Produced by David Widger
By Charles Dudley Warner
At the close of the war for the Union about five millions of negroes wereadded to the citizenship of the United States. By the census of 1890 thisnumber had become over seven and a half millions. I use the word negrobecause the descriptive term black or colored is not determinative. Thereare many varieties of negroes among the African tribes, but all of themagree in certain physiological if not psychological characteristics,which separate them from all other races of mankind; whereas there aremany races, black or colored, like the Abyssinian, which have no othernegro traits.
It is also a matter of observation that the negro traits persist inrecognizable manifestations, to the extent of occasional reversions,whatever may be the mixture of a white race. In a certain degree thispersistence is true of all races not come from an historic common stock.
In the political reconstruction the negro was given the ballot withoutany requirements of education or property. This was partly a measure ofparty balance of power; and partly from a concern that the negro wouldnot be secure in his rights as a citizen without it, and also upon thetheory that the ballot is an educating influence.
This sudden transition and shifting of power was resented at the South,resisted at first, and finally it has generally been evaded. This was dueto a variety of reasons or prejudices, not all of them creditable to agenerous desire for the universal elevation of mankind, but one of themthe historian will judge adequate to produce the result. Indeed, it mighthave been foreseen from the beginning. This reconstruction measure was anattempt to put the superior part of the community under the control ofthe inferior, these parts separated by all the prejudices of race, and bytraditions of mastership on the one side and of servitude on the other. Iventure to say that it was an experiment that would have failed in anycommunity in the United States, whether it was presented as a piece ofphilanthropy or of punishment.
A necessary sequence to the enfranchisement of the negro was hiseducation. However limited our idea of a proper common education may be,it is a fundamental requisite in our form of government that every votershould be able to read and write. A recognition of this truth led to theestablishment in the South of public schools for the whites and blacks,in short, of a public school system. We are not to question the sincerityand generousness of this movement, however it may have halted and lostenthusiasm in many localities.
This opportunity of education (found also in private schools) was hailedby the negroes, certainly, with enthusiasm. It cannot be doubted that atthe close of the war there was a general desire among the freedmen to beinstructed in the rudiments of knowledge at least. Many parents,especially women, made great sacrifices to obtain for their children thisadvantage which had been denied to themselves. Many youths, both boys andgirls, entered into it with a genuine thirst for knowledge which it waspathetic to see.
But it may be questioned, from developments that speedily followed,whether the mass of negroes did not really desire this advantage as asign of freedom, rather than from a wish for knowledge, and covet itbecause it had formerly been the privilege of their masters, and marked abroad distinction between the races. It was natural that this should beso, when they had been excluded from this privilege by pains andpenalties, when in some States it was one of the gravest offenses toteach a negro to read and write. This prohibition was