JOHN GREENLEAF WHITTIER
A PLEA
For Political Equality
Centennial Oration
Delivered by
REVERDY C. RANSOM
In Faneuil Hall, Boston, Mass., U.S.A., December 17, 1907
The burden of unwe'lcome truth,
And left us weak and frail and few,
The censor's painful work to do.
We bore as Freedom's hope forlorn,
The private hate, the public scorn;
Yet held through all the paths we trod
Our faith in man, and trust in God.
WHITTIER.
REV. REVERDY C. RANSOM
Who Delivered Classic at Whittier Centenary in Faneuil Hall, Boston,
Mass., U.S.A., Tuesday, December 17, 1907
Boston Whittier Centennial Oration
By
REVERDY C. RANSOM
HE muse of poetry has been inspired by no worthier theme, nor tuned
the harp of truth to nobler strains, than Whittier's Songs of Freedom.
His lines gave voice to conscience; while his genius set to music the
cause of human liberty on a scale in which every note rings true. Hjs is not
the voice of Milton reciting in the stately lines of Paradise Lost, the fall of
man for eating fruit of a forbidden tree, but arguments in favor of giving to
ail the right to partake of the fruit of tfie tiee of liberty. He does not sing
like Dante, of Marlebolge—the land of abandoned hope—but before the
gates of the Inferno of American Slavery, he pleads for the release of the
captives from their cruel chains.
The poems of Whittier are trumpet calls to action; they are weapons of
war. His message was that of a prophet no less inspired, because clothed
in language as beautiful, as that of David or Isaiah. In his poems we are
made to feel, to know, the sufferings of the slave, while the apologists for
slavery are disarmed of every weapon of defense. He was a consummate
artist who painted in such vivid colors the forbidding aspects of slavery
as to make it forever loathsome and a thing to be despised.
A nobler band was never enlisted in the service of a worthier cause
than the exceptional men and women who consecrated their talents to the
overthrow of slavery.
Religion gave us Channing and Parker; Literature, Emerson, Whittier,
Longfellow, Lowell and Harriet Beecher Stowe; Statesmanship, Lincoln and
Sumner; Eloquence, Phillips, Douglass and Beecher; Journalism, Love joy
and Garrison; while the sacrificial blood of John Brown placed the seal
of martydom upon them all.
The presence of the Negro in the land has brought to the service of the
oppressed the best intellect, called forth the consecration of the highest
character, awakened the most generous response of philanthropy, made
wider the boundaries of human sympathy and produced more heroes and
martyrs than any nation has ever given to the cause of human brotherhood
in the history of the world. Whittier was not the only poet of his day to
sing with uncompromising voice the song of Freedom. But so voluminous
were his contributions, so great his zeal, so valorous his championship,
as to win for him the title of "The Poet Laureate of Abolition." In religious
belief he was a Quaker. Throughout his long life he exemplified the simpli¬
city and virtues of that peculiar people. He was descended from ancestors
who had learned to suffer for conscience sake. The largest article of his
faith was to be true to "the Inner Light." Against such a man the weapons
of persecution, ridicule and scorn, had no power.
The man whose memory we honor here tonight pleaded our cause with
all the strength and wisdom of his powers. Now that men like him have
placed us on our feet, we should stand and as courageously resist the
foes that assail us to-day, as they did the enemies that oppressed us in the
past.
2
As we are assembled within the walls of Faneuil Hall, a temple dedi¬
cated to Liberty, to celebrate the one hundredth anniversary of the birth of
John Greenleaf Whittier, what tribute more worthy can we bring, what
more cheering message to his spirit fcan we send across the shoreless
depths that separate us from him on the thrones of light, than make a plea
tonight for POLITICAL EQUALITY.
For more than 250 years the Negro was silent in the councils of the
nation. "White men were his voice. The world can boast no nobler literary
monuments, no sublimer deeds of unselfish devotion to humanity, than the
arguments put forth in his behalf and the deeds performed for his eleva¬
tion. Out of weakness we have gained strength; after centuries of silence
we have become articulate, and stand upon this platform clothed with every
constitutional right of an American citizen, and ask that we be permitted to
speak for ourselves. Ours is not the voice of a stranger, our motives are
not unpatriotic; our attitude i® not a menace to anything truly republican; our
ideals are the loftiest held and cherished on American soil. We ask no
greater things than these—Liberty and Fraternity; Justice and Equality.
This earth and the fulness thereof is not the property of any race. No
nation holds a grant from Almighty God to an acre of its soil; it is a com¬
mon possession. Elach owes to all to contribute the best that is in him toward
the development of its resources. One of the first commands of God to man,
was to take the earth and subdue it. For nation or race to disobey, is to
have its dominion given to another. But no nation or race has a right to
usurp the place of the Almighty by arbitrarily seeking to impose the condi¬
tions, and limit the sphere, to which another shall confine, its activities.
Birth, class, rank, title, are artificial distinctions among men and not or¬
dained of God. The first, the highest dignity among men, is the" dignity of
manhood. He who feels or acknowledges himself to Le naturally inferior
to another, tears the sovereign crown of manhood from his brow and abdi¬
cates his throne. Those who assume because of race or color to set them¬
selves above their fellowmen, would usurp the nature and powers of divin¬
ity. Any one who acknowledges their assumption of superiority, defiles God's
image and insults the Almighty to his face.
A nation cannot continue to exist without a recognized government, author¬
ity, law. In the modern world no Moses has come to us with a form of
government written upon tablets of stone by the hand of God. Govern¬
ments are human institutions, and derive their form and "character from
the ideals held and cherished by the men by whom they were instituted. Na¬
tions have been strong and vigorous, or tottered to their fall, as they have
been true or false to the ideals upon which tney were founded. Invading
armies have not been the foes which have overthrown kingdoms and nations.
When they have become sated with wealth, drunk with the lust of power,
plunderers of the poor and oppressors of the weak, the scepter of empire has
departed from them.
When the Thirteen Colonies sought "to form a more perfect union" there
was no thought of admitting the Negro to citizenship, much less conferring
upon him the ballot. He was not included in the phrase, "We the people of
the United States." Paradoxical as it may seen, the men who founded this
nation based it upon the principle of political equality. Had it not' been for
the compromises growing out of the slavery question, whereby it was agreed
on the one hand, that the African slave trade should be discontinued after
the year 1808, and on the other, that three-fifths of the slaves should be
counted in the apportionment of representatives in Congress, the Thir¬
teen Colonies would not have ratified the Constitution which .is now the
Charter of our liberties.
Never before had the governments of the earth beheld the birth of a
new nation so truly a child of hope, as the infant Republic of the United
States. Patriots and soldiers who had endured the blood and terror of the
French Revolution, and liberty loving men throughout the world, hailed her
as the fruition of their hopes, the realization of their fondest dreams. The
Star of Bethlehem did not shine with brighter lustre to guide the feet of
tjie Wise Men of the East, to tfte manger which cradled "the World's Redeem-
er, than did the star of our flag to the poor and oppressed of Europe, who
came to find liberty and equality' beneath its folds.
If a period of tutelage were needed to prepare the American Negro for
the duties and responsibilities of citizenship, he-received it in the most rigid
school of discipline. The millions composing our citizenship, who came to
our shores from the ranks of the peasantry of the Old World, cannot surpass
in loyalty and devotion to our institutions, the black millions, who for gener¬
ations have been born and reared on American soil.
Among all the chajrges brought against the Negro, that of disloyalty
has never been alleged against him. His bitterest enemies have not pro¬
posed that he be required to take an o ath of allegiance to the government of
the United States before being admitted to citizenship. This test has been
reserved for the white men who sought to dismember the Union, and for
foreigners who desire to renounce their government in favor of our own.
If the tree of liberty planted upon these shores has been watered by
the blood of heroes, shall we give, or withhold, the honors that are due, ac¬
cording to the nationality or race of the veins from which it flowed?
From France we have Lafayette, from Germany, men of the type of
General Seigal and Carl Schurz. But Americans of African descent have an
unclouded title to a place in the ranks of the saviors and preservers of the
nation, so long as they can point to Crispus Attucks, whose blood was the first
to be shed for American independence; to Peter Salem at Bunker Hill; to
the men who fought with Ferry on Latke Erie and to the 200,000 loyal bayo¬
nets in the hands of the black regiments which fastened the Falling Stars
of Secession in the banner of the Union and sealed them with their blood.
It seems like a Providence of God, that the Negro has been present at
every turning point in the nation's history. If we call the nation's roll of
honor, we must pronounce his name. If the historian would make truthful
record of events, he must write him present at every epoch. If bronze
and marble are to perpetuate to future generations the deeds that have
made posterity their debtors, then let our children look upon the masterpiece
of St. Gaudens, which stands in Boston, on Beacon Hill, in memory of the
black heroes who fought and fell at Jb"ort Wagner under the gallant Col.
Shaw.
Can a nation so soon forget? It seems but yesterday that the life of
our militant President was saved by the coolness and courage of his black
comrades in arms, who fought at his side on Cuban soil. If our strenuous
President, still holding fresh in his memory this valiant deed, sees fit to con¬
demn his saviors on an unapproved charge, shall the defenders of his help¬
less victims be branded with cherishing hatred and disloyalty because they
resent this action? Have protest against injustice and resentment against
wrong become execrable crimes, while usurpation of power is condoned and
gratitude sits enthroned refusing to thrice place upon its brow the people's
imperial crown of the Republic, while seeding to name a successor to the
politics it has formulated and the issues it has made?
Why do the war trumpets of the South continue to peal with blasts
of apprehension and alarm? Will the usually sober North become frightened
by the spectre which race prejudice and injustice have conjured? For more
than forty years of freedom the Negro has cast his influence and his vote on
the side of law' and order. He has revered the Constitution; he has honored
the flag. The past history and the present attitude of this race render op¬
position to the recognition of its political equality as unjust as it is unfound¬
ed. The Negroes are a kind hearted people. Their nature is flooded with all
the warmth of oriental sunshine which for ages beat upon them. Their
generosity is as opulent as the fruits a.nd flowers which spring spontaneously
from the soil of Africa whence their fathers came. "When they had them at
their mercy they took; no reprisals on the white women of the South for the
two or three million mulattoes now among us. While the white men of the
South, who nowi pose as America's conservators of chivalry and virtue, were
in armed rebellion against the government of the United States, they com¬
mitted their wives and daughters to the care of Black men, resting in <jojv
fldewce that their trust would not be betrayed,
4
When the Negrio had it in his power lie did not retaliate for the wounds
and scars inflicted by the slave-driver's lash.; he took no vengence for the suf¬
ferings he had! endured and the deaths he had died.
t ^e^ro °* generation is told that demands for the full bestowal
ot his rights must be withheld, not in the spirit of injustice to him, but for his
own best interests and the peace and welfare of the nation. He is told that
he was unprepared to be a citizen in the republic which has been saved from
destruction by his valor; that he cannot be trusted to participate in govern¬
ing by his ballot, a nation whose institutions are his inspiration and guiding
star. There is a time worn bill for an uncancelled debt of gratitude which
is presented year by year and in state and national elections emphatic de¬
mands are made for payment on account. The denial of his civil and political
rights, the suppression of his ballot, his wanton murder when accused of
crime, refusal to give him an equal chance in the race of life, are all set
down as partial payments of interest on the debt of gratitude which it is
alleged the Negro owes this nation. Let the books be opened and impartially
examined and it will be discovered that the largest item, including princi¬
pal and interest, is the nation's debt to the Negro.
When the Israelitish bond'men went out of Egypt, they spoiled the Egyp¬
tians and were laden with treasures of silver and gold.
When Abraham Lincoln proclaimed freedom to the Negro slaves, they
left their house of bondage without receiving one dollar for more than 200
years of unrequited toil. The nation made no effort to restore children to
their parents, wives to their husbands or to reunite families which the auc¬
tion block had sundered. They were not given a foot of ground, a beast of
burden, an instrument of husbandry, or an implement of trade with which
to make a beginning to their new. life of freedom. They were turned loose
in the midst of their former masters, and after a few years the last semblance
of protection was withdrawn. Despite all this they have established the
family and the home, turned the auction blocks and slavepens into churches
and schools, accumulated millions in banks, homes and farms and they are
decreasing their illiteracy more rapidly than any other element of our popu¬
lation. The strong arm of repression may be invoked against the enemies of
the social order, but never in the history of the Republic has the Negro been
found in their ranks.
The ballot may be denied those who do not meet the requirements of
c'tlzenship laid down in the 'Constitution. But we are assembled here to¬
night as loyal Americans, to make our appeal to the nation for the impartial
e nforcement of the Constitution, regardless of ra^e, color, class or creed. The
debt the Negro owes the nation is one with that of other citizens, to be
law abiding, sober, industrious, alert, loyal to his country, true to his family
and faithful to his God. This, our Fatherland, is sacredly obligated before
God and man, to make no distinction in the treatment accorded to its children
who have both an equal place and right within the national household.
In the South, the issue which obscures the question which overshadows
.all others, is the race question. The South no longer seeks to deceive the
nation; it does not conceal its motives; it has completely torn off the mask.
Its hostile attitude 'is not due to the Negro's ignorance, poverty or immor¬
ality, but to the Negro per se. Senator Tillman of . South Carolina truly rep¬
resents the attitude of the Southern whites when he declares that they do
not intend to accord Negiroes, under any condition, political or any other
kind of equality; that white men consider any method justifiable which will
prevent Colored men from participating with them in' the government on
terms of equality. , . , ^ ^ „
At the close of the war, the Negro confided his destiny to the Republican
party with all the trustful confidence of a child, only to find himself used for
party profit and! selfish personal ambition, to be at last deserted and be¬
trayed The South first sought to rob him of the sympathy of the world by
accusing! itum of base crimes against women; it then stripped him of political
power, and new seeks to make his humiliation complete by degrading forms
of Jim Crow Legislation. _ t ... .. .
If Saul Of Tarsus became an accomplice to crime, by holding the clothes
5
of the men who stoned Stephen the martyr, what shall we say of the Hon.
Wm. H. Taft, Secretary of War, who in a speach delivered in one of the bor¬
der states, recently condoned, if he did not seek to justify the nullification of
the Fifteenth Amendment, while counseling the Negro that the South was
his best friend. To whom shall we flee 7 To the political highwaymen who
have robbed and stripped us of our rights, or to the Tafts who have held us
while the crime was being committed?
The question before the nation which most loudly cries for settlement is
tht Negro Question. It can no more be ignored than the sun in the heavens;
nor its relation to our weal or woe, than the influence of its rays upon this
planet. "Malefactors of great wealth" are not so much a menace to the Re¬
public, as the political malefactors who have assailed the foundations upon
which it rests. "Discrimination in railroad rates" works not so great an in¬
justice, as discrimination against our constitutional rights. "Regulation of
the trusts" is of minor importance, compared with our duty to regulate our
conduct in accordance with the sacred trust we hold, to make each citizen,
however lowly, secure in the enjoyment of those rights which the Declaration
of Independence declares to be inalienable.
The Negro cannot be classed as "an undesirable citizen," unless it is based
upon no higher ground than the color of his skin. His poverty he acknowl¬
edges without shame. The world knows it is due neither to his indolence
nor improvidence. It was his unremunerated labor with which the white chil¬
dren of the South were educated for more than 100 years. It was his ebony
arms that wrested. from the soil the wealth which supported the Southern
aristocracy in idleness. He was the foundation of its wealth in slavery as
he is the mainstay of its present industrial prosperity. He who mocks at his
poverty does but make of himself a fool. The Negro confesses his ignorance
by knocking at the door of every school and college in the land. He has no
fear that wise men and scholars will charge his lack of knowledge to either
racial. or intellectual inferiority. Ignorance was the door-keeper of his
house of bondage. Disregarding the taunts of his enemies, he is drinking
deeply at every fountain of knowledge w th a keener thirst than has charac¬
terized any people, the Japanese not excepted, in modern times.
He acknowledges that in this country, tie is second to the white man in
the race of life, but he is in the race to stay. He does not ask to be granted
any privilege or accorded any right, to which, because of his ignorance and
poverty he is not entitled. He only asks that as in intelligence and wealth
he measures up to the same standards that are set for the white man, he be
accorded the same treatment. He does not asik that the political standards
of the nation be lowered to his level. He begs the nation to keep both the
standards and the requirements of citizenship high. If he fails to measure up
to those standards, he will submit to exclusion without protest or complaint.
But when he comes clothed with every qualification required by law for other
cfitizens, he demands that the right to vote be granted on the same condition
and subject to the same tests, both in letter and spirit, as are imposed upon
white men.
The revised constitutions of the Southern states may hinder for a time,
but they cannot change our attitude. The North may be at present apathetic,
but we will agitate until its sense of justice is aroused. Political parties may
repudiate the planks in their platform framed with a view to capture the
Negro vote; men who have been exalted by our votes to places of trust and
honor, may betray us by compromising our rights with the enemies against
whom they had warned us,—by these we shall be disillusioned but not dis¬
heartened.
A mere sentiment and tradition can no longer sway a Negro electorate
which is growing more intelligent from day to day. Our traditional enemies
and our traditional friends have too many interests in common in which the
Negro is permitted to have no share. The next presidential election will be
historic, marking a new epoch in the annals of American politics, because for
the first time, the Negro will cast his vote, not under the influence of issues
which the North and South alike proclaim are dead, not because of what
the Republican party said or did a generation ago, but because of what it
6 ~ '
is doing now. Those whose political property he has been, may look with
confidence no longer to find him in his accustomed place, for reason will sway
his choice of party label and intelligence will mark his ballot as never here¬
tofore.
It is a base slander to allege that the Negroes intend to use the ballot
to secure political patronage and the spoils of office. It is, perhaps, their
fault that they have been entirely too free from this charge. Both of the
great parties nominate tickets in which the Negroes are almost universally
ignored. No state political organization ever gives official recognition to
more than one or two Negroes at a time and then for inferior places; while
the political jobs which are accorded to Negroes by party managers and
bosses, are such as would be spurned by any other element of our citizenship
who were numerically as strong. National administrations whose candidates
have been nominated and elected on the strength of the Negro vote have
never done more than dole out to them a few picturesque appointments.
Undoubtedly the Negro will seek- in future, more and more, to hold elective
office in the government. But Federal office holders, the tenure of whose
place is at the pleasure of the party in power, are5in no position to resent
acts of injustice which their superiors may commit against us, or to lead
the people in an effort to secure their rights or redress their wrongs.
It is neither office or emoluments of office we are seeking. We are
buying- homes, engaging in business, educating our children and seeking to
occupy a respected place in the communities in which we live. What we
demand is the protection of the law, impartial justice in the courts and
the removal of every legal barrier which discriminates against us as a race
and circumscribes our opportunities as a people. There need be no fear that
the Negro intends to use his ballot as an instrument of vengeance, but it is
his duty as a good citizen to use it to express his resentment of the injustice
perpetuated against him and to rebuke those in authority who have been
untrue to their trust. As a soldier in the service of his country he has
given repeated demonstrations of his courage in arms. It now becomes his
duty to use the ballot as fearlessly as he did the bayonet, for the welfare of
his country and the protection of his rights.
While enemies of Negro suffrage, at the South, are robbing us of the
ballot, some of our influential friends at the North, who are giving us mater¬
ial aid, are advising us as a race, to let politics alone and devote ourselves
to industry. Indeed, they intimate that if we do not eschew politics, we
may alienate our friends and cause the withdrawal of sympathy and sup¬
port. What is the meaning of this advice? There is absolutely no evidence
that the Negro is in any more danger of neglecting industry for politics
than any other element in our population. He has caused and is likely to
cause, less disturbance in the industrial world than any class of laborers in
America. Will he become less efficient as a laborer if he assist in deciding
by his ballot the conditions under which he must work? Must he deny him¬
self voice and vote in deciding the policies that are to regulate the benefits
that should flow to him as a result of the fruit of his toil?
The Negro is not lazy, he not only works but saves. He is saving as
much of his earnings as any people in this country who are regulating
their economy in accordance with American standards of living. Do his
advisers mean to- say that he shall have no voice in deciding questions
that relate to taxation and the expenditure of public money, a part of which
he has contributed? We shall refuse to act upon the advice erf these friends,
however well intentioned they may be. We will not charge them with cowar¬
dice but it is clear that they have either been intimidated by our aggressive
foes' or they are trying to build us into thrifty and intelligent peasantry in
the midst of the republic. We have served this nation as slaves but after
having known the blessings of liberty, we will not consent to become its
serfs To have no voice or vote in a country where the will of the people
is the supreme law of the land, is to become an object of Injustice, the easy
nrev and defenseless victim of tyranny and oppression.
The more than 10,000,000 Negro Americans of to-day, will a few decades
hence number fifty million souls. Tihey will not grow disloyal to the govern-
7
ment, but they will grow more insistent that the government be loyai to
them. These black millions, multiplying from year to year, will continue
to grow in intelligence and wealth. In this time of reaction against them,
they are not blind to their future welfare. They will neither be bribed nor
intimidated; they will neither compromise nor surrender their right to vote,
which is the chief weapon of defence by which the enemies that assail tS6m
may be combated, and their progress and prosperity defended. Surely this na¬
tion will not fail to heed the lessons of history before it is too late. This re¬
public cannot continue, without disastrous results, to treat one-seventh of its
citizens with greater injusice and tyranny than that which caused the Col¬
onists to rise in revolt against the rule of George III. Ten million reproduc¬
tive human beings, ignorant or intelligent, rich or poor, black or white, will
powerfully influence the destiny of any nation of which they form a part.
Chi-ld of a virgin soil! land for which the ages waited! pantheon of the
nations! the Republic of the United States, is the best and latest birth of all
the ages! Here the hand of toil has wrought new miracles on the continent
it has conquered to civilization; the human brain unfettered., has outrun the
progress of twenty centuries; the uncouth child of the prairies has occupied
the seats of the mighty; the slave has stood before kings; the poor have
dwelt in palaces by the sea and the children of the lowly have been clothed
with power.
Never did ardent lover sue for the hand of the bride he would win, with a
greater wealth of affection, than the black citizen of the Republic willingly
lays at her feet. Though often spurned and rejected, he returns again and
again, patient to wait through the years, knowling that when her fickle
lovers have despoiled her of her dower, she will willingly flee to him for
protection and support. To-day the black children of the republic are being
disciplined by opposition, strengthened by adversity, and chastened by in¬
justice and wrong.
But the day is not far distant when the weight of their ballots will cause
the scales of our civilization to balance in favor of the preservation of our
Republican institutions. A few years hence, when the war ships of a foreign
foe shall appear above the western horizon and anchor outside the Golden
Gate, or when anarchy from within, shall lay its red hand upon the throat
of the republic, black patriots will be among the first to repel the invader
from our shores, as their ebony arms will be the power that shall rescue to
posterity, liberty and equality before the law.
GUARDIAN PRESS, 21 CORNHILL, BOSTON.