INTERMARRIAGE OF WHITES AND NEGROES
IN THE DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA
AND
SEPARATE ACCOMMODATIONS IN STREET CARS
FOR WHITES AND NEGROES IN THE
DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA
HEARING
before the
COMMITTEE ON THE DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA
HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES
SIXTY-FOURTH CONGRESS
First Session
on
H. R. 12, H. R. 13, H. R. 274, H. R. 326,
H. R. 618, H. R. 715, and H. R. 748
FEBRUARY 11, 1916
WASHINGTON
government PRINTING OFFICE
1010
COMMITTEE ON THE DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA.
House op Representatives.
sixty-fourth congress.
BEN JOHNSOl
WYATT AIKEN, South Carolina.
ROBERT CROSSER, Ohio.
JAMES T. LLOYD, Missouri.
JAMES A. HAMILL, New Jersey.
CHAS. O. LOBECK, Nebraska.
JOE H. EAGLE, Texas.
J. WILLARD RAGSDALE, South Carolina.
CARL VINSON, Georgia.
PETER J. DOOLING, New York.
WARREN WORTH BAILEY, Pennsylvania.
Sam W.
2
, Kentucky, Chairman.
EMMETT WILSON, Florida.
BENJAMIN C. HILLIARD, Colorado.
WILLIAM J. CARY, Wisconsin.
CARL E. MAPES, Michigan.
BENJAMIN K. FOCHT, Pennsylvania.
LOREN E. WHEELER, Illinois.
GEORGE P. DARROW, Pennsylvania.
P. DAVIS OAKEY, Connecticut.
NORMAN J. GOULD, New York.
GEORGE HOLD EN TINKHAM, Massachusetts.
Sskew, Clerk.
INTERMARRIAGE OF WHITES AND NEGROES AND SEPARATE ACCOMMO¬
DATIONS IN STREET CARS FOR NEGROES AND WHITES IN THE
DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA.
House of Representatives,
Committee on the District of Columbia,
Washington, Friday, February 11, 1916.
On the several bills, commonly known as the "jim-crow" car bills
and the anti-intermarriage bills.
The committee met at 11 o'clock a. m., Mr. Tinkham in the chair.
STATEMENT OF MR. ARCHIBALD H. GRIMKE.
Mr. Grimke. Mr. Chairman, I represent the National Association
for the Advancement of Colored People.
Mr. Tinkham. Where do you live ?
Mr. Grimke. I am from Boston, but I am living here now.
We think that this is a matter of great importance, this proposed
race legislation, and I refer particularly to the two bills before the
committee, the bill in reference to the jim-crow cars and the anti-
intermarriage bill.
I first want to speak of the sex question and race segregation.
One wrong produces other wrongs as surely and as naturally as the
seed of the thorn produces other thorns. Men do not in the moral
world gather figs from a thorn bush any more than they do in the
vegetable world. What they sow in either world, that they reap.
Such is the law. The earth is bound under all circumstances and
conditions of time and place to reproduce life, action, conduct, char¬
acter, each after its own kind. Men can not make what is bad bring
forth what is good. Truth does not come out of error, light out of
darkness, love out of hate, justice out of injustice, liberty out of
slavery. No; error produces more error, darkness more darkness,
hate more hate, injustice more injustice, slavery more slavery. That
which we do is that which we are, and that which we are, and that
which we shall be.
The great law of reproduction which applies without shadow of
change to individual life, applies equally to the life of that aggrega¬
tion of individuals called a race or nation. Not any more than an
individual can they do wrong with impunity, can they commit a bad
deed without reaping in return the results in kind. There is nothing
more certain than the wrong done by a people shall reappear to plague
them, if not in one generation, then in another. For the consumma¬
tion of a bad thought in a bad act puts what is bad in the act beyond
the control of the actor. The evil thus escapes out of the Pandora
box of the heart, of the mind, to reproduce and to multiply itself an
hundredfold and in a hundred ways in the complex relationships of
3
4 WHITES AND NEGROES IN DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA.
men within human society. And then it returns not as it is issued
singly, but with its related" brood of ill consequences:
But in these cases,
We still have judgment here; that we but teach
Bloody instructions, which being taught return
To plague the inventor; this even-handed justice
Commends the ingredients of our poisoned chalice
To our own lips.
The ship which landed at Jamestown in 1619 with a cargo of African
slaves for Virginia plantations imported at the same time into America
with its slave cargo certain seed principles of wrong. As the slaves
reproduced after their kind, so did these seed principles of wrong
reproduce likewise after their kind. Wherever slavery rooted itself,
they rooted themselves also. The one followed the other with the
regularity of a law of nature, the invariability of the law of cause
and effect. As slavery grew and multiplied and spread itself over
the land, the evils begotten of slavery grew, and multiplied, and
spread themselves over the life of the people, black and white alike.
The winds which blew north carried the seeds, and the winds which
blew south; and wherever they went, wherever they fell, "v^hether
east or west, they sprang up to bear fruit in the characters of men,
in the conduct of a growing people.
The enslavement of one race by another necessarily produces
certain moral effects upon both races, moral deterioration of the
masters, moral degredation of the slaves. The deeper the degreda-
tion of the one, the greater will be the deterioration of the other, and
vice versa. Indeed, slavery is a breeding bed, a sort of compost
heap, where the best qualities of both races decay and become food
for the worst. The brute appetites and passions of the two act and
react on the moral nature of each race, with demoralizing effects.
The subjection of the will of one race under such circumstances to
the will of another begets in the race that rules cruelty^ and tyranny,
and in the one that is ruled fear, cunning, and deceit. The lust,
the passions of the master class act powerfully on the lust, the
passions of the slave class, and those of the slave class react not less
powerfully on the master class. The greater the cruelty, tyranny,
and lust of the one, the greater will be the cunning, deceit, and lust
of the other. And there is no help for this so long as the one race
rules and the other race is ruled, so long as there exists between
them in the State inequality of rights, of conditions, based solely on
the racehood of each.
If two races live together on the same land and under the same
government as master and slave, or as superior and inferior, there
will grow up in time two moral standards in consequence of the two
races living together under such conditions. The master or superior
race will have one standard to regulate the conduct of individuals
belonging to it in respect to one another, and another standard to
regulate the conduct of those selfsame individuals in respect to
individuals of the slave or inferior race. Action which would be
considered bad if done by an individual of the former race to another
individual of the same race would not be regarded as bad at all
at least in anything like the same degree, if done to an individual of
the latter race. On the other hand, if the same offense were
mitted by an individual of the slave or inferior race ao-ain ° ~
WHITES AND NEGROES IN DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA.
5
individual of the master or superior race, it would not only be deemed
bad, but treated as very bad.
With the evolution of the double moral standard and its applica¬
tion to the conduct of these two sets of individuals in the State, there
grows up in the life of both classes no little confusion in respect to
moral ideas, no little confusion in respect to ideas of right and wrong.
Nor is this surprising. The results of such a double standard of
morals could not possibly be different so long as human nature is
what it is. The natural man takes instinctively to the double stand¬
ard, to any scheme of morals which makes it easy for him to sin and
difficult for a brother or enemy to do likewise. And that is exactly
what our American double standard does practically in the South for
both races, but especially for the dominant race, for example, in re¬
gard to all that group of actions which grows out of the relation of
the sexes in Southern society.
What relations do the Southern males of the white race sustain to
the females of both races % Are these relations confined strictly to
the females of their own race ? Or do they extend to the females of
the black race ? Speaking frankly, we all know what the instinct of
the male animal is, and man, after all, is physically a male animal.
He is by nature one of the most polygamous of male animals.
There goes on in some form among the human males, as among
other males, a constant struggle for the females. In polygamous
countries each man obtains as many wives as he can purchase and
support. In monogamous countries he is limited by law to one wife,
whether he is able to maintain a plurality of wives or not. When he
marries this one woman the law defines his relations to her and also
to the children who may issue from such a union. But the man—
I am talking broadly—is at heart a polygamist still. The mere animal
instinct in his blood inclines him to run after, to obtain possession of
other wives. To give way to this inclination in monogamous coun¬
tries he knows to be attended with danger, to be fraught with sundry
grievous consequences to himself. He is liable to his wife, for exam¬
ple, to an action for divorce on the ground of adultery. He is liable
to be prosecuted criminally on the same charge by the State, and to
be sent to prison for a term of years; but this is not the end of his
troubles. Public opinion, society, falls foul of him also in consequence
of his misconduct. He loses social recognition, the respect of his
fellows, becomes in common parlance a disgraced man. The one-wife
country is grounded on the inviolability of the seventh commandment.
All the sanctions of law, of morals, and of religion conspire to protect
the wife against the roving propensities of the husband, combine to
curb his male instinct to run after many women, to practice plural
marriages. There thus grows up in the breast of the race, is trans¬
mitted to each man with the accumulated strength of social heredity
a feeling of personal fear, a sense of moral obligation, which together
war against his male instinct for promiscuous sexual intercourse and
make for male purity, for male fidelity to the one-wife idea, to the
one-wife institution. The birth of this wholesome fear in society is
the beginning of wisdom in monogamous countries, and unless this
sense of moral obligation is able to maintain its ascendency in those
countries the male sexual instinct to practice plural marriages will
reassert itself, will revert, if not openly then secretly, to a state of
nature, to illicit relations; but every tendency to such reassertion or
6 WHITES AND NEGROES IN DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA.
reversion is effectively checked in a land where national morals are
sound, are pure, by wise laws which a strong, an uncompromising
public sentiment makes and executes impartially against all offenders.
That is the case in respect to monogamous countries inhabited by
a homogeneous population. In such countries, where there exist no
differences of race, where there is no such thing as a dominant and a
subject race, the national standard of morals is single, the sexual
problem is accordingly simple and yields readily, uniformly, to the
single standard regulation or treatment. The "Thou shalt not" of
the law applies equally to all males in their relation to all females in
general and to the one female in particular. No confusion ensues in
law or in fact in respect to the subject, to the practical application of
the rule to the moral conduct of individuals. Fornication, adultery,
marriage, and concubinage are not interpreted by public sentiment to
mean one thing for one class of individuals and another thing for
another class under the same law. There are no legal double stand¬
ards, no moral double standards. The moral eye of society, under
these circumstances, is single, the legal eye of the State is likewise
single, and the eye of the whole people becomes in consequence full
of moral light. Marriage is held to be sacred by the State, by society,
and adultery or the breach of the marriage vow or obligation is held
accordingly to be sacrilege, one of the greatest of crimes.
The man who seduces another man's wife in such a society, in such
a state, is regarded as an enemy by society, by the State, and is dealt
with as such. Likewise the man who seduces another man's daugh¬
ter. For this crime the law has provided penalties which the wrong¬
doer may not escape. And it matters not whether the seducer be
rich and powerful or the girl poor and ignorant, the State—society—
respects not his wealth nor his power. His status in respect to her is
fixed by law, and hers also in respect to him; while in the event of
issue arising from such a union the law establishes certain relations
between the child and the putative father. It enables the mother to
procure a writ against him, and in case of her success he will be
thereupon bound to support the child during a certain number of
years. The State —society—does not yet compel him to give his name
to the innocent offspring of his illicit act, but it does compel him to
provide for its proper maintenance. Thus has the State—society—in
monogamous countries restrained within bounds the sexual activity
of the human male, evolving in the process a code of laws and one of
morals for this purpose. These codes are administered impartially,
equally, by the State —by society—over all of the males in their rela¬
tion to all of the females.
The monogamous countries where two races live side by side, one
dominant, the other subject, the single legal standard, the single
moral standard, yields in practice if not in theory to the double stand¬
ard in law and morals in respect to the sexual question. In the en¬
suing confusion of moral ideas, of moral obligations, the male instinct
gains in freedom from restraints of law, of social conventions, and
reverts in consequence, and to that extent, to a state of nature, of
natural marriage. The legal and moral codes which regulate the
relations of the males of one race with the females of the same race
are not applicable in regulating the relations of those selfsame males
with the females of the other race. Marriage in such a country has
regard to the males and females of the same race, and not to those of
whites and negroes in district op columbia.
7
different races. The crime of adultery or of fornication undergoes
the same gross modification; for in such a land the one-wife idea,
the one-wife institution, has reference to the individuals of the same
race only, not to individuals of opposite races. The "Thou shalt
not" of the law, public opinion interprets to refer to the sexual con¬
duct of the males and females in the same race in respect to one
another, i. e., a male member of the dominant race must limit his
roving propensities whenever the females of his own race are con¬
cerned. He need not under this same law, interpreted by this same
public opinion, curb to the same extent those roving propensities
where the females of the other race are concerned. He may live in
illicit intercourse with a woman of his own race and at the same
time live in illicit intercourse with a woman of the other race; that
is, without incurring the pains and penalties made by the State—by
society—against such an offense in case the second woman be of his
own race. Neither the law nor public opinion puts an equal value
on the chastity of the women of the two races. Female chastity in
the so-called superior race is rated above that in the so-called inferior
race. Hence the greatest protection accorded to the woman of the
first class over that accorded to the woman of the second class. The
first class has well-defined legal and moral rights which the men of
that class are bound to respect, rights which may not be violated with
impunity. Here we encounter one of the greatest dangers attendant
upon race segregation, where the two races are not equal before the
law, where public opinion makes and enforces one law for the upper
race and practically another law for the under race.
Under these circumstances a male member of the dominant race
may seduce the wife of a member of the subject race, or a daughter,
without incurring any punishment except at the hands of the man
wronged by him.
Mr. Tinkham. May I not suggest that the question involved in
this bill is marriage, and as to the question of adultery or fornication,
that they would be punished with one race the same as they would
with the other race, or between the two races, so far as it was a crim¬
inal act. That is true, is it not 1
Mr. Grimke. I understand. But taking the South, for instance,
wherever these antimiscegenation laws exist, the situation that I am
describing exists. You have to face these conditions that I am de¬
scribing where a man of one race is forbidden to marry a woman of
another race, where one is supposed to be the upper and the other
the under race, you have a condition that will make the woman the
quarry not only of the upper race, but the quarry of the men of her
own race.
Mr. Tinkham. Yes, but both the negro and the white man would
be equally guilty before the criminal law, of adultery or of fornica¬
tion, one equally with the other, as I understand it.
Mr. Grimke. But it is not so in (he South.
Mr. Tinkham. But the law is so, is it not ?
Mr. Grimke. Yes.
Mr. Tinkham. You mean it is not so as administered?
Mr. Grimke. That is what I am trying to show. These are the
conditions which exist where such laws exist, and that is what you
are going to produce by such laws. I am going to show you how it
works in the section of the country where such laws prevail.
8 whites and negroes in district of columbia.
Mr. Tinkham. I understand; but you do not deny that the law,
so far as it is written in the South is concerned, makes adultery a
crime, whether it is between people of the white race or the negro
race, or between white and negro, and that fornication is punishable
as a crime——
Mr. Grimke. So far as the law is concerned.
Mr. Tinkham. So far as the law is concerned, that is what I say.
Mr. Grimke. Yes; but not in its administration.
Mr. Tinkham. In its administration you say that is not so ?
Mr. Grimke. I do. A southern woman would never under any
circumstances bring a divorce suit and call into it a colored woman
as a corespondent. That is what I mean. And if a white man were
to seduce a colored girl or have a child by a colored girl, she would
have no chance to successfully invoke the law against him for the
support of such child.
Mr. Tinkham. The law would be in her favor.
Mr. Grimke. Yes; but public opinion is such that she has no
chance under the law. And therefore now I am talking to the
fundamentals underlying this law and trying to show you what is
bound to happen in any State or country where such laws are passed.
As I have said, such a wrongdoer would not be indicted or tried
for adultery or seduction, nor could the wronged husband or father
recover from him damages in a suit at law, nor yet could a bastardy
suit be brought by this girl against him with any show of success for
the support of his child, were issue to be born to her from such illicit
union. The men of the dominant race find themselves thus in a
situation where the law, public opinion, provides for their exclusive
possession the women of their own race, and permits them at the
same time to share with the men of the subject race possession of
the women of that race.
Mr. Tinkham. Of course, the law does not allow that, but you
say the administration of the law does ? That is the point that you
are trying to make.
Mr. Grimke. Yes.
Mr. Tinkham. Or, as you say, public opinion ?
Mr. Grimke. Public opinion; that is the whole thing which, of
course, is at the bottom of it.
Mr. Tinkham. Of course we can pass or any law-making body
can pass any law, but if public opinion is not behind it it can never
be enforced, whether it is in relation to marriage or anything else
on earth?
Mr. Grimke. Exactly, that is true.
Mr. Tinkham. All a law-making body does, philosophically speak¬
ing, is to express what is or is supposed to be temporary public
opinion ?
Mr. Grimke. That is the point I am trying to make. I want to
show you how bad this public opinion is, and how viciously it acts
when it comes to that point, because one class of women are abso¬
lutely unprotected.
Mr. Tinkham. Of course, we can not change public opinion any
mcue than any other legislature can change public opinion by reason
of the very fact that the laws themselves are merely the expression
of public opinion. You realize that ?
whites and negroes in district of columbia.
9
Mr. Grimke. Oh, certainly, and all I want to show is that to pass
a law like this is utterly unfair, and it ought not to be passed; that it
is a grave wrong, not only to the colored race, but it involves the
greatest moral consequences to the whole country.
The sexual activity of the men of the first class approaches in these
conditions to a state of nature in respect to the women of the second
class. They are enabled, therefore, to select wives from the stronger
race, and mistresses from the weaker one. The natural law of sexual
selection determines the mating in the one case as truly as in the other,
1. e., in the case of concubinage as in that of marriage. The men of
the upper class fall in love with the women whom they elected to
become their wives, they also fall in love with the women they have
elected to become their concubines. They go through all those
erotic attentions to the women of each class, which are called court¬
ship in the language of sexual love. Only in the case of women of
the first class this courtship is open, visible to the eye of the upper
world of the dominant race, while in the case of the women of the
second class it is secret, conducted in a corner of the lower world of
the subject race.
These men build homes in the upper world where are installed their
wives, who beget their children in lawful wedlock; they likewise build
homes in the lower world where are installed their concubines, who
beget their children in unlawful wedlock. The wives move, have
their being in the upper world and sustain to their husbands certain
well-defined rights and relations, social and legal. The children of
this union sustain to those fathers equally clear and definite rights
and relations in the eye of the law, in the eye of society. The law,
society, imposes on them, these husbands and fathers, certain well-
defined duties and obligations in respect to these children, these
wives, which may not be evaded or violated impunity. These man
can not, therefore, disown or desert their wives and children at will.
Mr. Tinkham. Now, if a man is married, of course he can not under
any law in any civilized country, marry another woman, and there¬
fore in relation to forbidding whites to marry with the negroes, that
would have no bearing, because even if no law were passed forbidding
that, it would not affect the situation you are speaking of, namely,
if a man is married and is living with one woman he can not marry
another woman, whether he wants to or not, and that is so whether
this law is passed or not.
Mr. Grimke. But if he were doing that with a white woman and
having children by the white woman the law takes care of the situa¬
tion.
Mr. Tinkham. Not if he was already married
Mr. Grimke. Yes, he could be indicted for adultery.
Mr. Tinkham. Yes, of course, under all of the law in all of the
States it would be possible for him to be indicted for adultery; and
we come back again to the question of public opinion and the admin¬
istration of the laws, which has nothing to do with the question of
whether or not a bill should be passed permitting marriage between
the white race and the colored race. That is true, is it not?
Mr. Grimke. But I do not think that is exactly—you are stating,
as a matter of fact, that if a man is married he can not marry a second
wife?
Mr. Tinkham. Certainly; that is true, is it not?
10
whites and negroes in .district of columbia.
Mr. Grimke. That is true.
Mr. Tinkham. And if a married man is living with another woman
than his wife he is living in adultery, whether that woman is a white
woman or a colored woman, and it would not make any difference
so far as forbidding marriage between the white and colored races is
concerned; it would not make any difference on that point.
Mr. Grimke. No; but do you not see, Mr. Tinkham-
Mr. Tinkham. And the real question before us is this, whether it
is good public policy, or sound public policy, for us in the District
of Columbia to forbid the white race marrying with the colored race
or the colored race marrying with the white race.
Mr. Grimke. That is just what I am discussing; it is not sound
policy, because I am showing you what will grow up. You will
see that you would have in a short while, if you were to enact such a
law, a public opinion under which it would be perfectly safe for a
white man to do just that sort of thing, not with two white women
but with one colored woman, and you can get no redress, absolutely
none, in the South now, where this kind 01 a law is in existence.
Mr. Tinkham. But the passing of this law would not make it any
different from what it is to-day, either in the South or in the North.
If a white man is married he can not go and marry another woman,
even if he wants to, either a colored woman or any other kind of a
woman.
Mr. Grimke. But it creates conditions—there are two sorts of
marriages—it creates conditions where it is safe for a man, who is
protected on one side by his color, to do certain things which he would
not dare to do if he were not protected in that way. Now, all through
the South—you probably do not believe that—but all through the
South we have a condition of things existing exactly as I am describ¬
ing them, where the laws are made, but the laws
Mr. Tinkham. Are not enforced, because public opinion down there
does not demand their enforcement.
Mr. Grimke. But if you make it possible to invoke against a white
man the consequences of his wrongdoing, so that a grand jury would
indict him and a petit jury would convict him, you would break that
thing up. You do not need these laws—this law—for that, because
a white man would not wish under those circumstances to be saddled
with the consequences of his act; but where he is absolutely pro¬
tected
Mr. Tinkham. But by forbidding marriage between the white and
colored races you are not protecting either the colored woman or the
white man. It does not seem to me you are doing it one way or the
other in the way you want them protected, because I do not think it
makes any difference so far as forbidding marriage, as to illicit rela¬
tions, because if a man is married, a white man, to a white wife, he
would not marry another woman, white or colored; and, on the
other hand, he can be indicted under the law as it exists, I assume, in
all the Southern States as well ap the Northern States. If he is married
to a white woman he could be indicted and be convicted and pun¬
ished for living with another woman, provided that public opinion
and the administration of the law calls for it.
Mr. Grimke. Of course, Mr. Tinkham, but do not you see that you
are stating a case where conditions are created by the very fact
Mr. Tinkham. That marriage is forbidden ?
whites and negroes in district of columbia. 11
Mr. Grimke. Is forbidden. You have talked about a man who is
married, the white man who is married, living with a colored woman.
Now, if he should do that if this law were abrogated, or if there were
no such law, he could not marry the colored womai}, because he was
married already to the white woman.
Mr. Tinkham. No, but he could be made responsible for his acts.
Mr. Grimke. He is to-day under the law
Mr. Tinkham. No, no, but——
Mr. Grimke. If it was administered.
Mr. Tinkham. I know, but we have got to take not only a law but
we have got to take the administration of the law into consideration,
because it produces serious and grave conditions. Of course, neither
Congress nor any legislative body can take into consideration the
administration of a law; we have to take into consideration the law,
and the policy of either passing or defeating a proposed law.
Mr. Grimke. Well, if we show you how the thing works, that if a
certain bill is proposed, and we show you that if this thing goes into
effect it is going to produce certain very bad effects
Mr. Tinkham. Oh, yes
Mr. Grimke. Well, I .think that is what I am showing—I am trying
to show you how it works in certain sections of the country. They
have these laws down there
Mr. Tinkham. Exactly. Suppose down there they have a law, as
they have, which forbids intermarriage of the races.
Mr. Grimke. They have; yes.
Mr. Tinkham. They have that now?
Mr. Grimke. Yes.
Mr. Tinkham. Now, suppose they did not. Would it make any
difference in the ultimate outcome, as far as the colored race was
concerned and so far as the illicit relation between the races was
concerned ?
Mr. Grimke. It would make a difference, because, don't you see,
the inferior race would be elevated at once to a higher plane—the
women of that race would be elevated to a higher plane. They
would have a better show.
Mr. Tinkham. Would the juries convict any quicker?
Mr. Grimke. It would be a growth of public opinion. Here you
are perpetuating a certain condition. The condition is already bad
by reason of these laws that are in existence. If you refrain from
passing such a law as this one proposed, public opinion will be culti¬
vated, and in time you will begin to see that the whole thing will be
changed, so that a colored girl who is wronged by a white man can
go before a court and have some chance to get some redress.
Mr. Tinkham. It seems to me, to be perfectly frank, that it is the
administration of the law that you are really criticizing rather than
the law itself as to intermarriage. The question, of course, before the
committee is whether intermarriage between the two races should
be allowed or forbidden. Now, it does not seem to me that the for¬
bidding of it in the South has anything to do with the enforcement of
the laws in relation to illicit intercourse there.
Mr. Grimke. On the contrary, we know that it has a vital con¬
nection
12
whites and negroes in district op columbia.
Mr. Tinkham. Just explain that, will you, how it has a vital
connection ?
Mr. Grimke. Just that. Here is public opinion that came from
a condition of things that existed during slavery. During slavery a
colored woman had no rights which her master was bound to respect.
He could have intercourse with her and have children by her, and
there was not any law that interfered with it. That situation came
down from slavery, down to to-day the same conditions exist, and are
made fast by these laws which forbid a master, even if he cared for a
colored woman, even if he were a single man and if he cared for his
children, these laws forbid him to legitimitize his children, forbid
him to recognize them as his own and give them, as far as he can, an
honorable position in the world. In such a case if a man is honorable,
what is the result ? You can see very well what would be the result.
The whole community is interpenetrated with that sort of public
feeling and disregard of the rights of the other race, the result is that
the women of that race are simply regarded as the quarry for the
men of the other race.
Mr. Tinkham. It seems to me that you are now getting closer to
what should be the argument against such a law as is proposed,
namely, that if the two races, when both are unmarried, desire to
marry, that .they should be allowed to do so rather than forbidden
to do so, as the forbidding of the marriage rather tends to promote
illicit intercourse; that is about the situation, is it not ?
Mr. Grimke. No; I mean more than that. I mean that if they
were allowed to marry the consequences of wrong doing would be
fastened upon the white man as they are in the case of a white girl,
and they would be more careful, there would not be so much illicit
intercourse between the races, and there would not be so much
admixture of blood in the South.
Mr. Tinkham. Would not there be a greater admixture if marriage
were allowed ?
Mr. Grimke. No, sir; there would not. There would be less
admixture in the South. There would be a great deal less, and there
would be less in any community where the white man was compelled
under certain circumstances to marry the colored woman, because a
lot of men are compelled to marry under certain circumstances.
You know that, as a lawyer; that is, if a man seduces a girl he is often
compelled to marry her, and so we think in certain cases that it would
be a good thing if the white man could be brought into court and be
compelled to marry the colored girl whom he has wronged or to
support his bastard children.
Mr. Tinkham. But if he were compelled to marry her there would
be a greater admixture of blood ?
Mr. Grimke. Oh, no; far from that. You have no idea how great
an admixture of blood there is to-day in the South, and in spite of
these laws against the marriage of the races, and it is because you
can not bring such men into court, because these girls have no pro¬
tection, that you have so large an admixture of blood in the South
now. As I said, if the sentiment of the community and public
opinion are such that you allow a man to marry one woman and have
as many other women as he chooses a great many men are going to
pursue such a course, and if he can do so with impunity you can not
whites and negroes in district of columbia. 13
develop moral sentiment enough to prevent him, because the whole
moral sentiment of the community is lowered.
Mr. Tinkham. Go ahead with your argument.
to Grimke. I am dealing with the fundamental conditions that
this thing produces in the South. And it would be the same way
everywhere where such laws were passed.
Of course I do not want to go on with my argument if you do not
think it reaches the point.
Mr. Tinkham. It may do so; go ahead, I will be glad to hear what
you have to say. Of course, I think that the thing at issue is this:
It is proposed in this bill to forbid the marriage or intermarriage of
the two races in the District of Columbia, and that does not affect
the administration of the law; the question is, is that good public
policy or not ?
Mr. Grimke. I am trying to show you that it is bad public policy,
because I am trying to show what conditions are produced by such
laws.
Mr. Tinkham. Of course, it seems to me, as you have told the story,
that it is more a question of public opinion and administration of the
law than it is a question of what law should be passed or not passed.
Mr. Grimke. What I want is that instead of passing a law which
would perpetuate a bad condition, I want to show you that it would
be bad policy to pass such a law.
Mr. Miller. Might I suggest that the speaker summarize the points
in his argument, and that if he has a written paper that he be allowed
to file that ?
Mr. Grimke. Well, my point is that this would produce certain
very bad effects on white men. It would give them a certain irre¬
sponsibility. It would allow them to do certain things with im¬
punity which they can not do otherwise. On the other hand, what
effect does it produce or would it produce on colored men ? It pro¬
duces an equally bad effect on them, because they see on the one hand
that white men are allowed to have exclusive possession of their own
women, and that on the other hand they share with the colored men
the possession of colored women, and that produces, as you can very
well understand, with certain classes of people, a very bad impression.
It produces finally passion, and a desire for revenge. They do not
see that there is any justice in that. They can not do what white
men are doing. They are being educated and they are climbing,
and they are in that position that they realize their women are un¬
protected. They have all these disturbances and troubles in the
South, and they will continue as long as these vicious laws exist.
Now, the effect also upon the women of the race—the women of
both races—is very bad indeed, because it perpetuates a bad condi¬
tion of things among the white women. They hate the colored
women because they consider them rivals. They wish to impose
upon them all bad conditions. And this perpetuates this condition
of inequality, so that if the colored girl is wronged she can not get
her rights. If a wife is wronged the husband can not get his rights,
because they are not considered good enough; they are not consid¬
ered equals in that sort of thing; and you perpetuate this condition
by passing laws like this; and that is the objection we have to these
laws They are bad in themselves, and they perpetuate a very bad
14
whites and negroes in district of columbia.
condition of things. Colored women are absolutely under such cir¬
cumstances unprotected. We ask you, on grounds of public policy,
not to pass these laws which are so degrading and so injurious to the
colored race, and involve such moral consequences to the white race
as well as to the colored race and the country.
Mr. Tinkham. I would like to ask you one question. You are a
man of intelligence and a man of some years. Do you believe that
the admixture of blood between the races is a good thing for the
races, or a good thing for either race ? I would like your opinion on
that, as a matter of public policy and of eugenics, and looking at it
from a purely scientific standpoint.
Mr. Grimke. I do not see that it has produced any harm, and I can
see that it might produce a great deal of good, but that is an indi¬
vidual opinion. There are very few marriages between the races. I
do not know just how many, but it is a very small fraction of 1 per
cent.
Mr. Cook. I have only heard of two cases in 20 years, that is where
they divulged the marriage.
Mr. Grimke. I think it is safe to say that it is a very small per¬
centage of 1 per cent in this District, where there is no law to prevent
such marriages. Now, the great thing you want to do is to prevent
the admixture, the miscegenation of the races.
Mr. Tinkham. Yes; that is the object of the bill.
Mr. Grimke. But it does not do that; it does not prevent miscege¬
nation, it has not prevented it in the South, where such a law has been
in effect; but, on the contrary, there is an increasing number of mixed
bloods growing up under the present system.
Mr. Cobb. For instance, compare my State, Louisiana, with Massa¬
chusetts.
Mr. Grimke. In Louisiana the admixture is tremendous, and you
know how slight it is in Massachusetts. Yet there is no law against
intermarriage in Massachusetts. Wherever there is no law against
intermarriage the admixture of the two races does not take place
nearly so much. In such a case you force everybody into the open
and when it comes to a man marrying a colored woman he does not
want to do it, and he is not going to do it. That is the result of not
having»any such law; they will not do it if they have to be responsible
for their acts; it is the secret things, secret illicit intercourse that
makes the miscegenation of the races possible, and that it is increas¬
ing enormously in Louisiana and Mississippi and in South Carolina,
and in all those Southern States where the evils that I have spoken of
are going on, where, as I have explained, a white man can have
children by a half dozen women with impunity; that has grown up
under this system forbidding intermarriages.
Mr. Tinkham. But a man can not marry half a dozen.
Mr. Grimke. No, no; but the purpose of this bill is to preserve the
purity of the race, and it simply does not do it; it does not preserve
the purity of the Anglo-Saxon race, and as I say, it would be pre¬
served better by taking down the bars and saying that whoever,
white or colored, marries into the other race, will be held up before
the people. If we say to a white man "You can not go with a colored
girl and wrong her with impunity for she may bring you into court
and force you to do that which you ought to do." In that case the
white man is not going to wrong her. Where these laws prevail the
WHITES AND NEGROES in district of columbia. 15
mulatto population, according to the census, is certainly on the
increase. Who is responsible for this increase in the mulatto popu¬
lation ?
Mr. Tinkham. Of course laws do not have much effect unless
public opinion is behind them. Take the Frank case in Georgia.
What was done was against the law, and yet public policy appar¬
ently did not allow any action to be taken, and you can pass all the
laws you want to, and if you have not public opinion behind them
the laws are worthless.
Mr. Grimke. But these laws that are proposed cultivate a public
opinion that is inimical to morals, inimical to justice, violative of
justice; such a law as this allows a man to do what he wants to with
impunity, and that is what we are saying is entirely against sound
policy and against sound morals.
Mr. Tinkham. Of course the bill does not allow anything; it only
forbids something, namely, intermarriage.
Mr. Grimke. I understand; it forbids intermarriage, that is what
it does. After you pass your bill then it has to be administered as
it is in the South, but legislatures have no right to turn out bills
after bills without any regard to how the laws are going to be admin¬
istered. Legislators ought to consider what is going to be the effect,
whether there will be proper machinery to administer a proposed
law justly in order to break up illicit intercourse, and to preserve
race purity. You have not got it and you will not have it.
I have already discussed the subject of the contact of the two races
living together, on the same land and on terms of inequality, in its
relations to the morals of the men of those races. I have also touched
upon the same subject in its relations to the conduct of the women.
What is the effect of such conduct on the women of the two races
in the South?
And first, what is it on the white women? Do these women know
of the' existence of the criminal commerce which goes on between
the world of the white man and that of the colored woman ? And if
so, are they cognizant of its extent and magnitude? They do per¬
ceive, without doubt, what it must have been in the past from the
multitude of the mixed bloods who came down to the South from the
period before the war, or the abolition of slavery. Such visible
evidence not even a fool could refuse to accept at its full face value.
And the white women of the South are not fools. Far from it.
They have eyes like other women and ears and with them they see
and hear what goes on about them. Their intelligence is not de¬
ceived in respect to appearances and underlying causes. Certainly
they are not ignorant of the fact that a negro can no more change
his skin than a leopard his spots. When therefore they see black
mothers with light-colored children they need not ask the meaning
of it, the cause of such apparent wonder. For they know to their
sorrow its natural explanation, and whence have come all the mu-
lattoes and quadroons and octoroons of the South. And to these
women this knowledge has been bitterer than death. The poisoned
arrow of it long ago entered deep into their souls. And the hurt,
cruel and immedicable, rankles in the breasts of these women to-day,
as it rankled in the breasts of their mothers of a past long vanished.
What, pray, is engendered by all of this widespread but suppressed
suffering transmitted, as a bitter heritage for generations, by Southern
16 WHITES AND NEGROES IN DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA.
mothers to Southern daughters ? What but bitter hatred of the black
woman of the South by the white woman of the South ? How is this
hatred expressed ? In a hundred ways and by a hundred means.
One can not keep down a feeling of pity for a large class of women in
the South who can not meet in street, or store, or car, a well dressed
and comely colored girl without experiencing a pang of suspicion, a
spasm of fear. But there arises unbidden, unavoidably, in the minds
of such women the ugly question, whose daughter is she, and whose
mistress is she to be ? ' For in the girl's veins may flow the proudest
blood of the South. And this possibility, aye, probability, so shame¬
ful to both races, no one in the South knows better than the southern
white woman. What happens? The most natural thing in the world,
but not the wisest. The hatred, the suspicion, the fear of these wo¬
men find expression in scorn, in active ill will, not only toward that
particular girl, but toward her whole class as well. They are all under
the ban of this accumulated hatred, suspicion, and fear.
A hostility, deep-seated and passionate as that which proceeds from
white women as a class toward black women as a class, shoots beyond
the mark and attacks indiscriminately all colored women without
regard to character, without regard to standing or respectability. It
is enough that they belong to the black race; ergo, they are bad, ergo
they are dangerous. All this bitter hatred of the women of one race
by the women of the other race has borne bitter fruit in the South in
merciless class distinctions, in hard and fast caste lines, designed to
limit contact of the races there to the single point where they come
together as superior and inferior.
And hence, Mr. Chairman, the South has its laws against intermar¬
riage, for separating the races in schools, in public libraries, in churches,
in hotels, in cars, in waiting rooms, on steamboats, in hospitals, in
poorhouses, in prisons, in graveyards. Thus it is intended to reduce
the contact of the races to a minimum, to glut at the same time the
hatred of the white women of the South toward the black women of
the South, and to shut the men of each race from the women of the
other races. But how foolish are all these laws, how futile all these
class distinctions.
Do they really effect the separation of the races? They do not;
they can not under existing conditions. What then do they? They
do indeed separate the world of the white man and woman from the
colored man and woman, but they fail utterly to separate the world
of the colored woman from the white man.
The joint fear of the white woman and the white man is incorpo¬
rated to-day in every State of the South in laws interdicting marriage
between the races. But do these laws put an end to the sexual com¬
merce which goes on between the world of the white man and that of
the colored woman ? Have they checked perceptibly this vile traffic
between these two worlds ? They have not nor can they diminish or
extinguish this evil. On the contrary, because they divide the two
worlds, because they uphold this legal separation of the races, they
provide a secret door, a dark way between the two worlds, between
the two races, which the men of the upper world open at will and
travel at pleasure. For they hold the key to this secret door, the clue
to this dark way. Such preventive measures are in truth but a repe¬
tition of the fatal folly of the ostrich when it is afraid. For then while
this powerful bird takes infinite pains to cover its insignificant front
WHITES AND NEGROES IN DISTRICT OP COLUMBIA. 17
lines, it leaves unprotected its widely extended rear ones, and falls
ac^rdingly an\easy victim to the enemy which pursues it.
lhe real peril of an admixture of the races in the South lies not in
intermarriage, but in concubinage, lies through that secret door
which connects the races, the key to which is in the hands of the
white men of the South. It is they who first opened it, and it is
they who continue to keep it open. Were it not for the folly of the
white women of the South, it might yet be closed and sealed. The
folly of the white women of the South is their hatred, their fear of
the colored women of the South. They first think to rid themselves
of the rivalry of the second class by excluding them from the upper
world, by shutting them securely within the limits of the lower one.
But these women forget the existence of that secret door, of that
hidden way. They forget also the hand that holds the key to the
one and the clue to the other. That hand is the hand of the white
man; it is certainly not the hand of the colored woman.
Is it not the white woman of the South more than any other
agency, or than all other agencies put together, who are responsible
for the existence of a public sentiment in the South which makes it
legally impossible for a colored girl to obtain redress from the white
man who betrays her, or support from him for his bastard child?
The white woman of the South thus outlaws, thus punishes her
black rival. But what does such outlawry accomplish, what such
punishment ? What do they but add immensely to the strength of
the white man's temptation by making such illicit intercourse safe
for ,him to indulge in? Thanks to the white woman's mad hatred
of the colored woman, to her insane fear of her colored rival, the
white man of the South is enabled to practice with singular impunitv
this species of polygamy. For the penalties against the adulterer,
against the fornicator, which the law provides, which public opinion
provides, for him in the upper world, he well knows will not be called
down on his head where the acts of adultery or fornication are com¬
mitted by him in the lower world. It is a sad fact and a terrible
one, sad for both races and terrible for the women of both races in
the actual and potential wickedness of it.
No colored girl, however cruelly wronged by a white man in the
South, will be able to obtain an iota of justice at the hands of that
man in any court of law in any Southern State, or to get the slightest
hearing or sympathy for her cause at the bar of a Southern public
opinion. Were she to enter the upper world of the white woman with
such a case against some white man, who but the Southern white
woman would be the first to drive her back into her world ? But,
unless she is not only allowed but encouraged to emerge out of her
world jvith the shameful fruit of her guilty life and love and so to con¬
front her white paramour or betrayer in his world, how is the lower
world ever to rid itself of such as she or the upper one of such as he ?
In the segregation and outlawry of the black woman under such
conditions lie the white woman s greatest danger, lie the white race s
greatest danger from admixture of the races, lies the South s great¬
est danger to its morals. For through such segregation and outlawry
run the white man s way to the black woman s world, and therefore
to miscegenation of the races, to their widespread moral degradation
31335—16 2
18
WHITES AND NEGROES IN DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA.
and corruption. Amalgamation is not therefore made hard, but
appallingly easy.
Have the white women of the South considered that under existing
conditions they are deprived of effective influence, of effective power,
to reform the morals of the men of their race ? And that unless the
morals of the men are reformed the morals of the whole white race
will eventually decline. If the women fail to lift the level of the
moral life of their men to their own higher plane, the lower morals of
the men will drag downward ultimately to their level that of the
women. For this inevitable conclusion and consequence there is no
possible escape. But the white women of the South are powerless
to lift the morals of their men without lifting at the same time the
morals of the women of the black race. If, however, they steadily
refuse to do so in the future, as they have refused to so do in the past
and as the}r refuse to do so to-day by the only sure means which can
and will contribute mightily to effect such a purpose, viz, by making
the black women their equals before the law, and at the bar of an en¬
lightened public sentiment, and these women remain, in consequence,
where they are to-day, a snare to the feet of white men, when these
men trip over this snare into the hell of the senses, they will drag down¬
ward slowly but surely with them toward the level of these self-same
black women the moral ideals, if not the moral life, of the white
women of the South.
And now, Mr. Chairman, a final word about the black woman of
the South. She holds in her keeping the moral weal or woe not only
of her own race but of the white race also. As she stands to-day in
respect to the white man of the South, her situation is full of peril to
both races. For she lives in a world where the white man may work
his will on her without let or hindrance, outside of the law, outside of
the social code and moral restraints which protect the white woman.
This black woman's extra-legal position in the South, and her extra-
social status there, render her a safe quarry for the white man's lust.
And she is pursued by him for immoral ends without dread of ill
consequences to himself, either legal or social. If she resists his ad¬
vances, and in many cases she does resist them, he does not abate his
pursuit but redoubles it. Her respectability, her very virtue, makes
her all the more attractive to him, spurs the more his sensual desire
to get possession of her person. He tracks her, endeavors to snare
her in a hundred ways and by a hundred crooked means. On the
street, in stores, in cars, going to and from church, she encounters
this man, bent on her ruin. Into her very home his secret emissaries
may attack her with their temptation, with their vile solicitation.
Nowhere is she safe, free from his pursuit, because no law protects her,
no moral sentiment casts about her person the segis of its power.
And when haply dazed by the* insignia of his superior class, or his
wealth, or the magic of his skin, or the creature comforts which he is
able to offer her, she succumbs to his embrace and enters the home
to which he invites her, she becomes from that time outlawed in both
worlds, a moral plague-spot in the midst of both races. For she
begins then to reproduce herself, her wretched history, her sad fate,
in the more wretched history, in the sadder fate of her daughters.
And so in her world of the senses, of the passions, she enacts in a sort
of vicious circle the moral tragedy of the two races. If the white man
WHITES AND NEGROES IN DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA. 19
works the moral ruin of her and hers, she and they in turn work upon
"wi! • S a mora,l ruin no less sure and terrible.
What is the remedy ? It certainly does not lie in such bills as
tnese, m the segregation of the races in a state of inequality before the
f-u iiT °r suc]1 segregation exists to-day. It has existed to the hurt
ol both races in the past. It is the fruitful parent of fearful woes at
the present time, and will be the breeder of incalculable mischief for
b°th races, for the South, and for the Nation itself, in the future.
The remedy lies not then in racial segregation and inequality, for
that is the disease, but in interracial comity and equality. The
double moral standard has got to be rid of as quickly as possible,
and a single one erected in its stead, applicable alike to the men and
the women of both races.
The moral world of the white man and that of the black woman
must be merged into one by the ministers of law and religion, by an
awakened public conscience, and by an enlightened and impartial
public sentiment, which is the great promoter and upholder of indi¬
vidual and national righteousness. Such bills as these perpetuate the
evil.
The black woman of America must be as sacredly guarded by law
and public opinion against the sexual passion and pursuit of the
white man as is the white woman.
Such equality of condition, of protection, in the South, in this Dis¬
trict, is indispensable to any lasting improvement in the morals of
its people, black or white. If that section persists in sowing ine¬
quality instead of equality between the races it must continue to
gather the bitter fruits of it in the darkened moral life, in the low
moral standard of both races.
For what the South sows, whether it be cotton or character, that
it will surely reap.
STATEMENT OF MR. KELIY MILLER, WASHINGTON, D. C.
Mr. Tinkham. What is your business ?
Mr. Miller. I am a professor at Howard University.
Mr. Chairman, I understand there are two billfe before this com¬
mittee. Am I correct ?
Mr. Tinkham. You are correct.
Mr. Miller. There is what is known as the jim-crow car bill, as I
understand it, and the anti-intermarriage bill.
Mr. Tinkham. Yes.
Mr. Miller. I understand that the Committee on the District of
Columbia acts in the capacity of a legislature for the District of
Columbia. Am I correct about that ?
Mr. Tinkham. You are.
Mr. Miller. I understand, then, that this committee does not
represent any particular State or section or party or race, but the
United States ?
Mr. Tinkham. That is right.
Mr. Miller. That it represents the spirit and sentiment oi the
United States as a whole ?
Mr. Tinkham. It is supposed to.
20 whites and negroes in district of columbia.
Mr. Miller. Now, I want to say a few words, and I will be as brief
as possible, concerning the first bill, the bill H. R. 13, the ' jim-crow
car bill," as it is usually styled.
In the first place, I want to say that this bill is unnecessary. 1 nave
lived in the District of Columbia for over 30 years, and have ridden
on the street cars here almost daily during that time, having spent
hundreds of dollars for car fare that have gone into the coffers of the
street car companies, and my eyes are always wide open to the racial
situation, to the relationship and adjustment of races, and I have
rarely seen any rude conduct or misbehavior growing out of differences
of race. I dare say that there is as little disorder or disturbance in
the street cars of Washington as you will find in any city of this size
where you have a complexity of population, even although that popu¬
lation is of different races in the District, and in many of the cities of
the comparative size of Washington the complexity is involved in
members of the same race. Take San Francisco, or Los Angeles, or
Cleveland, Ohio, where you have various elements within the white
race, and I dare say that the conduct you find on the street cars in
any of those cities is no more orderly than it is in Washington.
Then, again, Mr. Chairman, the District of Columbia at one time
tried these separate cars.
Mr. Tinkham. When was that, please ?
Mr. Miller. In the seventies.
Mr. Grimke. In 1865; they were abolished in 1865.
Mr. Miller. Well, I am sure that they had them at one time, and
it proved very unsatisfactory, and they were abolished. This looks
like a step backward.
Mr. Tinkham. When were they abolished ?
Mr. Grimke. In 1865.
Mr. Miller. Now, there is less necessity, speaking from the point
of view of the white people, for jim-crow cars in the District of
Columbia now than there was 30 years ago, by reason of the fact
that the proportion of the negro population in the District is less
to-day that it was 30 years ago, and is growing steadily less from
year to year.
Mr. Tinkham. What proportion of the District of Columbia is
negro ?
Mr. Miller. About 31 per cent. At one time it was over 33 per
cent—I think 34 per cent; it is gradually declining.
Mr. Tinkham. When you speak of it declining, you mean declining
relatively, of course; that there are more white people coming in
here, so that the proportion of negro population is growing less ?
Mr. Miller. Yes, sir; the negro population is increasing in num¬
bers, but decreasing proportionately.
Mr. Tinkham. It is not increasing as rapidly as the white popula¬
tion ?
Mr. Miller. No; and the population of the colored race in the
District is likely to increase solely in the future because of the eco¬
nomic conditions. The negro population increased in the last decade
I think only 8 per cent, and in the next decade it will be still less.
That is on account of economic conditions. So you can see that
there is very little demand for jim-crow cars here, from the standpoint
of the white people, and that there will be even less demand in the
WHITES AND NEGROES IN DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA. 21
future. There is another reason why the demand will be less
urgent still speaking from the standpoint of the white people who
advocate it and that is that the colored people of the District of
Columbia in the last 30 years have made marvelous progress. The
slum population, the alley population, has declined. I think 30
years ago the alley population was something like 20,000, and to-day
it is less than 10,000, and it will be reduced as the years go by. We
have a public-school system, and the negro attendance is very large;
I think larger in proportion to the total negro population than the
attendance in the white schools.
The public school, of course, has an influence toward making for
decency and respectability and morality, and that uplift is reflected
in the behavior of the colored people on the street cars. I suppose
that the motive of those who advocate the separate cars is to keep
the negro from association with the white people—I presume that is
the motive. Am I correct about that, Mr. Chairman ?
Mr. Tinkham. I don't know what the motives are.
Mr. Miller. I can not see any other motive. Now, association in
the street cars is an incidental and temporary matter; it is not per¬
manent, and, as a matter of fact, there is no association there any
more than there is association between people who walk along the
streets together, or people who buy goods at the same counter at the
same time. When I go from here back to Howard University I may
walk on the same side of the street with a lot of white people, not
because I want to be with them, but because it is a convenient way
to go; or I may ride in the street car; I have no particular desire to
ride with anybody except friends of mine whom I know personally,
but we are both after the same convenience and we go at the same
time and under the same conditions.
Now, this bill says something about equal accommodations in
these conveyances. That is practically an impossibility. I am not
speaking now for any other section of the country or the States. But
as a matter of fact wherever these separate-car laws prevail—and
they have prevailed in Massachusetts, you know, Mr. Chairman.
Mr. Tinkham. I didn't know that.
Mr. Miller. Oh, yes.
Mr. Tinkham. When ?
Mr. Miller. In 1841.
Mr Tinkham. That is news to me.
Mr. Grimke. Oh, yes; that is true.
Mr. Miller. But wherever they have prevailed the accommodation
of the so-called inferior race has never been the same as the accommo¬
dations furnished the more powerful race, and that would be the same
way it would work out in the District of Columbia.
I understand that a number of citizens' associations have voiced
their sentiment in favor of this bill, and some against it. Now, these
citizens' associations are made up of white citizens of the District of
Columbia, about two-thirds of the population, and these measures
have been passed by a majority vote, sometimes by a bare majority,
and it therefore does not represent the sentiment of the total popu¬
lation of this District. If you would submit this proposition to the
suffrage of the District, the 350,000 people here, white and black, it
would result in an overwhelming defeat, m my humble judgment, of
any such proposition as this jim-crow bill. The newspapers voice
22 WHITES AND NEGROES IN DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA.
public opinion. The great newspapers of the city voice the real
sentiments of the citizens of the District, the Washington Star, which
is the organ of local public opinion, beyond any other publication
which we have in this city, and the Post, which is more broadly
national in its scope, and the Herald and the Times, have none ol
them advocated this bill. It is not in harmony with the prevailing
sentiment of this community, and it not only would be a great injus¬
tice to one-third of the population of the District but it is a bad gen¬
eral public policy.
So much for the jim-crow car bill.
I now want to say a word about the anti-intermarriage bill, or the
bill forbidding marriages between the races. You said, Mr. Chair¬
man, that this committee represented the Federal Government, the
spirit and method of the Federal Government. Now, the Federal
Government in the first place has not made any distinction between
or among native Americans in the Constitution of the United States,
adopted at the time when one-fifth of the population of the country
was of the Negro race—a larger proportion than we have had at any
time since, and twice as large a proportion as we have to-day—at
a time when these people were for the most part slaves. Under those
circumstances, and at that time the founders of our Republic shut
out all distinction as to race in the Constitution. You may search
that document with a microscope, and you will not find a single dis¬
tinction based upon race or based upon color.
I am not a lawyer, but I have been reliably informed that nowhere
do the Federal Statutes make any legal distinction on account of
race; and if they do, Mr. Chairman, you could easily see that it
would be very bad policy. I will admit that there are descriptive
distinctions. Take the Census Bureau. They make all sorts of dis¬
tinctions between people by reason of color and race, and education,
under the sanction and authority of the Government, but these dis¬
tinctions have no legal standing at all; that is, they are merely soci¬
ological distinctions. But when it comes to making legal distinctions
between native-born American citizens this committee would be
taking a very radical departure from the fixed policy of the Govern¬
ment from its foundation up to the present time if it undertook to
distinguish between the white and negro races. The nearest ap¬
proach to any distinction by the Federal Government is in the
fourteenth and fifteenth amendments, where race or color is .men¬
tioned, but there it is mentioned for the purpose of forbidding any
distinctions or discriminations. As Mr. Grimke has said, if your
purpose is to preserve the integrity of racial blood no such bill as
this will accomplish that purpose. I have lived here for 30 years
and I know from daily observation of what is going on in the mar¬
riage clerk's office in the courthouse that there are very few cases of
intermarriage; not enough to be ©f any social importance whatso¬
ever. The races would not blend in 50,000 years according to the
number of intermarriages between the races that we have now.
And then, if you recommend this measure to Congress and Con¬
gress passes it, you will impose upon the Federal Government for the
first time an exact definition of a negro. You will be undertaking for
the first time to give an exact legal definition of who a negro is. We
have some learned anthropologists here, but I will defy any of them
in the District of Columbia or in Massachusetts to tell me what pro-
WHITES AND NEGROES IN DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA.
23
portion of negro blood this gentleman near me possesses. It is im¬
possible for anyone to do so. Congress has not wisdom enough, and
1 say it in all respect to Congress, to construct a definition to deter¬
mine who is a negro and who is not. Neither has the Supreme Court of
the United States.
Mr. Tinkham. For information, I would like to ask you how that is
determined in a place like Georgia or Alabama, or a State where they
have such a law as is proposed here ? What do they say in those
laws ?
Mr. Miller. They fix some arbitrary proportion of negro blood.
Mr. Tinkham. As is done in this proposed bill ?
Mr. Grimke. In some it is one-sixteenth, and in some it is one-
thirty-second.
Mr. Miller. In Georgia and Alabama they do not need exact defi¬
nitions to carry out the purposes of the ruling elements of those com¬
munities, but I hardly think that there would be a fair basis for
Federal procedure.
Mr. Tinkham. I simply wanted that fact for my information.
Mr. Miller. You can see, Mr. Chairman, the legal tangle that
would result from attempting to make an exact definition of a person
of the black, or the Ethiopian, race. Mr. Grimke has said something
about the purpose being to forbid the amalgamation of the races.
Now, if you let people alone, of their own motion they do not usually
amalgamate. The Jew will marry a Jew; the Italian will marry an
Italian; the Englishman will marry an Englishwoman. That is so
in the natural course of things. If you could trace our Irish immi¬
grants in this country during the past 80 years, I daresay you would
find that for the most part they have married among themselves.
An amalgamation of races is a slow and long process when you leave
people alone. Now, if you want to forbid the intermingling of races
just bear in mind, as I am sure you will bear in wind, this fundamental
principle. It makes absolutely no difference in the long run whether
races are amalgamated legitimately or illegitimately. The students
of history tell me that at one time in England they had two distinct
people—the Normans and Saxons—and they finally became amal¬
gamated ; but that amalgamation took place very largely through
illegitimate processes, but after a few generations i't made absolutely
no difference. After the social stigma passes away it makes no
difference.
For example, take the chairman of our delegation here [referring
to the chairman of the committee composed of colored men]. He is
as white inside and outside as any Member of Congress. That does
not make any difference. If he chooses to change his name and
residence and practice a little deceit, he coukl easily become a part
of the white race. What he can do is only what 200,000 others
could do in his situation. I will take the census. The census makes
a study of these things. There are at least 200,000 who could do
the same thing. This is made possible by the illegitimate processes.
In the long run, what difference does it make whether it comes about
legitimately or illegitimately ? Under slavery the amalgamation of
the races took place illegitimately-
Mr Grimke. Except as to public morals.
Mr Miller Except as to public morals. The colored woman
was the absolute victim of the white man, and the men of the superior
24 WHITES AND NEGROES IN DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA.
race are always prone to take advantage of the women of the lower
status. It is not a question of race, primarily. You know, Mr.
Chairman, in the great factory population of the North, with over¬
lords and overseers, unless they are fortified by high moral princi¬
ples, they would be disposed to take advantage of the helpless people
placed under them. That is the natural tendency of the male. The
male, as Mr. Grimke told us, is naturally polygamous, and it is only
when under restraint that his natural impulses are kept under con¬
trol. Now, if slavery had continued to exist for a few hundred years
longer, without a fresh importation of Africans, the amalgamation
would have been complete, because it was easy for the white man
to victimize the colored woman. Our objection to this law is that
it makes the colored woman absolutely helpless, not only in opinion,
as she is now, but in law.
I will take up your time to say but one thing further, and that is
this: I am very sorry that a larger attendance is not present
Mr. Tinkham. The other members of the committee will have these
minutes. This is all being taken down, and all you say will be avail¬
able to the other members of the committee.
Mr. Miller. Well, we have no representation in Congress. The
only way we can have our views known is through some such agency
as this.
Washington is a beautiful city, and it is the general desire to make
it the model city of the Nation and of the world. You want your
streets and parks and public buildings to be modeled not only for the
United States but for the world. If that is sol should think you would
want your laws to be a model, not only for the Nation, but also for the
world. Now, any laws that tend to degrade and humiliate any element
of the population would not be a good model for the United States.
While on this point, permit me to say that the States which have these
proscriptive laws do not represent the majority of the United States,
and they are not the most populous States. The States that are
first in population and in wealth do not have these proscriptive laws.
Mr. Tinkham. Twenty-eight States have such laws.
Mr. Miller. Which laws?
Mr. Tinkham. Laws against intermarriage of the races. I will
name these States.
The States which have laws against intermarraige of the races are
Alabama, Arizona, Arkansas, California, Colorado, Delaware, Florida,
Georgia, Idaho, Indiana, Kentucky, Louisiana, Maryland, Mississippi,
Missouri, Montana, Nebraska, North Carolina, North Dakota, Okla¬
homa, Oregon, South Carolina, South Dakota, Tennessee, Texas,
Utah, Virginia, and West Virginia—28 States.
Mr. Miller. That is the anti-intermarriage laws ?
Mr. Tinkham. Yes, forbidding intermarriage.
Mr. Miller. But they have not the separate car laws.
Mr. Tinkham. No; some of them have, however.
Mr. Miller. In the States you have mentioned there are only two
of the very great States, Indiana and Missouri, and they border on
the southern tier of States, and perhaps borrow that sentiment from
the Southern States; but the great States like New York, Pennsyl¬
vania, Massachusetts, Ohio, and Illinois, the largest and most power¬
ful States in the Union, do not have such laws.
whites AND negroes IN district of COLUMBIA. 25
We frf Soing to make Washington the model city it ought
, ,e in ali respects, and it would be a sad spectacle to
f0 i-l WorW if while advocating equality of law and equal
justice and liberty to all we should also nave to present to them the
lact oi the existence here in the District of Columbia of these pro-
scrip tive laws governing a part of our population.
So please bear in mind, Mr. Chairman, that in trying to make
Washington the model city, your laws should be just and fair and
equitable to all the elements of the population of the city.
Mr. Grimke. I will next ask Prof. Cook to address the committee.
STATEMENT OF MR. GEORGE W. COOK, SECRETARY AND
PROFESSOR OF HOWARD UNIVERSITY.
Mr. Cook. Mr. Chairman, much that I would probably say if I
were here alone—in fact, almost all of it—has been covered by the
remarks of the chairman of this delegation and Prof. Miller.
I do not think, from one of the greatest principles that underlies
action on the part of American citizens, that the jim-crow car bill
ought to be passed, and that is that it will be in its very nature aimed
to bring into less appreciation than should be a set of taxpayers of
the District of Columbia, and this set of taxpayers is not negligible.
From the standpoint of revenue it is strong, and it probably is as
strong as any class of people industrially situated as you will find in
the United States.
Therefore, in the name of the colored people who are taxpayers in
the District of Columbia, I hope that this bill will not pass. First, I
should like to consider in my mind before I go further the question of
the utility of the proposed legislation. Dean Miller has very forcibly
and forcefully given to you the lack of need of that bill in the very
apparent cordiality and peaceful existence of the two races here. 1
have been traveling for 41 years on one street car line in the District
of Columbia, and growing out of racial antipathy I do not remember
having seen a single altercation, although I have seen many alterca¬
tions on the street cars.
Mr. Grimke. That is, you mean between the races?
Mr. Cook. That is what I say. I have seen altercations between
white men; I have seen altercations between colored men; I have
heard quarrels between conductors and motormen and with both,
and at no time did any altercation, so far as I remember, grow out of
any act or condition of circumstances that said themselves "because
you are white" or "because you are colored.
Mr. Tinkham. How long have you lived in Washington?
Mr. Cook. Forty-one years last October, and I have been con¬
stantly moving all the time, for I have only been sick, I think, about
15 days in that time. . .
Mr Tinkham. I might say this, although perhaps it is a little out
of order that I do not believe the committee will report this jim-crow
ear bill favorably, but I think on the question of the bill forbidding
intermarriage the situation is quite different. Of course, I do not
want to make any difference in your argument
Mr Grimke. In the committee, you mean?
Mr Tinkham. Yes. I do not believe this committee will report
the jim-crow bill, but as to the other bill the situation is quite
26 whites and negroes in district of columbia.
different. As I said, however, I do not want to interfere with your
statement.
Mr. Cook. I thank you for your suggestion, as it will naturally
shorten my argument. I will say in passing, however, that if you
pass the jim-crow car bill to separate the races, you must immedi¬
ately stop the railroad companies from getting the type of car that
is being introduced, because the center-entry car will make more
jostling, more personal contact in attempting to put one class of
people in the back of those cars, than the present condition could
do. A colored man to-day can stand on that center platform; with
your bill he probably must be relegated to the back of the car, there
to jostle both white and colored people, not intentionally, but out
of the circumstances of the case, in order to get to his seat. Since
that bill possibly will not be reported, I will not go into further detail
about it, but simply say that the bill will defeat the very object that
it is presented to cover.
As to the intermarriage bill, to be frank with you, I have always
considered that the intermarriage bill must have been conceived for
other than reasons of preventing marriage.
Mr. Grimke. Conceived for reasons other than preventing misce¬
genation ?
Mr. Cook. No, even for intermarriage; for, in the first place, inter¬
marriage between whites and colored people in the District of Col¬
umbia, in the minds of both, seems to be against public opinion.
I think the first speaker said it was something like 1 per cent
Mr. Grimke. No, I said that mixed marriages formed only a small
fraction of 1 per cent.
Mr. Tinkham. I understand that last year there were 16 in the
District.
Mr. Cook. Since the object is to prevent the mingling of the blood
of the two races, no such bill as this ought to be passed, because that
would rather encourage illicit relations between the races. If you
want to prevent the mingling of blood you do not want to pass such
a law as this, because in the Southern States, where they have such
laws, there is a great deal more admixture of blood than there is where
there are no such laws. The anti-intermarriage law everywhere is
based upon the idea of superior and inferior races. You will find in
the South that public opinion is inimical to the inferior race, because
the law puts a protection around the white man, just as our chairman
has said, who seduces the colored girl.
Now, there need be no arguments in regard to the colored people
about their wanting intermarriage, because intermarriages are so
rare that that is a negligible proposition in the argument. It is not
worth while talking about. But we do see a danger in the District
of Columbia in the enactment of such a law, because it would point
the finger apparently to the inferiority of the colored race. What
does it say to the colored^ youth? It would say to every child, no
matter what his training or education or breeding, that he is inferior
to everybody who is white. Now, I do not know what the standard
may be in the minds of others as to what constitutes superiority or
inferiority, but, to my mind, character, efficiency as a public citizen—
the good that a man does for the public by his living—is the proper
measure of a man's superiority or inferiority.
Mr. Tinkham. It is to all intelligent men, I agree with you there.
WHITES AND NEGROES IN DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA. 27
Miller <fl°r]Ki\r'^OW'-"'" not say anything more, but I think Mr.
qtnr> +V. n Grimke have made arguments here that ought to
lS n PassaSe of such a bill.
MKE- 1 will next call on Mr. Whitefield McKinley.
STATEMENT OF MR. WHITEFIELD M'KINIEY.
a?"' ^nkham. Where do you live«
Mr. McKinley In the District of Columbia.
^ A rINT?nAM> A?d what is y°ur occupation ?
Mr. McKinley. I am a real estate agent.
r—- ^nJ?Ham- How long have you lived in the District of Columbia ?
Mr. McKinley. About 30 years.
■ Gklmke. Mr. Chairman, Mr. McKinley is ex-collector of the
P0^ °f Georgetown. He served under President Taft.
_ Mr. McKinley. I will speak only of the question of the intermar¬
riage of the races, and will speak from a personal standpoint. I
feel that the bill, while aiming at the purity of blood, will have, as
all such laws do have, the very opposite effect. I can speak from
personal experience, because I know that the vicious laws that have
been passed in the South during the last 25 years have had the
effect of driving over to the white side thousands and thousands of
mixed bloods who unquestionably would have remained loyal to
their own race had it not been for these laws. I come from one of
the largest colored families in the South, originally from Charleston,
S. C., and I know in that family almost 60 per cent of the members
of the family in the past 25 years have drifted over into the white
race. The matter has been such a delicate one that in 1894, when
the Democrats held a constitutional convention in Columbia, S. C.,
Mr. George Tillman, a brother of Senator Tillman of South Carolina,
a Member of Congress, opposed the bringing of the question into
discussion.
Mr. Tinkham. What question ?
Mr. McKinley. The question of the proportion of white blood
and colored blood. The more radical members wanted to reduce it
from what it was to even a smaller percentage. My recollection is
that Mr. Tillman made a speech in bitter opposition, and cited the
fact that in four counties in South Carolina there would certainly
be bloodshed when they came to administer an estate, because of
this delicate question.
Mr Miller. I thmk you ought to amplify that pomt a little more
fully, Mr. McKinley. .
Mr McKinley. Because the blood through centuries has so
mmp-ied in its miscegenation and marriage that there were, to his
manv families under suspicion, so that if they attempted
Knowledge, in j if tlmv flttprrmfprl to disturb the sitna-
to draw the line as proposed, if they attempted to disturb the sitaa-
xo U1 . OYictPd bv any new laws, there would certainly be blood-
tion as ^er that the News and Courrier came out in an
" 1 and commended Mr. George Tillman for his position on
1VL • l onrl rnmmenaea ivat. vjreuige Amman 1U1 nio
editorial an knoW that as a matter of fact that if there were no
that questio . ide of itgelf would be a barrier against
laws on the su j ^ Tafee my Qwn j We tw0
the internum sf wllQm is so white that it is impossible for any one
daughters, ^ ^ ^ c0\0Ted blood in her, and yet I would almost
28
whites and negroes in district of columbia.
prefer to see one of my daughters dead than to see them marry
into the white race under present conditions. That is the feeling
of almost every one in our social standing, due, as you can see, to a
pride of race.
Mr. Grimke. And to the terrible time they have if they are
married into the white race.
Mr. McKinley. Now, Mr. Chairman, I can conceive of nothing
more vicious, nothing more harmful to both races, than to inflict
upon them a law that in effect says that one race is superior and the
other race is inferior, and not in effect bringing about the results
intended.
Mr. Tinkham. If I understand you, you object to the law, in the
first place, because you say it is unnecessary.
Mr. McKinley. It is unnecessary.
Mr. Tinkham. Because, in the second place, there are so very,
Very few such marriages in the District of Columbia ?
Mr. McKinley. That is right.
Mr. Tinkham. And sentimentally that you think it should not be
put upon the statute books; that it would be useless if it were made
a law ?
Mr. McKinley. Yes.
Mr. Grimke. And public sentiment on both sides would be such
that the whites would hate those who intermarried, and the colored
people would hate them likewise.
Mr. Chairman. I would like to have the lady who is on this com¬
mittee speak to you for a few moments.
STATEMENT OF MRS. ROSETTA E. LAWSON.
Mr. Tinkham. Where do you live, Mrs. Lawson ?
Mrs. Lawson. In Washington, D. C.
Mr. Tinkham. And have lived here for how long?
Mrs. Lawson. For 50 years. I think it is due to the committee
to make known why I appear here, a lone woman in the presence of
all these men. I attended a meeting of the National Emancipation
Commemorative Society last evening. The meeting was of a com¬
mittee to commemorate the one hundred and seventh anniversary
of the birth of Abraham Lincoln, and it was during a conversation
in that meeting, or during the talk that was made, that this legisla¬
tion was referred to. The men and women of that meeting had the
impression that this meeting of the committee would be in regard
to the bill providing for the so-called jim-crow cars in the District
of Columbia, and that this hearing would be on that bill, and that
they did not know whether the hearing would be a public one or a
semiprivate one. So they deputized me to find out whether I
might come to this meeting as the representative of that association,
and finding out that I might come, I am here. I did not come to
make any speech as to my personal feelings in the matter. It goes
without saying that having lived and given social service in the
District of Columbia for the number of years that I have, that I
would have nothing to say favorable to any jim-crow car law but
everything to say contrary to it.
Prof. Miller, Prof. Cook, and Mr. Grimke have all expressed the
sentiment of my heart very much more strongly than I could express
whites and negroes in district of columbia.
29
it myself. But the sentiment in the meeting which I have referred
to, which was a largely attended meeting, was that the men and
women represented in that meeting are strongly opposed to the
enactment of any law that would discriminate against the race in
the common carriages in the District of Columbia. And so I am
simply expressing to you the sentiment that pervaded that meeting,
rf1 1S I rose in response to your kind invitation.
Mr. Grimke. Mr. Cobb, who for eight years was a member of the
district attorney's office of the District of Columbia, will now address
you.
STATEMENT OF MR. JAMES A. COBB.
Mr. Tinkham. What is your name and address ?
Mr. Cobb. James A. Cobb, 609 F Street NW. Mr. Chairman, I
am a resident of Washington and a lawyer.
Mr. Tinkham. And you are connected with one of the Federal
departments ?
Mr. Cobb. I was for eight years one of the assistant district attor¬
neys. Mr. Chairman, I do not think that there is anything I can add
to what has already been said so very well by the speakers who have
preceded me.
All I want to say is that I am in full and hearty accord with what
has been said. The point strikes me, as made by Prof. Miller, that
it is illogical, unnecessary, and calculated to engender hard feelings
between the races to pass any such bills as these bills before you.
The colored people, just as any other people, would naturally
resent any law being passed that would reflect upon them in any
wise—and I am speaking more particularly as to the miscegenation
law. As Prof. Miller and the other speakers have said, it is not
because the colored people want to marry white people, but they do
resent to the fullest the proposition that a law should be passed
reflecting on them, because any law of that kind always works to
the detriment of the weaker race, or the weaker members of that
race.
As Prof. Miller said, there is absolutely nothing in the Federal
Constitution respecting the white and colored races. The Constitu¬
tion and the Federal Government are supposed to stand for all races
and for all people under the American flag, and it would be a step
backward for the Federal Government now for the first time to pass
any law reflecting on its citizenship. As a famous French writer
said in one of his works, if the Civil War had not come about when it
did the colored people themselves would have freed themselves in
the' course of time, because slavery was wrong, and no law that is
inherentlv wrong can ever stand on the statute books forever; no
law against one race has ever been able to stand. The race that is
Iwn to-dav may be up to-morrow. It ought to be the purpose of
rLLment like ours, republican m form, to not engender hard
a Gtover the races> but to try and bring about the best kind
feelings b may work for the support of the Government,
of feeling, th ^ well said, this bill is absolutely unnecessary. The
Ass has tween the races are negligible, and as ex-President
marriages uot ^ of his magazine articles, he observed that in
Roosevei^saia wag & larger coiored population than anywhere
30 WHITES AND NEGROES IN DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA.
else in the world, in proportion to tlie total population, and that
there there is no race problem because there are no restrictive laws
against the colored race. He made this point, that marriages between
the two races were negligible, and he said for the reason that there
were no restrictive laws, and because all were treated properly—-and
like seeks like.
As has been so well said, Mr. Chairman, it is unnecessary to have
any such law as this bill proposes, and it is a reflection on the colored
race, which they resent. No such law ought to be on the Federal
Statute books. For my part I believe it is absolutely unconstitu¬
tional. I know the Supreme Court of the United States has not
passed upon the question. I know a number of States have passed
upon a similar question, and Mr. Colley intimates that such a law
might be constitutional from analogy; but the Supreme Court of the
United States has never passed upon it. This bill as drawn in my
opinion is absolutely unconstitutional because it says if some one
goes out into another State and then comes back it makes the mar¬
riage punishable, which certainly makes it unconstitutional. I
know the other part is unconstitutional, so far as the letter and
spirit of the Constitution is concerned, as the Constitution was
written at the foundation of our Government.
Mr. Grimke. We are much obliged to you for your patience in
listening to us throughout this hearing.
Mr. Tinkham. We are glad to have heard you.