BY
HUBERT H.HARRISON
Cosmo-Advocate Publishing Co.
2305 Seventh Avenue
NewYork
This little book is made up of articles contributed several years agoto radical newspapers and magazines like The Call, The Truth-Seeker,Zukunft, and The International Socialist Review. They are re-publishedin this form, partly to preserve a portion of the author’s early work,but mainly because they help to throw into strong relief the presentsituation of the Negro in present day America, and to show how thatsituation re-acts upon the mind of the Negro. That is the great need ofthe Negro at this time.
Some time in the near future I hope to write a little book on the NewNegro which will set forth the aims and ideals of the new ManhoodMovement among American Negroes rich has grown out of the internationalcrusade “for democracy—for the right of those who submit to authority tohave A VOICE in their own government”— as President Wilson so sincerelyputs it.
Because I wish this little book to have as large a circulation aspossible among Negroes and white people, I have preferred publication ata popular price to the doubtful advantage of having a prominentpublisher’s name at the foot of the title-page. The present editionconsists of five thousand copies. When it is sold off a second editionwill be issued.
HUBERT H. HARRISON New York, August, 1917.
NOTE: This article and the next were contributed to the InternationalSocialist Review in 1912 while the author was a member of the SocialistParty. He has since left it (but has joined no other party) partlybecause, holding as he does by the American doctrine of “Race First,” hewished to put himself in a position to wont among his people along linesof his own choosing.
Providence, according to Mr. Kipling, has been pleased to place uponthe white man’s shoulders the tremendous burden of regulating theaffairs of men of all other colors, who, for the purpose of hisargument, are backward and undeveloped—“half devil and half child.” Whenone considers that of the sixteen hundred million people living uponthis earth, more than twelve hundred million are colored, this seems atruly staggering burden.
But it does not seem to have occurredto the proponents of this pleasant doctrine that the shoe may be uponthe other foot so far as the other twelve hundred million are concerned.It is easy to maintain an ex parte argument, and as long as we donot ask the other side to state their case our own arguments will appearnot only convincing but conclusive. But in the court of common sensethis method is not generally allowed, and a case is not consideredclosed until both parties have been heard from.
I have no doubt but that the colored peoples of [4] the world will have a word or two to say intheir own defense. In this article I propose to put the case of theblack man in America, not by any elaborate arguments, but by thepresentation of certain facts which will probably speak forthemselves.
I am not speaking here of the evidences of Negro advancement, noreven making a plea for justice. I wish merely to draw attention tocertain pitiful facts. This is all that is necessary—at present. For Ibelieve that those facts will furnish such a damning ind