186">[Pg 186]</a></span> +into the world by colored doctors, taught by +colored teachers, buried by colored undertakers. +Education, along industrial lines, +shall help train the worker to this efficiency, +and a proper race pride shall give him the +patronage of the Negroes about him. When, +as will of course happen in the majority of +cases, the Negro works for the white man, +he must consider himself and his race. He +must not go out on strike when the white +man strives for higher wages; he is justified, +if he is willing to risk a broken head, in +filling the place of the striking workman, for +he has to look after his own concerns.</p> + +<p>The second point of view resists segregation. +It believes that the Negro should +never cease to struggle against being treated +as a race apart, that he should demand the +privileges of a citizen, free access to all +public institutions, full civil and political +rights. As a workman, he should have the +opportunity of other workmen, his training +should be the training of his white neighbor, +and in business and the professions he should +strive to serve white as well as black. And +just as in the battle-field he fights in a com<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_187" id="Page_187">[Pg 187]</a></span>mon +cause with his white comrade, so in the +struggle for better working class conditions +he should stand by the side of the laborer, +regardless of race. Believing these things +and finding that America fails to meet his +demands, he thinks it should be his part to +struggle for his ideal, vigorously to protest +against discrimination, and never, complacent, +to submit to the position of inferiority.</p> + +<p>As I have said, few men hold logically to +either of these ideals, and as that of acquiescence +to present conditions is naturally +popular with the whites, who are themselves +responsible for discrimination, material success +sometimes means a departure from the +aggressive to the submissive attitude. However, +the whole question of the Negro as a +wage earner is yet scarcely understood by +this small professional and business class. +They are in turmoil, in a virile struggle, +harsh, bewildering, baffling.</p> + +<p>"I cannot conceive what it would mean +not to be a Negro," a prominent New York +colored man once said to me. "The white +people think and feel so little; their life +lacks an absorbing interest."</p> + +<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_188" id="Page_188">[Pg 188]</a></span></p> +<p>This is the characteristic fact of the life +of the well-to-do Negro in New York. He +is not permitted to go through the city streets +in easy comfort of body or mind. Some +personal rebuff, some harsh word in newspaper +or magazine, quickens his pulse and +rouses him from the lethargy that often +overtakes his comfortable white neighbor. +Looking into the past of slavery, watching +the coming generation, the most careless of +heart is forced into serious questioning. A +comfortable income and the intelligence to +enjoy the culture of a great city do not bring +to the Negro any smug self-satisfaction; only +a greater responsibility toward the problem +that moves through the world with his dark +face.</p> + +<p>Before turning to our last topic, the Negro +and the Municipality, we ought to note two +further characteristics of the Negro in New +York.</p> + +<p>There are certain statistics quoted by +every writer upon the Negro, statistics of +mortality and crime. We have noted these +for the child, but not as yet for the Negroes +as a whole. They have been left until this<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_189" id="Page_189">[Pg 189]</a></span> +point in our study that we may view them +in relation to what we have learned of the +Negro's economic condition and his environment.</p> + +<p>Looking for criminal statistics first, we +find them difficult to obtain in New York. +The courts' reports do not classify by color, +but we can learn something from the census +enumeration of 1904 of the prisoners in the +New York County Penitentiary and the New +York County Workhouse. These are short +term offenders sent up from the city of New +York. The enumeration is as follows:</p> + +<table class="ruled" summary="Census enumeration of 1904 of prisoners."> +<caption class="smcap">New York County Penitentiary (Blackwell's Island)</caption> +<tr class="bb"><td class="tdl"></td><td class="tdc">Total</td><td class="tdc">Males</td><td class="tdc">Females</td><td class="tdc">Per cent<br />Total</td><td class="tdc">Per cent<br />Females</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tdl">White</td><td class="tdr">582</td><td class="tdr">533</td><td class="tdr">49</td><td class="tdr">91.8</td><td class="tdr">8.4</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tdl">Colored</td><td class="tdr">52</td><td class="tdr">33</td><td class="tdr">19</td><td class="tdr">8.2</td><td class="tdr">36.5</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tdc inner-caption smcap" colspan="6">New York County Workhouse</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tdl">White</td><td class="tdr">1126</td><td class="tdr">870</td><td class="tdr">256</td><td class="tdr">96.5</td><td class="tdr">22.7</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tdl">Colored</td><td class="tdr">41</td><td class="tdr">12</td><td class="tdr">29</td><td class="tdr">3.5</td><td class="tdr">70.7</td></tr> +</table> +<p>In view of the proportion of Negroes to +whites in Manhattan, two per cent, we find<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_190" id="Page_190">[Pg 190]</a></span> +the percentage of colored prisoners high, but +no higher than we expect when we remember +that the Negro occupies the lowest plane in +the industrial community, "the plane which +everywhere supplies the jail, the penitentiary, +the gallows."<a name="FNanchor_56_1" id="FNanchor_56_1"></a><a href="#Footnote_56_1" class="fnanchor">[1]</a> But the very large +percentage of crime among colored women +calls for grave consideration. In the workhouse, +imprisoned for fighting, for drunkenness, +for prostitution, the colored women +more than double in number the colored +men. Here is a condition that we noted +in the Children's Court records: an unduly +large percentage of disorderly and depraved +colored female offenders.</p> + +<p>We have already touched upon the subject +of morality among colored women. Various +causes, some of which we have noted, go to +the making up of this high percentage of +crime. The Negroes themselves believe the +basic cause to be their recent enslavement +with its attendant unstable marriage and +parental status. They point to the centuries +of healthful home relationships among Amer<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_191" id="Page_191">[Pg 191]</a></span>icans +and Europeans, and contrast them with +the thousands upon thousands of yearly +sales of slaves that but two generations ago +disrupted the Negro's attempts at family +life. With this heritage they believe that +it is inevitable that numbers of their women +should be slow to recognize the sanctity of +home and the importance of feminine virtue.</p> + +<p>The mortality figures for the New York +Negro are more striking than the figures for +crime. In 1908 the death rate for whites in +the city was 16.6 in every thousand; for +colored (including Chinese), 28.9, almost +double the white rate. The Negroes' greatest +excess over the white was in tuberculosis, +congenital debility, and venereal diseases as +the table on the following page shows.</p> + +<p>The Negro's inherent weakness, his inability +to resist disease, is a favorite topic +today with writers on the color question. +A high mortality is indeed a matter for grave +concern, but we may question whether these +figures show inherent weakness. If a new +disease attacks any group of people, it causes +terrible decimation, and tuberculosis and +venereal diseases, the white man's plagues,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_192" id="Page_192">[Pg 192]</a></span> +have proved terribly destructive to the black +man. But recalling the conditions under +which the great majority of the colored race +lives in New York, the long hours of labor, +the crowded rooms, the insufficient food, we +find abundant cause for a high death rate. +For poverty and death go hand in hand, and +the proportion of Negroes in New York who, +live in great poverty far exceeds the proportion +of whites.<a name="FNanchor_57_2" id="FNanchor_57_2"></a><a href="#Footnote_57_2" class="fnanchor">[2]</a></p> + +<table class="ruled" summary="Mortality figures for New York, 1908."> +<tr class="bb"><td class="tdc">New York, 1908.</td> +<td class="tdc">White.</td><td class="tdc">Colored.</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tdl">Number of deaths from all causes per 1000 population</td> +<td class="tdr">16.6</td><td class="tdr">28.9</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tdl">Number of deaths per 1000 deaths:</td><td /><td /></tr> +<tr><td class="tdl"><span class="indent">Tuberculosis</span></td> +<td class="tdr">136.0</td><td class="tdr">232.8</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tdl"><span class="indent">Pneumonia</span></td> +<td class="tdr">126.0</td><td class="tdr">136.3</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tdl"><span class="indent">Diarrhœa and enteritis</span></td> +<td class="tdr">91.8</td><td class="tdr">79.0</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tdl"><span class="indent">Bright's disease</span></td> +<td class="tdr">78.3</td><td class="tdr">56.5</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tdl"><span class="indent">Heart disease</span></td> +<td class="tdr">76.7</td><td class="tdr">83.4</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tdl"><span class="indent">Cancer</span></td> +<td class="tdr">45.5</td><td class="tdr">24.8</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tdl"><span class="indent">Congenital debility</span></td> +<td class="tdr">24.5</td><td class="tdr">34.1</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tdl"><span class="indent">Diphtheria and croup</span></td> +<td class="tdr">23.7</td><td class="tdr">15.0</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tdl"><span class="indent">Scarlet fever</span></td> +<td class="tdr">19.0</td><td class="tdr">3.2</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tdl"><span class="indent">Typhoid</span></td> +<td class="tdr">7.3</td><td class="tdr">6.9</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tdl"><span class="indent">Venereal diseases</span></td> +<td class="tdr">4.0</td><td class="tdr">13.4</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tdl">All others</td><td class="tdr">367.2</td><td class="tdr">314.6</td></tr> +<tr><td /><td class="tdr bt">1000.0</td><td class="tdr bt">1000.0</td></tr> +</table> +<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_193" id="Page_193">[Pg 193]</a></span></p> +<p>The students at Hampton Institute sing +an old plantation song that runs like this:</p> + +<blockquote> +<p> +"If religion was a thing that money could buy,<br /> +The rich would live and the poor would die.<br /> +But my good Lord has fixed it so<br /> +The rich and the poor together must go." +</p> +</blockquote> + +<p>Some of our rich men seem to have fixed +it with religion to escape from the condition +the poem describes, but it depicts a reality +in the Negro's life. Rich and poor, as we +saw when we left our old New Yorkers, +competent and inefficient, pure and diseased, +good and bad, all go together. Much of the +recent literature written by Negroes, and<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_194" id="Page_194">[Pg 194]</a></span> +especially that by Dr. Booker T. Washington, +attempts to separate in the minds of the +community the thrifty and prosperous colored +men from the helpless and degraded; +but the effort meets with a limited success. +When we can have a statistical study of +some thousands of the well-to-do Negroes +compared with an equal number of well-to-do +whites, we may find striking similarity. +From my own observations I find that the +well-to-do Negroes bear and rear children, +refrain from committing crimes that put +them into jail, and live to an old age with +the same success as their white neighbors. +But they get little credit for it. Willy-nilly, +the strong, intellectual Negro is linked +to his unfortunate fellow. Whether an increase +in material prosperity will break this +bond, or whether it will continue until it +ceases to be a bond as humanity comes into +its own, is a secret of the future. For today +the song rings true, and the rich and the +poor go together.</p> + + +<div class="footnotes"><h3>FOOTNOTES:</h3> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_56_1" id="Footnote_56_1"></a><a href="#FNanchor_56_1"><span class="label">[1]</span></a> Quincy Ewing, "The Heart of the Race Problem," +<i>Atlantic Monthly</i>, March, 1909.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_57_2" id="Footnote_57_2"></a><a href="#FNanchor_57_2"><span class="label">[2]</span></a> The statistician, Mr. I. B. Rubinow, in a discussion of +high death rates (American Statistical Association, December, +1905) quotes the rate in five agricultural districts in a province +of Russia, districts inhabited by peasantry of a common stock. +With almost mathematical certainty, prosperity brings longer +life. He divides his peasants into six groups showing their +death rate as follows: +</p> +<table summary="Death rate of Russian peasants"> +<tr><td /><td class="td">Death Rate</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tdl">Having no land </td><td class="tdc">34.7</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tdl">Less than 13.5 acres </td><td class="tdc">32.7</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tdl">13.5 to 40.5 acres </td><td class="tdc">30.1</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tdl">40.5 to 67.5 acres </td><td class="tdc">25.4</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tdl">67.5 acres to 135 acres</td><td class="tdc">23.1</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tdl">More than 135 acres </td><td class="tdc">19.2</td></tr> +</table><p> +Mr. Rubinow suggests that the high Negro death rate +may be explained by noting the poorly paid occupations in +which the Negro engages.</p></div> +</div> + + + + +<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_195" id="Page_195">[Pg 195]</a></span></p> +<h2><a name="CHAPTER_VIII" id="CHAPTER_VIII">CHAPTER VIII</a><br /> +<span class="smcap">The Negro and the Municipality</span></h2> + + +<p>A capricious mood, varying with the +individual, considerate today and offensive +tomorrow, this, as far as our observations +have led us, has been New York's attitude +toward the Negro. Is it possible to find any +principle underlying this shifting position? +The city expresses itself through the individual +actions of its changing four millions +of people, but also through its government, +its courts of justice, its manifold public +activities. Out of these various manifestations +of the community's spirit can we find a +Negro policy? Has New York any principle +of conduct toward these her colored citizens? +This question should be worth our consideration, +for New York's attitude means its +environmental influence, and helps determine +for the newly arrived immigrant and the +growing generation whether justice or intol<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_196" id="Page_196">[Pg 196]</a></span>erance +shall mark their dealings with the +black race.</p> + +<p>The first matter of civic importance to the +Negro, as to every other New York resident, +is his position in the commonwealth; is he a +participant in the government under which +he lives, or a subject without political rights? +The law since 1873 has been explicit on this +matter, wiping out former property qualifications, +and giving full manhood suffrage. +Probably, even with a much larger influx +of colored people, the city will never agitate +this question again. Since the death of the +Know-nothing Party, New York has ceased +any organized attempt to lessen the power +of the foreigner, and the growing cosmopolitan +character of the population strengthens +the Negro in his rights. Only in those states +where the white population is homogeneous +can Negro disfranchisement successfully take +place.</p> + +<p>With the vote the Negro has entered into +politics and has maintained successful political +organizations. The necessity of paying +for rent and food out of eight or ten dollars +a week is the Negro's immediate issue in<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_197" id="Page_197">[Pg 197]</a></span> +New York, and he tries to meet it by securing +a congenial and more lucrative job. The +city in 1910 showed some consideration for +him in this matter. An Assistant District +Attorney and an Assistant Corporation Counsel +were colored, and scattered throughout +the city departments were nine clerks making +from $1200 to $1800 apiece, and a dozen +more acting as messengers, inspectors, drivers, +attendants, receiving salaries averaging +$1275. Three doctors served the Board of +Health, and there were six men on the police +force (none given patrol duty), and one first +grade fireman, while the departments of +docks, parks, street cleaning, and water supply +employed 470 colored laborers. Altogether +511 colored men figure among the +city's employees.<a name="FNanchor_58_1" id="FNanchor_58_1"></a><a href="#Footnote_58_1" class="fnanchor">[1]</a></p> + +<p>In her communal gifts the city acts toward +the Negro with a fair degree of impartiality. +At the public schools and libraries, the parks +and playgrounds, the baths, hospitals, and, +last, the almshouse, the blacks have equal +rights with the whites. Occasionally indi<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_198" id="Page_198">[Pg 198]</a></span>vidual +public servants show color prejudice, +but again, occasionally, especial kindness +attends the black child. The rude treatment +awaiting them, however, from other +visitors keeps many Negro children, and +men and women, from enjoying the city's +benefactions. Particularly is this true with +the public baths and with some of the playgrounds. +The employment by the city of +at least one colored official in every neighborhood +where the Negroes are in great +numbers would do much to remedy this +condition.</p> + +<p>One department of the city might be cited +as having been an exception to the rule of +reasonably fair treatment to the colored +man. Harshness, for no cause but his black +face, has been too frequently bestowed upon +the Negro by the police. This has been +especially noticeable in conflicts between +white and colored, when the white officer, +instead of dealing impartially with offenders, +protected his own race.</p> + +<p>There have been two conflicts between the +whites and Negroes in New York in recent +years, the first in 1900, on the West Side, in<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_199" id="Page_199">[Pg 199]</a></span> +the forties, the second in 1905, on San Juan +Hill. Each riot was local, representing no +wide-spread excitement comparable to the +draft riots of 1863, and in each case the police +might easily in the beginning have stopped all +fighting. Instead, they showed themselves +ready to aid, even to instigate the conflict.</p> + +<p>The riot of 1900 was caused by the death +of a policeman at the hands of a Negro. +The black man declared that he was defending +his life, but the officer was popular, and +after his funeral riots began. Black men ran +to the police for protection, and were thrown +back by them into the hands of the mob.<a name="FNanchor_59_2" id="FNanchor_59_2"></a><a href="#Footnote_59_2" class="fnanchor">[2]</a></p> + +<p>The riot of 1905 commenced on San Juan +Hill one Friday evening in July with a +fracas between a colored boy and a white +peddler; both races took a hand in the matter +until the side streets showed a rough scrambling +fight. Saturday and Sunday were +comparatively quiet; men, black and white, +stood on street corners and scowled at one +another, but nothing further need have +occurred, had each race been treated with<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_200" id="Page_200">[Pg 200]</a></span> +justice. The police, however, instead of +keeping the peace, angered the Negroes, +urged on their enemies, and by Monday +night found that they had helped create a +riot, this time bitter and dangerous. Overzealous +to proceed against the "niggers," +officers rushed into places frequented by +peaceable colored men, whom they placed +under arrest. Dragging their victims to the +station-house they beat them so unmercifully +that before long many needed to be +handed over to another city department—the +hospital. Little question was made as +to guilt or innocence, and some of the worst +offenders, colored as well as white, were +never brought to justice.<a name="FNanchor_60_3" id="FNanchor_60_3"></a><a href="#Footnote_60_3" class="fnanchor">[3]</a> "If," as a colored +preacher whose church was the centre of the +storm district pointed out, "the police +would only differentiate between the good +and the bad Negroes, and not knock on the +head every colored man they saw in a riot, +we should be quite satisfied. As it is, there +is no safety for any Negro in this part of the +city at any time."<a name="FNanchor_61_4" id="FNanchor_61_4"></a><a href="#Footnote_61_4" class="fnanchor">[4]</a></p> + +<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_201" id="Page_201">[Pg 201]</a></span></p> +<p>The result of these two riots was the bringing +to justice of one policeman and the +placing of a humane and tactful captain on +San Juan Hill. But for some time the colored +man felt little protection in the Department +of Police, finding that he was liable to arrest +and clubbing for a trivial offence. Often +the officer's club fell with cruel force. This, +however, was before the administration of +Mayor Gaynor, who has commanded humane +treatment, and the brutal clubbing of the +New York Negro has now ceased.</p> + +<p>From the police one turns naturally to the +courts. What is their attitude toward the +Negro offender? Is there any race prejudice, +or do black and white enjoy an impartial and +judicial hearing?</p> + +<p>As the Negro comes before the magistrates +of the city courts, he learns to know that +judges differ greatly in their conceptions of +justice. To the Southerner, let us say from +Richmond, where the black man is arrested +for small offences and treated with considerable +roughness and harshness, New York +courts seem lenient.<a name="FNanchor_62_5" id="FNanchor_62_5"></a><a href="#Footnote_62_5" class="fnanchor">[5]</a> To the West Indian,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_202" id="Page_202">[Pg 202]</a></span> +accustomed to British rule, justice in New +York is noticeable for its variability, the +likelihood that if it is severe tonight, it will +be generous tomorrow.</p> + +<p>"Three months," the listener at court +hears given as sentence to a respectable-looking +colored servant girl who has begged +to be allowed to return to her place which +she has held for five years. "I never was +up for drinking before," she pleads; "I have +learnt my lesson; please give me a chance; +I will not do this again."</p> + +<p>"What should you two be fighting for?" +another judge, another morning, says to two +very battered women, one white and one +colored, who come before him in court. +And talking kindly to both, but with greater +seriousness to the Irish offender, his own +countrywoman, he sends them away with a +reprimand.</p> + +<p>How much of this unequal treatment comes<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_203" id="Page_203">[Pg 203]</a></span> +from color prejudice or caprice or temperament, +the Negro is unable to decide, but he +soon learns one curious fact: while his black +skin marks him as inheriting Republican +politics, it is the Democratic magistrate, the +Tammany henchman whose name is a byword +to the righteous, who is the more +lenient when he has committed a trifling +offence.</p> + +<p>"Didn't I play craps with the nigger boys +when I was a kid?" one of these well-known +politicians says, "and am I going back on +the poor fellows now?" Of course, the +Negro is assured such men only want his +vote, but he believes real sympathy actuates +the Tammany leader, who is too busy to +bother whether the man before him is black +or white. The reformer, on the other hand, +big with dignity, at times makes him vastly +uncomfortable as he lectures upon the Negro +problem from the eminence of the superior +race.</p> + +<p>But whether Republican or Democrat, the +Negro learns that it is well to have a friend +at court; that helplessness is the worst of all +disabilities, worse than darkness of skin or<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_204" id="Page_204">[Pg 204]</a></span> +poverty. So he soon becomes acquainted +with his local politician, and if his friend is +in trouble, or his wife or son is locked up, +pounds vigorously at the politician's door. +It may be midnight, but the man of power +will dress, and together they will turn from +the dark tenement hall into the lighted street +and on to the police-station or magistrate's +court to seek release for the offender. That +too often the gravity of the offence weighs +little in the securing of lenient treatment is +part of the muddle of New York justice. +The Negro finds that he has taken the most +direct way to secure relief.</p> + +<p>As far as we have followed, we have found +the municipality of New York generally +ready to treat her black citizens with the +same justice or injustice with which she +treats her whites. Exceptions occur, but she +does not often draw the color line. Perhaps, +in this connection, it might be well to stop +a moment and see what return the black +man makes, whether by his vote he helps +secure to the city honest and efficient government.</p> + +<p>Walking through a Negro quarter on elec<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_205" id="Page_205">[Pg 205]</a></span>tion +day, the most careful search fails to reveal +any such far-sighted altruism. With a +great majority of colored voters the choice of +a municipal candidate is based on the argument +of a two-dollar bill or the promise of a +job, combined with the sentiment, decreasing +every year, for the Republican Party—the +party that once helped the colored man +and, he hopes, may help him again. The +public standing of the mayoralty candidate, +his ability to choose wise heads of departments, +the building of new subways, the +ownership of public utilities, these are unimportant +issues. The matter of immediate +moment is what this vote is going to +mean to the black voter himself.</p> + +<p>Such a selfish and unpatriotic attitude, +not unknown perhaps to white voters, leads +some of our writers and reformers to doubt +the value of universal manhood suffrage. +Mr. Ray Stannard Baker tells us that the +Negro and the poor white in New York, +through their venality, are practically without +a vote. "While the South is disfranchising +by legislation," he says, "the North +is doing it by cash." "What else is the<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_206" id="Page_206">[Pg 206]</a></span> +meaning of Tammany Hall and the boss +and machine system in other cities?"<a name="FNanchor_63_6" id="FNanchor_63_6"></a><a href="#Footnote_63_6" class="fnanchor">[6]</a> New +York's noted ethical culture teacher argues +against agitation for woman's suffrage on +the ground that so many of those who now +have the vote do not know how to use it. +But looking closely at these unaltruistic citizens, +we see that after all they are putting +the ballot to its primary use, the protection +of their own interests. The Negro in New +York has one vital need, steady, decent work. +He dickers and plays with politics to get as +much of this as he can. It is very insufficient +relief for an intolerable situation, but +it is partial relief. In another city, Atlanta +for instance, he might find education the +most important civic gift for which to strive. +Atlanta is a fortunate city to choose for an +example of the power of the suffrage, for +since the Negro's loss of the vote in Georgia, +educational funds have been turned chiefly +to white schools, and 5,000 colored children +are without opportunities for public education. +1885 saw the last school building +erected for Negroes, the result of a bargain<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_207" id="Page_207">[Pg 207]</a></span> +between the colored voters and the prohibitionists.<a name="FNanchor_64_7" id="FNanchor_64_7"></a><a href="#Footnote_64_7" class="fnanchor">[7]</a> +Should a colored teacher in New +York be refused her certificate, a colored +consumptive be denied a place in the city's +hospital, a colored child meet with a rebuff +in the city park, the colored citizen would<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_208" id="Page_208">[Pg 208]</a></span> +find his vote an important means of redress. +Then, too, while there are so many men to +buy, it is important to have a vote to sell, +lest the other citizens secure the morning's +bargains. Venality in high and low places +will not disappear until we are dominated +by the ideal of social, not individual advancement. +Before that time, it is well for the +weak that they are able, at least in the +political field, to bargain with the strong.</p> + +<p>The importance to the Negro of the vote +is quickly appreciated when we consider New +York's attitude unofficially expressed. With +the franchise behind him the colored man +can secure for himself and his children +the municipality's advantages of education, +health, amusement, philanthropy. He is +here a citizen, a contributor to the city +treasury, if not directly as a taxpayer, as a +worker and renter. But as a private individual, +seeking to use the utilities managed +by other private individuals, he continually +encounters race discrimination. Private +doors are closed, and were the state not so +wealthy and generous, disabilities still graver +than at present would follow.</p> + +<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_209" id="Page_209">[Pg 209]</a></span></p> +<p>A few examples will show the condition. +A Negro applies by letter for admission to +an automobile school, and is accepted; but +on appearing with his fee his color debars +his entrance. Carrying the case to court, +the complaint is dismissed on the ground +that the law which forbade exclusion from +places of education on account of race +and color is applicable only to public +schools. Private institutions may do as +they desire.</p> + +<p>Again, a colored man tries to get a meal. +At the first restaurant he is told that all +the tables are engaged; at the next no one +will serve him. Fearful of further rebuffs, +he has to turn to the counter of a railway +station. He wants to go to the theatre. +Like Tommy Atkins, he is sent to the gallery +or round the music halls. The white barber +whose shop he enters will not shave him; +and when night comes, he searches a long +time before the hotel appears that will give +him a bed. The sensitive man, still more +the sensitive woman, often finds the city's +attitude difficult to endure.</p> + +<p>American Negroes have become familiar<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_210" id="Page_210">[Pg 210]</a></span> +with racial lines, but the foreigner of African +descent, a visitor to the city, meets with +rebuffs that fill him with surprise as well as +rage. Haytians and South Americans, men +of continental education and wide culture, +have been ordered away as "niggers" from +restaurant doors, and at the box office of +the theatre refused an orchestra seat. English +Negroes from the West Indies, men and +women of character and means, learn that +New York is a spot to be avoided, and cross +the ocean when they wish to taste of city +life. In short, the stranger of Negro descent, +if he be rash of temper, hurls anathemas at +the villainously mannered Americans; or, if +he be good-natured, shrugs his shoulders and +counts New York a provincial settlement of +four million people.</p> + +<p>Northern Negroes believe this discrimination +in public places against the black man +to be increasing in New York. One, who +came here fifteen years ago, tells of the simple +and adequate test by which he learned that +he had reached the northern city. Born in +South Carolina, as he attained manhood he +desired larger self-expression, broader human<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_211" id="Page_211">[Pg 211]</a></span> +relations—he wanted "to be free," as he +again and again expressed it. So leaving +the cotton fields he started one morning +to walk to New York. After a number of +days he entered a large city and, uncertain +in his geography, decided that this was his +journey's end. "I'll be free here," he +thought, and opening the door of a brightly +lighted restaurant started to walk in. The +white men at the tables looked up in +astonishment, and the proprietor, laying his +hand on the youth's shoulder, invited him, +in strong southern accent, to go into the +kitchen. "I reckon I'm not North yet," the +Negro said, smiling a bright, boyish smile. +Interested in his visitor's appearance, the +proprietor took him into another room, gave +him a good supper, and talked with him far +into the night, urging the advantages of his +staying in the South. But the youth shook +his head, and the next morning trudged on. +At length he reached a rushing city, tumultuous +with humanity, and entering an eating-house +was served a meal. To him it was +almost a sacrament. He belonged not to a +race but to humanity. He tasted the freedom<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_212" id="Page_212">[Pg 212]</a></span> +of passing unnoticed. But it is doubtful +if the same restaurant would serve him +today.</p> + +<p>Color lines, on these matters of entertainment +as on others, are not hard and fast. A +few hotels, chiefly those frequented by Latin +<a name="tn3" id="tn3"></a>people, receive colored guests; and while +the foreign Negro meets with rudeness, he +is rebuffed less than the native. "I can't +get into that place as a southern darky," a +black man laughingly says, pointing to a +fashionable restaurant, "I'll be the Prince +of Abyssinia." But as Prince or American +his status is shifting and uncertain; here, +preeminently, he is half a man.</p> + +<p>Discrimination against any man because of +his color is contrary to the law of the state. +After the fifteenth amendment became a +law, New York passed a civil rights bill, +which as it stands, re-enacted in 1909, is +very explicit. All persons within the jurisdiction +of the state are entitled to the accommodation +of hotels, restaurants, theatres, +music halls, barbers' shops, and any person +refusing such accommodation is subject to +civil and penal action. The offence may<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_213" id="Page_213">[Pg 213]</a></span> +be punished by fine or imprisonment or +both.<a name="FNanchor_65_8" id="FNanchor_65_8"></a><a href="#Footnote_65_8" class="fnanchor">[8]</a></p> + +<p>In 1888, the attempt to exclude three +colored men from a skating-rink at Binghamton, +N. Y., led to a suit against the owner +of the rink, and his conviction. The case<a name="FNanchor_66_9" id="FNanchor_66_9"></a><a href="#Footnote_66_9" class="fnanchor">[9]</a><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_214" id="Page_214">[Pg 214]</a></span> +reached the Court of Appeals, where the +constitutionality of the civil rights bill +was upheld. "It is evident," said Justice +Andrews in his decision, "that to exclude +colored people from places of public resort +on account of their race is to fix upon them +a brand of inferiority, and tends to fix their +position as a servile and dependent people."</p> + +<p>But despite the law and precedent, the +civil rights bill is violated in New York. +Occasionally colored men bring suit, but the +magistrate dismisses the complaint. Usually +the evidence is declared insufficient. A case +of a colored man refused orchestra seats at +a theatre is dismissed on the ground that +not the proprietor but his employees turned +the man away. A keeper of an ice-cream +parlor, wishing to prevent the colored man +from patronizing him, charges a Negro a +dollar for a ten-cent plate. The customer +pays the dollar, keeps the check, and brings +the case to court. Ice-cream parlors are +then declared not to come under the list of +places of public entertainment and amusement. +A bootblack refuses to polish the +shoes of a Negro, and the court decides that<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_215" id="Page_215">[Pg 215]</a></span> +a bootblack-stand is not a place of public +accommodation, and refusal to shine the +shoes of a colored man does not subject its +proprietor to the penalties imposed by the +law.<a name="FNanchor_67_10" id="FNanchor_67_10"></a><a href="#Footnote_67_10" class="fnanchor">[10]</a> This last case was carried to the +Court of Appeals, and the adverse judgment +has led many of the thoughtful colored men +of the city to doubt the value of attempting to +push a civil rights suit. Litigation is expensive, +and money spent in any personal rights +case that attacks private business, whether +the plaintiff be white or colored, is usually +wasted. The civil rights law is on the books, +and the psychological moment may arrive +to insist successfully on its enforcement.</p> + +<p>If there is an increase in discrimination +against the Negro in New York solely because +of his color, it is a serious matter to +the city as well as to the race. Every community +has its social conscience built up of +slowly accumulated experiences, and it cannot +without disaster lose its ideal of justice +or generosity. New York has never been tender +to its people, but it has a rough hospitality, +what Stevenson describes as "uncivil<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_216" id="Page_216">[Pg 216]</a></span> +kindness," and welcomes new-comers with a +friendly shove, bidding them become good +Americans. After the war, the Negro entered +more than formerly into this general +welcome. He was unnoticed, allowed to go +his way without questioning word or stare, +the position which every right-minded man +and woman desires. But today New York +has become conscious that he is dark-skinned, +and her attitude affects her growing children. +"I never noticed colored people," an old +abolitionist said to me, "I never realized +there were white and black until, when a boy +of twelve, I entered a church and found +Negroes occupying seats alone in the gallery." +As New York returns to the gallery +seats, her boys and girls return to consciousness +of color and, from fisticuffs at school, +move on to the race riots upon the streets +with bullets among the stones.</p> + +<p>The municipality, as we have seen, treats +the Negro on the whole with justice; its +standard is higher than the standard of the +average citizen. It cherishes the ideal of democracy, +and strives for impartiality toward +its many nationalities and races. And the<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_217" id="Page_217">[Pg 217]</a></span> +New York Negro in his turn does not +allow his liberties to be tampered with without +protest. But the New York citizen can +hardly be described as friendly to the Negro. +What catholicity he has is negative. He +fails to give the black man a hearty welcome. +"Do you know where I stayed the four +weeks of my first trip abroad?" a colored +clergyman once asked me. I refused to make +a guess. "Well," he said a little shamefacedly, +"it was in Paris. Paris may be +a wicked city—any city has wickedness if +you want to look for it—but I found it a +place of kindliness and good-will. Every one +seemed glad to be courteous, to assist me in +my stumbling French, to show me the way +on omnibus or boat, or through the difficult +streets. It was so different from America; +I was never wanted in the southern city of +my youth. In Paris I was welcome."</p> + +<p>"How is it in New York?" I asked.</p> + +<p>"In New York?" He stopped to consider. +"In New York I am tolerated."</p> + + +<div class="footnotes"><h3>FOOTNOTES:</h3> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_58_1" id="Footnote_58_1"></a><a href="#FNanchor_58_1"><span class="label">[1]</span></a> The total number of municipal employees is 55,006—Negro +employees, 511—Percentage of Negro to whole, 0.9.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_59_2" id="Footnote_59_2"></a><a href="#FNanchor_59_2"><span class="label">[2]</span></a> "Story of the Riot," published by Citizens Protective +League.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_60_3" id="Footnote_60_3"></a><a href="#FNanchor_60_3"><span class="label">[3]</span></a> New York <i>Age</i>, July 27, 1905.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_61_4" id="Footnote_61_4"></a><a href="#FNanchor_61_4"><span class="label">[4]</span></a> New York <i>Tribune</i>, July 24, 1905.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_62_5" id="Footnote_62_5"></a><a href="#FNanchor_62_5"><span class="label">[5]</span></a> A southern student says, "The Negro in Richmond is +arrested for small offences and fined in the city courts. He is +treated with considerable roughness and harshness in his +punishment for these offences. It looks as though he were +being imposed upon as an individual of the lower strata of +society. But the Negro responds so impulsively to what +appeals, that constant fear, dread, and impressiveness of the +police act well as resistants to temptations."</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_63_6" id="Footnote_63_6"></a><a href="#FNanchor_63_6"><span class="label">[6]</span></a> Ray Stannard Baker, "Following the Color Line," p. 269.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_64_7" id="Footnote_64_7"></a><a href="#FNanchor_64_7"><span class="label">[7]</span></a> The following story of Athens, Georgia, told by a Northerner +teaching in the South, illustrates this point. "The city +of Athens was planning to inaugurate a public school system, +and also wished to 'go dry.' It made a proposal to the colored +voters promising that if their combined vote would +carry the city, two schools should be built, of equal size and +similar structure for each race. I visited Athens shortly after +the two buildings were built, and I found two beautiful brick +buildings very similar in all their appointments. At an interval +of several years I again visited the little city and again +spent an hour in the same brick school-house of the colored +folk. +</p> +<p> +"At my third visit, I found my colored friends occupying +a wooden structure on the edge of the city, and not only inconveniently +located, but much less of a building than the one +hitherto occupied. Upon inquiry I found that in the growth +of the school population of the whites, it was cheaper to seize +the building formerly occupied by the colored children, and to +build for them a cheap wooden structure on the outskirts of +the town. +</p> +<p> +"The colored school was still occupying this inadequate +building at my visit this last September, 1909. A second +wooden structure has been added to the colored equipment +on the east side of the town." +</p> +<p> +This story of the Athenians well illustrates what will be +done when the Negro counts for something politically, and +also what may be undone if his value as a political asset is +reduced.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_65_8" id="Footnote_65_8"></a><a href="#FNanchor_65_8"><span class="label">[8]</span></a> Civil Rights Law, State of New York. Chapter 14 of +the Laws of 1909, being Chapter 6 of the Consolidated Laws. +</p> +<p> +"Article 4.—Equal rights in places of public amusement. +</p> +<p> +"Section 40.—All persons within the jurisdiction of this +state shall be entitled to the full and equal accommodations, +advantages, facilities, and privileges of inns, restaurants, +hotels, eating houses, bath houses, barber shops, theatres, +music halls, public conveyances on land and water, and all +other places of public accommodation or amusement, subject +only to the conditions and limitations, established by the law +and applicable alike to all citizens. +</p> +<p> +"Section 41.—Penalty for violation. Any person who +shall violate any of the provisions of the foregoing section by +denying to any citizen, except for reasons applicable alike to +all citizens of every race, creed and color, and regardless of +race, creed and color, the full enjoyment of any of the accommodations, +advantages, facilities or privileges in said section +enumerated, or by aiding or inciting such denial, shall, for +every such offence, forfeit and pay a sum not less than one +hundred dollars nor more than five hundred dollars to the +person aggrieved thereby, to be recovered in a court of competent +jurisdiction in the County where said offence was committed, +and shall also, for every such offence, be deemed guilty +of a misdemeanor, and upon conviction thereof shall be fined +not less than one hundred dollars nor more than five hundred +dollars, or shall be imprisoned not less than thirty days nor +more than ninety days, or both such fine and imprisonment."</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_66_9" id="Footnote_66_9"></a><a href="#FNanchor_66_9"><span class="label">[9]</span></a> People <i>vs.</i> King, 110 N. Y., 418, 1888.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_67_10" id="Footnote_67_10"></a><a href="#FNanchor_67_10"><span class="label">[10]</span></a> Burke <i>vs.</i> Bosso, 180 N. Y., 341, 1905.</p></div> +</div> + + + + +<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_218" id="Page_218">[Pg 218]</a></span></p> +<h2><a name="CHAPTER_IX" id="CHAPTER_IX">CHAPTER IX</a><br /> +<span class="smcap">Conclusion</span></h2> + + +<p>A new little boy came two years ago into +our story-book world. When Miss North, +taking Ezekiel by the hand, led him into her +school-room,<a name="FNanchor_68_1" id="FNanchor_68_1"></a><a href="#Footnote_68_1" class="fnanchor">[1]</a> we met a child full of what we +call temperament; dreaming quaint stories, +innocently friendly, anxious to please for +affection's sake, in his queer, unconscious +way something of a genius. We saw his +big musing eyes looking out upon a world in +which his teacher stood serene and reasoning, +but a little cold like her name; his friend, +Miss Jane, kind and very practical; his employer, +Mr. Rankin, amused and contemptuous; +all watching him with the impersonal +interest with which one might view a new +species in the animal world. For Ezekiel, +unlike our other story-book boys, had a +double being, he was first Ezekiel Jordan, a<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_219" id="Page_219">[Pg 219]</a></span> +little black boy, and second, a Representative +of the Negro Race.</p> + +<p>Ezekiel was too young to understand his +position, but the white world about him +never forgot it. When he arrived late to +school, he was a dilatory representative; +when, obliging little soul, he promised three +people to weed their gardens all the same +afternoon, he was a prevaricating representative. +He never happened to steal ice-cream +from the hoky-poky man or to play +hookey, but if he had, he would have been +a thieving and lazy representative. Always +he was something remote and overwhelming, +not a natural growing boy.</p> + +<p>Ezekiel's position is that of each Negro +child and man and woman in the United +States today. I think we have seen this as +we have reviewed the position of the race +in New York; indeed, the very fact of our +attempting such a review is patent that +we see and feel it. We white Americans +do not generalize concerning ourselves, we +individualize, leaving generalizations to the +chance visitor, but we generalize continually +concerning colored Americans; we classify<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_220" id="Page_220">[Pg 220]</a></span> +and measure and pass judgment, a little +more with each succeeding year.</p> + +<p>Now if we are going to do this, let us be +fair; let us try as much as possible to dismiss +prejudice, and to look at the Ezekiels entering +our school of life, with the same impartiality +and the same understanding sympathy +with which we look upon our own race. +And if we are to place them side by side with +the whites, let us be impartial, not cheating +them out of their hard-earned credits, or +condemning them with undue severity. Let +us try, if we can, to be just.</p> + +<p>When we begin to make this effort to +judge fairly our colored world, we need to +remember especially two things: First, that +we cannot yet measure with any accuracy +the capability of the colored man in the +United States, because he has not yet been +given the opportunity to show his capability. +If we deny full expression to a race, if we +restrict its education, stifle its intellectual +and æsthetic impulses, we make it impossible +fairly to gauge its ability. Under these circumstances +to measure its achievements with +the more favored white race is unreasonable<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_221" id="Page_221">[Pg 221]</a></span> +and unjust, as unreasonable as to measure +against a man's a disfranchised woman's +capabilities in directing the affairs of a state.<a name="FNanchor_69_2" id="FNanchor_69_2"></a><a href="#Footnote_69_2" class="fnanchor">[2]</a></p> + +<p>The second thing is difficult for us to +remember, difficult for us at first to believe; +that we, dominant, ruling Americans, may +not be the persons best fitted to judge the +Negro. We feel confident that we are, since +we have known him so long and are so +familiar with his peculiarities; but in moments +of earnest reflection may it not occur +to us that we have not the desire or the +imagination to enter into the life emotions +of others? "We are the intellect and virtue +of the airth, the cream of human natur', and +the flower of moral force," Hannibal Chollup<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_222" id="Page_222">[Pg 222]</a></span> +still says, and glowers at the stranger who +dares to suggest a different standard from +his own. Hannibal Chollup and his ilk are +ill-fitted to measure the refinements of feeling, +the differences in ideals among people.</p> + +<p>This question of our fitness to sit in the +judgment seat must come with grave insistence +when we read carefully the literature +published in this city of New York within +the past two years. Our writers have assumed +such pomposity, have so revelled in +what Mr. Chesterton calls "the magnificent +buttering of one's self all over with the same +stale butter; the big defiance of small enemies," +as to make their conclusions ridiculous. +Ezekiel entering their school is at +once pushed to the bottom of the class, while +the white boy at the head, Hannibal Chollup's +descendant, sings a jubilate of his own +and butters himself so copiously as to be +as shiny as his English cousin, Wackford +Squeers. Then the writer, the judge, begins. +Ezekiel is shown as the incorrigible +boy of the school. He is a lazy, good-for-nothing +vagabond. Favored with the chance +to exercise his muscles twelve hours a day<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_223" id="Page_223">[Pg 223]</a></span> +for a disinterested employer, he fails to appreciate +his opportunity. He is diseased, degenerate. +His sisters are without chastity, +every one, polluting the good, pure white +men about them. He is a rapist, and it is +his criminal tendencies that are degrading +America. The pale-faced ones of his family +steal into white society, marry, and insinuate +grasping, avaricious tendencies into the +noble, generous men of white blood, causing +them to cheat in business and to practise +political corruption. In short there is nothing +evil that Ezekiel is not at the bottom of. +Sometimes, poor little chap, he tries to sniffle +out a word, to say that his family is doing +well, that he has an uncle who is buying a +home, and a rich cousin in the undertaking +business, but such extenuating circumstances +receive scant attention, and we are not surprised +to find, the class dismissed, that +Ezekiel and the millions whom he represents, +are swiftly shuffled off the earth, victims of +"disease, vice, and profound discouragement."</p> + +<p>Now this is not an exaggerated picture +of much that has recently been printed in<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_224" id="Page_224">[Pg 224]</a></span> +newspaper and magazine, and does it not +make us feel the paradox that if we are to +judge the Negro fairly, we must not judge +him at all, so little are we temperamentally +capable of meeting the first requirement?</p> + +<p>"My brother Saxons," says Matthew +Arnold, "have a terrible way with them of +wanting to improve everything but themselves +off the face of the earth." And he +adds, "I have no such passion for finding +nothing but myself everywhere." Among +our American writers a few, like Arnold, do +not care to find only themselves everywhere, +and these have told us a different story of +the American Negro. They are poets and +writers of fiction, men and women who are +happy in meeting and appreciating different +types of human beings.<a name="FNanchor_70_3" id="FNanchor_70_3"></a><a href="#Footnote_70_3" class="fnanchor">[3]</a> If these writers +were to instruct us, they would say that we +must individualize more when we think of +the black people about us, must differentiate. +That, too, we must remember that when we +pass judgment, we need to know whether our +own standard is the best, whether we may<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_225" id="Page_225">[Pg 225]</a></span> +not have something to learn from the standards +of others. Supposing Ezekiel is deliberate +and slow to make changes or to take +risks; are we who are "acceleration mad," +who acquire heart disease hustling to catch +trains, who <a name="tn4" id="tn4"></a>mortgage our farms to buy automobiles, +who seek continually new sensations, +really better than he? Is it not a +matter of difference, just as we may each +place in different order our desires, the one +choosing struggle for power and the accumulation +of wealth, the other preferring serenity +and pleasure in the immediate present? +And lastly, after having praised our own +virtues and our own ideals, must we not +beware that we do not blame the Negro +when he adopts them, that we do not turn +upon him and fiercely demand only servile +virtues, the virtues that make him useful not +to himself but to us?<a name="FNanchor_71_4" id="FNanchor_71_4"></a><a href="#Footnote_71_4" class="fnanchor">[4]</a></p> + +<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_226" id="Page_226">[Pg 226]</a></span></p> +<p>No one can talk for long of the Negro in +America without propounding the all-embracing +question, What will become of him, +what will be the outcome of all this racial +controversy? It is a daring person who +attempts to answer. We, who have studied +the Negro in New York, may perhaps venture +to predict a little regarding his future +in this city, his possible status in the later +years of the century; whether he will lose in +opportunity and social position, or whether +he will advance in his struggle to be a man.</p> + +<p>Looking upon the great population of the +city, its varied races and nationalities, I +confess that his outlook to me begins to be +bright. New York is still to a quite remarkable +extent dominated socially by its old +American stock, its Dutch and Anglo-Saxon +element. Few things strike the foreign +visitor so forcibly as that despite its enormous +European population, American society<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_227" id="Page_227">[Pg 227]</a></span> +is homogeneous. But this is not likely to +continue for very long. When the present +demand for exhausting self-supporting work +becomes less insistent, we shall feel in a +deeper, more vital way the influence of our +vast foreign life. With a million Jews and +nearly a million Latin people, we cannot for +long be held in the provincialism of to-day. +I suspect that to many Europeans New +York seems still a great overgrown village +in "a nation of villagers," pronouncing with +narrow, dogmatic assurance upon the deep +unsolved problems of life. But in the future +it may take on a larger, more cosmopolitan +spirit. Its Italians may bring a finer feeling +for beauty and wholesome gayety, its Jews +may continue to add great intellectual +achievements, and its people of African +descent, perhaps always few in number, may +show with happy spontaneity their best and +highest gifts. If New York really becomes +a cosmopolitan city, let us believe the Negro +will bring to it his highest genius and will +walk through it simply, quietly, unnoticed, +a man among men.</p> + + +<div class="footnotes"><h3>FOOTNOTES:</h3> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_68_1" id="Footnote_68_1"></a><a href="#FNanchor_68_1"><span class="label">[1]</span></a> Lucy Pratt, "Ezekiel."</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_69_2" id="Footnote_69_2"></a><a href="#FNanchor_69_2"><span class="label">[2]</span></a> "The world of modern intellectual life is in reality a white +man's world. Few women and perhaps no blacks have +entered this world in the fullest sense. To enter it in the fullest +sense would be to be in it at every moment from the time +of birth to the time of death, and to absorb it unconsciously +and consciously, as the child absorbs language. When something +like this happens we shall be in a position to judge of +the mental efficiency of women and the lower races. At +present we seem justified in inferring that the differences in +mental expression between the higher and lower races and +between men and women are no greater than they should be +in view of the existing differences in opportunity." W. I. +Thomas, "Sex and Society," p. 312.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_70_3" id="Footnote_70_3"></a><a href="#FNanchor_70_3"><span class="label">[3]</span></a> Note especially the stories of Alice MacGowan and Grace +MacGowan Cooke, and the poems of Rosalie M. Jonas.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_71_4" id="Footnote_71_4"></a><a href="#FNanchor_71_4"><span class="label">[4]</span></a> Careful readers of economic Negro studies by white +writers will notice this tendency to look upon the Negro as +belonging to a servile class. Emphasis is laid upon his responsibilities +to the white man, not upon the white man's responsibilities +to him. Any one familiar with the sympathetic +attitude toward the workers in such a study as the <i>Pittsburg +Survey</i> will notice at once the difference in attitude in Negro +surveys by whites, the slight emphasis laid upon the black +laborers' long hours and poor pay, and the failure to emphasize +the white man's responsibility. Negro laborers are still +studied from the viewpoint of the capitalist. There is one +notable exception to this, the study by the governor of +Jamaica, Sir Sidney Olivier, on "White Capital and Coloured +Labor."</p></div> +</div> + + + + +<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_229" id="Page_229">[Pg 229]</a></span></p> +<h2><a name="APPENDIX" id="APPENDIX">APPENDIX</a></h2> + + +<p>The federal census in 1900 contained a +volume on the Negro in the United States, a +source of information quoted by nearly every +writer on the American Negro. The tables +in that volume, however, do not classify by +cities, and any one desiring information regarding +the Negro in some especial city must +search through other volumes. As this is a +lengthy task, I am affixing a list of the tables +in the census of 1900, treating of the Negro +in New York City, believing that it may also +be a guide to students of the new census of +1910, who wish to find New York Negro +statistics.</p> + +<blockquote><p>Population. Vol. I, Part I. Published 1901.</p> + +<p>Page 868, Table 57. Aggregate, white, and colored +population distributed according to native or foreign +parentage, for cities having 25,000 inhabitants or more: +1900.</p> + +<p>Page 934, Table 81. Total males twenty-one years +of age and over, classified by general nativity, color,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_230" id="Page_230">[Pg 230]</a></span> +and literacy, for cities having 25,000 inhabitants or +more: 1900.</p> + +<p>Vol. II. Published 1902.</p> + +<p>Page 163, Table 19. Persons of school age, five to +twenty years, inclusive, by general nativity and color, +for cities having 25,000 inhabitants or more: 1900. Also, +pages 165 and 167, Tables 20 and 21.</p> + +<p>Page 332, Table 32. Conjugal condition of the +aggregate population, classified by sex, general nativity, +color, and age periods, for cities having 100,000 inhabitants +or more: 1900.</p> + +<p>Page 397, Table 54. Negro persons attending school +during the census year, classified by sex and age periods, +for cities having 25,000 inhabitants or more: 1900.</p> + +<p>Page 737, Table 111. Persons owning and hiring +their homes, classified by color, for cities having 100,000 +inhabitants or more: 1900.</p> + +<p>Vital Statistics. Vol. III. Published 1902.</p> + +<p>Page 458, Table 19. Population, births, deaths, +and death rates at certain ages, and deaths from certain +causes, by sex, color, general nativity, and parent +nativity: census year 1900.</p> + +<p>Occupations. Published 1904.</p> + +<p>Pages 634 to 642, Table 43. Total males and females, +ten years of age and over, engaged in selected groups of +occupations, classified by general nativity, color, conjugal +condition, months unemployed, age periods, and +parentage, for cities having 50,000 inhabitants or +more: 1900.</p> + +<p>Supplementary Analysis. Published 1906.</p> + +<p>Page 262, Table 87. Per cent Negro in total population, +1900, 1890, and 1880, per cent male and female<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_231" id="Page_231">[Pg 231]</a></span> +in Negro population, per cent illiterate in Negro population +at least ten years of age, and among negro males +of voting age, and per 10,000 distribution of Negro +<a name="tn5" id="tn5"></a>population by age periods.</p> + +<p>Women at Work. Published 1907.</p> + +<p>Page 146, Table 9. Number and percentage of +breadwinners in female population, sixteen years of +age and over, classified by race and nativity, for cities +having at least 50,000 inhabitants: 1900.</p> + +<p>Pages 147 to 151, Table 10. Number and percentage +of breadwinners in the female population, sixteen years +and over, classified by age, race, and nativity.</p> + +<p>Pages 266 to 275, Table 28. Female breadwinners, +sixteen years of age and over, classified by family relationship, +and by race, nativity, marital condition, and +occupation, for selected cities: 1900.</p> + +<p>Pages 354 to 365, Table 29. Female breadwinners, +sixteen years of age and over, living at home, classified +by the number of other breadwinners in the family, +and by race, nativity, marital condition, and occupation, +for selected cities: 1900.</p> + +<p>Mortality Statistics. Published 1908.</p> + +<p>Page 28. Number of deaths from all causes per +1,000 of population.</p> + +<p>Page 376, Table 2. Deaths in each registration area, +by age: 1908.</p> + +<p>Pages 566 to 568, Table 8. Deaths in each city having +100,000 population or over in 1900, from certain +causes and classes of causes, by age: 1908.</p></blockquote> +<hr class="chap" /><p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_233" id="Page_233">[Pg 233]</a></span></p> + + + + +<h2><a name="INDEX" id="INDEX">INDEX</a></h2> + +<ul class="index"> +<li class="indx">Aldridge, Ira, <a href="#Page_137">137</a>.</li> + +<li class="indx">Amalgamation, <a href="#Page_168">168</a>.</li> + +<li class="indx">Andrews, Charles, civil rights of Negroes, <a href="#Page_214">214</a>.</li> + +<li class="indx">Andrews, Chas. C., on education, <a href="#Page_14">14</a>;</li> +<li class="isub1">on industrial opportunity, <a href="#Page_27">27</a>.</li> + +<li class="indx">Archer, William, <a href="#Page_172">172</a>.</li> + +<li class="indx">Arnold, Matthew, <a href="#Page_224">224</a>.</li> + +<li class="indx">Arthur, Chester A., <a href="#Page_23">23</a>.</li> + +<li class="indx">Association for Improving the Condition of the Poor, <a href="#Page_159">159</a>.</li> + +<li class="indx">Athens, Ga., <a href="#Footnote_64_7">207</a>.</li> + +<li class="indx">Atlanta, Negroes in occupations in, <a href="#Page_77">77</a>, <a href="#Page_91">91</a>, <a href="#Page_93">93</a>;</li> +<li class="isub1">proportion of Negro women to men in, <a href="#Page_148">148</a>;</li> +<li class="isub1">suffrage in, <a href="#Page_206">206</a>.</li> + + +<li class="ifrst">Baker, Ray Stannard, on suffrage, <a href="#Page_205">205</a>.</li> + +<li class="indx">Benefit societies, <a href="#Page_175">175</a>.</li> + +<li class="indx">Birthplaces, <a href="#Page_35">35</a>.</li> + +<li class="indx">Boese, Thomas, <a href="#Footnote_6_5">15</a>.</li> + +<li class="indx">Brokers, real estate, <a href="#Page_45">45</a>, <a href="#Page_108">108</a>.</li> + +<li class="indx">Brown, William, <a href="#Page_14">14</a>.</li> + +<li class="indx">Bulkley, W. L., <a href="#Page_161">161</a>.</li> + +<li class="indx">Burke <i>v.</i> Bosso, <a href="#Page_215">215</a>.</li> + +<li class="indx">Burleigh, Harry, <a href="#Page_126">126</a>.</li> + +<li class="indx">Businesses, <a href="#Page_106">106</a>-<a href="#Page_112">112</a>.</li> + + +<li class="ifrst">Cahill, Marie, <a href="#Page_133">133</a>.</li> + +<li class="indx">Charity Organization Society, <a href="#Page_158">158</a>.</li> + +<li class="indx">Chesnutt, Charles W., <a href="#Page_181">181</a>.</li> + +<li class="indx">Chesterton, Gilbert K., <a href="#Page_222">222</a>.</li> + +<li class="indx"><a name="Churches" id="Churches"></a>Churches:</li> +<li class="isub1">Baptist, <a href="#Page_20">20</a>, <a href="#Page_116">116</a>, <a href="#Page_123">123</a>;</li> +<li class="isub1">Catholic, <a href="#Page_116">116</a>;</li> +<li class="isub1">Congregational, <a href="#Page_20">20</a>;</li> +<li class="isub1">Episcopal, <a href="#Page_20">20</a>, <a href="#Footnote_46_3">113</a>, <a href="#Page_116">116</a>, <a href="#Page_120">120</a>;</li> +<li class="isub1">Methodist, <a href="#Page_20">20</a>, <a href="#Page_116">116</a>.</li> + +<li class="indx">City and Suburban Homes, <a href="#Page_41">41</a>.</li> + +<li class="indx">Civil rights:</li> +<li class="isub1">state bill, <a href="#Footnote_65_8">213</a>;</li> +<li class="isub1">violations of, <a href="#Page_209">209</a>, <a href="#Page_210">210</a>.</li> + +<li class="indx">Clarkson, Thomas, <a href="#Footnote_17_2">32</a>.</li> + +<li class="indx">Cleveland, Grover, <a href="#Page_17">17</a>.</li> + +<li class="indx">Clinton, De Witt, <a href="#Page_14">14</a>.</li> + +<li class="indx">Cole and Johnson, <a href="#Page_127">127</a>, <a href="#Page_133">133</a>.</li> + +<li class="indx">Constitutional conventions, state, <a href="#Page_11">11</a>-<a href="#Page_13">13</a>.</li> + +<li class="indx">Cook, Will Marion, <a href="#Page_136">136</a>.</li> + +<li class="indx">Cooke, Grace MacGowan, <a href="#Footnote_70_3">224</a>.</li> + +<li class="indx">Court:</li> +<li class="isub1">children's, <a href="#Page_66">66</a>;</li> +<li class="isub1"><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_234" id="Page_234">[Pg 234]</a></span>magistrate's, <a href="#Page_202">202</a>-<a href="#Page_204">204</a>.</li> + +<li class="indx">Craig, Walter A., <a href="#Page_126">126</a>.</li> + +<li class="indx">Crime:</li> +<li class="isub1">among children, <a href="#Page_66">66</a>-<a href="#Page_68">68</a>;</li> +<li class="isub1">among adults, <a href="#Page_189">189</a>.</li> + + +<li class="ifrst">Dahomeyans, <a href="#Page_131">131</a>.</li> + +<li class="indx">District Nursing Association of Brooklyn, <a href="#Page_159">159</a>.</li> + +<li class="indx">Dix, Morgan, <a href="#Page_25">25</a>.</li> + +<li class="indx">Domestic Service, <a href="#Page_80">80</a>-<a href="#Page_83">83</a>, <a href="#Page_149">149</a>-<a href="#Page_153">153</a>.</li> + +<li class="indx">Downing, Thomas, <a href="#Page_27">27</a>.</li> + +<li class="indx">Du Bois, W. E. B., <a href="#Page_183">183</a>.</li> + +<li class="indx">Dudley, S. H., <a href="#Page_128">128</a>.</li> + +<li class="indx">Dunbar, Paul Lawrence, <a href="#Page_71">71</a>, <a href="#Page_83">83</a>, <a href="#Page_131">131</a>.</li> + + +<li class="ifrst">East Side, <a href="#Page_42">42</a>-<a href="#Page_44">44</a>.</li> + +<li class="indx"><a name="Education" id="Education"></a>Education:</li> +<li class="isub1">colored teacher, <a href="#Page_17">17</a>, <a href="#Page_18">18</a>;</li> +<li class="isub1">private colored schools, <a href="#Page_14">14</a>;</li> +<li class="isub1">public colored schools, <a href="#Page_15">15</a>-<a href="#Page_19">19</a>.</li> + +<li class="indx">Emancipation, <a href="#Page_8">8</a>.</li> + +<li class="indx">Ewing, Quincy, <a href="#Footnote_56_1">190</a>.</li> + + +<li class="ifrst">Fall River, mortality among infants, <a href="#Page_59">59</a>.</li> + +<li class="indx">Finley, H. M., <a href="#Footnote_16_1">32</a>.</li> + +<li class="indx">Frazier, S. E., <a href="#Page_18">18</a>.</li> + + +<li class="ifrst">Gaynor, William J., <a href="#Page_201">201</a>.</li> + +<li class="indx">Government service, Negroes in, <a href="#Page_88">88</a>.</li> + +<li class="indx">Greenwich Village, <a href="#Page_33">33</a>-<a href="#Page_35">35</a>.</li> + + +<li class="ifrst">Hale, Edward Everett, <a href="#Page_119">119</a>.</li> + +<li class="indx">Hamilton, Alexander, <a href="#Page_14">14</a>.</li> + +<li class="indx">Hampton Institute, <a href="#Footnote_44_1">110</a>, <a href="#Page_119">119</a>, <a href="#Page_193">193</a>.</li> + +<li class="indx">Hansell, George H., <a href="#Footnote_11_10">20</a>.</li> + +<li class="indx">Haynes, George E., <a href="#Footnote_45_2">112</a>.</li> + +<li class="indx">Health Department, <a href="#Footnote_20_5">40</a>, <a href="#Footnote_26_2">53</a>, <a href="#Page_197">197</a>.</li> + +<li class="indx">Held, Anna, <a href="#Page_133">133</a>.</li> + +<li class="indx">Hell's Kitchen, <a href="#Page_37">37</a>, <a href="#Page_85">85</a>.</li> + +<li class="indx">Hogan, Ernest, <a href="#Page_134">134</a>.</li> + +<li class="indx">Horsmanden, Daniel, <a href="#Footnote_2_1">7</a>.</li> + +<li class="indx"><a name="Housing" id="Housing"></a>Housing, <a href="#Page_34">34</a>, <a href="#Page_36">36</a>, <a href="#Page_40">40</a>, <a href="#Page_45">45</a>-<a href="#Page_51">51</a>.</li> + +<li class="indx">Hunt, John H., against Negro suffrage, <a href="#Page_13">13</a>.</li> + + +<li class="ifrst">Janvier, Thomas, <a href="#Page_8">8</a>, <a href="#Page_33">33</a>.</li> + +<li class="indx">Jay, John, on emancipation, <a href="#Page_8">8</a>;</li> +<li class="isub1">interest in education, <a href="#Page_14">14</a>.</li> + +<li class="indx">Jay, Peter, on Negro suffrage, <a href="#Page_11">11</a>.</li> + +<li class="indx">Jennings, Elizabeth, <a href="#Page_21">21</a>.</li> + +<li class="indx">Jonas, Rosalie M., <a href="#Footnote_70_3">224</a>.</li> + +<li class="indx">Jones, Edward, <a href="#Page_14">14</a>.</li> + + +<li class="ifrst"><a name="tn6" id="tn6"></a>Kean, Edmund, <a href="#Page_137">137</a>.</li> + +<li class="indx">Kent, Chancellor, favors Negro suffrage, <a href="#Page_11">11</a>.</li> + +<li class="indx">Kidd, Dudley, <a href="#Footnote_25_1">52</a>.</li> + +<li class="indx">King <i>v.</i> Gallagher, <a href="#Page_16">16</a>.</li> + +<li class="indx">Kingsley, Mary, <a href="#Page_70">70</a>, <a href="#Footnote_47_4">113</a>.</li> + + +<li class="ifrst">Lanier, Sidney, <a href="#Page_31">31</a>.</li> + +<li class="indx">Lincoln, Charles Z., <a href="#Page_13">13</a>.</li> + +<li class="indx">Lincoln Hospital:</li> +<li class="isub1">attitude towards Negro doctors, <a href="#Footnote_48_5">114</a>;</li> +<li class="isub1"><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_235" id="Page_235">[Pg 235]</a></span>graduates of, <a href="#Page_157">157</a>.</li> + +<li class="indx">Livingston, against Negro suffrage, <a href="#Page_11">11</a>.</li> + +<li class="indx">London, Jack, <a href="#Page_63">63</a>.</li> + + +<li class="ifrst">MacGowan, Alice, <a href="#Footnote_70_3">224</a>.</li> + +<li class="indx">Manhattan Trade School, <a href="#Page_161">161</a>, <a href="#Page_162">162</a>.</li> + +<li class="indx">Manumission society, <a href="#Page_14">14</a>.</li> + +<li class="indx">Middle West Side, <a href="#Page_35">35</a>-<a href="#Page_38">38</a>.</li> + +<li class="indx">Miller, Kelly, <a href="#Page_86">86</a>, <a href="#Page_147">147</a>.</li> + +<li class="indx">Morris, Gouverneur, on emancipation, <a href="#Page_8">8</a>.</li> + +<li class="indx">Mortality:</li> +<li class="isub1">among infants, <a href="#Page_53">53</a>-<a href="#Page_60">60</a>;</li> +<li class="isub1">death rate by diseases, <a href="#Page_192">192</a>.</li> + +<li class="indx">Municipal service, Negroes in, <a href="#Page_197">197</a>.</li> + +<li class="indx">Music, <a href="#Page_125">125</a>-<a href="#Page_127">127</a>.</li> + + +<li class="ifrst">New York Conspiracy, <a href="#Page_7">7</a>.</li> + +<li class="indx">New York Milk Committee, <a href="#Footnote_28_4">54</a>.</li> + +<li class="indx">Newman, G., infant mortality, <a href="#Footnote_29_5">55</a>, <a href="#Page_58">58</a>.</li> + +<li class="indx">Nurses' Settlement, <a href="#Page_159">159</a>.</li> + + +<li class="ifrst">Olivier, Sidney, <a href="#Footnote_71_4">226</a>.</li> + + +<li class="ifrst">Palmer, A. Emerson, <a href="#Footnote_8_7">18</a>.</li> + +<li class="indx">Patten, S. N., <a href="#Footnote_19_4">38</a>.</li> + +<li class="indx">People <i>v.</i> King, <a href="#Page_213">213</a>.</li> + +<li class="indx">Phillips, Ulrich B., <a href="#Footnote_43_10">101</a>.</li> + +<li class="indx">Phipps, Henry, <a href="#Page_41">41</a>.</li> + +<li class="indx">Phipps tenement, <a href="#Footnote_21_6">42</a>, <a href="#Page_51">51</a>, <a href="#Page_125">125</a>.</li> + +<li class="indx">Pittsburg Survey, <a href="#Footnote_71_4">225</a>.</li> + +<li class="indx">Police department, <a href="#Page_198">198</a>-<a href="#Page_201">201</a>.</li> + +<li class="indx">Poole, Ernest, <a href="#Page_84">84</a>.</li> + +<li class="indx">Population, Negro, <a href="#Page_9">9</a>;</li> +<li class="isub1">total, <a href="#Page_31">31</a>.</li> + +<li class="indx">Pratt, Lucy, <a href="#Footnote_68_1">218</a>.</li> + +<li class="indx">Prostitution, <a href="#Page_155">155</a>, <a href="#Page_156">156</a>.</li> + + +<li class="ifrst">Ray, Charles B., <a href="#Page_24">24</a>.</li> + +<li class="indx">Reason, Patrick, <a href="#Page_27">27</a>.</li> + +<li class="indx">Religion (see <a href="#Churches">Churches</a>).</li> + +<li class="indx">Riots:</li> +<li class="isub1">draft riots, <a href="#Page_25">25</a>;</li> +<li class="isub1">riot of 1900, <a href="#Page_199">199</a>;</li> +<li class="isub1">riot of 1905, <a href="#Page_199">199</a>-<a href="#Page_201">201</a>.</li> + +<li class="indx">Roosevelt, Theodore, <a href="#Page_18">18</a>.</li> + +<li class="indx">Rubinow, I. B., relation of death rate to poverty, <a href="#Footnote_57_2">193</a>.</li> + +<li class="indx">Russell, John L., <a href="#Page_12">12</a>.</li> + +<li class="indx">Russell, Lillian, <a href="#Page_133">133</a>.</li> + +<li class="indx">Russia, infant mortality in, <a href="#Page_54">54</a>;</li> +<li class="isub1">mortality and poverty, <a href="#Footnote_57_2">193</a>.</li> + +<li class="indx">Russworm, John B., <a href="#Page_14">14</a>.</li> + + +<li class="ifrst">Sanger, William W., <a href="#Page_153">153</a>.</li> + +<li class="indx">San Juan Hill, <a href="#Page_39">39</a>-<a href="#Page_42">42</a>.</li> + +<li class="indx">Schools (see <a href="#Education">Education</a>).</li> + +<li class="indx">Scottron, Samuel R., on industrial opportunities, <a href="#Page_26">26</a>;</li> +<li class="isub1">on occupations, <a href="#Page_78">78</a>.</li> + +<li class="indx">Segregation:</li> +<li class="isub1">churches, <a href="#Page_19">19</a>;</li> +<li class="isub1">dwelling-places, <a href="#Page_48">48</a>-<a href="#Page_50">50</a>;</li> +<li class="isub1">schools, <a href="#Page_15">15</a>-<a href="#Page_19">19</a>.</li> + +<li class="indx">Shirtwaist makers' strike, <a href="#Page_163">163</a>.</li> + +<li class="indx">Simmons, William J., <a href="#Footnote_50_7">137</a>.</li> + +<li class="indx">Slave ships, <a href="#Page_32">32</a>.</li> + +<li class="indx">Slaves, brutality towards, <a href="#Page_5">5</a>;</li> +<li class="indx"><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_236" id="Page_236">[Pg 236]</a></span>insurrections of, <a href="#Page_6">6</a>-<a href="#Page_8">8</a>.</li> + +<li class="indx">Smith, Gerritt, <a href="#Page_24">24</a>.</li> + +<li class="indx">Smith, James McC., <a href="#Page_27">27</a>.</li> + +<li class="indx">Smith, William G., <a href="#Page_14">14</a>.</li> + +<li class="indx">Stage, <a href="#Page_127">127</a>-<a href="#Page_137">137</a>.</li> + +<li class="indx">Stevenson, Robert Louis, <a href="#Page_215">215</a>.</li> + +<li class="indx">Stone, Alfred Holt, on Negro in occupations in South, <a href="#Page_75">75</a>;</li> +<li class="isub1">color line in South, <a href="#Page_89">89</a>, <a href="#Page_92">92</a>;</li> +<li class="isub1">irresponsibility of Negroes, <a href="#Page_102">102</a>.</li> + +<li class="indx">Straus, Nathan, <a href="#Page_59">59</a>.</li> + +<li class="indx">Street cars, discrimination, <a href="#Page_21">21</a>-<a href="#Page_23">23</a>.</li> + +<li class="indx">Suffrage:</li> +<li class="isub1">past, <a href="#Page_11">11</a>-<a href="#Page_13">13</a>;</li> +<li class="isub1">present, <a href="#Page_196">196</a>;</li> +<li class="isub1">Negro's use of suffrage, <a href="#Page_204">204</a>-<a href="#Page_208">208</a>;</li> +<li class="isub1">in Athens, Ga., <a href="#Page_207">207</a>.</li> + + +<li class="ifrst">Tanner, Henry, <a href="#Page_126">126</a>.</li> + +<li class="indx">Tenements (see <a href="#Housing">Housing</a>).</li> + +<li class="indx">Thomas, W. I., <a href="#Footnote_69_2">221</a>.</li> + +<li class="indx">Trade-unions, <a href="#Page_95">95</a>-<a href="#Page_99">99</a>.</li> + +<li class="indx">Trinity Church, <a href="#Page_25">25</a>.</li> + +<li class="indx">Tucker, Helen, on Negro craftsmen, <a href="#Page_96">96</a>, <a href="#Page_98">98</a>.</li> + + +<li class="ifrst">Underground Railroad, <a href="#Page_24">24</a>.</li> + +<li class="indx">Upper West Side, <a href="#Page_45">45</a>-<a href="#Page_48">48</a>.</li> + + +<li class="ifrst">Varick, James, <a href="#Page_20">20</a>.</li> + + +<li class="ifrst">Walker, Aida, <a href="#Page_157">157</a>.</li> + +<li class="indx">Washington, Booker T., <a href="#Page_184">184</a>, <a href="#Page_194">194</a>.</li> + +<li class="indx">Waterbury, Daniel S., <a href="#Page_12">12</a>.</li> + +<li class="indx">West Indies, arrivals from, <a href="#Page_48">48</a>.</li> + +<li class="indx">Wheeler, B. F., <a href="#Footnote_10_9">20</a>.</li> + +<li class="indx">White, Philip A., <a href="#Page_27">27</a>.</li> + +<li class="indx">Williams, Peter, <a href="#Page_20">20</a>.</li> + +<li class="indx">Williams and Walker, <a href="#Page_129">129</a>-<a href="#Page_133">133</a>.</li> + +<li class="indx">Wilson, H. J., <a href="#Footnote_49_6">124</a>.</li> + +<li class="indx">Wilson, J. G., <a href="#Footnote_3_2">8</a>.</li> + +<li class="indx">Winterbottom, <a href="#Page_25">25</a>.</li> + +<li class="indx">Wright, Richard R., on the city Negro, <a href="#Page_100">100</a>, <a href="#Page_104">104</a>.</li> + +<li class="indx">Wright, Theodore S., <a href="#Page_14">14</a>.</li> + + +<li class="ifrst">Zangwill, Israel, <a href="#Page_137">137</a>.</li> +</ul> + +<div class="transnote"> +<p> +Transcriber's notes: +</p> + +<p> +The date of the case of King <i>v.</i> Gallagher, given in the text +as <a href="#tn1">1862</a>, and in Footnote <a href="#Footnote_7_6">6</a> +as 1882, is 1883. +</p> + +<p> +The following is a list of changes made to the original. +The first line is the original line, the second the corrected one. +</p> + +<p> +their positive as well as <span class="u">there</span> relative number<br /> +their positive as well as <a href="#tn2">their</a> relative number +</p> + +<p> +See H. J. <span class="u">Wilson.</span> "The Negro and Music," <i>Outlook</i>,<br /> +See H. J. <a href="#Footnote_49_6">Wilson,</a> "The Negro and Music," <i>Outlook</i>, +</p> + +<p> +<span class="u">peoples</span>, receive colored guests; and while<br /> +<a href="#tn3">people</a>, receive colored guests; and while +</p> + +<p> +trains, who <span class="u">mortgate</span> our farms to buy automobiles,<br /> +trains, who <a href="#tn4">mortgage</a> our farms to buy automobiles, +</p> + +<p> +<span class="u">pupulation</span> by age periods.<br /> +<a href="#tn5">population</a> by age periods. +</p> + +<p> +<span class="u">Keane</span>, Edmund, 137.<br /> +<a href="#tn6">Kean</a>, Edmund, 137. +</p> +</div> + + + + + + + +<pre> + + + + + +End of Project Gutenberg's Half a Man, by Mary White Ovington and Franz Boas + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK HALF A MAN *** + +***** This file should be named 39742-h.htm or 39742-h.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + http://www.gutenberg.org/3/9/7/4/39742/ + +Produced by David Edwards, Paul Clark and the Online +Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net (This +file was produced from images generously made available +by The Internet Archive) + + +Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions +will be renamed. + +Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no +one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation +(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without +permission and without paying copyright royalties. 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You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: Half a Man + The Status of the Negro in New York + +Author: Mary White Ovington + Franz Boas + +Release Date: May 20, 2012 [EBook #39742] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ASCII + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK HALF A MAN *** + + + + +Produced by David Edwards, Paul Clark and the Online +Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net (This +file was produced from images generously made available +by The Internet Archive) + + + + + + Transcriber's Note: + + Every effort has been made to replicate this text as faithfully as + possible, including inconsistencies in spelling and hyphenation. + Some changes of spelling have been made. They are listed at the end + of the text. + + Italic text has been marked with _underscores_. + OE ligatures have been expanded. + + + + + HALF A MAN + + THE STATUS OF THE NEGRO + IN NEW YORK + + BY + MARY WHITE OVINGTON + + _WITH A FOREWORD BY DR. FRANZ BOAS + OF COLUMBIA UNIVERSITY_ + + LONGMANS, GREEN, AND CO. + FOURTH AVENUE & 30TH STREET, NEW YORK + LONDON, BOMBAY, AND CALCUTTA + 1911 + + + _Copyright, 1911, by_ + LONGMANS, GREEN, AND CO. + + THE . PLIMPTON . PRESS + [W . D . O] + NORWOOD . MASS . U . S . A + + + TO + THE MEMORY OF MY FATHER + THEODORE TWEEDY + OVINGTON + + + + +FOREWORD + + +Miss Ovington's description of the status of the Negro in New York City +is based on a most painstaking inquiry into his social and economic +conditions, and brings out in the most forceful way the difficulties +under which the race is laboring, even in the large cosmopolitan +population of New York. It is a refutation of the claims that the Negro +has equal opportunity with the whites, and that his failure to advance +more rapidly than he has, is due to innate inability. + +Many students of anthropology recognize that no proof can be given of +any material inferiority of the Negro race; that without doubt the bulk +of the individuals composing the race are equal in mental aptitude to +the bulk of our own people; that, although their hereditary aptitudes +may lie in slightly different directions, it is very improbable that the +majority of individuals composing the white race should possess greater +ability than the Negro race. + +The anthropological argument is invariably met by the objection that the +achievements of the two races are unequal, while their opportunities are +the same. Every demonstration of the inequality of opportunity will +therefore help to dissipate prejudices that prevent the best possible +development of a large number of our citizens. + +The Negro of our times carries even more heavily the burden of his +racial descent than did the Jew of an earlier period; and the +intellectual and moral qualities required to insure success to the Negro +are infinitely greater than those demanded from the white, and will be +the greater, the stricter the segregation of the Negro community. + +The strong development of racial consciousness, which has been +increasing during the last century and is just beginning to show the +first signs of waning, is the gravest obstacle to the progress of the +Negro race, as it is an obstacle to the progress of all strongly +individualized social groups. The simple presentation of observations, +like those given by Miss Ovington, may help us to overcome more quickly +that self-centred attitude which can see progress only in the domination +of a single type. + +This investigation was carried on by Miss Ovington under the auspices of +the Greenwich House Committee on Social Investigations, of which she was +a Fellow.[1] + +FRANZ BOAS. + + +FOOTNOTE: + +[1] The Greenwich House Committee on Social Investigations is composed +of Edwin R. A. Seligman, Chairman, Franz Boas, Edward T. Devine, +Livingston Farrand, Franklin H. Giddings, Henry R. Seager, Vladimir G. +Simkhovitch, Secretary. + +Miss Ovington's is the second publication of the Committee, the first +being Mrs. Louise Bolard More's "Wage-Earners' Budgets," published by +Henry Holt & Co. + + + + +CONTENTS + + + CHAPTER PAGE + + I "UP FROM SLAVERY" 5 + + II WHERE THE NEGRO LIVES 31 + + III THE CHILD OF THE TENEMENT 52 + + IV EARNING A LIVING--MANUAL LABOR AND THE TRADES 75 + + V EARNING A LIVING--BUSINESS AND THE PROFESSIONS 106 + + VI THE COLORED WOMAN AS A BREAD WINNER 138 + + VII RICH AND POOR 170 + + VIII THE NEGRO AND THE MUNICIPALITY 195 + + IX CONCLUSION 218 + + APPENDIX 229 + + INDEX 233 + + + + +HALF A MAN + + + + +INTRODUCTION + + +Six years ago I met a young colored man, a college student recently +returned from Germany where he had been engaged in graduate work. He was +born, he told me, in one of the Gulf States, and I questioned him as to +whether he intended going back to the South to teach. His answer was in +the negative. "My father has attained success in his native state," he +said, "but when I ceased to be a boy, he advised me to live in the North +where my manhood would be respected. He himself cannot continually +endure the position in which he is placed, and in the summer he comes +North to be a man. No," correcting himself, "to be half a man. A Negro +is wholly a man only in Europe." + +Half a man! During the six years that I have been in touch with the +problem of the Negro in New York this characterization has grown in +significance to me. I have endeavored to know the life of the Negro as I +know the life of the white American, and I have learned that while New +York at times gives full recognition to his manhood, again, its race +prejudice arrests his development as certainly as severe poverty arrests +the development of the tenement child. Perhaps a study of this shifting +attitude on the part of the dominant race, and of the Negro's reaction +under it, may not be unimportant; for the color question cannot be +ignored in America, nor should the position taken by her largest city be +overlooked. And those who love their fellows may be glad, among New +York's four millions--its Slavs and Italians, its Russians and +Asiatics--to meet these dark people who speak our language and who for +many generations have made this country their home. + + + + +CHAPTER I + +"UP FROM SLAVERY" + + +The status of the Negro in New Amsterdam, a slave in a pioneer +community, differed fundamentally from his position today in New York. +His history from the seventeenth to the twentieth century contains many +exciting incidents, but those only need be considered here that show a +progress or a retardation in his attainment to manhood. What were his +struggles in the past to secure his rights as a man? + +Slavery in the early days of the colonies was more brutal than at the +time of final emancipation. Savages recently arrived from Africa lacked +the docility of blacks reared in bondage, and burning and torturing, as +well as whipping, were recognized modes of punishment. Masters looked +upon their Negroes, bought at the Wall Street market from among the +cargo of a recently arrived slaver, with some suspicion and fear. Nor +were their apprehensions entirely without reason. In 1712 some of the +discontented among the New York slaves met in an orchard in Maiden Lane +and set fire to an outhouse. Defending themselves against the citizens +who ran to put out the flames, they fired, killing nine men and wounding +six. Retribution soon followed. They were pursued when they attempted +flight, captured and executed--some hanged, some burned at the stake, +some left suspended in chains to starve to death. + +Perhaps it was the memory of this small revolt that caused the people of +New York in 1741 to lay the blame for a series of conflagrations upon +their slaves. Nine fires that seemed to be incendiary came one upon +another, and a robbery was committed. To escape death herself, a +worthless white servant girl gave testimony against the Negroes who +frequented a tavern where she was employed, declaring that a plot had +been conceived whereby the slaves would kill all the white men and take +control of the city. New York was aflame with fear, and evidence that at +another time would have been rejected, was listened to by the judges +with grave attention. The slaves were allowed no defence, and before the +city had recovered from its fright, it had burned fourteen Negroes, +hanged eighteen, and transported seventy-one.[1] + +Historians today think that the slaves were in no way concerned in this +so-called "plot." The two thousand blacks in the city might have done +much mischief to the ten thousand whites, but their servile condition +made an organized movement among them impossible. We may infer, however, +from the fear which they provoked, that they were not all docile +servants. In a letter written at the port of New York in 1756, an +English naval officer says of the city, "The laborious people in general +are Guinea Negroes who lie under particular restraints from the attempts +they have made to massacre the inhabitants for their liberty."[2] +Janvier in his "Old New York" thinks, "that the alarm bred by the +so-called Negro plot of 1741 was most effective in checking the growth +of slavery in that city." Probably the restlessness of the slaves, their +efforts toward manhood, in a community where there was little economic +justification for slavery, contributed to the movement for emancipation +that began in 1777. + +Emancipation came gradually to the New York Negro. Gouverneur Morris at +the state constitutional convention of 1776-1777 recommended that "the +future legislature of the state of New York take the most effectual +measures consistent with the public safety and the private property of +individuals for abolishing domestic slavery within the same, so that in +future ages every human being who breathes the air of this state shall +enjoy the privileges of a freeman." The postponement of action to a +future legislature was keenly regretted by John Jay, who was absent from +the convention when the slavery question arose, but who had hoped that +New York might be a leader in emancipation. The state's initial measure +for abolishing slavery was in 1785, when it prohibited the sale of +slaves in New York. This was followed in 1799 by an act giving freedom +to the children of slaves, and in 1817 by a further act providing for +the abolition of slavery throughout the state in 1827. This law went +into effect July 4, 1827, the emancipation day of the Negroes in New +York. + +With gradual emancipation and the cessation of the sale of slaves, the +Negroes numerically became unimportant in the city. In 1800 they +constituted ten and a half per cent of the population. Half a century +later, while they had doubled their numbers, the immense influx of +foreign immigrants brought their proportion down to two and seven-tenths +per cent. In 1850 and 1860 their positive as well as their relative +number decreased, and it was not until twenty years ago that they began +to show some gain. The last census returns of 1900 give Greater New York +(including Brooklyn) 60,666 Negroes in a population of 3,437,202, one +and eight-tenths per cent. It seems probable that the census of 1910 +will show a large positive and a slight relative Negro increase.[3] + +The relative decrease in the number of Negroes did not, however, produce +a decrease in the agitation upon their presence and position in the +city. Their political status was a subject for heated discussion even +before their complete emancipation. The first state constitution, +drafted in 1777, was without color discrimination, since it based the +suffrage upon a property qualification requiring voters for governor and +senators to be freeholders owning property worth L100. A Negro with such +a holding was a phenomenon, a curiosity. But by 1821, when the framing +of the second constitution was in progress, Negroes of some education +were an appreciable element in the population, and with them ignorant, +recently emancipated slaves. Should they be admitted to the full manhood +suffrage contemplated for the whites? Those who favored the new +democratic movement were doubtful of its applicability to colored +people. Livingston, a champion of universal white manhood suffrage, was +against giving the black man the vote. On the other hand, the +conservative Chancellor Kent, apprehending in the new constitution "a +disposition to encroach on private rights,--to disturb chartered +privileges and to weaken, degrade, and overawe the administration of +justice," would yet have made no color discrimination, and Peter A. Jay, +who did not believe in universal white manhood suffrage, urged that +colored men, natives of the country, should derive from its institutions +the same privileges as white persons. The second constitution when +adopted enfranchised practically all white men, but gave the Negroes a +property qualification of $250. The issue of the revolution, however, +was not far from men's thoughts, and "taxation without representation" +was not permitted; for while no colored man might vote without a +freehold estate valued at 250 dollars, _no person of color was subject +to direct taxation unless he should be possessed of such real estate_. + +In 1846 a third constitutional convention was held, and the same matter +came up for debate. John L. Russell of St. Lawrence declared that "the +Almighty had created the black man inferior to the white man," while +Daniel S. Waterbury of Delaware County believed that "the argument that +because a race of men is marked by a peculiarity of color and crooked +hair they are not endowed with a mind equal to another class who have +other peculiarities is unworthy of men of sense." John H. Hunt of New +York City proclaimed that "We want no masters, least of all no Negro +masters.... Negroes are aliens." And he predicted that the practical +effect of their admission to the suffrage would be their exclusion from +Manhattan Island. A delegation of colored men appeared at Albany before +the suffrage committee, but their arguments and those of their friends +produced no effect. The new constitution contained the same Negro +property qualification, and it was not until 1874, after the passage of +the fifteenth amendment to the Constitution of the United States, that +legislation placed the Negro voter of New York upon the same footing as +the white.[4] + +Had New York sincerely desired to keep the Negro in an inferior +position, it could have accomplished this by refusing him an education. +This it never did, though it suffered much tribulation regarding the +place and manner of his instruction. Before the establishment of a +public school system, the Manumission society, an association composed +largely of Friends, though including in its membership John Jay, De Witt +Clinton, and Alexander Hamilton, undertook the education of the Negro. +In 1787 it opened a school for Africans on Cliff Street. One of the +early teachers was Charles C. Andrews, whose little book on "The African +Free Schools," published in 1830, shows a kindly tolerance for the black +race. "As a result of forty years' experience," he writes, "the idea +respecting the capacity of the African race to receive a respectable and +even a liberal education has not been visionary." And he recites the +names of some of his pupils: "Rev. Theodore S. Wright, graduate of +Princeton Theological Seminary; John B. Russworm, graduate of Bowdoin; +Edward Jones, graduate of Amherst; William Brown and William G. Smith, +students of the medical department, Columbia College: all of them +persons of color." Describing an annual exhibition of his school on May +12, 1824, he quotes from the _Commercial Advertiser_ of the same date: +"We never beheld a white school, of the same age (of and under the age +of fifteen), in which, without exception, there was more order and +neatness of dress and cleanliness of person. And the exercises were +performed with a degree of promptness and accuracy which was +surprising." + +In 1834 the public school association took over the schools of the +Manumission society, but before this time the Negroes had begun to +assert themselves regarding the method and place of instruction for +their children. They clamored for colored teachers and succeeded in +displacing Charles Andrews himself. In 1838, at their desire, the word +African was changed to colored in describing the race; but of chief +importance to their educational future, they began a protest, only to +end in 1900, against segregation. + +Removed from the care of the Manumission society, the colored schools +deteriorated. Their grade was reduced,[5] and owing to the growth of the +city, their attendance was very irregular, the severe winter weather +often keeping children who lived at a distance at home. A Brooklyn man +tells me that, when a boy, he used to walk from his home at East New +York to Fulton Ferry, passing inferior Brooklyn colored schools, and +after crossing the river, on up to Mulberry Street to be instructed by +the popular colored teacher, John Peterson. Here he received a good +education; but few boys would have endured a daily trip of fourteen +miles. Increasingly parents, if the colored school of their neighborhood +was not of the best, sent their boys and girls to be instructed with the +white boys and girls of their district. + +The state law declared that any city or incorporated village might +establish separate schools for the instruction of African youths, +provided the facilities were equal to those of white schools, and when, +in 1862, a colored parent brought a case against the city for forcing +her child to go to a colored school, the case was lost.[6] Nevertheless, +during the nineteenth century Negroes in some numbers attended white +schools in both Brooklyn and New York, and Negro parents continued in +their quiet but persistent efforts against segregation. Then again, New +York grew too rapidly to segregate any race. The Negro boys and girls +were scattered through many districts, and the attendance at colored +schools fell off; in 1879 it was less than in 1878, and in 1880 less +than in 1879; so that the Board of Education in 1883 decided to +disestablish three colored schools. + +But this involved another factor. If the colored schools were +disestablished, what would become of the colored teachers? The Negroes +met this issue by delaying disestablishment for a year, while the +teachers went about among the parents of the ward, making friends and +urging that children, _white or colored_, be sent to their schools. +Numbers of new pupils of both races were brought in within the year, and +at the end of the time, after a hearing before the governor, then Grover +Cleveland, a bill was passed prohibiting the abolition of two of the +three colored schools, but also making them open to all children +regardless of color.[7] + +Occasionally a colored girl graduated from the normal college of the +city, but if there was no vacancy for her in the four colored schools +she received no appointment. In 1896, however, a normal graduate, Miss +S. E. Frazier, insisted upon her right to be appointed as teacher in any +school in which there was a vacancy. She visited the ward trustees and +the members of the Board of Education, and represented to them the +injustice done her and her race in refusing her the chance to prove her +ability as a teacher in the first school that should need a normal +graduate. She was finally appointed to a position in a white school. Her +success with her pupils was immediate, and since then the question of +race or color has not been considered in the appointment of teachers in +New York. + +Until 1900, the state law permitted the establishment of separate +colored schools. In that year, however, on the initiative of Theodore +Roosevelt, then governor, the legislature passed a bill providing that +no person should be refused admission or be excluded from any public +school in the state on account of race or color.[8] This closed the +question of compulsory segregation in the state, though before this it +had ceased in New York. Public education was thus democratized for the +New York Negroes, their persistent efforts bringing at the end complete +success. + +While the colored people in New York started with segregated schools and +attained to mixed schools, the movement in the churches was the reverse. +At first the Negroes were attendants of white churches, sitting in the +gallery or on the rear seats, and waiting until the white people were +through before partaking of the communion; but as their number increased +they chafed under their position. Why should they be placed apart to +hear the doctrine of Christ, and why, too, should they not have full +opportunity to preach that doctrine? The desire for self-expression was +perhaps the greatest factor in leading them to separate from the white +church. In 1796 about thirty Negroes, under the leadership of James +Varick,[9] withdrew from the John Street Methodist Episcopal Church, +and formed the first colored church of New York. Varick had been denied +a license to preach, but now as pastor of his own people, he was +recognized by the whites and helped by some of them. He was the founder +of the African Methodist Episcopal Zion Church. + +The Abyssinian Baptist Church was organized in 1800 by a few colored +members who withdrew from the First Baptist Church, then in Gold Street, +to establish themselves on Worth Street,[10] and in 1818 the colored +Episcopalians organized St. Philip's Church. In 1820 one of their race, +Peter Williams, for six years deacon, became their preacher. + +Another prominent church was the colored Congregational, situated, in +1854, on Sixth Street; and it was the determined effort of its woman +organist to reach the church in time to perform her part in the Sunday +morning service that led to an important Negro advance in citizenship. + +In the middle of the last century the right of the Negro to ride in car +or omnibus depended on the sufferance of driver, conductor, and +passenger. Sometimes a car stopped at a Negro's signal, again the driver +whipped up his horses, while the conductor yelled to the "nigger" to +wait for the next car. Entrance might always be effected if in the +company of a white person, and the small child of a kindly white +household would be delegated to accompany the homeward bound black +visitor into her car where, after a few minutes, conductor and +passengers having become accustomed to her presence, the young +protector might slip away. Such a situation was very galling to the +self-respecting negro. + +In July, 1854, Elizabeth Jennings, a colored school-teacher and organist +at the Congregational Church, attempted to board a Third Avenue car at +Pearl and Chatham Streets. She was hurrying to reach the church to +perform her part in the service. The conductor stopped, but as Miss +Jennings mounted the platform, he told her that she must wait for the +next car, which was reserved for her people. "I have no people," Miss +Jennings said. "I wish to go to church as I have for six months past, +and I do not wish to be detained." The altercation continued until the +car behind came up, and the driver there declaring that he had less room +than the car in front, the woman was grudgingly allowed to enter the +car. "Remember," the conductor said, "if any passenger objects, you +shall go out, whether or no, or I'll put you out." + +"I am a respectable person, born and brought up in New York," said Miss +Jennings, "and I was never insulted so before." + +This again aroused the conductor. "I was born in Ireland," he said, "and +you've got to get out of this car." + +He attempted to drag her out. The woman clung to the window, the +conductor called in the driver to help him, and together they dragged +and pulled and at last threw her into the street. Badly hurt, she +nevertheless jumped back into the car. The driver galloped his horses +down the street, passing every one until a policeman was found who +pushed the woman out, not, however, until she had taken the number of +the car. She then made her way home. + +Elizabeth Jennings took the case into court, and it came before the +Supreme Court of the State in February, 1855, Chester A. Arthur, +afterwards President of the United States, being one of the lawyers for +the plaintiff. The judge's charge was clear on the point that common +carriers were bound to carry all respectable people, white or colored, +and the plaintiff was given $225 damages, to which the court added ten +per cent and costs; and to quote the New York _Tribune's_ comment on the +case,[11] "Railroads, steamboats, omnibuses, and ferryboats will be +admonished from this as to the rights of respectable colored +people."[12] + +When you talk with the elderly educated colored people of New York +today, they tell you that before the War were "dark days." The +responsibility felt by the thoughtful Negroes was very great. They had +not only their own battles to wage, but there were the fugitives who +were entering the city by the Underground Railroad, whom they must +assist though it cost them their own liberty. In 1835 a Vigilance +Committee was formed in New York City to take charge of all escaping +slaves, and also to prevent the arrest and return to slavery of free men +of color. Colored men served on this Committee, and its secretary was +the minister of the church to which Elizabeth Jennings was endeavoring +to make her way that Sunday morning, the Reverend Charles B. Ray. In +1850 the New York State Vigilance Committee was formed with Gerritt +Smith as President and Ray as Secretary. Ray's home was frequently used +to shelter fugitives.[13] Once a young man, stepping up to the door and +learning that it was Charles Ray's house, whistled to his companions in +the darkness, and fourteen black men made their appearance and received +shelter. There would also come the task of negotiating for the purchase +of a slave, or this proving impossible, for the careful working out of +a means for his escape. Dark days, indeed, but made memorable to the +Negro by heroic work and the friendship of great men. Perhaps the two +races have never worked together in such fine companionship as at the +unlawful and thrilling task of protecting and aiding the fugitive. + +The hardest year of the century for the Negro was 1863, when the draft +riot imperilled every dark face. Many Negroes fled from the city. +Colored homes were fired, the Orphan Asylum for colored children on +Fifth Avenue was burned, and even the dead might not be buried save at +the peril of undertaker and priest. Elizabeth Jennings, now Mrs. Graham, +lost a child when the rioting was at its height. An undertaker named +Winterbottom, a white man, was brave enough to give his services, +winning the lasting gratitude and patronage of the colored people. With +the danger of violence about them, the father and mother went to +Greenwood Cemetery, where the Reverend Morgan Dix of Trinity Church read +the burial service at the grave. + +With the end of the War and the passage of the fourteenth and fifteenth +amendments came a revulsion of feeling for the race. "I remember," an +old time friend of the Negro tells me, "when the fifteenth amendment was +passed. The colored people stood in great numbers on the streets, and on +their faces was a look of gratitude and thanksgiving that I shall never +forget." Following the amendment came the State Civil Rights Bill in +1873, declaring that all persons should be entitled to full and equal +accommodations in all public places; and discrimination for a time +largely ceased. + +While the colored people were winning citizenship, their progress in +industry was also considerable. Until 1860 the race was infrequently +segregated, and black and white were neighbors, not only in their homes, +but in business. Samuel R. Scottron, a careful Negro writer, compiled a +long list of the trades in which Negroes engaged before the War. Besides +the various lines of domestic service, in which they were more +frequently seen than today--coachmen, cooks, waitresses, seamstresses, +barbers--there were many craftsmen, ship-builders, trimmers, riggers, +coopers, caulkers, printers, tailors, carpenters. "Second-hand clothing +shops were everywhere kept by colored men. All the caterers and +restaurant keepers of the high order, as well as small places, were kept +by colored men.... Varick and Peters kept about the most pretentious +barber shop in the city. Patrick Reason was one of the most capable +engravers. The greatest among the restaurateurs was Thomas Downing, who +kept a restaurant under what is now the Drexel Building, corner of Wall +and Broad Streets. The drug stores of Dr. James McCune Smith on West +Broadway, and Dr. Philip A. White on Frankfort Street, were not +outclassed by any kept by white men in their day."[14] + +And so the list goes on. It is perhaps somewhat exaggerated in the +importance in the city's business life which it gives to the colored +race. Charles Andrews, in 1837, says of the pupil who graduates from his +school, "He leaves with every avenue closed against him--doomed to +encounter as much prejudice and contempt as if he were not only +destitute of that education which distinguishes the civilized from the +savage, but as if he were incapable of receiving it." And he goes on to +tell of those few who have been able to learn trades, and their +subsequent difficulties in finding employment in good shops. White +journeymen object to working in the same shop with them, and many of the +best lads go to sea or become waiters, barbers, coachmen, servants, +laborers. But he is writing of an early date, and the opinion of the +colored people seems to be that, before our large foreign immigration, +the Negro was more needed in New York than today and received a large +share of satisfactory employment. His chief competitor was the Irish +immigrant, like himself an agricultural laborer, without previous +training in business, and he was frequently able to hold his own in his +shop. His long experience in domestic service, moreover, made him a +better caterer than the representatives of any other nationality that +had yet entered the city. His churches were flourishing, thus securing a +profession for which he had natural ability, and as we have seen, +colored men and women taught in the New York schools. + +The city grew rapidly after 1875, and the colored society, the little +group that had attained to modest means and education, bought homes, +chiefly in Brooklyn, where land was easier to secure than in Manhattan, +and strove to enlarge the opportunities for those who were to come after +them. Color prejudice had waned, and they often met with especial +consideration because of their race. Had they been white they would have +slipped into the population and been lost, as happened to the Germans +and the Irish, who had been their competitors. As it was, they formed a +society apart from the rest of the city, meeting it occasionally in work +or through the friendship of children, who, left to themselves, know no +race. They had battled against prejudice and had won their rights as +citizens. + +As we look at the life of a segregated people, however, we see that we +tend always to regard not the individual but the group. The Negro is a +man in Europe, because there he is an individual, standing or falling +by his own merits. But in America, even in so cosmopolitan a city as New +York, he is judged, not by his own achievements, but by the achievements +of every other New York black man. So we will leave these able colored +Americans, who won much both for themselves and for their race, and turn +to the mass of the Negroes, the toiling poor, who dwell in our tenements +today. + + +FOOTNOTES: + +[1] Daniel Horsmanden, "New York Conspiracy, or a History of the Negro +Plot." + +[2] James Grant Wilson, "History of New York," Vol. II, p. 314. + +[3] + POPULATION OF NEW YORK FROM 1800 TO 1900: TOTAL AND NEGRO. + + BOROUGH OF MANHATTAN + Percentage + Total Negro of Negroes + + 1800 60,515 6,382 10.5 + + 1810 96,373 9,823 10.2 + + 1820 123,706 10,886 8.8 + + 1830 202,589 13,976 6.9 + + 1840 312,710 16,358 5.2 + + 1850 515,547 13,815 2.7 + + 1860 805,658 12,574 1.6 + + 1870 942,292 13,072 1.5 + + BOROUGHS OF MANHATTAN AND BRONX + + 1880 1,206,299 19,663 1.6 + + 1890 1,515,301 23,601 1.6 + + 1900 2,050,600 38,616 1.9 + + GREATER NEW YORK + + 1900 3,437,202 60,666 1.8 + +[4] For a full account of the Negro's political status in New York +consult Charles Z. Lincoln's "Constitutional History of New York." + +[5] Thomas Boese's "Public Education in the City of New York," p. 227. + +[6] King _v._ Gallagher, 1882. + +[7] A. Emerson Palmer, "The New York Public School." + +[8] Laws of New York, Chapter 492. + +[9] B. F. Wheeler, D.D., "The Varick Family." + +[10] Geo. H. Hansell, "Reminiscences of New York Baptists." + +[11] _New York Tribune_, February 23, 1855. + +[12] "The Story of an Old Wrong," in _The American Woman's Journal_, +July, 1895. + +[13] Life of the Reverend Charles B. Ray. + +[14] _Colored American Magazine_, October, 1907. + + + + +CHAPTER II + +WHERE THE NEGRO LIVES + + +It is thirty-five years since, in his Symphony, Sidney Lanier told of + + "The poor + That stand by the inward opening door + Trade's hand doth tighten evermore, + And sigh their monstrous foul air sigh + For the outside hills of liberty." + +Were Lanier writing this today, we should wonder whether New York's +crowded tenements had not served as inspiration for his figure. The +island of Manhattan, about eight miles long by two miles wide, with an +additional slender triangle of five miles at the north end, in 1905, +housed two million one hundred and twelve thousand people. These men and +women and children were not scattered uniformly throughout the island, +but were placed in selected corners, one thousand to the acre, while a +mile or so away large comfortable homes held families of two or three. +This was Manhattan's condition in 1905, and with each succeeding year +more congestion takes place, and more pressure is felt upon the inward +opening door.[1] + +The Negro with the rest of the poor of New York has his part in this +excessive overcrowding. The slaver in which he made his entrance to this +land provided in floor space six feet by one-foot-four for a man, five +feet by one-foot-four for a woman, and four feet by one-foot-four for a +child.[2] This outdoes any overcrowding New York can produce, but an +ever increasing cost in food and rent is bringing into her interior +bedrooms a mass of humanity approximating that of the slaver's ship. +These new-comers, however, are not unwilling occupants, since unlike the +slaves they may spend their day and much of their night amid an ocean of +changing and exciting incidents. If you are young and strong, you care +less where you sleep than where you may spend your waking hours. + +From among the millions of New York's poor, can we pick out the Negroes +in their tenements? This is not so difficult a task as it would have +proved fifty years ago when the colored were scattered throughout the +city; today we find them confined to fairly definite quarters. A black +face on the lower East Side is viewed with astonishment, while on the +middle West Side it is no more noticeable than it would be in Atlanta or +New Orleans. Roughly we may count five Negro neighborhoods in Manhattan: +Greenwich Village, the middle West Side, San Juan Hill, the upper East, +and the upper West sides. Brooklyn has a large Negro population, but it +is more widely distributed and less easily located than that of +Manhattan. + +Of the five Manhattan neighborhoods the oldest is Greenwich Village, +according to Janvier once the most attractive part of New York, where +the streets "have a tendency to sidle away from each other and to take +sudden and unreasonable turns." Here one finds such fascinating names as +Minetta Lane and Carmine and Cornelia Streets. These and neighboring +thoroughfares grow daily more grimy, however, and no longer merit +Janvier's praise for cleanliness, moral and physical. The picturesque, +friendly old houses are giving way to factories with high, monotonous +fronts, where foreigners work who crowd the ward and destroy its former +American aspect. + +Among the old time aristocracy bearing Knickerbocker names there are a +few colored people who delight in talking of the fine families and past +wealth of old Greenwich Village. Scornful of the gibberish-speaking +Italians, they sigh, too, at their own race as they see it, for the +ambitious Negro has moved uptown, leaving this section largely to +widowed and deserted women and degenerates. The once handsome houses, +altered to accommodate many families, are rotten and unwholesome, while +the newer tenements of West Third Street are darkened by the elevated +road, and shelter vice that knows no race. Altogether, this is not a +neighborhood to attract the new-comer. Here alone in New York I have +found the majority of the adults northern born, men and women who, +unsuccessful in their struggle with city life, have been left behind in +these old forgotten streets.[3] + +The second section, north of the first, lies between West Fourteenth and +West Fifty-ninth Streets, and Sixth Avenue and the Hudson River. In 1880 +this was the centre of the Negro population, but business has entered +some of the streets, the Pennsylvania Railroad has scooped out acres for +its terminal, and while the colored houses do not diminish in number, +they show no decided increase. No one street is given over to the Negro, +but a row of two or three or six or even eight tenements shelter the +black man. The shelter afforded is poorer than that given the white +resident whose dwelling touches the black, the rents are a little +higher, and the landlord fails to pay attention to ragged paper, or to a +ceiling which scatters plaster flakes upon the floor. In the Thirties +there are rear tenements reached by narrow alley-ways. Crimes are +committed by black neighbor against black neighbor, and the entrance to +the rear yard offers a tempting place for a girl to linger at night. A +rear tenement is New York's only approach to the alley of cities farther +south. + +There are startling and happy surprises in all tenement neighborhoods, +and I recall turning one afternoon from a dark yard into a large +beautiful room. Muslin curtains concealed the windows, the brass bed was +covered with a thick white counterpane, and on either side of the +fireplace, where coal burned brightly in an open grate, were two rare +engravings. It was a workroom, and the mistress of the house, steady, +capable, and very black, was at her ironing-board. By her sat the +colored mammy of the story book rocking lazily in her chair. She +explained to me that her daughter had found her down south, two years +ago, and brought her to this northern home, where she had nothing to do, +for her daughter could make fifty dollars a month. This home picture was +made lastingly memorable by the younger woman's telling me softly as she +went with me to the door, "I was sold from my mother, down in Georgia, +when I was two years old. I ain't sure she's my mother. _She_ thinks so; +but I can't ever be sure." + +Homes beautiful both in appearance and in spirit can rarely occur where +people must dwell in great poverty, but there are many efforts at +attractive family life on these streets. A few of the blocks are orderly +and quiet. Thirty-seventh Street, between Eighth and Ninth Avenues, is +largely given over to the colored and is rough and noisy. Here and down +by the river at Hell's Kitchen the rioting in 1900 between the Irish and +the Negro took place. Men are ready for a fight today, and the children +see much of hard drinking and quick blows. + +"The poorer the family, the lower is the quarter in which it must live, +and the more enviable appears the fortune of the anti-social class."[4] +A vicious world dwells in these streets and makes notorious this section +of New York. For this is a part of the Tenderloin district, and at +night, after the children's cries have ceased, and the fathers and +mothers who have worked hard during the day have put out their lights, +the automobiles rush swiftly past, bearing the men of the "superior +race." Temptation is continuous, and the child that grows up pure in +thought and deed does so in spite of his surroundings. + +Before reaching West Fifty-ninth Street, the beginning of our third +district, we come upon a Negro block at West Fifty-third Street. When +years ago the elevated railroad was erected on this fashionable street, +white people began to sell out and rent to Negroes; and today you find +here three colored hotels, the colored Young Men's and Young Women's +Christian Associations, the offices of many colored doctors and lawyers, +and three large beautiful colored churches. The din of the elevated +drowns alike the doctor's voice and his patient's, the client's and the +preacher's. + +From Fifty-ninth Street, walking north on Tenth Avenue, we begin to +ascend a hill that grows in steepness until we reach Sixty-second +Street. The avenue is lined with small stores kept by Italians and +Germans, but to the left the streets, sloping rapidly to the Hudson +River, are filled with tenements, huge double deckers, built to within +ten feet of the rear of the twenty-five foot lot, accommodating four +families on each of the five floors. We can count four hundred and +seventy-nine homes on one side of the street alone! + +This is our third district, San Juan Hill, so called by an on-looker who +saw the policemen charging up during one of the once common race fights. +It is a bit of Africa, as Negroid in aspect as any district you are +likely to visit in the South. A large majority of its residents are +Southerners and West Indians, and it presents an interesting study of +the Negro poor in a large northern city. The block on Sixtieth Street +has some white residents, but the blocks on Sixty-first, Sixty-second, +and Sixty-third are given over entirely to colored. On the square made +by the north side of Sixty-first, the south side of Sixty-second +Streets, and Tenth and West End Avenues, 5.4 acres, the state census of +1905 showed 6173 inhabitants.[5] All but a few of these must have been +Negroes, as the avenue sides of the block, occupied by whites, are short +and with low houses. It is the long line of five-story tenements, +running eight hundred feet down the two streets, that brings up the +enumeration. The dwellings on Sixty-first and Sixty-second Streets are +human hives, honeycombed with little rooms thick with human beings. +Bedrooms open into air shafts that admit no fresh breezes, only foul +air carrying too often the germs of disease. + +The people on the hill are known for their rough behavior, their +readiness to fight, their coarse talk. Vice is abroad, not in insidious +form as in the more well-to-do neighborhood farther north, but open and +cheap. Boys play at craps unmolested, gambling is prevalent, and Negro +loafers hang about the street corners and largely support the Tenth +Avenue saloons. + +But San Juan Hill has many respectable families, and within the past +five years it has taken a decided turn for the better. The improvement +has been chiefly upon Sixty-third Street where two model tenements, one +holding one hundred, the other one hundred and sixty-one families, have +been opened under the management of the City and Suburban Homes Company, +the larger one having been erected by Mr. Henry Phipps. Planning for a +four per cent return on their investment, these landlords have rented +only to respectable families, and their rule has changed the character +of the block.[6] Old houses have been remodelled to compete with the +newer dwellings, street rows have ceased, and the police captain of the +district, we are told, now counts this as one of the peaceful and +law-abiding blocks of the city. When its other blocks show a like +improvement, San Juan Hill will no longer merit its belligerent name. + +The lower East Side of Manhattan, a many-storied mass of tenements and +workshops, where immigrants labor and sleep in their tiny crowded rooms, +was once a fashionable American district. At that time Negroes dwelt +near the whites as barbers, caterers, and coachmen, as laundresses and +waiting-maids. But with the removal of the people whom they served, the +colored men and women left also, and it is difficult to find an African +face among the hundreds of thousands of Europeans south of Fourteenth +Street. On Pell Street, in the Chinese quarter, there used to be two +colored families on friendly terms with their neighbors, who, however, +went uptown for their pleasures and their church. + +It is not until we reach Third Avenue and Forty-third Street that we +come to the East Side Negro tenement. From this point, such houses run, +a straggling line, chiefly between Second and Third Avenues, to +the Bronx where the more well-to-do among the colored live. At +Ninety-seventh Street, and on up to One Hundredth Street, dark faces are +numerous. About six hundred and fifty Negro families live on these four +streets and around the corner on Third Avenue. Occasionally they live in +houses occupied by Jews or Italians. Above this section there are a +number of Negro tenements in the One Hundred and Thirties, between +Madison and Fifth Avenues--almost a West Side neighborhood, since it +adjoins the large colored quarter to the west of Fifth Avenue. On the +whole, the East Side is not often sought by the colored as a place of +residence. Their important churches are in another part of the city, and +every New Yorker knows the difficulty in making a way across Central +Park. Yet, the neighborhood is not uncivil to them, and one rarely reads +here of race friction. Doubtless this is in part owing to the smallness +of the population, all of Manhattan east of Fifth Avenue containing but +fourteen per cent of the apartments occupied by colored in the city; but +it is partly, too, that Jews and Italians prove less belligerent +tenement neighbors than Irish. + +Five years ago, those of us who were interested in the Negro poor +continually heard of their difficulty in securing a place to live. Not +only were they unable to rent in neighborhoods suitable for respectable +men and women, but dispossession, caused perhaps by the inroad of +business, meant a despairing hunt for any home at all. People clung to +miserable dwellings, where no improvements had been made for years, +thankful to have a roof to shelter them. Yet all the time new-law +tenements were being built, and Gentile and Jew were leaving their +former apartments in haste to get into these more attractive dwellings. +At length the Negro got his chance; not a very good one, but something +better than New York had yet offered him--a chance to follow into the +houses left vacant by the white tenants. Owing in part to the energy of +Negro real estate agents, in part to rapid building operations, +desirable streets, near the subway and the elevated railroad, were +thrown open to the colored. This Negro quarter, the last we have to note +and the newest, has been created in the past eight years. When the +Tenement House Department tabulated the 1900 census figures for the +Borough of Manhattan, and showed the nationalities and races on each +block, it found only 300 colored families in a neighborhood that today +accommodates 4473 colored families.[7] This large increase is on six +streets, West Ninety-ninth, between Eighth and Ninth Avenues, West One +Hundred and Nineteenth, between Seventh and Eighth Avenues, and West One +Hundred and Thirty-third to One Hundred and Thirty-sixth Streets, +between Fifth and Seventh Avenues, with a few houses between Seventh and +Eighth, and on Lenox Avenues. There are colored tenements north and +south of this; and while these figures are correct today,[8] they may +be wrong tomorrow, for new tenements are continually given over to the +Negro people. Moreover, on all of these streets are colored boarding and +lodging houses, crowded with humanity. Houses today fall into the hands +of the Negro as a child's blocks, placed on end, tumble when a push is +given to the first in the line. The New York _Times_, in August, 1905, +gives a graphic account of the entrance of the colored tenant on West +Ninety-ninth Street. Two houses had been opened for a short time to +Negroes when the other house-owners capitulated, and the colored influx +came: "The street was so choked with vehicles Saturday that some of the +drivers had to wait with their teams around the corners for an +opportunity to get into it. A constant stream of furniture trucks loaded +with the household effects of a new colony of colored people who are +invading the choice locality is pouring into the street. Another equally +long procession, moving in the other direction, is carrying away the +household goods of the whites from their homes of years." The movement +is not always so swift as this, but it is continuous. + +This last colored neighborhood perhaps ought not to be spoken of as +belonging to the poor; not to Lanier's poor whose door pressed so +tighteningly inward. Here are homes where it is possible, with +sufficient money, to live in privacy, and with the comforts of steam +heat and a private bath. But rents are high, and if money is scarce, the +apartment must be crowded and privacy lost. Moreover, vice has made its +way into these newly acquired streets. The sporting class will always +pay more and demand fewer improvements than the workers, and, unable to +protect himself, the respectable tenant finds his children forced to +live in close propinquity to viciousness. Each of these new streets has +this objectionable element in its population, for while some agents +make earnest efforts to keep the property they handle respectable, they +find the owner wants money more than respectability. + +In our walk up and down Manhattan, turning aside and searching for +Negro-tenanted streets, we ought to see one thing with clearness--that +the majority of the colored population live on a comparatively few +blocks. This is a new and important feature of their New York life, and +in certain parts of the city it develops a color problem, for while you +seem an inappreciable quantity when you constitute two per cent of the +population in the borough, you are of importance when you form one +hundred per cent of the population of your street. This congestion is +accompanied by a segregation of the race. The dwellers in these +tenements are largely new-comers, men and women from the South and the +West Indies,[9] seeking the North for greater freedom and for economic +opportunity. Like any other strangers they are glad to make their home +among familiar faces, and they settle in the already crowded places on +the West Side. Freedom to live on the East Side next door to a Bohemian +family may be very well, but sociability is better. The housewife who +timidly hangs her clothes on the roof her first Monday morning in New +York is pleased to find the next line swinging with the laundry of a +Richmond acquaintance, who instructs her in the perplexing housekeeping +devices of her flat. No chattering foreigner could do that. And while to +be welcome in a white church is inspiring, to find the girl you knew at +home, in the next pew to you, is still more delightful when you have +arrived, tired and homesick, at the great city of New York. So the +colored working people, like the Italians and Jews and other +nationalities, have their quarter in which they live very much by +themselves, paying little attention to their white neighbors. If the +white people of the city have forced this upon them, they have easily +accepted it. Should this two per cent of the population be compelled to +distribute itself mathematically over the city, each ward and street +having its correct quota, it would evince dissatisfaction. This is not +true of the well-to-do element, but of the mass of the Negro workers +whose homes we have been visiting. Loving sociability, these new-comers +to the city--and it is in the most segregated districts that the greater +number of southern and British born Negroes are found--keep to their own +streets and live to themselves. If they occupy all the sidewalk as they +talk over important matters in front of their church, the outsider +passing should recognize that he is an intruder and take to the curb. He +would leave the sidewalk entirely were he on Hester Street or Mulberry +Bend. New-comers to New York usually segregate, and the Negro is no +exception. + +While congestion and segregation seem important to us as we look at +these colored quarters, I suspect that the matter most pertinent to the +Negro new-comer is, not where he will live nor how he will live, but +whether he will be able to live in New York at all, whether he can meet +the landlord's agent the day he comes to the door. For New York rents +have mounted upwards as have her tenements. The Phipps model houses, +built especially to benefit the poor, charge twenty-five dollars a month +for four tiny rooms and bath; and while this is a little more than the +dark old time rooms would bring, it takes about all of the twenty-five +dollars you make running an elevator, to get a flat in New York. What +wonder that, once secured, it is overrun with lodgers, or that, if +privacy is maintained, there is not enough money left to feed and clothe +the growing household. The once familiar song of the colored comedian +still rings true in New York: + + "Rufus Rastus Johnson Brown, + What you gwine ter do when de rent comes roun'?" + + +FOOTNOTES: + +[1] Harold M. Finley in _Federation_, May, 1908. + +[2] Thomas Clarkson, "History of the Abolition of the Slave Trade," p. +378. + +[3] Place of birth of 1036 New York Negro tenement dwellers. These +figures were obtained chiefly from personal visits: + + ======================================================================== + | Totals | East | Greenwich | Middle | San | Upper + | | Side | Village | West | Juan | West + | | | | Side | Hill | Side + ---------------------+--------+------+-----------+--------+------+------ + New England | 18 | 1 | 4 | 7 | 5 | 1 + West | 11 | 1 | 0 | 5 | 4 | 1 + New York | 157 | 6 | 47 | 42 | 55 | 7 + New Jersey | 18 | 1 | 4 | 3 | 9 | 1 + Pennsylvania | 19 | 0 | 3 | 3 | 12 | 1 + Maryland | 37 | 1 | 0 | 6 | 27 | 3 + District of Columbia | 26 | 0 | 1 | 5 | 16 | 4 + Virginia | 375 | 8 | 15 | 71 | 244 | 37 + Carolinas | 217 | 6 | 16 | 64 | 127 | 4 + Gulf States | 65 | 0 | 2 | 23 | 39 | 1 + Canada | 2 | 0 | 1 | 1 | 0 | 0 + West Indies | 87 | 1 | 6 | 13 | 67 | 0 + Europe | 4 | 0 | 1 | 0 | 3 | 0 + ---------------------+--------+------+-----------+--------+------+------ + | 1036 | 25 | 100 | 243 | 608 | 60 + ======================================================================== + +[4] S. N. Patten, "New Basis of Civilization," p. 52. + +[5] Some doubt is cast upon this figure. The New York Health Department +in an enumeration of its own, in 1905, found a population of 3833. There +is no question, however, of the great congestion of this block and the +one north and south of it. The erection of new tenements has gone on +rapidly since 1905, sweeping away the children's playgrounds, and making +this one of the most crowded centres of New York. + +[6] Too much cannot be said of the beneficial effect of good housing in +a colored neighborhood, when under such able management as the City and +Suburban Homes Company. Decent homes under competent management are +absolutely necessary to an improvement in the Negro quarters of +Manhattan and of Brooklyn as well. I can speak with some authority of +the good done by the Phipps houses on West Sixty-third Street, as I +lived, for eight months, the only white tenant in the one hundred and +sixty-one apartments. Church and philanthropy had done and are doing +excellent work on these blocks, but a sudden and marked improvement came +from good housing, from the building of clean, healthful homes for +law-abiding people. + +[7] The Tenement House Department tabulated the number of Negro +families living in tenements on these streets. I have counted the number +of flats rented to colored people. + +[8] July 15, 1910. + +[9] The yearly arrivals of "African blacks" at the port of New York, +secured from the Immigration Commissioner, are as follows: 1902-03, 110; +1903-04, 547; 1904-05, 1189; 1905-06, 1757; 1906-07, 2054; 1907-08, +1820; 1908-09, 2119. The year runs from July 1 to June 30. + + + + +CHAPTER III + +THE CHILD OF THE TENEMENT + + +Within the last few years white Americans, many of whom were formerly +ignorant of their condition, have been taught that they are possessed of +a racial antipathy for human beings whose color is not their own. They +have a "natural contrariety," "a dislike that seems constitutional" +toward the dark tint that they see on another's face. But however well +they may have conned their lesson, it breaks down or is likely to be +forgotten in the presence of a Negro baby; for a healthy colored baby +is a subject, not for natural contrariety, but for sympathetic +cuddling. They are most engaging new-comers, these "delicate bronze +statuettes,"[1] only warm with life, and smiling good will upon their +world. + +Not many colored babies are born in New York, at least not enough to +keep pace with the deaths. The year 1908 saw in all the boroughs 1973 +births as against 2212 deaths at all ages.[2] + +In this same year the colored births for Manhattan and the Bronx were +1459, and the deaths under one year of age 424, an infant mortality rate +of 290 to every thousand.[3] That is, two babies in every seven died +under one year of age. The white infant mortality rate was 127.7, a +little less than half that of the colored. + +Why should we have in New York this enormous colored infant death rate? +Many physicians believe it indicates a lack of physical stamina in the +Negro, an inability to resist disease. This may be so, but before +falling back upon race as an explanation of high infant mortality, we +need to exhaust other possible causes. We do not question the vitality +of the white race when we read that in parts of Russia 500 babies out +of every thousand die within the year; nor do we believe the people of +Fall River, a factory town in Massachusetts, have an inherent inability +to resist disease, though their infant mortality rate in 1900 was 260 in +one thousand births. We look in these latter cases, as we should in the +former, to see if we find those conditions which careful students of the +subject tell us accompany a high infant death rate. + +Among the first of the accepted causes of infant mortality is the +overcrowding of cities. We have viewed overcrowding as a usual condition +among the Negroes of New York, and have seen the small, ill-ventilated +bedroom where the baby spends much of its life. Heat, with its +accompanying growth of bacteria and swift process of decomposition, is a +second cause. New York's high infant mortality comes in the summer +months when in the poorest quarters it has been known to reach four +hundred in the thousand.[4] In the hot, crowded tenements, and no +place can be so hot as New York in one of its July record-breaking +weeks, the babies die like flies, and yet not like flies, for the flies +buzz in hundreds about the little hot faces. Excitement, late hours, +constant restlessness, these, too, cause infant mortality. On a city +block tenanted by hundreds of men and women and little children, no hour +of the night is free from some disturbance. Children whimper as they +wake from the heat, babies cry shrilly, and the brightly-lighted streets +are rarely without the sound of human footsteps. The sensitive new-born +organism knows nothing of the quiet and restful darkness of nature's +night. + +But the most important cause of infant mortality[5] is improper infant +feeding. And here we meet with a condition that confronts the Negro +babies of New York far more than it confronts the white. For a properly +fed baby is a breast fed baby, or else one whose food has been prepared +with great care, and mothers forced by necessity to go out to work, +cannot themselves give their babies this proper food. It is among the +infants of mothers at work that mortality is high. Mr. G. Newman, an +English authority on this subject, gives an interesting example of this +in Lancashire, where, during the American civil war, many of the cotton +operatives were out of employment and many more worked only half time. +Privation was great. A quarter of the mill hands were in receipt of poor +relief, the general death rate increased, but _the infant mortality rate +decreased_. The mothers, forced by circumstances to remain away from the +factory, though in a state of semi-starvation, by their nursing and by +their care of the home preserved the lives of their infants. Negro +mothers, owing to the low wage earned by their husbands, for the general +welfare of the family and to avoid semi-starvation, like the Lancashire +women, leave their homes, but they thereby sacrifice the lives of many +of their babies. The percentage for 1900 of Negro married women in New +York engaging in self-supporting work was 31.4 in every hundred; of +white married women 4.2 in every hundred, seven times as many in +proportion among the Negroes as among the whites.[6] The Negro also +shows a large percentage of widows, a quarter of all the female +population over ten years of age. Some of these, we have no means of +knowing how many, are widows only in name, and have babies for whom they +must in some way provide support. The colored mother who has no husband +often takes a position in domestic service and boards her baby, paying +usually by the month, and finding the opportunity to visit her infant +perhaps once a week. Sometimes she secures a "baby tender" who can give +kindly, intelligent care; but under the best conditions her child will +be bottle fed and in tenement surroundings inimical to health, while +sometimes the woman to whom she intrusts her infant will be ignorant of +the simplest matters of hygiene. + +I remember an old colored woman, she must be dead by this time, who kept +a baby farm. Her health was poor, and when I saw her, she had taken to +her bed and lay in a dark room with two infants at her side. They were +indescribably puny, with sunken cheeks and skinny arms and hands, +weighing what a normal child should weigh at birth, and yet six and +seven months old. The woman talked to me enthusiastically of salvation +and gave filthy bottles to her charges. She was exceptionally +incompetent, but there are others doing her work, too old or too +ignorant properly to attend to the babies under their care. + +Mothers who go out to day's-work are also unable to nurse their babies +or to prepare all their food. The infant is placed in the care of some +neighbor or of a growing daughter, who may be the impatient "little +mother" of a number of charges. When the hot summer comes, such a baby +is likely to fall the victim of epidemic diarrhoea, caused by pollution +of the milk. Newman has a striking chart of infant death rates in Paris +in which he pictures a rate mounting in one week as high as 256 in the +thousand among the artificially fed infants, while for the same week, +among the breast fed babies, the mortality is 32. The Negro mother, +seeking self-support by keeping clean another's house or caring for +another's children, finds her own offspring swiftly taken from her by a +disease that only her nourishing care could forestall.[7] + +Remedial measures have for some time been taken in New York to check +infant mortality, and they have met with some success. The distribution +of pasteurized milk by Mr. Nathan Straus, the establishment of milk +stations during the summer months in New York and Brooklyn where mothers +at slight cost may secure proper infant food, and where much educative +work is done by the visiting nurse, the multiplication of day nurseries, +all these have helped to decrease the death rate. The Negroes have been +benefited by these remedial agencies, but their percentage of 290 is +still a matter for grave attention. + +Two out of seven of New York's Negro babies die in the first year, but +the other five grow up, some with puny arms and ricketty legs, others +again too hardy for bad food or bad air to harm. + +Like the babies these children suffer from their mother's absence at +work. Family ties are loose, and more than other children they are +handicapped by lack of proper home care. In an examination of the +records of the Children's Court for three years I found that out of 717 +arraignments of colored children, 221 were for improper guardianship, +30.8 per cent of the whole. Among the Russian children of the East Side, +Tenth and Eleventh Wards, only 15 per cent of arraignments were on this +complaint, indicating twice as many children without parental care among +the colored as among the children of the Tenth and Eleventh Wards. Rough +colored girls, also, whose habits were too depraved to permit of their +remaining without restraint, were frequently committed to reformatories. + +Truancy is not uncommon in colored neighborhoods, though few cases come +before the courts. Sometimes the boy or girl is kept at home to care for +the younger children, but again, lacking the mother's oversight, he +remains on the street when he should be in school, or arrives late with +ill prepared lessons. + +Asking a teacher of long experience among colored and white children +concerning their respective scholarship, he assured me that the colored +child could do as well as the white, but didn't. "From 20 to 50 per cent +of the mothers of my colored children," he said, "go out to work. There +is no one to oversee the child's tasks, and consequently little +conscientious study." + +One can scarcely blame the children; and certainly one cannot blame the +mothers for toiling for their support. And the fathers, though they work +faithfully, are rarely able to earn enough unaided to support their +families. Perhaps in time the city may improve matters by opening its +school-rooms for a study period in the afternoon. + +But meanwhile the children are without proper care. This is not hard to +endure in the summer, but in winter it is very trying to be without a +home. Poor little cold boys and girls, some of them mere babies! You see +them in the late afternoon sitting on the tenement stairs, waiting for +the long day to be done. It seems a week since they were inside eating +their breakfast. The city has not pauperized them with a luncheon, and +they have had only cold food since morning. Sometimes they have been all +day without nourishment. When the door is opened at last, there are many +helpful things for them to do for their mother, and reading and +arithmetic are relegated to so late an hour that their problem is only +temporarily solved by sleep. + +Not all the colored working women, however, go out for employment. +Laundry work is an important home industry, and one may watch many +mothers at their tubs or ironing-boards from Monday morning until +Saturday night. This makes the tenement rooms, tiny enough at best, +sadly cluttered, but it does not deprive the children of the presence of +their mother, who accepts a smaller income to remain at home with them. +For after we have made full allowance for the lessening of family ties +among the Negroes by social and economic pressure, we find that the +majority of the colored boys and girls receive a due share of proper +parental oversight. They are fed on appetizing food, cleanly and +prettily dressed, they are encouraged to study and to improve their +position, and they are given all the advantages that it is possible for +their mothers and fathers to secure. + +Jack London tells in the "Children of the Abyss" of the East Side of +London, where "they have dens and lairs into which to crawl for sleeping +purposes, and that is all. One can not travesty the word by calling such +dens and lairs 'homes.'" I have seen thousands of Negro dwelling-places, +but I cannot think of half a dozen, however great their poverty, where +this description would be correct. No matter how dingy the tenement, or +how long the hours of work, the mother, and the father, too, try to make +the "four walls and a ceiling" to which they return, home. Visitors +among the New York poor, in the past and in the present, testify that +given the same income or lack of income, the colored do not allow their +surroundings to become so cheerless or so filthy as the white, and that +when there is an opportunity for the mother to spend some time in the +house, the rooms take on an air of pleasant refinement. Pictures +decorate the walls, the sideboard contains many pretty dishes, and the +table is set three times a day. Meals are not eaten out of the paper bag +common on New York's East Side, but there is something of formality +about the dinner, and good table manners are taught the children. The +tenement dwelling becomes a home, and the boys and girls pass a happy +childhood in it. + +Watching the colored children for many months in their play and work, I +have looked for possible distinctive traits. The second generation of +New Yorkers greatly resembles the "Young America" of all nationalities +of the city, shrill-voiced, disrespectful, easily diverted, whether at +work or at play, shrewd, alert, and mischievous--the New York street +child. I remember once helping with a club of eight boys where +seven nationalities were represented, and where no one could have +distinguished Irish from German or Jew from Italian, with his eyes +shut. Had a Negro been brought up among them he would quickly have taken +on their ways. Of the colored children who model their lives after their +mischievous young white neighbors, many outdo the whites in depravity +and lawlessness; but among the boys and girls who live by themselves, as +on San Juan Hill, one sees occasional interesting traits. + +The records of the Children's Court of New York (Boroughs of Manhattan +and the Bronx) throw a little light on this matter, and are sufficiently +important to quote with some fulness. For the three years studied, 1904, +1905, 1906, I tabulated the cases of the colored children brought before +the court, and also the cases of the children of the Tenth and Eleventh +Wards, chiefly Hungarians and Russian Jews, expecting to find, in two +such dissimilar groups, interesting comparisons. The following table +shows the result of this study. The court in its annual report gives the +figures for the total number of arrests which I have incorporated in my +table: + + RECORD OF ARRESTS IN CHILDREN'S COURT OF MANHATTAN AND THE BRONX FOR + 1904, 1905, 1906 + + Key to Column Headers-- + A: No. of children. + B: Arrests per cent. + + =================================================================== + | | 10th | Total arrests + | | and | for all + | Negro | 11th | children + | Arrests | Wards | in Manhattan + | | Arrests | and Bronx + +-----+------+-----+------+-------+------ + | A | B | A | B | A | B + -------------------------+-----+------+-----+------+-------+------ + Petit larceny | 56 | 7.8 | 139 | 6.8 | 2,697 | 10.1 + Grand larceny | 27 | 3.8 | 108 | 5.3 | 878 | 3.3 + Burglary--Robbery | 27 | 3.8 | 116 | 5.7 | 1,383 | 5.2 + Assault | 27 | 3.8 | 61 | 3.0 | 669 | 2.5 + Improper guardianship | 221 | 30.8 | 305 | 15.0 | 6,386 | 23.9 + Disorderly | | | | | | + child--ungovernable | | | | | | + child | 90 | 12.6 | 124 | 6.1 | 1,980 | 7.4 + Depraved girl | 33 | 4.6 | 21 | 1.1 | 312 | 1.2 + Violation of labor law | 0 | 0 | 73 | 3.5 | 592 | 2.1 + Unlicensed peddling[8] | 0 | 0 | 130 | 6.4 | 0 | .0 + Truancy | 5 | .7 | 23 | 1.0 | 298 | 1.1 + Malicious mischief | 1 | .1 | 9 | .4 | 179 | .7 + Violation of Park | | | | | | + Corporation ordinances | 0 | 0 | 25 | 1.2 | 175 | .7 + Mischief, including | | | | | | + craps, throwing stones, | | | | | | + building bonfires, | | | | | | + fighting, etc. | 214 | 29.8 | 896 | 43.7 |10,267 | 38.4 + Unclassified felonies, | | | | | | + misdemeanors | 13 | 1.8 | 16 | .7 | 799 | 3.0 + All others | 3 | .4 | 3 | .1 | 90 | .4 + -------------------------+-----+------+-----+------+-------+------ + | 717 |100.0 |2049 |100.0 |26,705 |100.0 + =================================================================== + + Percentage of Negro to total, 1904-1907 2.7 + Percentage of Negro to total, 1907-1910 1.9 + +Our table shows us that which we have already noted, the high percentage +of improper guardianship among the Negroes and the grave number of +depraved Negro girls. For the sins of petit larceny, grand larceny, and +burglary, putting the three together, the colored child shows a slightly +smaller percentage than the East Side white, a noticeably smaller +percentage than the total number of children. The sin of theft is often +swiftly attributed to a black face, but this percentage indicates that +the colored child has no "innate tendency" to steal. Ten per cent of the +arrests among the East Side children are for unlicensed peddling and +violation of the labor law, but no little Negro boys plunge into the +business world before their time. They have no keen commercial sense to +lead them to undertake transactions on their own account, and they are +not desired by purchasers of boy labor in the city. + +The most important heading, numerically, is that of mischief, and here +the Negro falls far behind the Eastsider, behind the average for the +whole. While depravity among the girls and improper guardianship are the +race's most serious defects, as shown by the arrests among its children +in New York, tractability and a decent regard for law are among its +merits. The colored child, especially if he is in a segregated +neighborhood, is not greatly inclined to mischief. My own experience has +shown me that life in a tenement on San Juan Hill is devoid of the +ingenious, exasperating deviltry of an Irish or German-American +neighborhood. No daily summons calls one to the door only to hear wildly +scurrying footsteps on the stairs. Mail boxes are left solely for the +postman's use, and hallways are not defaced by obscene writing. There is +plenty of crap shooting, rarely interfered with by the police, but there +is little impertinent annoyance or destructiveness. + +An observer, watching the little colored boys and girls as they play on +the city streets, finds much that is attractive and pleasant. They sing +their songs, learned at school and on the playground, fly their kites, +spin their tops, run their races. They usually finish what they begin, +not turning at the first interruption to take up something else. They +move more deliberately than most children, and their voices are slower +to adopt the New York screech than those of their Irish neighbors on the +block above them. Altogether they are attractive children, particularly +the smaller ones, who are more energetic than their big brothers and +sisters. Good manners are often evident. While receiving an afternoon +call from two girls, aged four and five, I was invited by the older to +partake of half a peanut, the other half of which she split in two and +generously shared with her companion. "Gim'me five cents," I once heard +a Negro boy of twelve say to his mother who walked past him on the +street. She did not seem to hear, but the boy's companion, a youth of +the same age, reproved him severely for his rude speech. When walking +with an Irish friend, who had worked among the children of her own race, +I saw a colored boy run swiftly up the block to meet his mother. He +kissed her, took her bundle from her, and carrying it under his arm, +walked quietly by her side to their home. "There are many boys here," I +said, "who are just as courteous as that." "Is that so?" she retorted +quickly, "Then you needn't be explaining to me any further the reason +for the high death rate." + +The gentle, chivalrous affection of the child for its mother is daily to +be seen among these boys and girls. "Your African," said Mary Kingsley, +"is little better than a slave to his mother, whom he loves with a love +he gives to none other. This love of his mother is so dominant a factor +in his life that it must be taken into consideration in attempting to +understand the true Negro."[9] And if the child lavishes affection upon +its parent, the mother in turn gives untiringly to her child. She is the +"mammy" of whom we have so often heard, but with her loving care +bestowed, as it should be, upon her own offspring. She tries to keep her +child clean in body and spirit and to train it to be gentle and good; +and in return usually she receives a stanch devotion. I once found +fault with a colored girl of ten years for her rude behavior with her +girl companions, adding that perhaps she did not know any better, at +which she turned on me almost fiercely and said, "It's our fault; we +know better. Our mothers learn us. It's we that's bold." As one watches +the boys and girls walking quietly up the street of a Sunday afternoon +to their Sunday-school, neatly and cleanly dressed, one appreciates the +anxious, maternal care that strives as best it knows how, to rear honest +and God-fearing men and women. + +Paul Lawrence Dunbar has painted the Negro father, his "little brown +baby wif sparklin' eyes," nestling close in his arms. Working at unusual +hours, the colored man often has a part of the day to give to his +family, and one sees him wheeling the baby in its carriage, or playing +with the older boys and girls. + +Negroes seem naturally a gentle, loving people. As you live with them +and watch them in their homes, you find some coarseness, but little +real brutality. Rarely does a father or mother strike a child. +Travellers in Central and West Africa describe them as the most friendly +of savage folk, and where, as in our city, they live largely to +themselves, they keep something of these characteristics. But it is only +a step in New York from Africa into Italy or Ireland; and the step may +bring a sad jostling to native friendliness. To hold his own with his +white companions on the street or in school, the Negro must become +pugnacious, callous to insult, ready to hit back when affronted. Many +are like the little girl who told me that she did not care to play with +white children, "because," she explained, "my mother tells me to smack +any one who calls me nigger, and I ain't looking for trouble." The +colored children aren't looking for trouble. They have a tendency to run +away from it if they see it in the form of a gang of boys coming to them +around the corner. They believe if they had a fight, it wouldn't be a +fair one, and that if the policeman came, he would arrest them and not +their Irish enemies. So they grow up on streets through which few white +men pass, leading their own lives with their own people and thinking not +overmuch of the other race that surrounds them. But the day comes when +school is over, and the outside world, however indifferent they may be +to it, must be met. They must go out and grapple with it for the means +to hire a cooking stove and a dark bedroom of their own; they must think +of making money. So they stand at the corner of their street, looking +out, and then move slowly on to find what opportunity is theirs to come +to a full manhood. The way ahead does not seem very bright, and some +move so timidly that failure is sure to meet them at the first turning. +But some have the courage of the little colored girl, aged four, who led +a line of kindergarten children up their street and then on to the +unknown country that lay between them and Central Park. At the first +block a mob of Irish boys fell upon them, running between the lines, +throwing sticks, and calling "nigger" with screams and jeers. The leader +held her head high, paying no attention to her persecutors. She neither +quickened nor slowed her pace, and when the child at her side fell back, +she pulled her hand and said, "Don't notice them. Walk straight ahead." + + +FOOTNOTES: + +[1] Dudley Kidd's, "Savage Childhood," a delightful book. + +[2] Report of the Department of Health, City of New York, 1908, pp. +844, 849. The returns for births, the report states, are incomplete. + +[3] This per cent is obtained from two sources, the births from the +Department of Health report, and the deaths from the Mortality +Statistics of the United States Census, 1908. "Colored" includes +Chinese, a negligible quantity in the infant population. + +[4] Third Annual Report of the New York Milk Committee, 1909. + +[5] See G. Newman, "Infant Mortality," for a careful study of this +whole subject. + +[6] Census, 1900, combination of Population table and Women at Work. + +[7] It is interesting to see that the married women of Fall River, +where we found a very high infant death rate, show a percentage of +married women at work of twenty in a hundred. + +[8] My tabulations of the Negro and Tenth and Eleventh Ward Children +are from the Court's unpublished records to which I was allowed access. +The absence of any figures for Unlicensed Peddling in the Total +indicates that in its printed reports the Court has included Unlicensed +Peddling with Unclassified Misdemeanors. + +[9] Mary Kingsley, "West African Studies," p. 319. + + + + +CHAPTER IV + +EARNING A LIVING--MANUAL LABOR AND THE TRADES + + +In "The American Race Problem," one of our recent important books upon +the Negro, the author, Mr. Alfred Holt Stone of Mississippi, after a +survey of the world, declares that "to me, it seems the plainest fact +confronting the Negro is that there is but one area of any size wherein +his race may obey the command to eat its bread in the sweat of its face +side by side with the white man. That area is composed of the Southern +United States."[1] + +On examination we find that only men of English and North European stock +are "white" to Mr. Stone, and that his statement is too sweeping by a +continent or two, but as applying to the United States, it will usually +meet with unqualified approval. It is generally believed that +discrimination continually retards the Negro in his search for +employment in the North, while in the South "he is given a man's chance +in the commercial world." Northern men visiting southern colored +industrial schools advise the pupils to remain where they are, and +restless spirits among the race are assured that it is better to submit +to some personal oppression than to go to a land of uncertain +employment. The past glory of the North is dwelt upon, its days of black +waiters, and barbers, and coachmen, but the present is painted in harsh +colors. + +There is some truth in this comparison of economic conditions among the +Negroes in the North and in the South, but it must not be taken too +literally. Today's tendency to minimize southern and maximize northern +race difficulties, while strengthening the bonds between white +Americans, sometimes obscures the real issues regarding colored labor in +this country. We need to look carefully at conditions in numbers of +selected localities, and we can find no northern city more worthy of +our study than New York. + +The New York Negro constitutes today but two per cent of the population +of Manhattan, one and eight-tenths per cent of that of Greater New York; +and, as many workers in Manhattan live in Brooklyn, the larger area is +the better one to consider. In 1900, the census volume on occupations +gives the number of males over ten years of age engaged in gainful +occupations in Greater New York at 1,102,471, and of that number 20,395 +or 1.8 per cent, eighteen in every thousand, are Negroes. In Atlanta, to +take a southern commercial centre, 351 out of every thousand male +workers are Negroes. This enormous difference in the proportion of +colored workers to white must never be forgotten in considering the +labor situation North and South. We cannot expect in the North to see +the Negro monopolizing an industry which demands a larger share of +workers than he can produce, nor need we admit that he has lost an +occupation when he does not control it. + +We often come upon such a statement as that of Samuel R. Scottron, a +colored business man, who, writing in 1905, said, "The Italian, +Sicilian, Greek, occupy quite every industry that was confessedly the +Negro's forty years ago. They have the bootblack stands, the news +stands, barbers' shops, waiters' situations, restaurants, janitorships, +catering business, stevedoring, steamboat work, and other situations +occupied by Negroes."[2] Did the colored men have all this forty years +ago when they were only one and a half per cent of the population? If +so, there were giants in those days, or New York was much simpler in its +habits than now. At present the control by the colored people of any +such an array of industries would be quite impossible. To take four out +of the nine occupations enumerated: the census of 1900 gives the number +of waiters at 31,211; barbers, 12,022; janitors, 6184; bootblacks, 2648; +a total of 52,065. But in 1900 there were only 20,395 Negro males +engaged in gainful occupations in New York. Without a vigorous astral +body the 20,000-odd colored men could not occupy half these jobs. If +they dominated in the field of waiters they must abandon handling the +razor, and not all the colored boys could muster 2684 strong to black +the boots of Greater New York. We must at the outset recognize that as a +labor factor the Negro in New York is insignificant. + +The volume of the federal census for 1900 on occupations shows us how +the Negroes are employed in New York City. There are five occupational +divisions, and the Negroes and whites are divided among them as follows: + + ==================================================================== + | White | Per | Negro | Per + | | cent | | cent + ------------------------------+-----------+-------+---------+------- + Agricultural pursuits | 9,853 | .9 | 251 | 1.2 + Professional service | 60,037 | 5.6 | 729 | 3.6 + Domestic and personal service | 189,282 | 17.6 | 11,843 | 58.1 + Trade and transportation | 398,997 | 37.1 | 5,798 | 28.4 + Manufacturing and mechanical | | | | + pursuits | 417,634 | 38.8 | 1,774 | 8.7 + ------------------------------+-----------+-------+---------+------- + Total | 1,075,803 | 100.0 | 20,395 | 100.0 + ==================================================================== + +But in examining in detail the occupations under these different +headings, we get a clearer view of the place the Negro maintains as a +laborer by finding out how many workers he supplies to every thousand +workers in a given occupation. He should average eighteen if he is to +occupy the same economic status as the white man. Taking the first +(numerically) important division, Domestic and Personal Service, we get +the following table: + + DOMESTIC AND PERSONAL SERVICE + + Key to column headers-- + A: Total number of males in each occupation. + B: Number of Negroes in occupation. + C: Number of Negroes to each 1000 workers in occupation. + + ======================================================= + | A | B | C + ------------------------------+---------+--------+----- + Barbers and hairdressers | 12,022 | 215 | 18 + Bootblacks | 2,648 | 51 | 20 + Launderers | 6,881 | 70 | 10 + Servants and waiters | 31,211 | 6,280 | 201 + Stewards | 1,366 | 140 | 103 + Nurses | 1,342 | 22 | 16 + Boarding and lodging house | | | + keepers | 474 | 10 | 21 + Hotel keepers | 3,139 | 23 | 7 + Restaurant keepers | 2,869 | 116 | 40 + Saloon keepers and bartenders | 17,656 | 111 | 6 + Janitors and sextons | 6,184 | 800 | 129 + Watchmen, firemen, policemen | 16,093 | 116 | 7 + Soldiers, sailors, marines | 3,707 | 56 | 15 + Laborers (including elevator | | | + tenders, laborers in coal | | | + yards, longshoremen, and | | | + stevedores) | 98,531 | 3,719 | 38 + | | | + Total, including some | | | + occupations not specified | 206,215 | 11,843 | 57 + ======================================================= + +The most important of these groups, not only in absolute numbers, but in +proportion to the whole working population, is the servants and waiters. +Two hundred out of every thousand (we must remember that the proportion +to the population would be eighteen out of every thousand) are holding +positions with which they have long been identified in America. We +cannot tell from the census how many "live out," or how many are able to +go nightly to their homes, how many have good jobs, and how many are in +second and third rate places. A study of my own of 716 colored men helps +to answer one of these questions. Out of 176 men coming under the +servants' and waiters' classification, I found 5 caterers, 24 cooks, 26 +butlers, 30 general utility men, 41 hotel men, and 50 waiters. Sixty per +cent of the 176 lived in their own homes, not in their masters'. Some of +the cooks and waiters were on Pullman trains or on river boats or +steamers; only a few were in first-class positions in New York. In the +summer many of these men are likely to go to country hotels, and with +the winter, if New York offers nothing, migrate to Palm Beach or stand +on the street corner while their wives go out to wash and scrub.[3] +"An' it don't do fer me ter complain," one of them tells me, "else he +gits 'high' an' goes off fer good." Waiters in restaurants sometimes do +not make more than six dollars a week, to be supplemented by tips, +bringing the sum up to nine or ten dollars. Hall men make about the +same, but both waiters and hall men in clubs and hotels receive large +sums in tips or in Christmas money. The Pullman car waiters have small +wages but large fees. + +Looking again at the census, we see that 129 out of every thousand +janitors and sextons are colored. The janitor's position varies from the +impecunious place in a tenement, where the only wage is the rent, to the +charge of a large office or apartment building. Then come the laborers, +nearly four thousand strong, with the elevator boy as a familiar figure. +Forty per cent of the 139 laborers in my own tabulation were elevator +boys, for, except in office buildings and large stores and hotels, this +occupation is given over to the Negro, who spends twelve hours a day +drowsing in a corner or standing to turn a wheel. Paul Lawrence Dunbar +wrote poetry while he ran an elevator, and ambitious if less talented +colored boys today study civil service examinations in their unoccupied +time; but the situation as a life job is not alluring. Twenty-five +dollars a month for wage, with perhaps a half this sum in tips, twelve +hours on duty, one week in the night time and the next in the day--no +wonder the personnel of this staff changes frequently in an apartment +house. A bright boy will be taken by some business man for a better job, +and a lazy one drifts away to look for an easier task, or is dismissed +by an irate janitor. + +Quite another group of laborers are the longshoremen who, far from +lounging indolently in a hallway, are straining every muscle as they +heave some great crate into a ship's hold. The work of the New York +dockers has been admirably described by Mr. Ernest Poole, who says of +the thirty thousand longshoremen on the wharves of New York--Italians, +Germans, Negroes, and Swedes, "Far from being the drunkards and bums +that some people think them, they are like the men of the lumber camps +come to town--huge of limb and tough of muscle, hard-swearing, +quick-fisted, big of heart." Their tasks are heavy and irregular. When +the ship comes in, the average stretch of work for a gang is from twelve +to twenty hours, and sometimes men go to a second gang and labor +thirty-five hours without sleep. Their pay for this dangerous, +exhausting toil averages eleven dollars a week. "There are thousands of +Negroes on the docks of New York," Mr. Poole writes me, "and they must +be able to work long hours at a stretch or they would not have their +jobs." At dusk, Brooklynites see these black, huge-muscled men, many of +them West Indians, walking up the hill at Montague Street. In New York +they live among the Irish in "Hell's Kitchen" and on San Juan Hill. They +are usually steady supporters of families. + +New York demands strong, unskilled laborers. To some she pays a large +wage, and Negroes have gone in numbers into the excavations under the +rivers, though a lingering death may prove the end of their two and a +half or perhaps six or seven dollar a day job. Many colored men worked +in the subway during its construction. One sees them often employed at +rock-drilling or clearing land for new buildings. About a third of the +asphalt workers, making their two dollars and a half a day, are colored. +Some educated, refined Negroes choose the laborer's work rather than +pleasanter but poorly paid occupations. A highly trained colored man, a +shipping clerk, making seven dollars a week, left his employer to take a +job of concreting in the subway at $1.80 a day. His decision was in +favor of dirty, severe labor, but a living wage. + +When the next census is published, those of us who are carefully +watching the economic condition of the Negro expect to find a movement +from domestic service into the positions of laborers, including the +porters in stores, who belong in our second census division. + +Kelly Miller[4] describes the massive buildings and sky-seeking +structures of our northern city, and finds no status for the Negro above +the cellar floor. One can see the colored youth gazing wistfully through +the office window at the clerk, whose business reaches across the ocean +to bewilderingly wonderful continents, knowing as he does that the +employment he may find in that office will be emptying the white man's +waste paper basket. + + TRADE AND TRANSPORTATION + + Key to Column Headers-- + A: Total number of males in each occupation. + B: Number of Negroes in each occupation. + C: Number of Negroes to each 1000 workers in occupation. + + ============================================================= + | A | B | C + --------------------------------------+---------+------+----- + Agents--commercial travellers | 27,456 | 67 | 2 + Bankers, brokers, and officials of | | | + banks and companies | 11,472 | 7 | 0 + Bookkeepers--accountants | 22,613 | 33 | 1 + Clerks, copyists (including shipping | | | + clerks, letter and mail carriers) | 80,564 | 423 | 5 + Merchants (wholesale and retail) | 72,684 | 162 | 2 + Salesmen | 45,740 | 94 | 2 + Typewriters | 3,225 | 36 | 11 + Boatmen and sailors | 8,188 | 145 | 18 + Foremen and overseers | 3,111 | 18 | 6 + Draymen, hackmen, teamsters | 51,063 | 1439 | 28 + Hostlers | 5,891 | 633 | 107 + Livery stable keepers | 967 | 9 | 9 + Steam railway employees | 11,831 | 70 | 6 + Street railway employees | 7,375 | 11 | 1 + Telegraph and telephone operators | 2,430 | 6 | 2 + Hucksters and peddlers | 12,635 | 69 | 5 + Messengers, errand and office boys | 13,451 | 335 | 25 + Porters and helpers (in stores, etc.) | 11,322 | 2143 | 188 + Undertakers | 1,572 | 15 | 9 + | | | + Total, including some occupations | | | + not specified | 405,675 | 5798 | 14 + ============================================================= + +This, however, does not apply to government positions, and a large +number of the 423 colored clerks in 1900 were probably in United States +and municipal service. The latter we shall consider later as we study +the Negro and the municipality. Of the former, in 1909 there were about +176 in the New York post-offices.[5] Ambitious boys work industriously +at civil service examinations, and a British West Indian will even +become an American citizen for the chance of a congenial occupation. The +clerkship, that to a white man is only a stepping-stone, to a Negro is a +highly coveted position. + +I have made two divisions of this census list; the first includes those +occupations requiring intellectual skill and carrying with them some +social position, the second, those demanding only manual work. It is in +the second that the colored man finds a place, and as a porter he +numbers 2143, and reaches almost as high a percentage as the waiter and +servant. Porters' positions are paid from five to fifteen dollars a +week, the man receiving the latter wage performing also the duties of +shipping clerk. There is some opportunity for advance, always within the +basement, and there are regular hours and a fairly steady job. + +The heading of draymen, hackmen, and teamsters, with 28 colored in every +thousand, shows that the Negro has not lost his place as a driver. The +chauffeur does not appear in the census, but the Negro is steadily +increasing in numbers in this occupation, and conducts three garages of +his own. + +The last census division to be considered in this chapter is that of +Manufacturing and Mechanical Pursuits. + + MANUFACTURING AND MECHANICAL PURSUITS + + Key to Column Headers-- + A: Total number of males in each occupation. + B: Number of Negroes in each occupation. + C: Number of Negroes to each 1000 workers in occupation. + + ============================================================= + | A | B | C + --------------------------------------+---------+-------+---- + Engineers, firemen (not locomotive) | 16,579 | 227 | 14 + Masons (brick and stone) | 12,913 | 94 | 7 + Painters, glaziers, and varnishers | 27,135 | 177 | 6 + Plasterers | 4,019 | 51 | 12 + Blacksmiths | 7,289 | 29 | 4 + Butchers | 12,643 | 31 | 2 + Carpenters and joiners | 29,904 | 94 | 3 + Iron and steel workers | 10,372 | 40 | 4 + Paper hangers | 962 | 18 | 19 + Photographers | 1,590 | 22 | 14 + Plumbers, gas and steam fitters | 16,614 | 31 | 2 + Printers, lithographers, and pressmen | 21,521 | 53 | 2 + Tailors | 56,094 | 69 | 1 + Tobacco and cigar factory operators | 11,689 | 189 | 16 + Fishermen and oystermen | 1,439 | 65 | 45 + Miners and quarrymen | 326 | 21 | 64 + Machinists | 17,241 | 47 | 3 + | | | + Total, including some occupations | | | + not specified |419,594 | 1774 | 4 + ============================================================= + + Bakers, boot and shoe makers, gold and silver workers, brass workers, + tin plate and tin ware makers, box makers, cabinet makers, marble and + stone cutters, book-binders, clock and watch makers, confectioners, + engravers, glass workers, hat and cap makers, and others--not more than + nineteen in any one occupation, nor a higher per cent than four in a + thousand. + +When Mr. Stone wrote of the Southern States as the only place in which +the Negro could "earn his bread in the sweat of his face," side by side +with the white man, he must especially have been thinking of workers in +the skilled trades. Unskilled laborers in New York are drenched in a +common grimy fellowship. But in this last division the Negro is +conspicuous by his absence. Only four in every thousand where there +should be eighteen! In Atlanta, under this division, the race reaches +almost its due proportion, 279 in a thousand instead of 351. The largest +number in any trade in New York is 189 men among the Cuban tobacco +workers. Seventy-five per cent of all the masons in Atlanta are colored +men, while in New York the colored are less than one per cent. Looking +down the list we see that the figures are small and the percentage +insignificant. The highly skilled and best paid trades are seemingly as +far removed from the Negro as the positions of floor-walkers or cashiers +of banks. + +Omitting for the present the professional class, we have reviewed the +Negro as a worker, and neither in wages nor choice of occupation has he +risen far to success. In domestic service he has gone a little down the +ladder, serving in less desirable positions than in former years. Why +has this happened? What good reasons are there for these conditions? + +The first and most obvious reason is race prejudice. No display of +talent, however prodigious, will open certain occupations to the colored +race. As a salesman he could teach courteous manners to some of our +white salesmen in New York, but he is never given a chance. There are a +few Negroes, digging in the tunnels or sweeping down the subway stairs, +who are capable of filling the clerkships that are counted the +perquisites of the whites; but clerkships are only accessible as they +are associated with municipal or federal service. Of course there are +exceptions, and though they do not affect the rule, they show the +existence of a few employers who ignore the color line, and a few +Negroes of inexhaustible perseverance. + +Mr. Stone argues that the Negro in the South profits by the strict +drawing of the color line, since the white man, always considered the +superior, is not lowered in the eyes of the community by working with +the black man. The Southern white may lay bricks on the same wall with +the Southern black, secure in his superior social position. But this +seems fanciful as an explanation of labor conditions. The black doctor, +for instance, in those localities where the color line is most rigid, +may not ask the white doctor to consult with him; or if he does, his +prompt removal from the community is requested. Colored postal clerks +are in disfavor in the South, though not colored postmen. North or +South, _the Negro gets an opportunity to work where he is imperatively +needed_. Constituting one-third of the working population, he can make a +place for himself in the laboring world of Atlanta as he cannot in New +York. Pick up the 20,000 New York Negroes and drop them in Liberia, and +in two or three weeks Ellis Island could empty out sufficient men to +fill their places; but remove a third of the male workers from Atlanta, +and the city for years would suffer from the calamity. If they are the +only available source of labor, colored men can work by the side of +white men; but where the white man strongly dominates the labor +situation, he tries to push his black brother into the jobs for which he +does not care to compete. + +We have seen, however, that in some occupations in New York the Negroes +appear in such proportion as should be sufficient to secure them +excellent positions; the most conspicuous instance being that of the +200 colored waiters out of every thousand. Why, then, do we not see +Negroes serving in the best hotels the city affords? + +It has been an ideal of American democracy, a part of its strenuous +individualism, that each member of the community should have full +liberty in the pursuit of wealth. The ambitious, capable boy who walks +bare-footed into the city, and at the end of twenty years has +outdistanced his country school-mates, becoming a multi-millionaire +while they are still farm drudges, is the example of American +opportunity. But this ability to separate one's self from the rest of +one's fellows and attain individual greatness is rarely possible to a +segregated race. In domestic service individual colored men have shown +ambition and high capability, but they have never been able to get away +from their fellows like the country boy--to leave the farm drudges and +take a place among the most proficient of their profession. They must +always work in a race group. And this Negro group is like the small +college that tries to win at football against a competitor with four +times the number of students and a better coach. The two hundred +colored waiters, competing against the eight hundred white ones, lose in +the game and are given a second place, which the best must accept with +the worst. When, then, we criticize a capable colored man for failing to +keep a superior position we must remember that he is tied to his group +and has little chance of advancement on his individual merit. + +The census division of mechanical pursuits shows only a few colored men +working at trades, and the paucity of the numbers is often attributed by +the Negro to a third obstacle in the way of his progress, the +trade-union. + +To the colored man who has overcome race prejudice sufficiently to be +taken into a shop with white workmen, the walking delegate who appears +and asks for his union card seems little short of diabolical; and all +the advantages that collective bargaining has secured, the higher wage +and shorter working-day, are forgotten by him. I have heard the most +distinguished of Negro educators, listening to such an incident as this, +declare that he should like to see every labor union in America +destroyed. But unionism has come to stay, and the colored man who is +asked for his card had better at once get to work and endeavor to secure +it. Many have done this already, and organized labor in New York, its +leaders tell us, receives an increasing number of colored workmen. Miss +Helen Tucker, in a careful study of Negro craftsmen in the West +Sixties,[6] found among 121 men who had worked at their trades in the +city, 32, or 26 per cent in organized labor. The majority of these had +joined in New York. Eight men, out of the 121, had applied for entrance +to unions and not been admitted. This does not seem a discouraging +number, though we do not know whether the other 81 could have been +organized or not. Many, probably, were not sufficiently competent +workmen. In 1910, according to the best information that I could secure, +there were 1358 colored men in the New York unions. Eighty of these were +in the building trades, 165 were cigar makers, 400 were teamsters, 350 +asphalt workers, and 240 rock-drillers and tool sharpeners.[7] + +Entrance to some of the local organizations is more easily secured than +to others, for the trade-union, while part of a federation, is +autonomous, or nearly so. In some of the highly skilled trades, to +which few colored men have the necessary ability to demand access, the +Negro is likely to be refused, while the less intelligent and well-paid +forms of labor press a union card upon him. Again, strong organizations +in the South, as the bricklayers, send men North with union membership, +who easily transfer to New York locals. Miss Tucker finds the +carpenters', masons', and plasterers' organizations easy for the Negro +to enter. There is in New York a colored local, the only colored local +in the city, among a few of the carpenters, with regular representation +in the Central Federated Union. The American Federation of Labor in 1881 +declared that "the working people must unite irrespective of creed, +color, sex, nationality, or politics." This cry is for self-protection, +and where the Negroes have numbers and ability in a trade, their +organization becomes important to the white. It may be fairly said of +labor organization in New York that it finds and is at times unable to +destroy race prejudice, but that it does not create it.[8] + +A fourth obstacle, and a very important one, is the lack of opportunity +for the colored boy. The only trade that he can easily learn is that of +stationary engineer, an occupation at which the Negroes do very well. +Colored boys in small numbers are attending evening trade schools, but +their chance of securing positions on graduation will be small. The +Negro youth who is not talented enough to enter a profession, and who +cannot get into the city or government service, has slight opportunity. +Nothing is so discouraging in the outlook in New York as the crowding +out of colored boys from congenial remunerative work. + +The last obstacle in the way of the Negro's advancement into higher +occupations is his inefficiency. Race prejudice denies him the +opportunity to prove his ability in many occupations, and the same +spirit forces him to work in a race group; but the colored men +themselves are often unfitted for any labor other than that they +undertake. + +The picture that is sometimes drawn of many thousands of highly skilled +Southern colored men forced in New York to give up their trades and to +turn to menial labor is not a correct one. Richard R. Wright, Jr., who +has made a careful study of the Negro in Philadelphia,[9] finds that +the majority of colored men who come to that city are from the class of +unskilled city laborers and country hands; the minority are the more +skilful artisans and farmers and domestic servants, with a number also +of the vagrant and criminal classes. + +In New York the untrained Negroes not only form a very large class, but +coming in contact, as they do, with foreigners who for generations have +been forced to severe, unremitting toil, they suffer by comparison. The +South in the days of slavery demanded chiefly routine work in the fields +from its Negroes.[10] The work was under the direction either of the +master, the overseer, or a foreman; and there has been no general +advance in training for the colored men of the South since that time. +Contrast the intensive cultivation of Italy or Switzerland with the +farms of Georgia or Alabama, or the hotels of France with those of +Virginia, and you will see the disadvantages from which the Negro +suffers. America is young and crude, but opportunity has brought to her +great cities workmen from all over the world. In New York these men are +driven at a pace that at the outset distracts the colored man who +prefers his leisurely way. Moreover, the foreign workmen have learned +persistence; they are punctual and appear regularly each morning at +their tasks. "The Italians are better laborers than any other people we +have, are they not?" I asked a man familiar with many races and +nationalities. "No," was his answer, "they do not work better than +others, but when the whistle blows, they are always there." Mr. Stone, +whose book I have already quoted a number of times, shows the +irresponsible, fanciful wanderings of his Mississippi tenants, whom he +endeavored, unsuccessfully, to establish in a permanent tenantry. The +colored men in New York are far in advance of these farm hands, who are +described as moving about simply because they desire a change, but they +are also far from the steady, unswerving attitude of their foreign +competitors. Inadequately educated, too often they come to New York with +little equipment for tasks they must undertake successfully or +starve--unless, puerile, they live by the labor of some industrious +woman. + +I have tried to depict the New York colored wage earners as they labor +in the city today. They are not a remarkable group, and were they white +men, distinguished by some mark of nationality, they would pass without +comment. But the Negro is on trial, and witnesses are continually called +to tell of his failures and successes. We have seen that both in the +attitude of the world about him, and in his own untutored self, there +are many obstacles to prevent his advance; and his natural sensitiveness +adds to these difficulties. He minds the coarse but often good-natured +joke of his fellow laborer, and he remembers with a lasting pain the +mortification of an employer's curt refusal of work. Had he the +obtuseness of some Americans he would prosper better. As we have seen, +many positions are completely closed to him, leading him to idleness and +consequent crime. Just as not every able-bodied white man, who is out of +work and impoverished, will go to the charities wood-yard and saw wood, +so not every colored man will accept the menial labor which may be the +only work open to him. Instead, he may gamble or drift into a vagabond +life. A well-known Philadelphia judge has said that "The moral and +intellectual advance of a race is governed by the degree of its +industrial freedom. When that freedom is restricted there is unbounded +tendency to drive the race discriminated against into the ranks of the +criminal." Discrimination in New York has led many Negroes into these +ranks. But as we look back at the occupations of our colored men we see +a large number who secure regular hours, and if a poor, yet a fairly +steady pay. For the mass of the Negroes coming into the city these +positions are an advance over their former work. Employment in a great +mercantile establishment, though it be in the basement, carries dignity +with it, and educating demands of punctuality, sobriety, and swiftness. +Richard R. Wright, Jr., whose right to speak with authority we have +already noted, believes that the "North has taught the Negro the value +of money; of economy; it has taught more sustained effort in work, +punctuality, and regularity." It has also, I believe, in its more +regular hours of work, aided in the upbuilding of the home. + +I remember once waiting in the harbor of Genoa while our ship was +taking on a cargo. The captain walked the deck impatiently, and, as the +Italians went in leisurely fashion about their task, declared, "If I had +those men in New York I could get twice the amount of work out of them." +That is what New York does; it works men hard and fast; sometimes it +mars them; but it pays a better wage than Genoa, and there is an +excitement and dash about it that attracts laborers from all parts of +the earth. The black men come, insignificant in numbers, ready to do +their part. They work and play and marry and bring up children, and as +we watch them moving to and from their tasks the North seems to have +brought to the majority of them something of liberty and happiness. + + +FOOTNOTES: + +[1] Alfred Holt Stone, "Studies in the American Race Problem," p. 164. + +[2] New York _Age_, August 24, 1905. + +[3] Occupations in 1907 of 716 colored men (secured from records of the +Young Men's Christian Association and personal visits) compared with +census figures of occupations in 1900. + + ============================================================== + | 716 Men | Census + -------------------------------------------+---------+-------- + Agricultural pursuits | -- | 1.2 + | | + Professional service, 27 men | 3.8 | 3.6 + | | + Domestic and personal service, 363 men | 50.6 | 58.1 + 5 barbers, 5 caterers, 24 cooks, | | + 30 general utility men, 41 hotel men, | | + 76 waiters and butlers, 8 valets, | | + 35 janitors and sextons, 29 longshoremen, | | + 5 laborers in tunnels, 7 asphalt | | + workers, 57 elevator men, 41 laborers. | | + | | + Trade and transportation, 279 men | 39.0 | 28.4 + 10 chauffeurs, 35 drivers, 13 expressmen, | | + 8 hostlers, 12 messengers, 14 municipal | | + employees, 127 porters in stores, | | + 15 porters on trains, 24 clerks, | | + 21 merchants. | | + | | + Manufacturing and mechanical | | + pursuits, 47 men | 6.6 | 8.7 + +---------+------- + | 100.0 | 100.0 + ============================================================= + +[4] Kelly Miller's "Race Adjustment," p. 129. + +[5] It is difficult to get accurate figures as no official record is +kept of color. + +[6] _Southern Workman_, October, 1907, to March, 1908. + +[7] In 1906, and again in 1910, I secured a counting of the New York +colored men in organized labor. The lists run as follows: + + 1906 1910 + + Asphalt workers 320 350 + Teamsters 300 400 + Rock-drillers and tool sharpeners 250 240 + Cigar makers 121 165 + Bricklayers 90 21 + Waiters 90 not obtainable + Carpenters 60 40 + Plasterers 45 19 + Double drum hoisters 30 37 + Safety and portable engineers 26 35 + Eccentric firemen 15 0 + Letter carriers 10 30 + Pressmen 10 not obtainable + Printers 6 8 + Butchers 3 3 + Lathers 3 7 + Painters 3 not obtainable + Coopers 1 2 + Sheet metal workers 1 1 + Rockmen 1 not obtainable + ---- ---- + Total 1385 1358 + +The large number of bricklayers in 1906 is questioned by the man, +himself a bricklayer, who made the second counting. However, the number +greatly decreased in 1908 when the stagnation in business compelled many +men to seek work in other cities. + +[8] The comment of the Negro bricklayer who secured my figures is +important. "A Negro," he says, "has to be extra fit in his trade to +retain his membership, as the eyes of all the other workers are +watching every opportunity to disqualify him, thereby compelling a +superefficiency. Yet at all times he is the last to come and the first +to go on the job, necessitating his seeking other work for a living, and +keeping up his card being but a matter of sentiment. While all the +skilled trades seem willing to accept the Negro with his travelling +card, yet there are some which utterly refuse him; for instance, the +house smiths and bridge men who will not recognize him at all. While +membership in the union is necessary to work, yet the hardest part of +the battle is to secure employment. In some instances intercession has +been made by various organizations interested in his industrial progress +for employment at the offices of various companies, and favorable +answers are given, but hostile foremen with discretionary power carry +out their instructions in such a manner as to render his employment of +such short duration that he is very little benefited. Of course, there +are some contractors who are very friendly to a few men, and whenever +any work is done by them, they are certain of employment. Unfortunately, +these are too few." + +[9] R. R. Wright, Jr.'s "Migration of Negroes to the North," Annals of +the American Academy, May, 1906. + +[10] See Ulrich B. Phillips' "Origin and Growth of the Southern Black +Belts," _American Historical Review_, July, 1906. + + + + +CHAPTER V + +EARNING A LIVING--BUSINESS AND THE PROFESSIONS + + +If we walk west on Fifty-ninth Street, at Eighth Avenue, we come upon +one of the colored business sections of New York. Here, for a block's +length, are employment and real estate agents, restaurant keepers, +grocers, tailors, barbers, printers, expressmen, and undertakers, all +small establishments occupying the first floor or basement of some +tenement or lodging house, and with the exception of the employment +agency all patronized chiefly by the colored race. Another such section +and a more prosperous one is in Harlem, on West One Hundred and +Thirty-third, One Hundred and Thirty-fourth, and One Hundred and +Thirty-fifth Streets. From the point of view of the whole business of +the city such concerns are insignificant, but they are important from +the viewpoint of Negro progress, since they represent the accumulation +of capital, experience in business methods, and hard work. Very slowly +the New York Negro is meeting the demanding power of his people and is +securing neighborhood trade that has formerly gone to the Italian and +the Jew. Husband and wife, father and son, work in their little +establishments and make a beginning in the mercantile world. + +The Negro, as we have seen, has conducted businesses in New York in the +past, businesses patronized chiefly by whites. Barbering and catering +were his successes, and in both of these he has lost, despite the fact +that one of the city's wealthiest colored men is a caterer. But if he +has lost here, he has gained along other lines. Among a number of +photographers he has one who is well-known for his excellent +architectural work. Two manufacturers have brought out popular goods, +the Haynes's razor strop, and the Howard shoe polish. These men, one a +barber and one a Pullman car porter, improved upon implements used in +their daily work and then turned to manufacture. The headquarters of +the Howard shoe polish is in Chicago, where the firm employs thirty +people, the New York branch giving employment to twelve. + +A wise utilization of labor already trained and at hand is seen in the +Manhattan House Cleaning and Renovating Bureau. This firm contracts for +the cleaning of houses and places of business and has also been +successful in securing work on new buildings, entering as the builders +leave and arranging everything for occupancy. In one week the Bureau has +given employment to sixty men. + +In those businesses in which he comes in contact with the white, the +most pronounced success of the colored man has been real estate +brokerage. The New York Negro business directory names twenty-two real +estate brokers, and though a dozen of them probably handle altogether no +more business than one white firm, a few put through important +operations. The ablest of these brokers, recently clearing twenty +thousand dollars at a single transaction, turned his operations to +Liberia, where he went for a few months to look into land concessions. +This broker has aided the Negroes materially in their efforts to rent +apartments on better streets. His energy, and that of many more like +him, is also needed to open up places for colored businesses, better +office and workroom facilities for the able professional and business +men and women. In New York as in the South the Negro needs to obtain a +hold upon the land. In this he is aided not only by his brokers, but by +realty companies. The largest of these, the Metropolitan Realty Company, +in operation since 1900, is capitalized at a million dollars, and had in +1910 $400,000 paid in stock, and $400,000 subscribed and being paid for +on instalment. This company operates in the suburban towns, and has +quite a colony in Plainfield, New Jersey, where it owns 150 lots. It has +built eighty cottages for its members, and has bought eighteen. + +Among the businesses that cater directly to the colored, probably none +is more successful than undertaking. The Negroes of the city die in +great numbers, and the funeral is all too common a function. Formerly +this business went to white men, but increasingly it is coming into the +hands of the colored. The Negro business directory gives twenty-two +undertakers, one of them, by common report, the richest colored man in +New York. Profitable real estate investment, combined with one of the +largest undertaking establishments in the city, has given him a +comfortable fortune. Another large and increasingly important Negro +business is the hotel and boarding-house. As the colored men of the +South and West accumulate wealth, they will come in increasing numbers +to visit in New York, and the colored hotel, now little more than a +boarding-house, may become a spacious building, with private baths, +elevator service, and a well-equipped restaurant. In today's modestly +equipped buildings the catering is often excellent, and good, +well-cooked food is sold at reasonable prices. Occasionally the Hotel +Maceo advertises a southern dinner, and its guests sit down to Virginia +sugar-cured ham, sweet potato pie, and perhaps even opossum. + +Printing establishments, tailors' shops,[1] express and van companies, +and many other small enterprises help to make up the Negro business +world. One colored printer brings out an important white magazine. There +are seven weekly colored newspapers, of which the New York _Age_ is the +most important, and two musical publishing companies. All these +enterprises are useful, not only to the proprietor and his patrons, but +especially to the clerks and assistants who thus are able to secure some +training in mercantile work. In the white man's office, white and +colored boys start out together, but as their trousers lengthen and +their ambitions quicken, the former secures promotion while the latter +is still given the letters to put into the mail box. If the Negro lad, +discouraged at lack of advancement, leaves the white man and ventures +with a tiny capital into some business of his own, his ignorance is +almost certain to lead to his disaster. He is indeed fortunate if he can +first work in the office of a successful colored man.[2] + +We have one more census division to consider, Professional Service. The +table runs as follows: + + PROFESSIONAL SERVICE + + Key to column headers-- + A: Total number of males in each occupation. + B: Number of Negroes in each occupation. + C: Number of Negroes to each 1000 workers in occupation. + + ======================================================== + | A | B | C + ------------------------------------+--------+-----+---- + Actors, professional showmen, etc. | 4,733 | 254 | 54 + Architects, designers, draftsmen | 3,966 | 2 | 0 + Artists, teachers of art | 2,924 | 13 | 4 + Clergymen | 2,833 | 90 | 32 + Dentists | 1,509 | 25 | 16 + Physicians and surgeons | 6,577 | 32 | 5 + Veterinary surgeons | 320 | 2 | 6 + Electricians | 8,131 | 18 | 2 + Engineers (civil) and surveyors | 3,321 | 7 | 2 + Journalists | 2,833 | 7 | 2 + Lawyers | 7,811 | 26 | 3 + Literary and scientific | 1,709 | 10 | 5 + Musicians | 6,429 | 195 | 30 + Officials (government) | 3,934 | 9 | 2 + Teachers and professors in colleges | 3,409 | 32 | 9 + | | | + Total including some occupations | | | + not specified | 60,853 | 729 | 12 + ======================================================== + +Examining these figures we find few colored architects[3] or engineers, +and a very small proportion of electricians, though among the latter +there is a highly skilled workman. The New York Negro has no position in +the mechanical arts. It may be that, as we so often hear, the African +does not possess mechanical ability.[4] You do not see Negro boys +pottering over machinery or making toy inventions of their own. But +another and powerful reason for the colored youth's failing to take up +engineering or kindred studies is the slight chance he would later have +in securing work. No group of men in America have opposed his progress +more persistently than skilled mechanics, and, should he graduate from +some school of technology, he would be refused in office or workshop. So +he turns to those professions in which he sees a likelihood of +advancement. + +Colored physicians and dentists are increasing in number in New York and +throughout the country. The Negro is sympathetic, quick to understand +another's feelings, and when added to this he has received a thorough +medical training he makes an excellent physician. New York State +examinations prevent the practice of ignorant doctors from other states, +and the city can count many able colored practitioners. These doctors +practise among white people as well as among colored. As surgeons they +are handicapped in New York by lack of hospital facilities, having no +suitable place in which they may perform an operation. The colored +student who graduates from a New York medical college must go for +hospital training to Philadelphia or Chicago or Washington.[5] + +Colored lawyers are obtaining a firm foothold in New York. From +twenty-six in the 1900 census they now, in 1911, number over fifty, +though not all of these by any means rely entirely upon their profession +for support. Some of our lawyers are descendants of old New York +families, others have come here recently from the South. + +Turning to our census figures again we see that the three professions in +which the colored man is conspicuous are those of actor, musician, and +minister. Instead of the average eighteen, he here shows fifty-four in +every thousand actors, thirty in every thousand musicians, and +thirty-two in every thousand clergymen. And since the pulpit and the +stage are two places in which the black man has found conspicuous +success it may be well in this connection to consider, not only the +economic significance of these institutions, but their place in the life +of the colored world. + +The Negro minister was born with the Negro Christian, and the colored +church, in which he might tell of salvation, is over a century old in +New York. Today the Boroughs of Manhattan and Brooklyn have twenty-eight +colored churches besides a number of missions. Some of the societies own +valuable property, usually, however, encumbered with heavy mortgages, +and yearly budgets mount up to ten, twelve, and sixteen thousand +dollars. The Methodist churches lead in number, next come the Baptist, +and next the Episcopalian. There are Methodist Episcopal, African +Methodist Episcopal, and African Methodist Episcopal Zion. Bethel +African Methodist Episcopal Church, as we have seen, is one of the +oldest and is still one of the largest and most useful Negro churches in +New York. Mount Olivet, a Baptist church on West Fifty-third Street, has +a seating capacity of 1600, taxed to its full on Sunday evenings. St. +Philip's gives the Episcopal service with dignity and devoutness, and +its choir has many sweet colored boy singers. At St. Benedict, the Moor, +the black faces of the boy acolytes contrast with the benignant +white-haired Irish priest, and without need of words preach good-will +to men. Only in this Catholic church does one find white and black in +almost equal numbers worshipping side by side. + +The great majority of the colored churches are supported by their +congregations, and the minister or elder, or both, twice a Sunday, must +call for the pennies and nickels, dimes and quarters, that are dropped +into the plate at the pulpit's base. Contributors file past the table on +which they place their offering, emulation becoming a spur to +generosity. These collections are supplemented by sums raised at +entertainments and fairs, and it is in this way, by the constant +securing of small gifts, that the thousands are raised. + +The church is a busy place and retains its members, not only by its +preaching, but by midweek meetings. There are the class meetings of the +Methodists, the young people's societies, the prayer meetings, and the +sermons preached to the secret benefit organizations. Visiting sisters +and brothers attend to relief work, and standing at a side table, +sometimes picturesque with lighted lantern, ask for dole for the poor. + +The Sunday-schools, while not so large as the church attendance would +lead one to expect, involve much time and labor in their conduct. A +colored church member finds all his or her leisure occupied in church +work. I know a young woman engaged in an exacting, skilled profession +who spends her day of rest attending morning service, teaching in +Sunday-school, taking part in the young people's lyceum in the late +afternoon, and listening to a second sermon in the evening. Occasionally +she omits her dinner to hear an address at the colored Young Men's +Christian Association. On hot summer afternoons you may see colored boys +and girls and men and women crowded in an ill-ventilated hall, giving +ear to a fervid exhortation that leads the speaker, at the sentence's +end, to mop his swarthy face. The woods, the salt-smelling sea, the +tamer prettiness of the lawns of the city's park, have not the impelling +call of sermon or hymn. If the whole of the Negro's summer Sunday is to +be given to direct religious teaching, one wishes that it might take +place at the old time camp meeting, where there is fresh air and space +in which to breathe it. The first of Edward Everett Hale's three rules +of life as he gave them to the Hampton students was, "Live all you can +out in the open air." The religious-minded New York Negro succumbs +easily to disease, and yet elects to spend his day of leisure within +doors. + +With the exception of the Episcopalians, the churches undertake little +institutional work. Money is lacking, and there is only a feeble +conviction of the value of the gymnasium, pool table, and girls' and +boys' clubs. The colored branches of the Young Men's Christian +Association, however, are places for recreation and instruction. The +lines that Evangelical Americans draw regarding amusements, prohibiting +cards and welcoming dominos, allowing bagatelle and frowning upon +billiards, must be interpreted by some folk-lore historian to show their +reasonableness. Doubtless the extent to which a game is used for +gambling purposes has much to do with its good or bad savor, and pool +and cards for this reason are tabooed. Dancing is also frowned upon by +many of the churches, while temperance societies make active campaign +for prohibition. To New York's black folk, the church-goers and they who +stand without are the sheep and the goats, and the gulf between them is +digged deep. + +Of the five colored Episcopal churches, St. Philip's and St. Cyprian's +have parish houses. St. Philip's has moved into a new parish house on +West One Hundred and Thirty-Fourth Street, where with its large, +well-arranged rooms, its gymnasium, and its corps of enthusiastic +workers it will soon become a powerful force in the Harlem Negro's life. +St. Cyprian's is under the City Episcopal Mission, and has unusual +opportunity for helpfulness since it is separated only by Amsterdam +Avenue from the San Juan Hill district and yet stands amid the whites. +Its clubs and classes, its employment agency, its gymnasium, its +luncheons for school children, its beautiful church, are all primarily +for the Negroes; but the colored rector has a friendly word for his +white neighbors, tow-headed Irish and German boys and girls sit upon his +steps, and his ministry has lessened the belligerent feeling between +the east and the west sides of Amsterdam Avenue. St. David's Episcopal +Church in the Bronx has a fresh air home at White Plains, cared for +personally by the rector and his wife, who spend their vacation with +tenement mothers and their children, the tired but grateful recipients +of their good-will. + +If there were ninety colored clergymen in New York in 1900, as the +census says, a number must have been without churches, itinerant +preachers or directors of small missions, supporting themselves by +other labor during the day. Those men who now fill the pulpits of +well-established churches have been trained in theological schools of +good standing, for the ignorant "darky" of the story who leaves the hot +work of the cotton field because he feels a "call" to preach does not +receive another from New York. The colored minister in this city works +hard and long, and finds a wearying number of demands upon his time. The +wedding and the funeral, the word of counsel to the young, and of +comfort to the aged, a multiplicity of meetings, two sermons every +Sunday, the continual strain of raising money, these are some of his +duties. With a day from fourteen to seventeen hours long he earns as few +men earn the meagre salary put into his hand. But his position among +his people is a commanding one, and carries with it respect and +responsibility. + +Strangers who visit colored churches to be amused by the vociferations +of the preacher and the responses of the congregation will be +disappointed in New York. Others, however, who attend, desiring to +understand the religious teaching of the thoughtful Negro, find much of +interest. They hear sermons marked by great eloquence. In the +Evangelical church the preacher is not afraid to give his imagination +play, and in finely chosen, vivid language, pictures his thought to his +people. Especially does he love to tell the story of a future life, of +Paradise with its rapturous beauty of color and sound, its golden +streets, its gates of precious stones, effulgent, radiant. He dwells not +upon the harshness, but rather upon the mercy of God. + +A theological library connected with a Calvinistic church, when recently +catalogued, disclosed two long shelves of books upon Hell and two slim +volumes upon Heaven. No such unloving Puritanism dominates the Negro's +thought. Hell's horrors may be portrayed at a revival to bring the +sinner to repentance, but only as an aid to a clearer vision of the +glories of Heaven. + +The Negro churches lay greater stress than formerly upon practical +religion; they try to turn a fine frenzy into a determination for +righteousness. This was strikingly exemplified lately in one of New +York's colored Baptist churches. During the solemn rite of immersion the +congregation began to grow hysterical, or "happy," as they would have +phrased it; there were cries of "Yes, Jesus," "We're comin', Lord," and +swayings of the body backward and forward. The minister with loud and +stirring appeal for a time encouraged these emotions. Then in a moment +he brought quiet to his congregation and called them to the consecration +of labor. Faith without works was vain. Baptism was not the end, but +only the beginning of their salvation. "You-all bleege ter work," he +said, "if yer gwine foller der Lord. Ain't Jesus work in der carpenter +shop till he nigh on thirty year old? Den one day he stood up (he ain't +none er yer two-by-fo' men) an' he tak off his blue apun (I reckon he +wore er apun like we-alls) an' he goes on down ter der wilderness, an' +John der Baptist baptize him." + +From oratory one turns naturally to music. The feeling for rhythm, for +melodious sound, that leads the Negro to use majestic words of which he +has not always mastered the meaning, leads him also to musical +expression. He has an instinct for harmony, and, when within hearing +distance of any instrument, will whistle, not the melody, however +assertive, but will add a part.[6] Those who have visited colored +schools, and especially the colored schools of the far South where the +pupils are unfamiliar with other music than their own, can never forget +the exquisite, haunting singing. When a foreman wants to get energetic +work from his black laborers he sets them to singing stirring tunes. The +Negro has his labor songs as the sailor has his chanties, and it would +be impossible to measure the joy coming to both through musical +expression. + +In New York, despite their poverty, few Negroes fail to possess some +musical instrument--a banjo perhaps, or a guitar, a mandolin or zither, +or it may be the highly prized piano. Visiting of an evening in the +Phipps model tenement, one hears a variety of gay tinkling sounds. And +besides the mechanical instruments there is always the great natural +instrument, the human voice. Singing, though not as common in the city +as in the country, is still often heard, especially in the summer, and +remains musical, though New York's noise and cheap and vulgar +entertainments have an unhappy fashion of roughening her children's +voices. + +Music furnishes a means of livelihood to many Negroes and supplements +the income of many others. Boys contribute to the family support by +singing cheap songs in saloons or even in houses of prostitution. A boy +"nightingale" will earn the needed money for rent while learning, all +too quickly, the ways of viciousness. Others, more carefully reared, +sing at church or secret society concert, perhaps receiving a little +pay. Men form male quartettes that for five or ten dollars furnish a +part of an evening's entertainment. There are many Negro musicians and +elocutionists who largely support themselves by their share in the +receipts from concerts and social gatherings. + +We speak of men crossing the line when they intermarry with the whites, +but there is another crossing of the line when some Negro by his genius +makes the world forget his race. Such a man is the artist, Henry Tanner; +and New York has such Negro musicians. Mr. Harry Burleigh, the baritone +at St. George's, has won high recognition, not only as an interpreter, +but as a composer of music; and one of the richest synagogues of the +city has a Negro for its assistant organist. There are five colored +orchestras in New York, the one conducted by Mr. Walter A. Craig having +toured successfully in New England and many other northern states. + +But the colored musician has usually found his opportunity for +expression and for a living wage upon the stage. Probably many of the +actors noted on the census list are musicians, and many of the +musicians, actors; the writer of the topical song having himself sung it +in vaudeville or musical comedy. Few New Yorkers appreciate how many of +the tunes hummed in the street or ground out on the hand-organ, have +originated in Negro brains. "The Right Church but the Wrong Pew," +"Teasing," "Nobody," "Under the Bamboo Tree," which Cole and Johnson, +the composers, heard the last thing as they left the dock in New York, +and the first thing when they arrived in Paris, these are a few of the +popular favorites. Handsome incomes have been netted by the shrewder +among these composers, and the demand for their songs is continuous. + +With a bright song and a jolly dance comes success. Picking up the copy +of the New York _Age_, that lies on my desk, I find jottings of +twenty-four colored troupes in vaudeville in the larger cities of the +North and West. Three are at Proctor's and three at Keith's. Their +economic outlook is not so hilarious as their songs, for transportation +is expensive and bookings are uncertain; yet pecuniarily these actors +are far better off than their more sober brothers who stick to their +elevators or their porters' jobs. + +Twenty years ago the Negro performer probably had little anticipation of +advancing beyond minstrel work, in which he sang loud, danced hard, and +told a funny story. S. H. Dudley, the leading comedian in the "Smart +Set" colored company, said in 1909: "When I started in business I had no +idea of getting as high as I am now. A minstrel company came to the +little town in Texas where I was raised, and at once my ambition fired +me to become a musician. So I bought a battered horn and began to toot, +to the great annoyance of my neighbors. Then I secured an engagement +with a minstrel company whose cornet player had fallen into the hands of +the law; and now here I am with one of the best colored shows ever +gotten together and a starring tour arranged for next season." The +movement from the minstrel show to the musical comedy, from the cheapest +form of buffoonery to attractive farce, and even to good comedy, has +been accomplished by a number of colored comedians. Williams and Walker +may be considered the pioneers in this movement, and the story of their +success, as Walker has told it, is a fine example of what the Negro can +do along the line of decided natural aptitude. And it is important to +notice this, for today, in the education of the race, aesthetic instincts +are often suppressed with Puritan vigor, and labor is made ugly and +unwelcome. + +Bert Williams and George Walker, one a British West Indian, the other a +Westerner, met in California where each was hanging around a box +manager's office, looking for a job. Hardly more than boys, they secured +employment at seven dollars a week. That was in 1889. In 1908 they made +each $250 a week, and in later times they have doubled and quadrupled +this. Their first stage manager expected them to perform as the +blacked-up white minstrels were performing, but the two boys soon saw +that the Negro himself was far more entertaining than the buffoon +portrayed by the white man. They wanted to show the true Negro, and +billing themselves as the "real coons" (their white rivals called +themselves "coons") they played in San Francisco with some success. +Later they came to New York, and at Koster and Bial's made their first +hit. + +"Long before our run terminated," Walker said in telling of those early +days, "we discovered an important fact: that the hope of the colored +performer must be in making a radical departure from the old time +'darky' style of singing and dancing. So we set ourselves the task of +thinking along new lines. + +"The first move was to hire a flat in Fifty-third Street, furnish it, +and throw our doors open to all colored men who possessed theatrical and +musical ability and ambition. The Williams and Walker flat soon became +the headquarters of all the artistic young men of our race who were +stage-struck. We entertained the late Paul Lawrence Dunbar, who wrote +lyrics for us. By having these men about us we had the opportunity to +study the musical and theatrical ability of the most talented members of +our race." + +In 1893 the World's Fair was held at Chicago, and on the "Midway" the +visitor saw races from all over the world. Here was a Dahomey village, +with strange little huts, representative of the African home life. The +Dahomeyans themselves were late in arriving, and American Negroes, +sometimes with an added coat of black, were employed to represent them. +Among them were Williams and Walker, who played their parts until the +real Dahomeyans arriving, they became in turn spectators and studied the +true African. This contact with the dancing and singing of the primitive +people of their own race had an important effect upon their art. Their +lyrics recalled African songs, their dancing took on African movements, +especially Walker's. Any one who saw Walker in "Abyssinia," the most +African and the most artistic of their plays, must have recognized the +savage beauty of his dancing when he was masquerading as an African +king. + +After the Dahomey episode the success of the two men was continuous. "In +1902 and 1903," Walker said, "we had all New York and London doing the +cake walk." In February, 1908, they appeared in "Bandanna Land," at the +Majestic Theatre, and remained there for six months. Only those colored +men who have made a steady, uphill struggle for the chance to play good +comedy, know how important such recognition was for the Negro. "Bandanna +Land" was probably the most popular light opera in New York that winter +next to "The Merry Widow." The singing, especially that of the male +chorus, was often beautiful. Mrs. Walker's dancing and charming acting +were delightful, the chorus girls were above the average in beauty +and musical expression, and the two men who made the piece were +spontaneously, irresistibly funny; added to this, unlike its successful +rival, "Bandanna Land" was without a vulgar scene or word. + +This was the last time the two men played together. Walker became +seriously ill, and died in January, 1911. After their company disbanded, +Williams went back to the one-piece act of vaudeville, but as a star in +a white troupe. His position as a permanent actor in the "Follies of +1910" marks a new departure for the colored comedian, a departure won by +great talent combined with character and tact. + +Since 1908 the Majestic has seen another colored company, Cole and +Johnson's, presenting a half-Negro, half-Indian, musical comedy, the +"Red Moon." These two men, for years in vaudeville, have written songs +for Lillian Russell, Marie Cahill, Anna Held, and other popular musical +comedy and vaudeville singers. They have played for six months +continuously at the Palace Theatre, London. Accustomed to writing for +white actors, their own plays are not so distinctively African as +Williams and Walker's. Both Johnson and Cole are of the mulatto type, +and neither blackens his face. Cole is one of the most amusing men in +comedy in New York. He is tall and very thin, with a genius for finding +lank and grotesque costumes that are delightfully incongruous with his +grave face. The words of the musical comedies are his, the music, +Johnson's. He, too, has become seriously ill, and his company has +disbanded. In three years the colored stage has suffered serious loss, +but we see forming new and successful companies whose reputation will +soon be assured. + +Comedy has always furnished a medium for criticism of the foibles of the +times, and there are many sly digs at the white man in the colored play. +Ernest Hogan, now deceased, better than any one else played the rural +southern darky. In the "Oysterman" we saw him in contact with a white +scamp who was intent upon getting his recently acquired money. He was +urged to take stock in a land company, to buy where watermelons grew as +thick as potatoes, and chickens were as common as sparrows. The audience +hated the white man heartily and sided with the simple, kindly, black +youth, sitting with his dog at his side, on his cabin steps. Behind +boisterous laughter and raillery the writers of these comedies often +gain the sympathy of their hearers for the black race. + +In this attempt to show the occupational life of the Negro, we have +found that race prejudice often proves a bar to complete success, to +full manhood. Something of this is true with the actor as well as with +the laborer and the business man. In securing entrance in vaudeville, +color is at first an advantage. The "darky" to the white man is +grotesquely amusing, and by rolling his eyes, showing a glistening +smile, and wearing shoes that make a monstrosity of his feet, the Negro +may create a laugh where the man with a white skin would be hooted off +the stage. And since the laugh is so easily won, many colored actors +become indolent and content themselves, year after year, with playing +the part of buffoon. But with the ambition to rise in his profession +comes the difficult struggle to induce the audience to see a new Negro +in the black man of today. The public gives the colored man no +opportunity as a tragedian, demanding that his comedy shall border +always on the farcical. And what is demanded of the actor is also +demanded of the musician. Writers of the scores of some of our musical +comedies are musicians of superior training and ability, but rarely are +they permitted full expression. Mr. Will Marion Cook, the composer of +much of the music of "Bandanna Land," for a few moments gives a piece of +exquisite orchestration. When the colored minister rises and exhorts his +quarrelling friends to be at peace with one another, one hears a +beautiful harmony. I am told that Mr. Cook declares that the next score +he writes shall begin with ten minutes of serious music. If the audience +doesn't like it, they can come in late, but for ten minutes he will do +something worthy of his genius. + +However light-hearted a people, and however worthy of praise the +entertainment that brings a jolly, wholesome laugh, let us hope that in +the near future the Negro will find a more complete expression for his +musical and histrionic gifts. Some actor of commanding talent, whose +claims cannot be ignored, may reveal the larger life of the race. The +nineteenth century knew a great Negro actor, Ira Aldridge, a _protege_ +and disciple of Edmund Kean. He played Othello to Kean's Iago, and in +the forties toured Europe with his own company, receiving high honors in +Berlin and St. Petersburg.[7] A dark-skinned African, of immense power, +physically and emotionally, he made Desdemona cry out in real fear, and +caused Bassanio instinctively to shrink as he demanded his pound of +flesh. Today's actor must be more subtle in his attack, but it may be +given to him to reveal the thoughts at the back of the black man's mind. +The genius of Zangwill gave us the picture of the children of the +Ghetto; perhaps from the theatre's seat the American will first +understand the despised black race. + + +FOOTNOTES: + +[1] On West 133d Street two former Hampton students have a prosperous +little tailor and upholstering shop. + +[2] Those interested in the Negro in business should look for an +intensive study, shortly to be published, on the wage-earners and +business enterprises among Negroes in New York. It is entitled "The +Negro at Work in New York City," and has been made by George E. Haynes, +under the direction of the Bureau of Social Research of the New York +School of Philanthropy. + +[3] Since going to press the new and very beautiful building of St. +Philips' Episcopal Church, on W. 134th Street, has been opened. This is +a fine example of English Gothic and its architects are two young +colored men, one of whom was for years in the office of a white firm. + +[4] Mary Kingsley has some interesting generalizations on this point. +She speaks of the African mind approaching all things from a spiritual +point of view while the English mind approaches them from a material +point of view, and of "the high perception of justice you will find in +the African, combined with the inability to think out a pulley or a +lever except under white tuition."--_West African Studies_, p. 330. + +[5] Lincoln Hospital in New York, while receiving white and colored +patients, was especially designed to help the colored race. It has a +training school for colored nurses, but neither accepts colored medical +graduates as interns, nor allows colored doctors upon its staff. This is +one of many cases in which the good white people of the city are glad to +assist the poor and ailing Negro, but are unwilling to help the strong +and ambitious colored man to full opportunity. + +[6] See H. J. Wilson, "The Negro and Music," _Outlook_, Dec. 1, 1906. + +[7] William J. Simmons's "Men of Mark." + + + + +CHAPTER VI + +THE COLORED WOMAN AS A BREAD WINNER + + +The life of the Negro woman of New York, if she belong to the laboring +class, differs in some important respects from the life of the white +laboring woman. Generalizations on so comprehensive a subject must, of +course, meet with many exceptions, but the observing visitor, familiar +with white and colored neighborhoods, quickly notes marked contrasts +between the two, contrasts largely the result of different occupational +opportunities. These pertain both to the married woman and the unmarried +working girl. + +The generality of white women in New York, wives of laboring men, +infrequently engage in gainful occupations. In the early years of +married life the wife relies on her husband's wage for support, and +within her tiny tenement-flat bears and rears her children and performs +her household duties--the sewing, cooking, washing, and ironing, and the +daily righting of the contracted rooms. She is a conscientious wife and +mother, and rarely, either by night or by day, journeys far from her own +home. When unemployment visits the family wage earner, she turns to +laundry work and day's cleaning for money to meet the rent and to supply +the household with scanty meals; but as soon as her husband resumes work +she returns to her narrow round of domestic duties. + +After a score of these monotonous years more prosperous times come to +the housewife. Every morning two or three children go out to work, and +their wages make heavier the family purse. Son and daughter, having +entered factory or store, bring home their pay envelopes unbroken on +Saturday nights, and the augmentation of the father's wage gives the +mother an income to administer. After the young people's wants in +clothing and entertainment have been in part supplied, it becomes +possible to buy new furniture on the instalment plan, to hire a piano, +even to move into a better neighborhood. The earnings of a number of +children, supplementing the wage of the head of the family, make life +more tolerable for all. + +These days, however, do not last long. Sons and daughters marry and +assume new responsibilities; the husband, his best strength gone, finds +unemployment increasing; and since saving, except for wasteful +industrial insurance, has seemed impossible without sacrificing the +decencies and pleasures of the children, the end of the woman's married +life is likely to be hard and comfortless. + +This rough description may fairly be taken to represent the life of the +average New York white woman of the laboring class. It is not, however, +the life of the average colored woman. With her, self-sustaining work +usually begins at fifteen, and by no means ceases with her entrance upon +marriage, which only entails new financial burdens. The wage of the +husband, as we have seen, is usually insufficient to support a family, +save in extreme penury, and the wife accepts the necessity of +supplementing the husband's income. This she accomplishes by taking in +washing or by entering a private family to do housework. Sometimes she +is away from her tenement nearly every day in the week; again the bulk +of her earnings comes from home industry. Her day holds more diversity +than that of her white neighbor; she meets more people, becomes familiar +with the ways of the well-to-do,--their household decorations, their +dress, their refinements of manner; but she has but few hours to give to +her children. With her husband she is ready to be friend and helpmate; +but should he turn out a bad bargain, she has no fear of leaving him, +since her marital relations are not welded by economic dependence. An +industrious, competent woman, she works and spends, and in her scant +hours of leisure takes pride in keeping her children well-dressed and +clean. + +At the second period of her married life, when her boys and girls, few +in number if she be a New Yorker, begin to engage in self-supporting +work, her condition shows less improvement than that of the white woman +of her class. Sometimes her children hand her their whole wage, far +oftener they bring her only such part as they choose to spare. The +strict accounting of the minor to the parent, usual among Northerners in +the past, and today common among the immigrant class, is not a part of +the Negro's training. Rather, as the race has attained freedom it has +copied the indulgent attitude of the once familiar "master," and regrets +that its offspring must enter upon any work. Children with this +tradition about them use the money they earn largely for the +gratification of their vanity, not for the lessening of their mother's +tasks. But a more potent factor than lack of discipline keeps the mother +from being the administrator of the family's joint earnings. White boys +and girls in New York enter work that makes it possible and advantageous +for them to dwell at home; Negroes must go out to service, accept long +and irregular hours in hotel or apartment, travel for days on boat or +train. The family home is infrequently available to them, and money +given in to it brings small return. Under these circumstances it is not +strange if the mother must continue her round of washing and scrubbing. + +The last years of life of the Negro woman, probably a little more than +the last years of the white, are likely to bring happiness. With a +mother at work a grandmother becomes an important factor, and elderly +colored women are often seen bringing up little children or helping in +the laundry--that great colored home industry. Accustomed all their +lives to hard labor, it is easy for them to find work that shall repay +their support, and in their children's households they are treated with +respect and consideration. + +The contrast in the lives of the colored and white married women is not +more strongly marked than the contrast in the lives of their unmarried +daughters and sisters. Unable to enter any pursuit except housework, the +unskilled colored girl goes out to service or helps at home with the +laundry or sewing. Factory and store are closed to her, and rarely can +she take a place among other working girls. Her hours are the long, +irregular hours of domestic service. She brings no pay envelope home to +her mother, the two then carefully discussing how much belongs +rightfully for board, and how much may go for the new coat or dress, +but takes the eighteen or twenty dollars given her at the end of the +month, and quite by herself determines all her expenditures. Far oftener +than any class of white girls in the city she lives away from the +parental home. + +These are some of the differences found by the observer who looks into +the Negro and the white tenement. They need not, however, rest alone +upon any observer's testimony. We have in the census abundant statistics +for their verification. Scattered among the volumes on Population, +Occupations, and Women at Work are many facts concerning Negro women +workers of New York, all of them confirmatory of the description just +given. We may note the most important. + +In 1900, whereas 4.2 per cent of the white married women in New York +were engaged in gainful occupations, 31.4 per cent of the Negro married +women were earning their living, over seven times as many in proportion +as the whites.[1] + +Again, in the total population of New York's women workers, 80 per cent +were single, 10 per cent married, and 10 per cent widowed and divorced; +while among the Negroes, the single women were only 53 per cent, the +married 25 per cent, and the widowed 22.[2] + +Statistics of the age period at which women are at work, show the +Negro's long continuing wage-earning activity. Between sixteen and +twenty is a busy time for the women of both races. Among the whites 59 +per cent are in gainful occupations, among the Negroes 66 per cent. But +as the girl arrives at the period when she is likely to marry, the per +cent of workers among the whites drops rapidly, until for white women, +forty-five and over, it is 13.5, about one in seven. With the colored, +among the women forty-five years of age and over, 53 per cent, more +than half, still engage in gainful toil.[3] + +Family life can be studied in the census table. While 59 per cent of the +unmarried white girls at work live at home, this is found to be true +of but 25 per cent of the colored girls; that is, 75 per cent, +three-quarters of all the colored unmarried working women, live with +their employers or board.[4] + +The census volume on occupations reveals at once the narrow range of the +New York colored woman's working life. Personal and domestic service +absorbs 90 per cent of her numbers against 40 per cent among the white. +But before considering more fully the colored girl at work, we need to +notice another statistical fact, the preponderance in the city of Negro +women over Negro men. + +Like the foreigner, the youth of the Negro race comes first to the city +to seek a livelihood. The colored population shows 41 per cent of its +number between the ages of 20 and 35. But unlike the foreigner, the +Negro women find larger opportunity and come in greater numbers than the +men. Their range of work is narrow, but within it they can command +double the wages they receive at home, and if they are possessed of +average ability, they are seldom long out of work. With the immense +growth of wealth in New York the demand for servants continually +increases, and finding little response from the white native born +population, many mistresses receive readily the services of the +English-speaking southern and West Indian blacks. So the boats from +Charleston and Norfolk and the British West Indies bring scores and +hundreds of Negro women from country districts, from cities where they +have spent a short time at service, girls with and girls without +experience, all seeking better wages in a new land. + +Mr. Kelly Miller was the first to call attention to the presence in +American cities of surplus Negro women.[5] The phenomenon is not +peculiar to New York. Baltimore, Washington, New Orleans, all show the +same condition. In Atlanta the women number 143 to every hundred colored +men. New York shows 123 to every masculine one hundred. These surplus +women account in part for the number of Negro women workers in New York +not living at home. Some are with their employers, but others lodge in +the already crowded tenements, for the southern servant, unaccustomed to +spending the night at her employer's, in New York also, frequently +arranges to leave her mistress when her work is done. In their hours of +leisure the surplus women are known to play havoc with their neighbors' +sons, even with their neighbors' husbands, for since lack of men makes +marriage impossible for about a fifth of New York's colored girls, +social disorder results. Surplus Negro women, able to secure work, +support idle, able-bodied Negro men. The lounger at the street corner, +the dandy in the parlor thrumming on his banjo, means a Malindy of the +hour at the kitchen washboard. In a town in Germany, where men were +sadly scarce, I was told that a servant girl paid as high as a mark to +a soldier to walk with her in the Hofgarten on a Sunday afternoon. +Colored men in New York command their "mark," and girls are found who +keep them in polished boots, fashionable coats, and well-creased +trousers. Could the Negro country boy be as certain as his sister of +lucrative employment in New York, or could he oftener persuade her to +remain with him on the farm, he would better city civilization. But the +demand for servants increases, and the colored girl continues to be +attracted to the city where she can earn and spend. + +The table on the following page shows in condensed form the occupations +of the Negro women in New York. As we see, the Negro women number +forty-four in every thousand women workers. + + FEMALES TEN YEARS OF AGE AND OVER, ENGAGED IN GAINFUL OCCUPATIONS IN + NEW YORK + + ============================================================ + | | | Number to + | Total | Negro | every 1000 + | | | workers + ----------------------------+---------+--------+------------ + Professional service | 22,422 | 281 | 12 + | | | + Domestic and personal | | | + service | 146,722 | 14,586 | 100 + Laundresses | 16,102 | 3,224 | 200 + Servants and waitresses | 103,963 | 10,297 | 99 + All others | 24,657 | 1,065 | 43 + | | | + Trade and transportation | 65,318 | 106 | Between one + | | | and two + Manufacturing and | | | + mechanical pursuits | 132,535 | 1,138 | 7 + Dressmakers | 37,514 | 813 | 22 + Seamstresses | 18,108 | 249 | 14 + All others | 76,913 | 76 | 1 + | | | + Total including some | | | + occupations not specified | 367,437 | 16,114 | 44 + ============================================================ + + Federal Census 1900: Occupations, Table 43, p. 638 + +Ninety per cent of all the Negro women workers of New York are in +domestic and personal service. This includes a variety of positions. +Some Negro girls work in stores, dusting stock, taking charge of cloak +or toilet rooms, scrubbing floors. Their hours are regular, but the pay, +five or six, or very occasionally eight dollars a week, means a scanty +livelihood without hope of advancement. The position of maid in a +theatre where perquisites are larger is prized, and a new and pleasant +place is that of a maid on a limited train. But the bulk of the girls +are servants in boarding-houses, or are with private families as nurses, +waitresses, cooks, laundresses, maids-of-all-work, earning from sixteen +and eighteen to twenty-five and even thirty dollars a month. +Occasionally a very skilful cook can command as high a monthly wage as +fifty dollars. + +The colored girl is frequently found engaged at general housework in a +small apartment. Her desire to return to her lodging at night makes her +popular with families living in contracted space. With the conveniences +of a New York flat, dumb-waiter, clothes-dryer, gas, and electricity, +general housework is not severe. Work begins early, seven at the latest, +and lasts until the dinner is cleared away, at half-past eight or nine. +Released then from further tasks, the young girl goes to her tiny inner +tenement room, dons a fresh dress, and then, as chance or her training +determines, walks the streets, goes to the theatre, or attends the class +meeting at her church. Entertainments among the Negroes are rarely under +way until ten o'clock, and short hours of sleep in ill-ventilated rooms +soon weaken the vitality of the new-comer. Housework under these +conditions does not create much ambition; the mistress moves, flitting, +in New York fashion, from one flat to another, and the girl also flits +among employers, changing with the whim of the moment. + +Few subjects present so fascinating a field for discussion as domestic +service, and the housewife of today enters into it with energy, +sometimes decrying the modern working girl, again planning household +economics that shall lure her from factory or shop. The only point we +need to consider now is the dissatisfaction that results when 64 per +cent of the women of a race are forced by circumstances into one +occupation. Those with native ability along this line succeed and make +others and themselves happy. The faithful, patient, loyal Negro servant +is well-known, the black mammy has passed into American literature, but +not every colored woman can wisely be given this position. Some of the +Negro girls who take up housework in New York are capable of more +intelligent labor, and chafe under their limitations; others have not +the ability to do good housework; for domestic service requires more +mental capacity than is demanded in many factories. In short, a great +many colored girls in New York are round pegs in square holes, and the +community is the loser by it. + +Among these round pegs are girls who, determining no longer to drudge in +lonely kitchens, contrive, as we shall see later, to find positions at +other more attractive reputable work. Others, deciding in favor of +material betterment at whatever cost, lower their moral standard and +secure easier and more remunerative jobs. A well-paying place, with +short hours and high tips, at once offers itself to the colored girl who +is willing to work for a woman of the demi-monde. In the sporting house +also she is preferred as a servant, her dark complexion separating her +from other inmates. In 1858, Sanger wrote in his "History of +Prostitution," "The servants (in these houses) are almost always colored +women. Their wages are liberal, their perquisites considerable, and +their work light." Untrained herself, bereft of home influence, with an +ancestry that sometimes cries out her parent's weakness in the contour +and color of her face, the Negro girl in New York, more even than the +foreign immigrant, is subject to degrading temptation. The good people, +who are often so exacting, want her for her willingness to work long +hours at a lower wage than the white; and the bad people, who are often +so carelessly kind, offer her light labor and generous pay. It is small +wonder that she sometimes chooses the latter. + +Not all the colored girls who work in questionable places and with +questionable people take the jobs from choice; some are sent without +knowing the character of the house they enter. A few years ago an +agitation was started for the protection of helpless Negro immigrants +who had fallen into the hands of unscrupulous employment agencies. A +system existed, and still exists, by which employment agencies were able +to advance the travelling expenses of southern girls, who on their +arrival in New York were held in debt until the cost of the journey had +been many times repaid. Helpless in the power of the agent, the +new-comer was forced to work where he wished. Under the city's +department of licenses some of the more unscrupulous of these agencies +have been closed, and philanthropy has placed a visitor at the docks to +give aid and advice to unprotected girls. But the danger is by no means +over. Those familiar with the subject assert that there is a +proportionately larger black slave than white slave traffic. + +There is a gainful occupation for women, black and white, too important +to be left unnoticed. The census does not tabulate it. The best people +strive to ignore it, and carefully sheltered girls grow up unconscious +of its existence. But the employment agent understands its commercial +value, and little children in the red light neighborhood are as familiar +with it as with the vending of peanuts on the street. To the poor it is +always an open door affording at least a temporary respite from +dispossession and starvation. How many of the colored turn to it, we do +not know--certainly not a few. Some gain from it a meagre livelihood, +but others, for a time at least, achieve comfort and even luxury. + +Among the round pegs that the square holes so uncomfortably chafe are +colored girls of intelligence and charm who deliberately join the +anti-social class. Probably a few in any case would lead this life, but +the history of many shows an unsuccessful struggle for congenial work, +ending with a choice of material comfort however high the moral cost. In +One Hundred and Thirty-fourth and One Hundred and Thirty-fifth Streets +are apartments where such girls live, two or three together, surrounded +by comforts that their respectable neighbors who go out to cook, wash, +and iron may fruitlessly long for all their lives. A colored +philanthropic worker, stopping by chance at the door of one of these +places, saw an old college friend. "How can you do it!" she cried as she +recognized the life the girl was leading, "How can you do it! I would +rather kill myself scrubbing!" "There is the difference between us," +came the answer, "I am not willing to die, and I cannot and will not +scrub." + +It is pleasant and encouraging to turn from colored women who have given +up the struggle, to ambitious, successful workers. Some among these are +in the domestic service group and enjoy with heartiness their tasks as +nurse-maid or cook. "This is my piano day," an expert colored +washerwoman says of a Monday morning. Among the domestic service +workers, as classified by the census, is the trained nurse, filling an +increasingly important position in New York. In 1909, Lincoln Hospital +graduated twenty-one colored nurses, some of whom remain in New York to +do excellent work. + +In the professions, with the women as with the men, the first place +numerically is occupied by performers upon the stage. So much has been +said of the Negro as an actor that there is little to add. A rather +better class of colored than of white women join musical comedy chorus +troupes, for fifteen or eighteen dollars a week that will attract a +Negro to the stage can be made by a white girl in a dozen other ways. +Lightness of color seems a requisite for a stage position, unless a dark +skin is offset by very great ability, as in the case of Aida Walker, one +of the most graceful and charming women in musical comedy. + +No record is kept of the number of colored teachers in the city's public +schools, but each year Negro graduates from the normal college secure +positions. These are found from the kindergarten through the primary +and up to the highest grammar grade. The colored girl with intellectual +ability, particularly if she comes of an old New York family, is apt to +turn to teaching. Her novitiate is long, but a permanent certificate +secured, she is sure of a good salary, increasing with her years of +service, and ending in a pension. This path of security has perhaps +tended to keep New York colored girls from going into other lines of +work. I have not yet found one who has graduated from a university. +Pratt Institute and the Teachers' College have colored normal students, +but they are usually from the South or West, not New Yorkers born. + +Philanthropy is opening up important lines of opportunity to the Negro +woman in New York. In 1903, a colored graduate nurse secured an +interview with the Secretary of the New York Charity Organization +Society, and so ably presented to him the need of Negro visitors among +Negroes that she was appointed visiting nurse for the colored sick who +came under the notice of the Society. In time the position changed into +that of a colored district visitor, other colored nurses entering in +numbers into district nursing work. In 1910, three nurses were employed +by the Nurses' Settlement, two by the Association for Improving the +Condition of the Poor of Manhattan, and two by the District Nursing +Association of Brooklyn. With increased knowledge of the sickness and +suffering amid the Negro poor, and of their need of proper care in their +homes, the number of these nurses will doubtless increase. Colored women +rank high among the trained nurses of New York. + +Other philanthropic work lately has been undertaken by Negro women in +New York. In 1910, besides the nurses of whom we have spoken, there were +at the head of societies in salaried positions, two settlement workers, +two matrons of day nurseries, two matrons of homes in which much social +work was carried on, many employees in colored orphan asylums, a teacher +of domestic science in a home-keeping flat, a traveller's aid visitor, +a playground instructor, besides workers in various religious +organizations. This does not include the many colored women doing +social and recreation work in the public schools and on the city's +playgrounds. Indeed, the difficulty in New York is to secure trained +colored women for philanthropic work, the Negro's attitude still being +that of the great majority of white women a few years ago, that love for +children and a sentimental kindness constitute the requisites for work +among the poor. But the school of experience is training workers, and as +the schools of philanthropy of New York, Boston, and Chicago also +graduate colored students, we shall have in the North the intelligent, +trained workers whom we need. + +The little kindergarten girl who, with head erect, walked past the +jeering line of boys to the green trees and soft grass of the park has +her counterpart in many young women of New York. In 1909, a colored girl +graduated from one of the city's dental colleges, the first woman of her +race to take this degree in the state. From the first her success was +remarkable. Colored girls with ability and steady purpose and dogged +determination have won success in clerical and business work; but the +last large and efficient group is that classified in the census under +mechanical and manufacturing pursuits: the dressmakers, seamstresses, +milliners. + +Colored women have always been known as good sewers, and recently they +have studied at their trade in some of the best schools. From 1904 to +1910, the Manhattan Trade School graduated thirty-four colored girls in +dressmaking, hand sewing, and novelty making. The public night school on +West Forty-sixth Street, under its able colored principal, Dr. W. L. +Bulkley, since 1907, has educated hundreds of women in sewing, +dressmaking, millinery, and artificial flower-making. While the majority +of the pupils have taken the courses for their private use, a large +minority are entering the business world. They meet with repeated +difficulties; white girls refuse to work in shops with them, private +employers object to their color, but they have, nevertheless, made +creditable progress. The census reports the number of Negro dressmakers +to have quadrupled in the United States from 1890 to 1900. Something +comparable to this increase in dressmaking and allied trades has taken +place among the Negroes of New York, and it has come through education +and persistence, and the increase of trade among the colored group +itself. Numbers of these dressmakers and milliners earn a livelihood, +though often a scanty one, from the patronage of the people of their own +race. + +But despite her efforts and occasional successes, the colored girl in +New York meets with severer race prejudice than the colored man, and is +more persistently kept from attractive work. _She gets the job that the +white girl does not want._ It may be that the white girls want the wrong +thing, and that the jute mill and tobacco shop and flower factory are +more dangerous to health and right living than the mistress's kitchen, +but she knows her mind, and follows the business that brings her liberty +of action when the six o'clock whistle blows. What she desires for +herself, however, she refuses to her colored neighbor. Occasionally an +employer objects to colored girls, but the Manhattan Trade School +repeatedly, in trying to place its graduates, has found that opposition +to the Negro has come largely from the working girls. Race prejudice +has even gone so far as to prevent a colored woman from receiving home +work when it entailed her waiting in the same sitting-room with white +women. Of course, this is not the universal attitude. In friendly talks +with hundreds of New York's white women workers, I have found the +majority ready to accept the colored worker. Jewish girls are especially +tolerant. They believe that good character and decent manners should +count, not color; but an aggressive, combative minority is quite sure +that no matter how well educated or virtuous she may be, no black woman +is as good as a white one. So the few but belligerent aristocrats +triumph over the many half-ashamed, timid democrats. + +The shirtwaist makers' strike of 1910 was so profoundly important in its +breaking down of feeling between nationalities, its union of all working +women in a common cause, that the colored girl, while very slightly +concerned in the strike itself, may profit by the more generous feeling +it engendered. Certainly an entrance into store and workshop would be to +her immense advantage. She needs the discipline of regular hours, of +steady training, of order and system. She needs also to become part of a +strong labor group, to share its working class ideal, to feel the weight +of its moral opinion; instead of looking into the mirror of her wealthy +mistress, she needs to reflect the aspirations of the strong, earnest +women who toil. + +Before bringing the story of the life of the New York colored working +woman to a close, it may not be amiss to look closely at the +discrimination practised against her, not only in her work, but in her +daily life. The Negro comes North and finds himself half a man. Does the +woman, too, come to be but half a woman? What is her status in the city +to which she turns for opportunity and larger freedom? + +Four years ago, within a few hours' time, two stories were told me, +illustrative of the colored woman's status. Neither occurred in the city +of New York, but both are indicative of its temper. The first I heard +from a woman skilled in a difficult profession, a Canadian now residing +in the United States, and the descendant of a fugitive slave. Her +youthful companions had all been white, and while an African in the +darkness of her skin and her musical voice, her rearing had been that of +an Englishwoman. "Shortly after coming to New York, I went for the first +time," she told me, "to a little resort on the Jersey coast. A board +walk flanked the ocean, and on the other side were shops and places of +amusement. Going out one morning with two companions, a colored man and +woman, we turned into an enclosure to examine a gaily painted +merry-go-round. The place was open to the public, and a few nursery +maids with their charges were seated about. The man in our party, +interested in the mechanism of the machine, went up to it and began to +explain it to us. Quite suddenly a rough fellow, in charge of the place, +walked over and called out, 'Get out of here! We don't allow niggers.' +The attack, to me at least, was so overwhelming that I did not move at +once. Thereupon I was again called 'nigger,' and ordered out. + +"When I reached the beach, I asked my companions to leave me, and I sat +on a bench looking upon the waves. After a time an old woman came to my +side, and said a little timidly, 'What are you thinking about, dearie?' +Looking in her face I saw that she feared that I would commit suicide. +'I am thinking,' I said turning to her, 'that I wish the ocean might +rise up and drown every white person on the face of the earth.' 'Oh, you +mustn't say that,' she cried horrified, and left me. After I cannot tell +how many minutes or hours, I returned to my boarding-house, and then to +my home in New York. I had had a great many white friends in my native +home; I had played with them, eaten with them, slept with them. Now I +destroyed their letters, and resolved never to know them again. That was +my first affront in the United States, and while I have learned to feel +somewhat differently, a little to discriminate, I can never forget that +the white people in the North stand for the insult which was cast upon +me." + +On the evening of the same day I had learned of this happening, a man +from a prominent college in New York State told me of a Negro classmate. +"He was a pleasant, intelligent fellow from the South," he said, "and +while I never knew him well, I was always glad to see him. One day, at +commencement time, when we were all having our relatives about, he +boarded my car with a young colored woman, evidently his sister. Without +a thought I rose, lifted my hat, and gave her my seat. Never again shall +I see such a look of gratitude as that which lighted up his face when he +bowed in acknowledgment of my courtesy. It revealed the race question to +me, and yet I had performed only the simplest act of a gentleman." + +In these two incidents we see the undecided, perplexing position of the +Negro woman in New York. Today she may be turned out of a public resort +as a "nigger," tomorrow she may receive the dues of a gentlewoman. And +since, while I write, I hear the cry of a class in the community who +adjudge the expulsion necessary since the other course must lead at once +to social equality, I make haste to add that the second story did not +end in wedlock. As far as I have seen, it never does. Intermarriage of +white and black in New York is so slight as to be a negligible quantity, +but amalgamation between the two races is not uncommon. And this we may +say with certainty, the man most blatant against the "nigger" in New +York as all over the country is the man most ready to enter into illicit +relationship with the woman whom he claims to despise. The raising of +the hat to the colored woman brings a diminution in sexual immorality. + +If the Negro civilization of New York is to be lifted to a higher level, +the white race must consistently play a finer and more generous part +toward the colored woman. There are many inherent difficulties against +which she must contend. Slavery deprived her of family life, set her to +daily toil in the field, or appropriated her mother's instincts for the +white child. She has today the difficult task of maintaining the +integrity and purity of the home. Many times she has succeeded, often +she has failed, sometimes she has not even tried. A vicious environment +has strengthened her passions and degraded her from earliest girlhood. +Beyond any people in the city she needs all the encouragement that +philanthropy, that human courtesy and respect, that the fellowship of +the workers can give,--she needs her full status as a woman. + + +FOOTNOTES: + +[1] These figures are obtained by a combination of tables, one in +Population, Vol. II, Part II, p. 332, describing the whole of Greater +New York, the other in Women at Work, pp. 266 to 275, describing +Manhattan, the Bronx, and Brooklyn. The error through the omission of +Richmond and Queens is probably negligible. + +[2] Federal Census 1900: Women at Work, Table 28, pp. 266 to 274. Among +800 married and widowed colored women whom I myself visited, I found +only 150, 19 per cent, who were not engaged in gainful occupations. + +[3] Federal Census 1900: Women at Work, Table 10, pp. 147 to 151. + +[4] Federal Census 1900: Women at Work, Table 28, pp. 266 to 275. + +[5] This is incorporated in a chapter in Mr. Miller's volume on "Race +Adjustment." + + + + +CHAPTER VII + +RICH AND POOR + + +Of the many nations and races that dwell in New York none, with the +exception of the Chinese, is so aloof from us in its social life as the +Negro. The childish recollection of an old school friend, recently +related to me, well illustrates this. Across the way from where she +lived there was a house occupied by a family of mulattoes. They were the +quietest and least obtrusive people on the block, and the wife, who was +known to be very beautiful, on the rare occasions when she left her +home, was always veiled. The husband was little seen, and the child, a +shy boy, never played on the street. For years the family lived aloof +from their neighbors, the subject of hushed and mysterious questioning. + +Probably had one of the white women dropped in some day to say +good-morning or to borrow a recipe book, the mystery would have been +wholly dispelled,--a pity surely for the children. Few of New York's +citizens are so American as the colored, few show so little that is +unusual or picturesque. The educated Italian might have in his home some +relic of his former country, the Jew might show some symbol of his +religion; but the Negro, to the seeker of the unusual, would seem +commonplace. The colored man in New York has no associations with his +ancient African home, no African traditions, no folk lore. The days of +slavery he wishes completely to forget, even to the loss of his +exquisite plantation music. He is ambitious to be conventional in his +manners, his customs, striving as far as possible to be like his +neighbor--a distinctly American ambition. In consequence, after +indicating the lines along which he has achieved economic success, one +finds little to describe in the lives of the well-to-do that will be of +interest. And yet this sketch would be open to criticism if, after so +long a survey of the working class, it gave no space to those Negroes +who have achieved a fair degree of wealth and leisure; and perhaps the +very recital of the likeness of these people to those about them may be +of importance, for the great mass of white Americans are like a +vivacious Kentuckian of my acquaintance, who, on learning something of a +well-to-do Negro family, assured me that she knew less of such people +than she did of the Esquimaux. + +Mr. William Archer, in his book, "Through Afro-America," describes a +round of visits to southern Negro homes, where, with touching pride, his +hostesses show their material wealth, or rather the material wealth of +their race as embodied in drawing-room, dining-room, and bedroom. There +seemed to be nothing remarkable about the rooms unless their very +existence was remarkable. So the interiors of colored homes in New York +would reveal nothing to mark them from the homes of their neighbors, +save perhaps the universal presence of some musical instrument. In +Brooklyn, the Bronx, and in the Jersey suburbs, Negroes buy and rent +houses, sometimes with a few of their race in close proximity, sometimes +with white neighbors only on the block. Brooklyn seems always to have +shown less race antagonism than Manhattan (where, indeed, anything but +the apartment is beyond the pocket-book of people of modest means), and +it has been in Brooklyn for the past three generations that the +well-to-do colored families with their children have chiefly been found. + +Much pleasant hospitality and entertainment take place behind these +modest doors. Visitors are common, relatives from the east and west and +south, and little dinner and supper parties are numerous. If church +discipline does not interfere, the women have their afternoons of +whist, and despite church discipline, dancing is very common, few +entertainments proving successful without it. To play well upon some +musical instrument is almost a universal accomplishment, and, as with +the Germans, families and friends meet the oftener for this harmonious +bond. + +The social life of the well-to-do colored family generally centres about +the church, and with a regularity unusual among the white people, father +and mother and children attend the Sunday and week-day meetings. +Colored society is also at the period of the bazaar and fair, the +concert and dramatic entertainment. Money is raised by this means for +the church, the private charity, or to supplement the dues of the mutual +benefit society. There are a number of Negroes in the different large +cities who support themselves by concerts and readings, appearing at +benefits in the North and South, where they receive a third or a half of +the receipts. Amateur performances are also common. A young New York +college man, one winter evening, saw two refined, remarkably +well-dressed colored women turn in at the entrance of the Grand Central +Palace. Purchasing a ticket for the benefit, as it proved, of a colored +day nursery (the entertainment netted $2300), he followed them to find +himself in the Afro-American social world. For while the amateur dancing +and singing upon the stage were pretty and attractive, the young man was +far more interested in the audience. "And the disappointing thing about +it," he remarked in telling of it afterwards, "was that they were +exactly like other people." To use the newspaper phrase, "there was no +'story.'" They were a group of Americans, trained in the social +conventions of their own land. + +There are many secret and benefit societies among the Negroes in New +York. The Masons have nine meeting places; the Elks, ten lodges. The Odd +Fellows have twenty-two places of meeting. The United Order of True +Reformers, a strong Negro organization in the South, where it conducts +large business enterprises, has forty-four head-quarters in church and +hall and private house, where meetings are held twice a month. Many +benefit societies are closely associated with the churches. Colored men +and women are very busy with their multitudinous church and society and +benefit meetings. I remember once attending an evening service at a +colored church when the minister preached the sermon to the benefit +orders of St. Luke's and the Galilean Fishermen. The officers, some of +them carrying spears with blue and red and white trimmings, marched down +the aisle and took their seats at the front of the pulpit. Their leader +was in purple, wearing a huge badge like a breastplate with yellow and +green stones. The women, equally prominent with the men, were dressed +one in yellow with green over it, and broad purple bands, two in white +with golden crowns. The pageant was very pretty, even beautiful, but too +artless in its simple enjoyment of color and display for the +conventional society of New York, and the colored "four hundred" were +not in it. + +Who are the four hundred in New York's colored society? An outsider +would be very bold who should attempt to answer. Twenty-five years ago +the New Yorker born, especially the descendant of some prominent +anti-slavery worker, would have held foremost social position. The taint +of slavery was far removed from these people, who looked with scorn upon +arrivals from the South. Many were proud of their Indian blood, and told +of the freedom that came to their black ancestors who married Long +Island Indians. But these old New York colored families, sometimes +bearing historic Dutch and English names, have diminished in size and +importance as have the old white families beside them. The younger +generation has gone west, or has died and left no issue. And into the +city has come a continual stream of Southerners and more recently West +Indians, some among them educated, ambitious men and women, full of the +energy and determination of the immigrant who means to attain to +prominence in his new home. These new-comers occupy many of the pulpits, +are admitted to the bar, practise medicine, and become leaders in +politics, and their wives are quite ready to take a prominent part in +the social world. They meet the older residents, and the various groups +intermingle, though not without some friction. Like a country village, +the New York Negro social world knows the happenings of its neighbors, +gossips over their shortcomings, rejoices, though with something of +jealousy, over their successes, and has its cliques, its many leaders, +but also its broad-minded spirits who strive to bring the whole village +life into harmony. + +As we have learned from a study of the occupational life of the Negro, +the majority of men and women of means are in the professional class, or +in the city or federal service. Such positions do not carry with them +large incomes, and remembering the high cost of living in New York, and +the exorbitant rental paid by black men, we can see that, gauged by the +white man's standard, the Negro with his two or three or four thousand +dollars a year is poor. Yet with his very limited income the demands +upon him are enormous. In the first place, he must educate his children, +and this means a large expenditure, for only in the technical schools or +the college can his boy or girl be prepared for a successful career. The +white boy may find some business firm that will give him a chance of +advancement, but the colored boy must receive such an education as shall +fit him to start an enterprise by himself, unless he enters public +service. So the trade or professional school or college absorbs the +savings of many years. + +The church is another large recipient of the Negro's slender means. +Watching the dimes and quarters drop into the contribution plate as the +dark-faced congregation files past the pulpit on a Sunday evening, one +wonders whether any other people in America willingly give so large an +amount of their income to their religious organizations. And not only +will money be requested for the church's need, but special offerings +will be given to home and foreign mission work. In 1907, the African +Methodist Church alone raised $36,000 for home and foreign missions. The +Baptists raised $44,000. Educational work demands a share: the African +Methodists support twenty schools, the African Zion twelve, and the +Negro Baptists one hundred and twenty. The other denominations do their +share, and the Negroes also give to the schools conducted by white +churches for their people. This money comes from all over the country, +and the well-to-do New York Negro must contribute his part. + +Home charities also help to drain the Negro's purse. Manhattan and +Brooklyn have a number of colored philanthropies, orphan asylums, old +people's homes, rescue missions, Young Men's and Young Women's Christian +Associations, and social settlements. Some are supported entirely by +white people, but the greater number receive some contributions from the +colored, and a few are dependent for money upon that race alone. +Thousands of dollars are raised yearly, among the well-to-do New York +Negroes, for these institutions. + +Yet, with all these various philanthropic activities, one too frequently +hears that the Negro does not support his own charities. As though +anything of the sort could be expected of him! A little time ago, in +asking for money for settlement work among Negroes, I was asked in turn +by the exquisitely dressed woman before me, whose furs and gown and +jewels must have represented a year's salary of a school-teacher, the +type of wealthy woman among the colored, why the well-to-do Negroes did +not support the settlement themselves. No such question is asked when we +demand money for work among the Italians or the Jews, who have +incomparably larger means. Indeed, one may question whether the Negro is +not too generous for the materialistic city of New York, whether his +successes would not be greater were he niggardly toward himself and +others. He lives well, dresses well, enjoys a good play, strives to give +every advantage to his children, helps the poor of his race. To hold his +own today in this civilization, he needs to be taught to seek first +riches, waiting until much treasure has been laid up before he allows +philanthropy to draw upon his bank account. + +The traveller to the British West Indies finds three divisions among the +inhabitants, white, colored, and black, each group having a distinct +social status. In the United States, on the other hand, there are but +two groups, white and colored, or as the latter is now more frequently +designated, Negro, the term thus losing its original meaning, and +becoming a designation for a race. But while the white race usually +makes no social distinction between the light and the dark Negro, +classing all alike, social lines are drawn within the color line. Years +ago these were more common than they are now. Charles W. Chesnutt, the +novelist, tells some amusing and pathetic stories of distinctions +between colored and black. One of his mulatto heroes, upon finding, as +he thinks, that the congressman who is to call upon his daughter is a +jet black Negro instead of the mulatto he was supposed to be, to prevent +a breach of hospitality, invents a case of diphtheria in the family +and quarantines the house, only to learn later, to his intense +mortification, that he has committed a mistake of identification, and +that the congressman is light after all. But this story belongs with the +last generation. Black men, if they are distinguished citizens, can +enter any colored society, and they not infrequently marry light wives. +Success, a position of probity and importance, these are attributes that +count favorably for the suitor, and as they are quite as often in the +man of strong African lineage as in the mulatto, they gain the desired +end. + +Within this little colored world of a few thousand souls, a drop in the +city's human sea, there is great upheaval and turmoil. The North is the +Negro's centre for controversy regarding his rightful position in the +commonwealth; and in the large cities, in Boston and Chicago, +Philadelphia and New York, the battle rages. The little society is +often divided into hostile camps regarding party politics or the +acceptance of a government position that brings the suspicion of a +bribe. Political, economic, educational matters as they affect the black +race, these are the subjects that fill the mind of the thoughtful +colored man and woman. + +In his "Souls of Black Folk," Dr. Du Bois describes the white man's +tactlessness when, as always, he approaches the Negro with a question +regarding his race. But the Negro, apart from his personal home +affairs, impresses the outsider as having little else as subject for +conversation. World politics, these concern him only as they affect the +race question. Australia is a country where the government excludes +Africans. England rules in South Africa and has lately recognized the +right of African disfranchisement. Germany in Africa is cruel to black +men. The Latin people know no color line. At home, the conflict of +capital and labor is important as the Negro wins or loses in the +economic struggle; the enfranchisement of woman is wise or unwise as it +would affect Negro enfranchisement, one colored thinker arguing against +it since it would double the white vote in the South where the Negro has +no political rights; literature is the poetry of Dunbar, the writing of +Washington and Du Bois, the literature of the Negro question, and art is +largely comprised in Tanner's paintings. + +This picture should not imply that the colored people of means are +without the possibility of wide culture and sympathy. They are perhaps +more sympathetic by nature than the white people about them. But each +year, as the white American grows increasingly conscious of race, as he +argues on racial differences, the Negro feels his dark face, is +sensitive to every disdainful look, and separates himself from the +people about him and their problems. + +There is a struggle against this. The majority of white people have +heard, in a vague way, that there is a difference of opinion in the +Negro world; and again, vaguely, that it takes the form of opposition to +Dr. Booker T. Washington and industrial training. But the difference of +opinion among the Negroes is a difference of ideals, and reaches far +beyond the controversy of industrial or cultural training, or the +question of individual leadership. It is difficult to formulate, +inasmuch as few, if any, Negroes hold logically to one ideal wholly to +the exclusion of the other. They cannot be logical and live. But their +division into radical and conservative is too important to omit; +especially since, as we have seen, there is nothing in their social life +to distinguish them from their neighbors; only in their thoughts are +they aloof from us--aliens upon whose shoulders is the problem of a +race. + +How can one explain these two ideals? Roughly, they accept or reject +segregation. The first looks upon the black man in America, for many +generations at least, as a race apart. Recognizing this, the race must +increasingly grow in self-efficiency. It must run its own businesses, +own its banks, its groceries, its restaurants, have its dressmakers, +milliners, tailors; it must establish factories where it shall employ +only colored men and women; its children shall be brought into the +world by colored doctors, taught by colored teachers, buried by colored +undertakers. Education, along industrial lines, shall help train the +worker to this efficiency, and a proper race pride shall give him the +patronage of the Negroes about him. When, as will of course happen in +the majority of cases, the Negro works for the white man, he must +consider himself and his race. He must not go out on strike when the +white man strives for higher wages; he is justified, if he is willing to +risk a broken head, in filling the place of the striking workman, for he +has to look after his own concerns. + +The second point of view resists segregation. It believes that the Negro +should never cease to struggle against being treated as a race apart, +that he should demand the privileges of a citizen, free access to all +public institutions, full civil and political rights. As a workman, he +should have the opportunity of other workmen, his training should be the +training of his white neighbor, and in business and the professions he +should strive to serve white as well as black. And just as in the +battle-field he fights in a common cause with his white comrade, so in +the struggle for better working class conditions he should stand by the +side of the laborer, regardless of race. Believing these things and +finding that America fails to meet his demands, he thinks it should be +his part to struggle for his ideal, vigorously to protest against +discrimination, and never, complacent, to submit to the position of +inferiority. + +As I have said, few men hold logically to either of these ideals, and as +that of acquiescence to present conditions is naturally popular with the +whites, who are themselves responsible for discrimination, material +success sometimes means a departure from the aggressive to the +submissive attitude. However, the whole question of the Negro as a wage +earner is yet scarcely understood by this small professional and +business class. They are in turmoil, in a virile struggle, harsh, +bewildering, baffling. + +"I cannot conceive what it would mean not to be a Negro," a prominent +New York colored man once said to me. "The white people think and feel +so little; their life lacks an absorbing interest." + +This is the characteristic fact of the life of the well-to-do Negro in +New York. He is not permitted to go through the city streets in easy +comfort of body or mind. Some personal rebuff, some harsh word in +newspaper or magazine, quickens his pulse and rouses him from the +lethargy that often overtakes his comfortable white neighbor. Looking +into the past of slavery, watching the coming generation, the most +careless of heart is forced into serious questioning. A comfortable +income and the intelligence to enjoy the culture of a great city do not +bring to the Negro any smug self-satisfaction; only a greater +responsibility toward the problem that moves through the world with his +dark face. + +Before turning to our last topic, the Negro and the Municipality, we +ought to note two further characteristics of the Negro in New York. + +There are certain statistics quoted by every writer upon the Negro, +statistics of mortality and crime. We have noted these for the child, +but not as yet for the Negroes as a whole. They have been left until +this point in our study that we may view them in relation to what we +have learned of the Negro's economic condition and his environment. + +Looking for criminal statistics first, we find them difficult to obtain +in New York. The courts' reports do not classify by color, but we can +learn something from the census enumeration of 1904 of the prisoners in +the New York County Penitentiary and the New York County Workhouse. +These are short term offenders sent up from the city of New York. The +enumeration is as follows: + + NEW YORK COUNTY PENITENTIARY (BLACKWELL'S ISLAND) + + ======================================================== + | Total | Males | Females | Per cent | Per cent + | | | | Total | Females + --------+--------+-------+---------+----------+--------- + White | 582 | 533 | 49 | 91.8 | 8.4 + Colored | 52 | 33 | 19 | 8.2 | 36.5 + ======================================================== + + NEW YORK COUNTY WORKHOUSE + + ======================================================== + White | 1126 | 870 | 256 | 96.5 | 22.7 + Colored | 41 | 12 | 29 | 3.5 | 70.7 + ======================================================== + +In view of the proportion of Negroes to whites in Manhattan, two per +cent, we find the percentage of colored prisoners high, but no higher +than we expect when we remember that the Negro occupies the lowest plane +in the industrial community, "the plane which everywhere supplies the +jail, the penitentiary, the gallows."[1] But the very large percentage +of crime among colored women calls for grave consideration. In the +workhouse, imprisoned for fighting, for drunkenness, for prostitution, +the colored women more than double in number the colored men. Here is a +condition that we noted in the Children's Court records: an unduly large +percentage of disorderly and depraved colored female offenders. + +We have already touched upon the subject of morality among colored +women. Various causes, some of which we have noted, go to the making up +of this high percentage of crime. The Negroes themselves believe the +basic cause to be their recent enslavement with its attendant unstable +marriage and parental status. They point to the centuries of healthful +home relationships among Americans and Europeans, and contrast them +with the thousands upon thousands of yearly sales of slaves that but two +generations ago disrupted the Negro's attempts at family life. With this +heritage they believe that it is inevitable that numbers of their women +should be slow to recognize the sanctity of home and the importance of +feminine virtue. + +The mortality figures for the New York Negro are more striking than the +figures for crime. In 1908 the death rate for whites in the city was +16.6 in every thousand; for colored (including Chinese), 28.9, almost +double the white rate. The Negroes' greatest excess over the white was +in tuberculosis, congenital debility, and venereal diseases as the table +on the following page shows. + +The Negro's inherent weakness, his inability to resist disease, is a +favorite topic today with writers on the color question. A high +mortality is indeed a matter for grave concern, but we may question +whether these figures show inherent weakness. If a new disease attacks +any group of people, it causes terrible decimation, and tuberculosis and +venereal diseases, the white man's plagues, have proved terribly +destructive to the black man. But recalling the conditions under which +the great majority of the colored race lives in New York, the long hours +of labor, the crowded rooms, the insufficient food, we find abundant +cause for a high death rate. For poverty and death go hand in hand, and +the proportion of Negroes in New York who, live in great poverty far +exceeds the proportion of whites.[2] + + ===================================================== + New York, 1908. | White. | Colored. + ----------------------------------+--------+--------- + Number of deaths from all causes | | + per 1000 population | 16.6 | 28.9 + Number of deaths per 1000 deaths: | | + Tuberculosis | 136. | 232.8 + Pneumonia | 126. | 136.3 + Diarrhoea and enteritis | 91.8 | 79. + Bright's disease | 78.3 | 56.5 + Heart disease | 76.7 | 83.4 + Cancer | 45.5 | 24.8 + Congenital debility | 24.5 | 34.1 + Diphtheria and croup | 23.7 | 15. + Scarlet fever | 19. | 3.2 + Typhoid | 7.3 | 6.9 + Venereal diseases | 4. | 13.4 + All others | 367.2 | 314.6 + +--------+--------- + | 1000.0 | 1000.0 + ===================================================== + +The students at Hampton Institute sing an old plantation song that runs +like this: + + "If religion was a thing that money could buy, + The rich would live and the poor would die. + But my good Lord has fixed it so + The rich and the poor together must go." + +Some of our rich men seem to have fixed it with religion to escape from +the condition the poem describes, but it depicts a reality in the +Negro's life. Rich and poor, as we saw when we left our old New Yorkers, +competent and inefficient, pure and diseased, good and bad, all go +together. Much of the recent literature written by Negroes, and +especially that by Dr. Booker T. Washington, attempts to separate in the +minds of the community the thrifty and prosperous colored men from the +helpless and degraded; but the effort meets with a limited success. When +we can have a statistical study of some thousands of the well-to-do +Negroes compared with an equal number of well-to-do whites, we may find +striking similarity. From my own observations I find that the well-to-do +Negroes bear and rear children, refrain from committing crimes that put +them into jail, and live to an old age with the same success as their +white neighbors. But they get little credit for it. Willy-nilly, the +strong, intellectual Negro is linked to his unfortunate fellow. Whether +an increase in material prosperity will break this bond, or whether it +will continue until it ceases to be a bond as humanity comes into its +own, is a secret of the future. For today the song rings true, and the +rich and the poor go together. + + +FOOTNOTES: + +[1] Quincy Ewing, "The Heart of the Race Problem," _Atlantic Monthly_, +March, 1909. + +[2] The statistician, Mr. I. B. Rubinow, in a discussion of high death +rates (American Statistical Association, December, 1905) quotes the rate +in five agricultural districts in a province of Russia, districts +inhabited by peasantry of a common stock. With almost mathematical +certainty, prosperity brings longer life. He divides his peasants into +six groups showing their death rate as follows: + + Death Rate + Having no land 34.7 + Less than 13.5 acres 32.7 + 13.5 to 40.5 acres 30.1 + 40.5 to 67.5 acres 25.4 + 67.5 acres to 135 acres 23.1 + More than 135 acres 19.2 + +Mr. Rubinow suggests that the high Negro death rate may be explained by +noting the poorly paid occupations in which the Negro engages. + + + + +CHAPTER VIII + +THE NEGRO AND THE MUNICIPALITY + + +A capricious mood, varying with the individual, considerate today and +offensive tomorrow, this, as far as our observations have led us, has +been New York's attitude toward the Negro. Is it possible to find any +principle underlying this shifting position? The city expresses itself +through the individual actions of its changing four millions of people, +but also through its government, its courts of justice, its manifold +public activities. Out of these various manifestations of the +community's spirit can we find a Negro policy? Has New York any +principle of conduct toward these her colored citizens? This question +should be worth our consideration, for New York's attitude means its +environmental influence, and helps determine for the newly arrived +immigrant and the growing generation whether justice or intolerance +shall mark their dealings with the black race. + +The first matter of civic importance to the Negro, as to every other New +York resident, is his position in the commonwealth; is he a participant +in the government under which he lives, or a subject without political +rights? The law since 1873 has been explicit on this matter, wiping out +former property qualifications, and giving full manhood suffrage. +Probably, even with a much larger influx of colored people, the city +will never agitate this question again. Since the death of the +Know-nothing Party, New York has ceased any organized attempt to lessen +the power of the foreigner, and the growing cosmopolitan character of +the population strengthens the Negro in his rights. Only in those states +where the white population is homogeneous can Negro disfranchisement +successfully take place. + +With the vote the Negro has entered into politics and has maintained +successful political organizations. The necessity of paying for rent and +food out of eight or ten dollars a week is the Negro's immediate issue +in New York, and he tries to meet it by securing a congenial and more +lucrative job. The city in 1910 showed some consideration for him in +this matter. An Assistant District Attorney and an Assistant Corporation +Counsel were colored, and scattered throughout the city departments were +nine clerks making from $1200 to $1800 apiece, and a dozen more acting +as messengers, inspectors, drivers, attendants, receiving salaries +averaging $1275. Three doctors served the Board of Health, and there +were six men on the police force (none given patrol duty), and one first +grade fireman, while the departments of docks, parks, street cleaning, +and water supply employed 470 colored laborers. Altogether 511 colored +men figure among the city's employees.[1] + +In her communal gifts the city acts toward the Negro with a fair degree +of impartiality. At the public schools and libraries, the parks and +playgrounds, the baths, hospitals, and, last, the almshouse, the blacks +have equal rights with the whites. Occasionally individual public +servants show color prejudice, but again, occasionally, especial +kindness attends the black child. The rude treatment awaiting them, +however, from other visitors keeps many Negro children, and men and +women, from enjoying the city's benefactions. Particularly is this true +with the public baths and with some of the playgrounds. The employment +by the city of at least one colored official in every neighborhood where +the Negroes are in great numbers would do much to remedy this condition. + +One department of the city might be cited as having been an exception to +the rule of reasonably fair treatment to the colored man. Harshness, for +no cause but his black face, has been too frequently bestowed upon the +Negro by the police. This has been especially noticeable in conflicts +between white and colored, when the white officer, instead of dealing +impartially with offenders, protected his own race. + +There have been two conflicts between the whites and Negroes in New York +in recent years, the first in 1900, on the West Side, in the forties, +the second in 1905, on San Juan Hill. Each riot was local, representing +no wide-spread excitement comparable to the draft riots of 1863, and in +each case the police might easily in the beginning have stopped all +fighting. Instead, they showed themselves ready to aid, even to +instigate the conflict. + +The riot of 1900 was caused by the death of a policeman at the hands of +a Negro. The black man declared that he was defending his life, but the +officer was popular, and after his funeral riots began. Black men ran to +the police for protection, and were thrown back by them into the hands +of the mob.[2] + +The riot of 1905 commenced on San Juan Hill one Friday evening in July +with a fracas between a colored boy and a white peddler; both races took +a hand in the matter until the side streets showed a rough scrambling +fight. Saturday and Sunday were comparatively quiet; men, black and +white, stood on street corners and scowled at one another, but nothing +further need have occurred, had each race been treated with justice. +The police, however, instead of keeping the peace, angered the Negroes, +urged on their enemies, and by Monday night found that they had helped +create a riot, this time bitter and dangerous. Overzealous to proceed +against the "niggers," officers rushed into places frequented by +peaceable colored men, whom they placed under arrest. Dragging their +victims to the station-house they beat them so unmercifully that before +long many needed to be handed over to another city department--the +hospital. Little question was made as to guilt or innocence, and some of +the worst offenders, colored as well as white, were never brought to +justice.[3] "If," as a colored preacher whose church was the centre of +the storm district pointed out, "the police would only differentiate +between the good and the bad Negroes, and not knock on the head every +colored man they saw in a riot, we should be quite satisfied. As it is, +there is no safety for any Negro in this part of the city at any +time."[4] + +The result of these two riots was the bringing to justice of one +policeman and the placing of a humane and tactful captain on San Juan +Hill. But for some time the colored man felt little protection in the +Department of Police, finding that he was liable to arrest and clubbing +for a trivial offence. Often the officer's club fell with cruel force. +This, however, was before the administration of Mayor Gaynor, who has +commanded humane treatment, and the brutal clubbing of the New York +Negro has now ceased. + +From the police one turns naturally to the courts. What is their +attitude toward the Negro offender? Is there any race prejudice, or do +black and white enjoy an impartial and judicial hearing? + +As the Negro comes before the magistrates of the city courts, he learns +to know that judges differ greatly in their conceptions of justice. To +the Southerner, let us say from Richmond, where the black man is +arrested for small offences and treated with considerable roughness and +harshness, New York courts seem lenient.[5] To the West Indian, +accustomed to British rule, justice in New York is noticeable for its +variability, the likelihood that if it is severe tonight, it will be +generous tomorrow. + +"Three months," the listener at court hears given as sentence to a +respectable-looking colored servant girl who has begged to be allowed to +return to her place which she has held for five years. "I never was up +for drinking before," she pleads; "I have learnt my lesson; please give +me a chance; I will not do this again." + +"What should you two be fighting for?" another judge, another morning, +says to two very battered women, one white and one colored, who come +before him in court. And talking kindly to both, but with greater +seriousness to the Irish offender, his own countrywoman, he sends them +away with a reprimand. + +How much of this unequal treatment comes from color prejudice or +caprice or temperament, the Negro is unable to decide, but he soon +learns one curious fact: while his black skin marks him as inheriting +Republican politics, it is the Democratic magistrate, the Tammany +henchman whose name is a byword to the righteous, who is the more +lenient when he has committed a trifling offence. + +"Didn't I play craps with the nigger boys when I was a kid?" one of +these well-known politicians says, "and am I going back on the poor +fellows now?" Of course, the Negro is assured such men only want his +vote, but he believes real sympathy actuates the Tammany leader, who is +too busy to bother whether the man before him is black or white. The +reformer, on the other hand, big with dignity, at times makes him vastly +uncomfortable as he lectures upon the Negro problem from the eminence of +the superior race. + +But whether Republican or Democrat, the Negro learns that it is well to +have a friend at court; that helplessness is the worst of all +disabilities, worse than darkness of skin or poverty. So he soon +becomes acquainted with his local politician, and if his friend is in +trouble, or his wife or son is locked up, pounds vigorously at the +politician's door. It may be midnight, but the man of power will dress, +and together they will turn from the dark tenement hall into the lighted +street and on to the police-station or magistrate's court to seek +release for the offender. That too often the gravity of the offence +weighs little in the securing of lenient treatment is part of the muddle +of New York justice. The Negro finds that he has taken the most direct +way to secure relief. + +As far as we have followed, we have found the municipality of New York +generally ready to treat her black citizens with the same justice or +injustice with which she treats her whites. Exceptions occur, but she +does not often draw the color line. Perhaps, in this connection, it +might be well to stop a moment and see what return the black man makes, +whether by his vote he helps secure to the city honest and efficient +government. + +Walking through a Negro quarter on election day, the most careful +search fails to reveal any such far-sighted altruism. With a great +majority of colored voters the choice of a municipal candidate is based +on the argument of a two-dollar bill or the promise of a job, combined +with the sentiment, decreasing every year, for the Republican Party--the +party that once helped the colored man and, he hopes, may help him +again. The public standing of the mayoralty candidate, his ability to +choose wise heads of departments, the building of new subways, the +ownership of public utilities, these are unimportant issues. The matter +of immediate moment is what this vote is going to mean to the black +voter himself. + +Such a selfish and unpatriotic attitude, not unknown perhaps to white +voters, leads some of our writers and reformers to doubt the value of +universal manhood suffrage. Mr. Ray Stannard Baker tells us that the +Negro and the poor white in New York, through their venality, are +practically without a vote. "While the South is disfranchising by +legislation," he says, "the North is doing it by cash." "What else is +the meaning of Tammany Hall and the boss and machine system in other +cities?"[6] New York's noted ethical culture teacher argues against +agitation for woman's suffrage on the ground that so many of those who +now have the vote do not know how to use it. But looking closely at +these unaltruistic citizens, we see that after all they are putting the +ballot to its primary use, the protection of their own interests. The +Negro in New York has one vital need, steady, decent work. He dickers +and plays with politics to get as much of this as he can. It is very +insufficient relief for an intolerable situation, but it is partial +relief. In another city, Atlanta for instance, he might find education +the most important civic gift for which to strive. Atlanta is a +fortunate city to choose for an example of the power of the suffrage, +for since the Negro's loss of the vote in Georgia, educational funds +have been turned chiefly to white schools, and 5,000 colored children +are without opportunities for public education. 1885 saw the last school +building erected for Negroes, the result of a bargain between the +colored voters and the prohibitionists.[7] Should a colored teacher in +New York be refused her certificate, a colored consumptive be denied a +place in the city's hospital, a colored child meet with a rebuff in the +city park, the colored citizen would find his vote an important means +of redress. Then, too, while there are so many men to buy, it is +important to have a vote to sell, lest the other citizens secure the +morning's bargains. Venality in high and low places will not disappear +until we are dominated by the ideal of social, not individual +advancement. Before that time, it is well for the weak that they are +able, at least in the political field, to bargain with the strong. + +The importance to the Negro of the vote is quickly appreciated when we +consider New York's attitude unofficially expressed. With the franchise +behind him the colored man can secure for himself and his children the +municipality's advantages of education, health, amusement, philanthropy. +He is here a citizen, a contributor to the city treasury, if not +directly as a taxpayer, as a worker and renter. But as a private +individual, seeking to use the utilities managed by other private +individuals, he continually encounters race discrimination. Private +doors are closed, and were the state not so wealthy and generous, +disabilities still graver than at present would follow. + +A few examples will show the condition. A Negro applies by letter for +admission to an automobile school, and is accepted; but on appearing +with his fee his color debars his entrance. Carrying the case to court, +the complaint is dismissed on the ground that the law which forbade +exclusion from places of education on account of race and color is +applicable only to public schools. Private institutions may do as they +desire. + +Again, a colored man tries to get a meal. At the first restaurant he is +told that all the tables are engaged; at the next no one will serve him. +Fearful of further rebuffs, he has to turn to the counter of a railway +station. He wants to go to the theatre. Like Tommy Atkins, he is sent to +the gallery or round the music halls. The white barber whose shop he +enters will not shave him; and when night comes, he searches a long time +before the hotel appears that will give him a bed. The sensitive man, +still more the sensitive woman, often finds the city's attitude +difficult to endure. + +American Negroes have become familiar with racial lines, but the +foreigner of African descent, a visitor to the city, meets with rebuffs +that fill him with surprise as well as rage. Haytians and South +Americans, men of continental education and wide culture, have been +ordered away as "niggers" from restaurant doors, and at the box office +of the theatre refused an orchestra seat. English Negroes from the West +Indies, men and women of character and means, learn that New York is a +spot to be avoided, and cross the ocean when they wish to taste of city +life. In short, the stranger of Negro descent, if he be rash of temper, +hurls anathemas at the villainously mannered Americans; or, if he be +good-natured, shrugs his shoulders and counts New York a provincial +settlement of four million people. + +Northern Negroes believe this discrimination in public places against +the black man to be increasing in New York. One, who came here fifteen +years ago, tells of the simple and adequate test by which he learned +that he had reached the northern city. Born in South Carolina, as he +attained manhood he desired larger self-expression, broader human +relations--he wanted "to be free," as he again and again expressed it. +So leaving the cotton fields he started one morning to walk to New York. +After a number of days he entered a large city and, uncertain in his +geography, decided that this was his journey's end. "I'll be free here," +he thought, and opening the door of a brightly lighted restaurant +started to walk in. The white men at the tables looked up in +astonishment, and the proprietor, laying his hand on the youth's +shoulder, invited him, in strong southern accent, to go into the +kitchen. "I reckon I'm not North yet," the Negro said, smiling a bright, +boyish smile. Interested in his visitor's appearance, the proprietor +took him into another room, gave him a good supper, and talked with him +far into the night, urging the advantages of his staying in the South. +But the youth shook his head, and the next morning trudged on. At length +he reached a rushing city, tumultuous with humanity, and entering an +eating-house was served a meal. To him it was almost a sacrament. He +belonged not to a race but to humanity. He tasted the freedom of +passing unnoticed. But it is doubtful if the same restaurant would serve +him today. + +Color lines, on these matters of entertainment as on others, are not +hard and fast. A few hotels, chiefly those frequented by Latin people, +receive colored guests; and while the foreign Negro meets with rudeness, +he is rebuffed less than the native. "I can't get into that place as a +southern darky," a black man laughingly says, pointing to a fashionable +restaurant, "I'll be the Prince of Abyssinia." But as Prince or American +his status is shifting and uncertain; here, preeminently, he is half a +man. + +Discrimination against any man because of his color is contrary to the +law of the state. After the fifteenth amendment became a law, New York +passed a civil rights bill, which as it stands, re-enacted in 1909, is +very explicit. All persons within the jurisdiction of the state are +entitled to the accommodation of hotels, restaurants, theatres, music +halls, barbers' shops, and any person refusing such accommodation is +subject to civil and penal action. The offence may be punished by fine +or imprisonment or both.[8] + +In 1888, the attempt to exclude three colored men from a skating-rink at +Binghamton, N. Y., led to a suit against the owner of the rink, and his +conviction. The case[9] reached the Court of Appeals, where the +constitutionality of the civil rights bill was upheld. "It is evident," +said Justice Andrews in his decision, "that to exclude colored people +from places of public resort on account of their race is to fix upon +them a brand of inferiority, and tends to fix their position as a +servile and dependent people." + +But despite the law and precedent, the civil rights bill is violated in +New York. Occasionally colored men bring suit, but the magistrate +dismisses the complaint. Usually the evidence is declared insufficient. +A case of a colored man refused orchestra seats at a theatre is +dismissed on the ground that not the proprietor but his employees turned +the man away. A keeper of an ice-cream parlor, wishing to prevent the +colored man from patronizing him, charges a Negro a dollar for a +ten-cent plate. The customer pays the dollar, keeps the check, and +brings the case to court. Ice-cream parlors are then declared not to +come under the list of places of public entertainment and amusement. A +bootblack refuses to polish the shoes of a Negro, and the court decides +that a bootblack-stand is not a place of public accommodation, and +refusal to shine the shoes of a colored man does not subject its +proprietor to the penalties imposed by the law.[10] This last case was +carried to the Court of Appeals, and the adverse judgment has led many +of the thoughtful colored men of the city to doubt the value of +attempting to push a civil rights suit. Litigation is expensive, and +money spent in any personal rights case that attacks private business, +whether the plaintiff be white or colored, is usually wasted. The civil +rights law is on the books, and the psychological moment may arrive to +insist successfully on its enforcement. + +If there is an increase in discrimination against the Negro in New York +solely because of his color, it is a serious matter to the city as well +as to the race. Every community has its social conscience built up of +slowly accumulated experiences, and it cannot without disaster lose its +ideal of justice or generosity. New York has never been tender to its +people, but it has a rough hospitality, what Stevenson describes as +"uncivil kindness," and welcomes new-comers with a friendly shove, +bidding them become good Americans. After the war, the Negro entered +more than formerly into this general welcome. He was unnoticed, allowed +to go his way without questioning word or stare, the position which +every right-minded man and woman desires. But today New York has become +conscious that he is dark-skinned, and her attitude affects her growing +children. "I never noticed colored people," an old abolitionist said to +me, "I never realized there were white and black until, when a boy of +twelve, I entered a church and found Negroes occupying seats alone in +the gallery." As New York returns to the gallery seats, her boys and +girls return to consciousness of color and, from fisticuffs at school, +move on to the race riots upon the streets with bullets among the +stones. + +The municipality, as we have seen, treats the Negro on the whole with +justice; its standard is higher than the standard of the average +citizen. It cherishes the ideal of democracy, and strives for +impartiality toward its many nationalities and races. And the New York +Negro in his turn does not allow his liberties to be tampered with +without protest. But the New York citizen can hardly be described as +friendly to the Negro. What catholicity he has is negative. He fails to +give the black man a hearty welcome. "Do you know where I stayed the +four weeks of my first trip abroad?" a colored clergyman once asked me. +I refused to make a guess. "Well," he said a little shamefacedly, "it +was in Paris. Paris may be a wicked city--any city has wickedness if you +want to look for it--but I found it a place of kindliness and good-will. +Every one seemed glad to be courteous, to assist me in my stumbling +French, to show me the way on omnibus or boat, or through the difficult +streets. It was so different from America; I was never wanted in the +southern city of my youth. In Paris I was welcome." + +"How is it in New York?" I asked. + +"In New York?" He stopped to consider. "In New York I am tolerated." + + +FOOTNOTES: + +[1] The total number of municipal employees is 55,006--Negro employees, +511--Percentage of Negro to whole, 0.9. + +[2] "Story of the Riot," published by Citizens Protective League. + +[3] New York _Age_, July 27, 1905. + +[4] New York _Tribune_, July 24, 1905. + +[5] A southern student says, "The Negro in Richmond is arrested for +small offences and fined in the city courts. He is treated with +considerable roughness and harshness in his punishment for these +offences. It looks as though he were being imposed upon as an individual +of the lower strata of society. But the Negro responds so impulsively to +what appeals, that constant fear, dread, and impressiveness of the +police act well as resistants to temptations." + +[6] Ray Stannard Baker, "Following the Color Line," p. 269. + +[7] The following story of Athens, Georgia, told by a Northerner +teaching in the South, illustrates this point. "The city of Athens was +planning to inaugurate a public school system, and also wished to 'go +dry.' It made a proposal to the colored voters promising that if their +combined vote would carry the city, two schools should be built, of +equal size and similar structure for each race. I visited Athens shortly +after the two buildings were built, and I found two beautiful brick +buildings very similar in all their appointments. At an interval of +several years I again visited the little city and again spent an hour in +the same brick school-house of the colored folk. + +"At my third visit, I found my colored friends occupying a wooden +structure on the edge of the city, and not only inconveniently located, +but much less of a building than the one hitherto occupied. Upon inquiry +I found that in the growth of the school population of the whites, it +was cheaper to seize the building formerly occupied by the colored +children, and to build for them a cheap wooden structure on the +outskirts of the town. + +"The colored school was still occupying this inadequate building at my +visit this last September, 1909. A second wooden structure has been +added to the colored equipment on the east side of the town." + +This story of the Athenians well illustrates what will be done when the +Negro counts for something politically, and also what may be undone if +his value as a political asset is reduced. + +[8] Civil Rights Law, State of New York. Chapter 14 of the Laws of +1909, being Chapter 6 of the Consolidated Laws. + +"Article 4.--Equal rights in places of public amusement. + +"Section 40.--All persons within the jurisdiction of this state shall be +entitled to the full and equal accommodations, advantages, facilities, +and privileges of inns, restaurants, hotels, eating houses, bath houses, +barber shops, theatres, music halls, public conveyances on land and +water, and all other places of public accommodation or amusement, +subject only to the conditions and limitations, established by the law +and applicable alike to all citizens. + +"Section 41.--Penalty for violation. Any person who shall violate any of +the provisions of the foregoing section by denying to any citizen, +except for reasons applicable alike to all citizens of every race, creed +and color, and regardless of race, creed and color, the full enjoyment +of any of the accommodations, advantages, facilities or privileges in +said section enumerated, or by aiding or inciting such denial, shall, +for every such offence, forfeit and pay a sum not less than one hundred +dollars nor more than five hundred dollars to the person aggrieved +thereby, to be recovered in a court of competent jurisdiction in the +County where said offence was committed, and shall also, for every such +offence, be deemed guilty of a misdemeanor, and upon conviction thereof +shall be fined not less than one hundred dollars nor more than five +hundred dollars, or shall be imprisoned not less than thirty days nor +more than ninety days, or both such fine and imprisonment." + +[9] People _vs._ King, 110 N. Y., 418, 1888. + +[10] Burke _vs._ Bosso, 180 N. Y., 341, 1905. + + + + +CHAPTER IX + +CONCLUSION + + +A new little boy came two years ago into our story-book world. When Miss +North, taking Ezekiel by the hand, led him into her school-room,[1] we +met a child full of what we call temperament; dreaming quaint stories, +innocently friendly, anxious to please for affection's sake, in his +queer, unconscious way something of a genius. We saw his big musing eyes +looking out upon a world in which his teacher stood serene and +reasoning, but a little cold like her name; his friend, Miss Jane, kind +and very practical; his employer, Mr. Rankin, amused and contemptuous; +all watching him with the impersonal interest with which one might view +a new species in the animal world. For Ezekiel, unlike our other +story-book boys, had a double being, he was first Ezekiel Jordan, a +little black boy, and second, a Representative of the Negro Race. + +Ezekiel was too young to understand his position, but the white world +about him never forgot it. When he arrived late to school, he was a +dilatory representative; when, obliging little soul, he promised three +people to weed their gardens all the same afternoon, he was a +prevaricating representative. He never happened to steal ice-cream from +the hoky-poky man or to play hookey, but if he had, he would have been a +thieving and lazy representative. Always he was something remote and +overwhelming, not a natural growing boy. + +Ezekiel's position is that of each Negro child and man and woman in the +United States today. I think we have seen this as we have reviewed the +position of the race in New York; indeed, the very fact of our +attempting such a review is patent that we see and feel it. We white +Americans do not generalize concerning ourselves, we individualize, +leaving generalizations to the chance visitor, but we generalize +continually concerning colored Americans; we classify and measure and +pass judgment, a little more with each succeeding year. + +Now if we are going to do this, let us be fair; let us try as much as +possible to dismiss prejudice, and to look at the Ezekiels entering our +school of life, with the same impartiality and the same understanding +sympathy with which we look upon our own race. And if we are to place +them side by side with the whites, let us be impartial, not cheating +them out of their hard-earned credits, or condemning them with undue +severity. Let us try, if we can, to be just. + +When we begin to make this effort to judge fairly our colored world, we +need to remember especially two things: First, that we cannot yet +measure with any accuracy the capability of the colored man in the +United States, because he has not yet been given the opportunity to show +his capability. If we deny full expression to a race, if we restrict its +education, stifle its intellectual and aesthetic impulses, we make it +impossible fairly to gauge its ability. Under these circumstances to +measure its achievements with the more favored white race is +unreasonable and unjust, as unreasonable as to measure against a man's +a disfranchised woman's capabilities in directing the affairs of a +state.[2] + +The second thing is difficult for us to remember, difficult for us at +first to believe; that we, dominant, ruling Americans, may not be the +persons best fitted to judge the Negro. We feel confident that we are, +since we have known him so long and are so familiar with his +peculiarities; but in moments of earnest reflection may it not occur to +us that we have not the desire or the imagination to enter into the life +emotions of others? "We are the intellect and virtue of the airth, the +cream of human natur', and the flower of moral force," Hannibal Chollup +still says, and glowers at the stranger who dares to suggest a different +standard from his own. Hannibal Chollup and his ilk are ill-fitted to +measure the refinements of feeling, the differences in ideals among +people. + +This question of our fitness to sit in the judgment seat must come with +grave insistence when we read carefully the literature published in this +city of New York within the past two years. Our writers have assumed +such pomposity, have so revelled in what Mr. Chesterton calls "the +magnificent buttering of one's self all over with the same stale butter; +the big defiance of small enemies," as to make their conclusions +ridiculous. Ezekiel entering their school is at once pushed to the +bottom of the class, while the white boy at the head, Hannibal Chollup's +descendant, sings a jubilate of his own and butters himself so copiously +as to be as shiny as his English cousin, Wackford Squeers. Then the +writer, the judge, begins. Ezekiel is shown as the incorrigible boy of +the school. He is a lazy, good-for-nothing vagabond. Favored with the +chance to exercise his muscles twelve hours a day for a disinterested +employer, he fails to appreciate his opportunity. He is diseased, +degenerate. His sisters are without chastity, every one, polluting the +good, pure white men about them. He is a rapist, and it is his criminal +tendencies that are degrading America. The pale-faced ones of his family +steal into white society, marry, and insinuate grasping, avaricious +tendencies into the noble, generous men of white blood, causing them to +cheat in business and to practise political corruption. In short there +is nothing evil that Ezekiel is not at the bottom of. Sometimes, poor +little chap, he tries to sniffle out a word, to say that his family is +doing well, that he has an uncle who is buying a home, and a rich cousin +in the undertaking business, but such extenuating circumstances receive +scant attention, and we are not surprised to find, the class dismissed, +that Ezekiel and the millions whom he represents, are swiftly shuffled +off the earth, victims of "disease, vice, and profound discouragement." + +Now this is not an exaggerated picture of much that has recently been +printed in newspaper and magazine, and does it not make us feel the +paradox that if we are to judge the Negro fairly, we must not judge him +at all, so little are we temperamentally capable of meeting the first +requirement? + +"My brother Saxons," says Matthew Arnold, "have a terrible way with them +of wanting to improve everything but themselves off the face of the +earth." And he adds, "I have no such passion for finding nothing but +myself everywhere." Among our American writers a few, like Arnold, do +not care to find only themselves everywhere, and these have told us a +different story of the American Negro. They are poets and writers of +fiction, men and women who are happy in meeting and appreciating +different types of human beings.[3] If these writers were to instruct +us, they would say that we must individualize more when we think of the +black people about us, must differentiate. That, too, we must remember +that when we pass judgment, we need to know whether our own standard is +the best, whether we may not have something to learn from the standards +of others. Supposing Ezekiel is deliberate and slow to make changes or +to take risks; are we who are "acceleration mad," who acquire heart +disease hustling to catch trains, who mortgage our farms to buy +automobiles, who seek continually new sensations, really better than he? +Is it not a matter of difference, just as we may each place in different +order our desires, the one choosing struggle for power and the +accumulation of wealth, the other preferring serenity and pleasure in +the immediate present? And lastly, after having praised our own virtues +and our own ideals, must we not beware that we do not blame the Negro +when he adopts them, that we do not turn upon him and fiercely demand +only servile virtues, the virtues that make him useful not to himself +but to us?[4] + +No one can talk for long of the Negro in America without propounding the +all-embracing question, What will become of him, what will be the +outcome of all this racial controversy? It is a daring person who +attempts to answer. We, who have studied the Negro in New York, may +perhaps venture to predict a little regarding his future in this city, +his possible status in the later years of the century; whether he will +lose in opportunity and social position, or whether he will advance in +his struggle to be a man. + +Looking upon the great population of the city, its varied races and +nationalities, I confess that his outlook to me begins to be bright. New +York is still to a quite remarkable extent dominated socially by its old +American stock, its Dutch and Anglo-Saxon element. Few things strike the +foreign visitor so forcibly as that despite its enormous European +population, American society is homogeneous. But this is not likely to +continue for very long. When the present demand for exhausting +self-supporting work becomes less insistent, we shall feel in a deeper, +more vital way the influence of our vast foreign life. With a million +Jews and nearly a million Latin people, we cannot for long be held in +the provincialism of to-day. I suspect that to many Europeans New York +seems still a great overgrown village in "a nation of villagers," +pronouncing with narrow, dogmatic assurance upon the deep unsolved +problems of life. But in the future it may take on a larger, more +cosmopolitan spirit. Its Italians may bring a finer feeling for beauty +and wholesome gayety, its Jews may continue to add great intellectual +achievements, and its people of African descent, perhaps always few in +number, may show with happy spontaneity their best and highest gifts. If +New York really becomes a cosmopolitan city, let us believe the Negro +will bring to it his highest genius and will walk through it simply, +quietly, unnoticed, a man among men. + + +FOOTNOTES: + +[1] Lucy Pratt, "Ezekiel." + +[2] "The world of modern intellectual life is in reality a white man's +world. Few women and perhaps no blacks have entered this world in the +fullest sense. To enter it in the fullest sense would be to be in it at +every moment from the time of birth to the time of death, and to absorb +it unconsciously and consciously, as the child absorbs language. When +something like this happens we shall be in a position to judge of the +mental efficiency of women and the lower races. At present we seem +justified in inferring that the differences in mental expression between +the higher and lower races and between men and women are no greater than +they should be in view of the existing differences in opportunity." W. +I. Thomas, "Sex and Society," p. 312. + +[3] Note especially the stories of Alice MacGowan and Grace MacGowan +Cooke, and the poems of Rosalie M. Jonas. + +[4] Careful readers of economic Negro studies by white writers will +notice this tendency to look upon the Negro as belonging to a servile +class. Emphasis is laid upon his responsibilities to the white man, not +upon the white man's responsibilities to him. Any one familiar with the +sympathetic attitude toward the workers in such a study as the +_Pittsburg Survey_ will notice at once the difference in attitude in +Negro surveys by whites, the slight emphasis laid upon the black +laborers' long hours and poor pay, and the failure to emphasize the +white man's responsibility. Negro laborers are still studied from the +viewpoint of the capitalist. There is one notable exception to this, the +study by the governor of Jamaica, Sir Sidney Olivier, on "White Capital +and Coloured Labor." + + + + +APPENDIX + + +The federal census in 1900 contained a volume on the Negro in the United +States, a source of information quoted by nearly every writer on the +American Negro. The tables in that volume, however, do not classify by +cities, and any one desiring information regarding the Negro in some +especial city must search through other volumes. As this is a lengthy +task, I am affixing a list of the tables in the census of 1900, treating +of the Negro in New York City, believing that it may also be a guide to +students of the new census of 1910, who wish to find New York Negro +statistics. + + Population. Vol. I, Part I. Published 1901. + + Page 868, Table 57. Aggregate, white, and colored population + distributed according to native or foreign parentage, for cities + having 25,000 inhabitants or more: 1900. + + Page 934, Table 81. Total males twenty-one years of age and over, + classified by general nativity, color, and literacy, for cities + having 25,000 inhabitants or more: 1900. + + Vol. II. Published 1902. + + Page 163, Table 19. Persons of school age, five to twenty years, + inclusive, by general nativity and color, for cities having 25,000 + inhabitants or more: 1900. Also, pages 165 and 167, Tables 20 and + 21. + + Page 332, Table 32. Conjugal condition of the aggregate population, + classified by sex, general nativity, color, and age periods, for + cities having 100,000 inhabitants or more: 1900. + + Page 397, Table 54. Negro persons attending school during the + census year, classified by sex and age periods, for cities having + 25,000 inhabitants or more: 1900. + + Page 737, Table 111. Persons owning and hiring their homes, + classified by color, for cities having 100,000 inhabitants or more: + 1900. + + Vital Statistics. Vol. III. Published 1902. + + Page 458, Table 19. Population, births, deaths, and death rates at + certain ages, and deaths from certain causes, by sex, color, + general nativity, and parent nativity: census year 1900. + + Occupations. Published 1904. + + Pages 634 to 642, Table 43. Total males and females, ten years of + age and over, engaged in selected groups of occupations, classified + by general nativity, color, conjugal condition, months unemployed, + age periods, and parentage, for cities having 50,000 inhabitants or + more: 1900. + + Supplementary Analysis. Published 1906. + + Page 262, Table 87. Per cent Negro in total population, 1900, 1890, + and 1880, per cent male and female in Negro population, per cent + illiterate in Negro population at least ten years of age, and among + negro males of voting age, and per 10,000 distribution of Negro + population by age periods. + + Women at Work. Published 1907. + + Page 146, Table 9. Number and percentage of breadwinners in female + population, sixteen years of age and over, classified by race and + nativity, for cities having at least 50,000 inhabitants: 1900. + + Pages 147 to 151, Table 10. Number and percentage of breadwinners + in the female population, sixteen years and over, classified by + age, race, and nativity. + + Pages 266 to 275, Table 28. Female breadwinners, sixteen years of + age and over, classified by family relationship, and by race, + nativity, marital condition, and occupation, for selected cities: + 1900. + + Pages 354 to 365, Table 29. Female breadwinners, sixteen years of + age and over, living at home, classified by the number of other + breadwinners in the family, and by race, nativity, marital + condition, and occupation, for selected cities: 1900. + + Mortality Statistics. Published 1908. + + Page 28. Number of deaths from all causes per 1,000 of population. + + Page 376, Table 2. Deaths in each registration area, by age: 1908. + + Pages 566 to 568, Table 8. Deaths in each city having 100,000 + population or over in 1900, from certain causes and classes of + causes, by age: 1908. + + + + +INDEX + + + Aldridge, Ira, 137. + + Amalgamation, 168. + + Andrews, Charles, civil rights of Negroes, 214. + + Andrews, Chas. C., on education, 14; + on industrial opportunity, 27. + + Archer, William, 172. + + Arnold, Matthew, 224. + + Arthur, Chester A., 23. + + Association for Improving the Condition of the Poor, 159. + + Athens, Ga., 207. + + Atlanta, Negroes in occupations in, 77, 91, 93; + proportion of Negro women to men in, 148; + suffrage in, 206. + + + Baker, Ray Stannard, on suffrage, 205. + + Benefit societies, 175. + + Birthplaces, 35. + + Boese, Thomas, 15. + + Brokers, real estate, 45, 108. + + Brown, William, 14. + + Bulkley, W. L., 161. + + Burke _v._ Bosso, 215. + + Burleigh, Harry, 126. + + Businesses, 106-112. + + + Cahill, Marie, 133. + + Charity Organization Society, 158. + + Chesnutt, Charles W., 181. + + Chesterton, Gilbert K., 222. + + Churches: + Baptist, 20, 116, 123; + Catholic, 116; + Congregational, 20; + Episcopal, 20, 113, 116, 120; + Methodist, 20, 116. + + City and Suburban Homes, 41. + + Civil rights: + state bill, 213; + violations of, 209, 210. + + Clarkson, Thomas, 32. + + Cleveland, Grover, 17. + + Clinton, De Witt, 14. + + Cole and Johnson, 127, 133. + + Constitutional conventions, state, 11-13. + + Cook, Will Marion, 136. + + Cooke, Grace MacGowan, 224. + + Court: + children's, 66; + magistrate's, 202-204. + + Craig, Walter A., 126. + + Crime: + among children, 66-68; + among adults, 189. + + + Dahomeyans, 131. + + District Nursing Association of Brooklyn, 159. + + Dix, Morgan, 25. + + Domestic Service, 80-83, 149-153. + + Downing, Thomas, 27. + + Du Bois, W. E. B., 183. + + Dudley, S. H., 128. + + Dunbar, Paul Lawrence, 71, 83, 131. + + + East Side, 42-44. + + Education: + colored teacher, 17, 18; + private colored schools, 14; + public colored schools, 15-19. + + Emancipation, 8. + + Ewing, Quincy, 190. + + + Fall River, mortality among infants, 59. + + Finley, H. M., 32. + + Frazier, S. E., 18. + + + Gaynor, William J., 201. + + Government service, Negroes in, 88. + + Greenwich Village, 33-35. + + + Hale, Edward Everett, 119. + + Hamilton, Alexander, 14. + + Hampton Institute, 110, 119, 193. + + Hansell, George H., 20. + + Haynes, George E., 112. + + Health Department, 40, 53, 197. + + Held, Anna, 133. + + Hell's Kitchen, 37, 85. + + Hogan, Ernest, 134. + + Horsmanden, Daniel, 7. + + Housing, 34, 36, 40, 45-51. + + Hunt, John H., against Negro suffrage, 13. + + + Janvier, Thomas, 8, 33. + + Jay, John, on emancipation, 8; + interest in education, 14. + + Jay, Peter, on Negro suffrage, 11. + + Jennings, Elizabeth, 21. + + Jonas, Rosalie M., 224. + + Jones, Edward, 14. + + + Kean, Edmund, 137. + + Kent, Chancellor, favors Negro suffrage, 11. + + Kidd, Dudley, 52. + + King _v._ Gallagher, 16. + + Kingsley, Mary, 70, 113. + + + Lanier, Sidney, 31. + + Lincoln, Charles Z., 13. + + Lincoln Hospital: + attitude towards Negro doctors, 114; + graduates of, 157. + + Livingston, against Negro suffrage, 11. + + London, Jack, 63. + + + MacGowan, Alice, 224. + + Manhattan Trade School, 161, 162. + + Manumission society, 14. + + Middle West Side, 35-38. + + Miller, Kelly, 86, 147. + + Morris, Gouverneur, on emancipation, 8. + + Mortality: + among infants, 53-60; + death rate by diseases, 192. + + Municipal service, Negroes in, 197. + + Music, 125-127. + + + New York Conspiracy, 7. + + New York Milk Committee, 54. + + Newman, G., infant mortality, 55, 58. + + Nurses' Settlement, 159. + + + Olivier, Sidney, 226. + + + Palmer, A. Emerson, 18. + + Patten, S. N., 38. + + People _v._ King, 213. + + Phillips, Ulrich B., 101. + + Phipps, Henry, 41. + + Phipps tenement, 42, 51, 125. + + Pittsburg Survey, 225. + + Police department, 198-201. + + Poole, Ernest, 84. + + Population, Negro, 9; + total, 31. + + Pratt, Lucy, 218. + + Prostitution, 155, 156. + + + Ray, Charles B., 24. + + Reason, Patrick, 27. + + Religion (see Churches). + + Riots: + draft riots, 25; + riot of 1900, 199; + riot of 1905, 199-201. + + Roosevelt, Theodore, 18. + + Rubinow, I. B., relation of death rate to poverty, 193. + + Russell, John L., 12. + + Russell, Lillian, 133. + + Russia, infant mortality in, 54; + mortality and poverty, 193. + + Russworm, John B., 14. + + + Sanger, William W., 153. + + San Juan Hill, 39-42. + + Schools (see Education). + + Scottron, Samuel R., on industrial opportunities, 26; + on occupations, 78. + + Segregation: + churches, 19; + dwelling-places, 48-50; + schools, 15-19. + + Shirtwaist makers' strike, 163. + + Simmons, William J., 137. + + Slave ships, 32. + + Slaves, brutality towards, 5; + insurrections of, 6-8. + + Smith, Gerritt, 24. + + Smith, James McC., 27. + + Smith, William G., 14. + + Stage, 127-137. + + Stevenson, Robert Louis, 215. + + Stone, Alfred Holt, on Negro in occupations in South, 75; + color line in South, 89, 92; + irresponsibility of Negroes, 102. + + Straus, Nathan, 59. + + Street cars, discrimination, 21-23. + + Suffrage: + past, 11-13; + present, 196; + Negro's use of suffrage, 204-208; + in Athens, Ga., 207. + + + Tanner, Henry, 126. + + Tenements (see Housing). + + Thomas, W. I., 221. + + Trade-unions, 95-99. + + Trinity Church, 25. + + Tucker, Helen, on Negro craftsmen, 96, 98. + + + Underground Railroad, 24. + + Upper West Side, 45-48. + + + Varick, James, 20. + + + Walker, Aida, 157. + + Washington, Booker T., 184, 194. + + Waterbury, Daniel S., 12. + + West Indies, arrivals from, 48. + + Wheeler, B. F., 20. + + White, Philip A., 27. + + Williams, Peter, 20. + + Williams and Walker, 129-133. + + Wilson, H. J., 124. + + Wilson, J. G., 8. + + Winterbottom, 25. + + Wright, Richard R., on the city Negro, 100, 104. + + Wright, Theodore S., 14. + + + Zangwill, Israel, 137. + + + + + Transcriber's notes: + + The date of the case of King _v._ Gallagher, given in the text + as 1862, and in Footnote 6 as 1882, is 1883. + + The following is a list of changes made to the original. + The first line is the original line, the second the corrected one. + + their positive as well as there relative number + their positive as well as their relative number + + See H. J. Wilson. "The Negro and Music," _Outlook_, + See H. J. Wilson, "The Negro and Music," _Outlook_, + + peoples, receive colored guests; and while + people, receive colored guests; and while + + trains, who mortgate our farms to buy automobiles, + trains, who mortgage our farms to buy automobiles, + + nearly a million Latin peoples, we cannot for + nearly a million Latin people, we cannot for + + pupulation by age periods. + population by age periods. + + Keane, Edmund, 137. + Kean, Edmund, 137. + + + + + +End of Project Gutenberg's Half a Man, by Mary White Ovington and Franz Boas + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK HALF A MAN *** + +***** This file should be named 39742.txt or 39742.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + http://www.gutenberg.org/3/9/7/4/39742/ + +Produced by David Edwards, Paul Clark and the Online +Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net (This +file was produced from images generously made available +by The Internet Archive) + + +Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions +will be renamed. + +Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no +one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation +(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without +permission and without paying copyright royalties. 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