Referring to the Reconstruction policy, Mr. Rhodes says: "Stevens' Reconstruction Acts, ostensibly in the interest of freedom, were an attack on civilization.[409] In my judgment Sumner did not show wise constructive statesmanship in forcing unqualified Negro Suffrage on the South."[410] The truth is that Stevens and Sumner were wiser than their day and generation. They were not favorable to an immediate restoration of the States lately in rebellion upon any conditions. They knew that after the cessation of hostilities, the flower of the Confederate Army, an army which it took the entire North with all of its numbers, immense wealth and almost limitless resources four years to conquer, would be at the South and that upon the completion of Reconstruction and the withdrawal of the federal troops, that army could be utilized to bring about practically the same conditions that existed before the war. They, therefore, opposed immediate restoration. This is what Mr. Rhodes characterizes as an attack on civilization. To what civilization does he refer? He surely could not have had in mind the civilization which believed in the divine right of slavery and which recognized and sanctioned the right of one man to hold another as his property; and yet this was the only civilization upon which the rebuilding of the rebellious governments was an attack. But for the adoption of the Congressional plan of Reconstruction and the subsequent legislation of the nation along the same line, the abolition of slavery through the ratification of the 13th Amendment would have been in name only, a legal and constitutional myth. This is the civilization, however, an attack upon which Mr. Rhodes so deeply deplores. It is fortunate for the country that a majority of Mr. Rhodes's fellow citizens did not and do not agree with him along these lines.

Since Stevens and Sumner could not secure the adoption of the plan advocated by them, they proceeded to secure the adoption of the best one that it was possible to obtain under conditions as they then existed. Hence they insisted, successfully, as was then believed, that the legislation, including the 14th Amendment, should be so framed as not only to create national citizenship, as distinguished from State citizenship, but that it should be made the duty of the Federal Government to protect its own citizens, when necessary, against domestic violence, to protect its citizens at home as well as when they are abroad. The closing clause of the 14th Amendment, therefore, declares that Congress shall have power to enforce the provisions of the amendment by appropriate legislation.

But Mr. Rhodes says the Congressional plan of Reconstruction was a failure. The defeat of the Republican party at the North, especially in 1874, he believes "was due to the failure of the Southern policy of the Republican party." In speaking of the action of President Hayes, he says: "Indeed it was the final admission of the Republican party that their policy of forcing Negro suffrage upon the South was a failure." Is it true that Reconstruction was a failure? That depends upon the view one takes of it. Admitting that some of the things expected of it by many of its friends and supporters were not fully realized, its failure even to that extent was, in a large measure, one of the results but not one of the contributory causes of the Democratic national victory of 1874. On the contrary, that policy was a grand and brilliant success.

In the first place, when the split between Congress and President Johnson took place, there was soon developed the fact that the enfranchisement of the blacks was the only plan which could be adopted and by which the one advocated by the President could be defeated. It had been seen and frankly admitted that the war for the preservation of the Union could not have been brought to a successful conclusion without putting the musket in the hands of the loyal blacks. The fact was now made plain that the fruits of the victory that had been won on the battlefield could not be preserved without putting the ballot in their hands. Hence, it was done.

Was this a mistake? Mr. Rhodes says it was; but the results prove that it was not. But for the enfranchisement of the blacks at the South at the time and in the way it was done the 14th and subsequently the 15th Amendment to the Federal Constitution never could have been ratified. The ratification of these two measures alone vindicated the wisdom of that legislation. The 14th Amendment, among other things, made the colored people American citizens. It was, in effect, a recall of the famous Dred Scott decision. The 15th Amendment gave the colored American access to the ballot box, in every State in the Union. The fundamental principles that were carried into effect through the Reconstruction acts of Congress were embodied in these two amendments. After the ratification of these measures, what had previously been local to the South became national. No State north, south, east or west can now legally and constitutionally make or enforce any law making race or color the basis of discrimination in the exercise and enjoyment of civil and public rights and privileges, nor can it make race or color the basis of discrimination in prescribing the qualification of electors. By the ratification of those amendments the right of an American citizen to the exercise and enjoyment of civil and political rights and the right to vote ceased to be local and became national. But it is claimed by some that because the 15th Amendment has been successfully evaded in certain States, it is, for that reason, a failure. I will state here in passing, however, that there has never been made nor can be made any law or constitution that can not at certain times and in some places be successfully evaded. But this does not necessarily prove that the law or constitution in question was a mistake and should, for that reason, be repealed. To this extent and for the reasons and purposes above stated, the wisdom of the Reconstruction Acts of Congress has been more than vindicated.

The failure of the Reconstruction legislation was not due so much to the change of sentiment in the North as to an unwise interpretation of these laws. This started with two unfortunate decisions rendered by the United States Supreme Court, the result of two unwise appointments to seats on the bench made by President Grant. The Judges referred to are Waite of Ohio, and Bradley of New Jersey. Both were supposed to be Republicans and believed to be in accord with the other leaders and constitutional lawyers in the Republican party in their construction of the War Amendments to the Federal Constitution. But they proved to be strong States' Rights men and, therefore, strict constructionists. Those two, with the other States' Rights men already on the bench, constituted a majority of that tribunal. The result was that the court declared unconstitutional and void, not only the national civil rights act, but also the principal sections of the different enforcement acts which provided for the protection of individual citizens by the Federal Government against domestic violence. National citizenship had been created by the 14th Amendment and the Federal Government had been clothed with power to enforce the provisions of that amendment. Legislation for that purpose had been placed upon the statute books and they were being enforced whenever and wherever necessary, as in the case of the lawless and criminal organization called the Ku Klux Klan. But the Supreme Court, very much to the surprise of every one, stepped in and tied the hands of the national administration and prevented any further prosecutions for violence upon the person of a citizen of the United States, if committed within the limits of any one of the States of the Union. In other words, if the State in which a citizen of the United States may reside can not, does not or will not protect him in the exercise and enjoyment of his personal, civil and political rights, he is without a remedy. The result is that the Federal Government is placed in the awkward and anomalous position of exacting support and allegiance from its citizens, to whom it can not in return afford protection, unless they should be outside the boundaries of their own country. By those unfortunate and fatal decisions the vicious and mischievous doctrine of States' Rights, called by some State sovereignty, by others local self government, which was believed to have perished upon the battlefields of the country, was given new life, strength and audacity, and fostered by the preaching of the fear of "Negro domination." The decision declaring the Civil Rights Law unconstitutional was rendered by Mr. Justice Bradley, and nearly all of those by which the principal sections of the different enforcement laws were nullified, were rendered by Chief Justice Waite.

If in every southern State today no attempt were made to violate or evade the 15th Amendment and colored men were allowed free and unrestricted access to the ballot boxes and their votes were fairly and honestly counted, there would be no more danger of "Negro domination" in any one of these States than there is of female domination in States where women have the right to vote. All that colored men have ever insisted upon, was not to dominate but to participate, not to rule but to have a voice in the selection of those who are to rule. In view of their numerical strength the probabilities are that more of them would be officially recognized than in other sections of the country, but never out of proportion to their fitness and capacity, unless there should be a repetition of conditions that existed in the early days of Reconstruction, which is improbable. The dominant element in the Democratic party in that section at that time adopted, as stated above, the policy of "masterly inactivity" which was intended to prevent white men, through intimidation, from taking any part in the organization and reconstruction of the State governments, with a view of making the governments thus organized as odious and as objectionable as possible, in other words, to make them as far as possible "Negro governments." This policy proved to be somewhat effective in many localities. The result was the colored men found much difficulty in finding desirable white men outside of the Democratic party for the different local positions to be filled. This made it necessary in some instances for colored men to be selected to fill certain positions for which white men would have been chosen. But under the present order of things, a repetition of any thing of this sort would be wholly out of the question.

I can not close this article without giving expression to the hope that a fair, just and impartial historian will, some day, write a history covering the Reconstruction period, in which an accurate account based upon actual facts of what took place at that time will be given, instead of a compilation and condensation of untrue, unreliable and grossly exaggerated statements taken from political campaign literature.

JOHN R. LYNCH, Author of "The Facts of Reconstruction."

4352 FORRESTVILLE AVENUE, CHICAGO, ILLINOIS

FOOTNOTES:

[402] Lynch, "The Facts of Reconstruction," Chapter XI.

[403] The speech of R. B. Elliott in reply to A. H. Stephens in the debate on the Civil Rights Bill was admitted to be one of the most eloquent and scholarly speeches ever delivered in Congress. But Mr. Rhodes's preconceived opinions and prejudices were so firmly fixed that he was incapable of detecting anything in the acts or utterances of any colored member of either branch of Congress that deserved to be commended or favorably noticed.

[404] Rhodes, "History of United States," VII, 141.

[405] See Chapter 16 of Lynch, "The Facts of Reconstruction."

[406] See Chapter 8 of Lynch, "The Facts of Reconstruction."

[407] Ibid.

[408] Lynch, "Facts of Reconstruction," pp. 150-151.

[409] Rhodes, "History of the United States," VI, 35.

[410] Rhodes, "History of the United States," VI, 40.



THE STRUGGLE FOR THE RECOGNITION OF HAITI AND LIBERIA AS INDEPENDENT REPUBLICS

The doctrine of recognition as a principle of International law appeared in definite form at the close of the American Revolution. New states had arisen and successful revolutions had given birth to new governments.[411] In Washington's Neutrality Proclamation of 1793, the French Republic was recognized and the neutral position of America was announced.[412] These principles, developed later by Adams and Jefferson through application to the South American colonies which had declared their independence of Spain, marked the beginning of the well-defined international principle of recognition.[413]

Between 1810 and 1825, the Spanish colonies of Mexico, New Granada (Columbia), Venezuela, Peru, Buenos Ayres, Chile, Ecuador and Upper Peru (Bolivia) had revolted and rejected Spanish dominion.[414] In 1824, England recognized the independence of Buenos Ayres, Mexico and Columbia, and gave no heed to the assertion that this "tended to encourage the revolutionary spirit which it had been found so difficult to restrain in Europe."[415]

But before the Spanish colonies had gained their independence, and the spirit of democracy had begun to diffuse its light, movements were on foot to secure the recognition of Haiti. After its discovery by Columbus in 1492, Haitian soil was drenched with the blood of the Spaniard and the native. Civil wars were begun and bloody scenes were enacted.[416] In 1533, peace came between the natives and the Spaniards. Soon thereafter, other Europeans began to arrive. The French and the English were attracted by the stories of riches and their chances for gain. The bloody struggles between these nations and the natives fill many pages of Haitian history.[417] The inhabitants took now the one side, now the other.

Led by Toussaint L'Ouverture, the cause of the French was championed. Finding the French yoke as heavy as the Spanish yoke, Toussaint struck for absolute liberty.[418] He was not, in a real sense, the liberator of the Haitians, as commonly supposed, but he was the precursor of their liberty.[419] His deportation aroused them to struggle with new vigor. Under Dessalines, one of the generals in the army of Toussaint L'Ouverture, the rebellion grew more successful, and on January 1, 1804, the army swore to abjure their allegiance to France forever, and thereupon declared the independence of Haiti.[420] Dessalines was chosen Governor-General and upon abolishing the name "Santo Domingo," the aboriginal name "Haiti" was reestablished.

The history of Haiti after 1804 is concerned with internal dissensions, and contentions with foreign powers. Haiti was not immediately recognized nor was she welcomed into the family of nations. Retaliatory measures were taken by her government to compel the powers to see the advantage in this recognition. Christophe, a contender for power with Petion, one of the founders of the republic, issued in 1816 the proclamation that no negotiation would be entered upon with France unless the independence of the kingdom of Haiti,[421] political as well as commercial, be previously recognized.[422]

In 1823, the independence of Mexico, Columbia, and others was recognized by Great Britain, but Haiti after nineteen years of independence was not given this consideration.[423] As a result the British trade privileges were abolished and the import tax of 12 per cent. was levied on the products of all nations.[424]

Early indications of American commercial relations with Haiti and of an unsatisfactory condition may be discerned in the following resolutions, the first of which was submitted in the Senate, January 11, 1819:

"Resolved: that the President of the United States be requested to communicate to the Senate any information in his possession and which, in his opinion, the public interest may permit to disclose, relating to the seizure and detention of the property of American citizens by the government of Haiti, and the state of any negotiations to procure restitution."[425]

On December 31, 1822, the following resolution was submitted in the House:

"Resolved: that the committee on commerce be instructed to inquire into the present state of the trade and intercourse between the United States and the Island of Haiti, and report what measures would be necessary to improve the commerce between the two countries."[426]

As a matter of fact, the trade with Haiti was very important during this period. By the report of the Register's Office, 1825, Haiti ranked twenty-ninth in the list of countries trading with the United States.[427]

The actual presentation of the question to the country as a whole grew out of an invitation to attend the Panama Congress. In 1825, General Bolivar, leader of the South American revolutionists, invited the states north and south of the Isthmus to send delegates to a congress which would assemble at Panama. Formal invitations to attend the congress were received from Mexico, Guatemala and Columbia and others. The following suggestions were made as to questions to be considered: the interference of European powers in America, the recognition of Haiti, the slave trade and the formation of an American league.[428] That the recognition of Haiti was one of the objects of consideration is so stated among the lists of subjects in the Official Gazette of Columbia. The congress was to determine on what footing should be placed the political and commercial relations of those portions of our hemisphere, which had obtained their independence, but whose independence had not been recognized by any American or European power, as was for many years the case with Haiti.[429] Other evidence is found in a letter of the Columbian minister, Salazar: "On what basis the relations of Haiti, and of other parts of our Hemisphere that shall hereafter be in like circumstances, are to be placed," said he, "is a question simple at first view, but attended with serious difficulties when closely examined. These arise from the different manner of regarding Africans, and from their different rights in Haiti, the United States and in other American states. This question will be determined at the Isthmus, and if possible, an uniform rule of conduct adopted in regard to it, or those modifications that may be demanded by circumstances."[430]

A special message was sent to Congress by President Adams on December 26, naming the delegates to this congress, and asking for an appropriation for expenses. Both Clay, then Secretary of State, and President Adams wished to extend the commercial power of the United States over the Americas, and they welcomed this opportunity. They disclaimed any desire to enter any league, but left poorly defined the objects which would be considered.[431]

The southern point of view, as expressed in the debates on this question, was that disaster awaited the Southern States, if the United States should send delegates to a congress in which Haitian representatives would sit, and which would consider the separation of Cuba and Porto Rico from Spain and the cessation of slavery. This viewpoint was expressed by Benton of Missouri, saying: "We buy coffee from her, and pay for it; but we interchange no consuls or ministers. We receive no mulatto consuls or black ambassadors. And why? Because the peace of eleven states in this Union will not permit the fruits of a successful Negro insurrection to be exhibited among them.... Who are to advise and sit in judgment upon it? Five nations who have already put the black man upon an equality with the white, not only in their constitutions but in real life; five nations who have at this moment (at least some of them) black generals in their armies and mulatto Senators in their Congresses."[432]

The same attitude was expressed by Hayne of South Carolina. "With nothing connected with slavery," said he, "can we consent to treat with other nations, and least of all, ought we to touch the question of the independence of Haiti, in conjunction with revolutionary governments.... You find men of color at the head of their armies, in their legislative halls, and in their executive departments. They are looking to Hayti, even now, with feelings of the strongest fraternity and show, by the very documents before us, that they acknowledge her to be independent."[433] So far as the mission itself was concerned, these arguments were farfetched and served rather to delay the time of departure than to hinder it. The Senate confirmed the nomination and the House voted the expenses. The delegates arrived after the close of the sessions of the congress. Another session was to be held at Tacubaya, but because of dissensions this congress did not assemble. Therefore, the Panama Congress served only to excite debate on the slavery issue and the recognition question, and this last became a rallying cry for the opponents of the administration.

During the intervening years between 1825 and 1860, many memorials, petitions and recommendations were made to Congress respecting the recognition of Haiti. In June, 1838, a petition was received by the Senate from "certain citizens of the United States praying that a diplomatic representative be sent and commercial regulations be entered into with the Republic."[434] This, as others, was laid on the table. While this session continued, petitions were repeatedly presented. John Quincy Adams was the champion of this cause, as of that against the Gag Resolutions, and, again and again, it was through him that the memorials were presented.

Objections were frequently made to the presentation of these memorials. On December 19, Legare of South Carolina said: "As sure as you live, Sir, if this course is permitted to go on, the sun of this Union will go down—it will go down in blood and go down to rise no more. I will vote unhesitatingly against nefarious designs like these. They are treason."[435] In 1839, while the House was considering an outfit for a charge d'affaires to Holland, Slade of Vermont began a speech in favor of appointing a diplomatic agent to Haiti. He spoke until the House refused to hear the continuation of his remarks.[436] A resolution was offered later to appoint a commercial agent to Haiti, but it was ruled out of order.[437] In the same year, the Committee on Foreign Affairs asked to be discharged from the "further consideration of sundry memorials asking for the opening of international relations with Haiti."[438] In spite of this request, the next year, 1840, petitions urging the recognition were continued.[439] That Garrison was active in this agitation of the abolition period is shown by the statement of Wise, of Virginia: "it is but part and parcel of the English scheme set on foot by Garrison, and to bring abolition as near as possible...."[440]

In 1844, the Committee on Foreign Affairs made a report on the subject of commercial intercourse with the republic of Haiti. Ten thousand copies were ordered to be printed.[441] As a result of this report, and the agitation of years back, a commission was appointed to Haiti in 1844 and again in 1851.[442] In the latter year, an invitation was made to the United States Government to join France and England in an offensive interference in Haiti.[443] The correspondence and the reports of one of the American Commissioners, Robert Walsh, was made public in 1852, and they were widely discussed.[444] The reports were unjust and unfair estimations even of the Haitian commercial situation. A reliable estimate of the trade of Haiti with the United States, at this time, places the trade as equal to the total trade of Venezuela, Bolivia, Argentina, the Cisalpine Republics and Peru with the United States. Mexico, with more than sixteen times as large a population as Haiti, exported from the United States in 1851, $330,000 less than Haiti and used for the purpose 26,000 tons less of shipping.[445] And yet these countries were recognized as independent republics, while Haiti was denied that right.

European countries were not as slow as the United States in granting recognition to Haiti. England formally acknowledged the Republic in 1825, and sent a Consul-General.[446] An imperfect recognition was granted by Charles X of France, by sending Baron Mackau as his representative.[447] Its independence was recognized fully in 1838, after thirty-four years of independence. Two treaties were negotiated, one of them political, by which the independence of the republic was recognized; the other financial, by which the claims of the French colonists were reduced to sixty million francs.[448] This debt made Haiti almost a dependency of France for over sixty years.[39] Before 1860, all important countries had representatives in Haiti. Great Britain, Spain, Denmark, Holland, Belgium, Portugal, Sweden, Hanover and Austria were all duly chronicled in the Almanach de Gotha.[449] In the language of Frederick Douglass: "After Haiti had shaken off the fetters of bondage, and long after her freedom and independence had been recognized by all other civilized nations, we continued to refuse to acknowledge the fact and treated her as outside the sisterhood of nations."

By act of Congress in 1819, the colony of Liberia was established. During the years following, groups of colonists left America for this shore.[450] The decade after 1832 was marked by the action of the independent State colonization societies. In 1847, the people of Liberia undertook self-government, which was adopted by popular vote. A later convention drew up a declaration of independence, and a new constitution modeled on that of the United States was adopted, July 26, 1847. In September, it was ratified by the people, and President Roberts took office, January 3, 1848.[451]

President Roberts set out on a voyage to the foreign countries with the intention of seeking favor for his country. In many countries, he was welcomed and his efforts were successful. In England, for example, not only was recognition secured, but also an armed vessel of small tonnage and a few guns were given him.[452] In the United States, not even the formal recognition of Liberia was obtained. This was due, in some measure, to the slavery question and the contention which was always aroused when any subject even remotely related thereto was presented.[453]

When Liberia declared its independence in 1848, the second Negro republic entered its demand for the recognition of its sovereignty by the United States. Henry Clay, one of the early officers of the American Colonization Society, wrote in a letter dated Ashland, October 18, 1851: "I have thought for years that the independence of Liberia ought to be recognized by our government, and I have frequently urged it upon persons connected with the administration and I shall continue to do so if I have suitable opportunity."

England recognized the independence of Liberia in 1848 and France in 1852.[454] In 1855 treaties were formed with the Hanseatic Republics, Lubeck, Bremen and Hamburg, with Belgium in 1858, with Denmark in 1861, with Italy and the Netherlands in 1862, with Holland, Sweden, Norway and Haiti in 1864, with Portugal and Denmark in 1865 and Austria in 1867.[455] For a period of years the United States had maintained a commercial agent at Monrovia and at Gaboon.[456] It was evident to those acquainted with the commercial situation that recognition was desirable, for both of these Republics.[457]

In 1859, the leading northern newspapers carried advertisements from the Haitian government, offering homes with land and free passage to those unable to provide the same. A reply was published in the Tribune addressed especially to the free people of color of Missouri and the North. A significant clause in this reply said: "Remember that when you pass beyond the limits of the United States, the government and laws of this country cease to protect you."[458] A circular was sent out in 1860, addressed to the "Blacks, Men of color, and Indians in the United States and British North American Provinces," and after calling attention to the prosperous condition of the country, added "that our relations with the powers represented in Haiti are on a footing of perfect harmony."[459]

The triumph of the Republican party in 1860 foreshadowed the exclusion of slavery from the territories, and the ultimate ruin of the institution. Six weeks after Lincoln's election, South Carolina had adopted the Ordinance of Secession, and the Gulf States soon followed. There were only four slave-holding States with representatives in Congress, Delaware, Maryland, Kentucky and Missouri. At the opening of the 37th Congress, 1861, the President's message contained the following: "If any good reason exists why we should persevere longer in withholding our recognition of the independence and sovereignty of Haiti and Liberia, I am unable to discern it. Unwilling, however, to inaugurate a novel policy in regard to them without the approbation of Congress, I submit to your consideration the expediency of an appropriation for maintaining a Charge d'Affaires near each of these states. It does not admit of doubt that important commercial advantages might be secured by favorable treaties with them."[460] Commenting on Lincoln's message, Garrison terms it "feeble and rambling" and he "could find nothing in it to praise except the recommendation that Congress should recognize the independence and sovereignty of Haiti and Liberia."[461]

The 45th annual report, January 21, 1862, of the American Colonization Society contained a section calling attention to the message.[462] The board of managers of the Pennsylvania Colonization Society took note of the same, May, 1862.[463] Newspapers and magazines took up the agitation. The Philadelphia North American said: "It is high time that Congress should recognize Liberia as an independent, self-sustaining government. Such a measure would be perfectly comformable to the principles, policy and direct interests of our country."[464]

On February 4, 1862, Charles Sumner from the Committee on Foreign Relations, introduced a bill "authorizing the President to appoint Diplomatic Representatives to the Republics of Haiti and Liberia respectively. Each Representative so appointed is to be accredited as Commissioner and Consul-General and is to receive, out of any money in the Treasury not otherwise appropriated, the compensation of commissioners provided for by Act of Congress, approved August 18, 1856; but the compensation of the Representative at Liberia is not to exceed $4,000."[465] With the introduction of the bill, Sumner spoke at some length, favoring the passage of the bill.[466] Following the speech of Sumner, the opposition arose. Davis, of Kentucky, said: "If after such a measure should take effect, the Republic of Haiti and the Republic of Liberia were to send their Ministers Plenipotentiary or their Charge d'Affaires to our government, they would have to be received by the President and by all the functionaries of the government upon the same terms of equality with similar representatives from other powers. If a full-blooded Negro were sent in that capacity from either of the two countries, by the laws of nations he could demand that he be received precisely on the same terms of equality with the white representative from the powers on the earth composed of white people."[467] This sentiment of the opposition, however, was expressed in harsher terms in some instances. Through Saulsbury, of Maryland, this sentiment again was: "How fine it will look, after emancipating the slaves in this District, to welcome here at the White House an African, full-blooded, all gilded and belaced, dressed in court style, with wig and sword and tights and shoe-buckles and ribbons and spangles and many other adornments which African vanity will suggest;" and "If this bill should pass the Houses of Congress and become a law, I predict that in twelve months, some Negro will walk upon the floor of the Senate and carry his family into that which is apart for foreign Ministers. If that is agreeable to the tastes and feelings of the people of this country, it is not to mine...."[468]

To these attacks, Sumner replied: "I content myself with a single remark. I have more than once had the opportunity of meeting citizens of those republics and I say nothing more than truth when I add that I have found them so refined, and so full of self-respect that I am led to believe no one of them charged with a mission from his government will seek any society where he will not be entirely welcome."[469] A letter from the Commercial Agent at Port au Prince was read, urging immediate recognition in order to counteract "the schemes of foreign powers"; adding further that "the Haitians believed that when the present administration came into power in the United States, our former coldness and neglect would cease; and they feel and do not hesitate to express a bitter disappointment that nothing has yet been done."[470] The bill was passed by the Senate, by a vote of 32 yeas to 7 nays. In the House, it was championed by Gooch of Massachusetts and passed by a vote of 86 yeas to 37 nays, and with the President's signature became a law. In November, 1864, a treaty of friendship, commerce and navigation was signed between the United States and Haiti.[471] A similar treaty was signed with Liberia.[472]

Both of the Republics have felt deeply indebted to Charles Sumner for the passage of this bill. The Liberian Commissioners, Alexander Crummell, Edward Blyden, and J. D. Johnson, expressed thanks for his discretion in securing its passage.[473] The republic of Haiti as late as 1871 manifested its gratitude for his continued interest in its welfare by presenting him with a medal and by an order that his portrait be placed in its capitol.[474] The A. M. E. Church, representing thousands of Negroes in the United States, expressed the sentiment of this people in a resolution adopted in August, 1862, to the effect "that, in the noble act of the United States Senate in passing a law recognizing the independence of Haiti and Liberia, we see the hand of God in a movement which we regard as ominous of good for the race."[475]

Thus after Haiti had been an independent power for sixty years and Liberia for fifteen years, the government of the United States granted recognition to them as independent republics, on the eve of the death of the slave system. Under the average circumstances, prompt recognition may have come as the result of the efforts of the nations themselves, as in the case of the republic of Texas.[476] But because of the unusual circumstance which the adoption of recognition for Negro republics would produce—holding some as slaves and recognizing others as equals—these republics were forced to ally themselves with the opponents of slavery and to encourage the presentation of their case through the champions of anti-slavery in the legislative halls. Without regard to their more recent internal politics and modern difficulties, the recognition of these republics as independent powers forms one of the great landmarks in the Negro's progress toward democracy, and justice.

CHARLES H. WESLEY

FOOTNOTES:

[411] Paxson, "Independence of South American Republics," pp. 17-18.

[412] Foster, "A Century of American Diplomacy," p. 154.

[413] Reddaway, "The Monroe Doctrine," p. 15.

[414] Robinson and Beard, "The Development of Modern Europe," Vol. 2, p. 22.

[415] Ibid., p. 27.

[416] Leger, "Haiti, Her History and Distractors," p. 22.

[417] Madiou (fils) describes the mutual cruelties of the French and natives. "l'Histoire d'Haiti."

[418] Leger, "Haiti," p. 125.

[419] In this struggle 50,000 Frenchmen were lost. Gastonnet des Fosses. "La Perte d'une Colonie," p. 34.

[420] Bird, "The Black Man or Haytian Independence (1869)," p. 60.

[421] Christophe assumed the title of king of Haiti in 1811.

[422] Leger, "Haiti," p. 168.

[423] During the presidency of Boyer (1818-1848) several invitations were sent to the free colored people of the United States to migrate to Haiti. Agents were sent and plans to cooperate with colonization groups in America were encouraged. The constitution of 1843 abolished the presidency for life, which was held by Boyer, and instituted a service for four years. The Republic is still governed by the stipulations of this constitution. Leger, p. 179.

[424] Seger, Haiti, p. 179.

America was subjected to these taxes as shown by: "While the citizens of France are scarcely affected in their importations to Haiti, the Americans here import and our merchants at home export scarcely any article that is free."—"Commercial Relations," Vol. 1, p. 560.

[425] Annals of Congress, 15th Congress, 2d Session, p. 113. This resolution was agreed to and the Committee was appointed.

[426] Annals of Congress, 17th Congress, 2d Session, p. 477. Agreed to without debate.

[427] Report of Register, Treasury Department, Gale and Seaton's Register of Debates, appendix, 18th Congress, 2d Session.

[428] Bassett, "History of United States," p. 383.

[429] Official Gazette of Columbia, February, 1826. Quoted by Hayne, 19th Cong., 1st Session, Gale and Seaton's Register, p. 156.

[430] Gale and Seaton's Register, 19th Cong., 1st Session, p. 329. General Bolivar, himself, was kindly disposed to Haiti, as disclosed by the correspondence which passed between President Petion and the General, just previous to the revolution in Venezuela. 4,000 rifles, provisions and ammunition were given by Haiti to the expedition.—"Expedition de Bolivar par le Senateur Marion aine," pp. 41-43, 1849.

[431] Cf. "Messages and Papers of the Presidents," Richardson, 1789-1897, Vol. 2, p. 320.

[432] Gale and Seaton's Register, 1825-1826, p. 330.

[433] Gale and Seaton's Register, 1825-1826, p. 166.

[434] Congressional Globe, 25th Congress, 2d Session, p. 457.

[435] National Intelligencer, December 19, 21, 1838.

[436] Congressional Globe, 25th Congress, 3d Session, p. 219.

[437] Ibid., p. 220.

[438] Ibid., p. 241, March 4, 1839.

[439] Ibid., 26th Congress, 1st Session, p. 164.

[440] Garrison and Garrison, "Life of Garrison," Vol. 2, p. 248. Liberator, 9:3.

[441] Congressional Globe, 28th Congress, 1st Session, p. 504.

[442] Clark, "United States Intervention in Hayti (1852)," p. 4.

[443] Ibid., p. 21. In 1844, San Domingo seceded and became the Dominican Republic. Frequent quarrels ensued between the two parts of the Island. Therefore the reason for this suggestion for interference. Cf. "San Domingo and the United States," John Bassett Moore, Review of Reviews, March, 1905, p. 298.

[444] Clark, p. 30. Congress. Globe, 32d Cong., 1st Session, p. 1769.

[445] Clark, p. 28.

[446] Sir Spencer St. John, "Hayti or The Black Republic," p. 86.

[447] Ibid., p. 380.

[448] Leger, "Recueil des traites et Conventions de la Republique d'Haiti," 23.

[449] Congress. Globe, 37th Congress, 2d Session, p. 1775. Speeches of Chas. Sumner, published variously, Washington, April 23, 1862, p. 6. Cf. "Contre la Reconnoissance de la Republique Haitienne (1825)" par M. Coustelin. La Norman pere Librairie, Paris.

[450] Cf. Kennedy's "Colonization Report."

[451] McPherson, "History of Liberia," Johns Hopkins University Studies, 9th Series, X, p. 34.

[452] Ibid., p. 39.

[453] Ibid., p. 38. "But the delicacy with which the dissension on the slavery question made it necessary to handle every subject remotely bearing on that bone of contention, prevented him (Roberts) from obtaining even the formal recognition of Liberia."

[454] Congress. Globe, 37th Cong., 2d Session, p. 2500.

[455] "Treaties and Conventions concluded between the Republic of Liberia and Foreign Powers, 1848-1892," pp. 9, 17, 23, 30, published by the Department of State, Monrovia, Liberia.

[456] Congress. Globe, 37th Cong., 2d Session, p. 2501.

[457] This is quite evident from the fact that in 1860, out of 60 countries trading with the United States, Haiti stood 27th and Liberia 29th. (Statistical View of Commerce of United States, exhibiting the value of exports to and imports from foreign countries, and the number and tonnage of American and foreign vessels arriving from and departing to each foreign country during the fiscal year ending June 30, 1860, Treasury Department, Register's Office, April 21, 1862.)

John L. Wilson, commercial agent at Cape Haytien, wrote, June 5, 1854: "By a recognition of the Independence of Hayti, our commerce would be likely to advance still more. Our citizens trading there would enjoy more privileges, besides standing on a better footing. Many decided advantages might be obtained through treaty and our own government would exercise a wholesome influence over theirs, of which it stands much in need."—"Commercial Relations," Vol. 4, p. 509.

Seth Webb, commercial agent at Port au Prince, wrote, December 12, 1861: "I must say with frankness to the Department, that I find my position much embarrassed by the failure of our government to take any steps toward acknowledging the nationality of Haiti, or entering into the usual relations of country, which exist between neighboring peoples."—To Hon. Wm. H. Seward, Sec. of State, U. S. Commercial Agency, Port au Prince.

[458] April 18, 1850. Quoted in N.Y. Tribune, November 9, 1860.

[459] Ibid., November 9, 1860.

[460] "Messages and Papers of the Presidents," Vol. 4, p. 47.

[461] Garrison and Garrison-Garrison, Vol. 4, p. 33. Liberator, 31: 194.

[462] African Repository, February, 1862, p. 41.

"The Executive Committee of the American Colonization Society observe with deep interest that the President of the United States has in his late message recommended that the Republic of Liberia should be acknowledged as independent. They also notice his recommendation of some plan of colonization for free people of color in some clime congenial to them."

[463] Ibid., May, 1862, p. 157.

[464] Ibid., April, 1862, p. 111.

[465] Congress. Globe, 37th Cong., 2d Session, February 4, 1862.

[466] Congress. Globe, 37th Cong., 2d Session, February 4, 1862.

[467] Globe, 37th Congress, 2d Session, p. 1806.

[468] Ibid., pp. 2501-2506.

[469] Ibid., p. 1807.

[470] Seth Webb to Seward, Sec. of State, December 12, 1861.

[471] La Republique d'Haiti et les Etats-Unis de l'Amerique, desirant rendre durables et solides l'amitie et la bonne entente, qui regnent heureusement entre les deux nations liberales, ont resolu de fixer d'une maniere claire, nette et positive les regles qui devront etre, a l'avenir, religieusement suivies entre l'une et l'autre, au moyen d'un traite d'amitie, de commerce et de navigation, ainsi que d'extradition de criminels fugitifs.—Leger, "Recueil des Traites," etc., p. 84.

[472] "Treaties and Conventions concluded between the Republic of Liberia and Foreign Powers, 1848-1892."

[473] Grimke, "Chas. Sumner," p. 343.

[474] Chas. Sumner's Works, Vol. XIV, pp. 306-309, XV, pp. 270-272. Memoirs and Letters of Chas. Sumner, E. L. Pierce, pp. 68-69.

[475] The African Repository, August, 1862, p. 255. This was passed after thanking the Liberian Commissioners, who had addressed them.

[476] Resolution of the Senate: Resolved, that the independence of Texas ought to be acknowledged by the United States whenever satisfactory information shall be received that it has in successful operation a civil government capable of performing the duties and fulfilling the obligations of an independent power.—Journal of the Senate, July 1, 1836.



THREE NEGRO POETS: HORTON, MRS. HARPER, AND WHITMAN[477]

With the exception of a few noteworthy individuals, conscious literary effort on the part of the Negro in America is, of course, a matter of comparatively recent years. Decades before Emancipation, however, there were those who yearned toward poetry as a means of artistic expression, and sought in this form to give vent to their groping, their striving, and their sorrow. Handicapped as they were, scores of these black bards must forever remain unknown. Even after the Civil War those who had gifts were frequently held back by insufficient education or the lack of other advantages of culture. At least three persons, however, in the long period between Phillis Wheatley and Paul Dunbar, deserve not wholly to pass unnoticed. These were George Moses Horton, Mrs. Frances Ellen Watkins Harper, and Albery A. Whitman. Each one of these poets had faults and even severe limitations as an artist. Each one had also, however, a spark of the divine fire that occasionally even kindled a flame.

George M. Horton was born a slave in Chatham County, North Carolina, in 1797. Later he became the property of one Hall Horton, son of James, who, from all accounts, was a very hard master. George, however, was permitted to hire his time out at Chapel Hill, the seat of the University of North Carolina, where by some accounts he received twenty-five cents a day for his labor, by others fifty cents. He was very ambitious. He was fond of the melodies and hymns sung at campmeetings, and learned to read largely by matching the words he knew in the hymnal to those in a spelling-book. Many people of distinction became interested in his abilities; several legends exist as to his instructors; and Dr. Caldwell, president of the University, was for some years a special patron. George's earliest poetical compositions, however, had to be written down for him by other people. His work was infused with his desire for freedom, and much of it was suggested by the common evangelical hymns, as were the following lines:

Alas! and am I born for this, To wear this slavish chain? Deprived of all created bliss, Through hardship, toil, and pain?

How long have I in bondage lain, And languished to be free! Alas! and must I still complain, Deprived of liberty?

* * * * *

Come, Liberty, thou cheerful sound, Roll through my ravished ears; Come, let my grief in joys be drowned, And drive away my fears.

Some of Horton's friends undertook to help him publish a volume of his poems so that from the sale of these he might purchase his freedom and go to the new colony of Liberia. The young man now became fired with ambition and inspiration. Thrilled by the new hope he wrote

'Twas like the salutation of the dove, Borne on the zephyr through some lonesome grove, When spring returns, and winter's chill is past, And vegetation smiles above the blast.

Horton's master, however, demanded for him an exorbitant price, and when the booklet, The Hope of Liberty, appeared in 1829 it had nothing of the sale that was hoped for. He lived for years as a janitor at the University, executed small commissions for verse from the students, who treated him kindly, and in later years even went to Philadelphia; but his old dreams had faded. Several reprintings of his poems were made, however, and one of these was bound with the 1838 edition of Phillis Wheatley's poems. He died in 1880 (by other accounts 1883). A scholarly article about him was written for the Southern Workman of October, 1914, by Mr. Stephen B. Weeks, who in turn owed much to the researches of Prof. George S. Wills.

Horton's work showed readily the influence of his models. He used especially the meter of the common evangelical hymns, and cultivated the vague personification of the poets of the eighteenth century. He himself, however, was essentially a romantic poet, as was evinced by his fondness for Byron and Marlowe. His common style is represented by the following lines from his poem entitled On the Evening and Morning:

When Evening bids the Sun to rest retire, Unwearied Ether sets her lamps on fire; Lit by one torch, each is supplied in turn, Till all the candles in the concave burn.

* * * * *

At length the silver queen begins to rise, And spread her glowing mantle in the skies, And from the smiling chambers of the east, Invites the eye to her resplendent feast.

The passion in the heart of this man, his undoubted gifts as a poet, and the bitter disappointment of his yearnings have all but added one more to the long list of those who died with their ambitions blasted and their most ardent hopes defeated.

In 1854 appeared the first edition of Poems on Miscellaneous Subjects, by Frances Ellen Watkins, commonly known as Mrs. Frances E. W. Harper, who was for many years before the public and who is even now remembered by many friends. Mrs. Harper was a woman of strong personality and could read her poems to advantage. Her verse was very popular, not less than ten thousand copies of her booklets being sold. It was decidedly lacking in technique, however, and much in the style of Mrs. Hemans. The Death of the Old Sea King, for instance, is in the ballad style cultivated by this poet and Longfellow; but it is not a well-sustained effort. Mrs. Harper was best when most simple, as when in writing of children she said:

I almost think the angels Who tend life's garden fair, Drop down the sweet white blossoms That bloom around us here.

The secret of her popularity is to be seen in such lines as the following from Bury me in a Free Land:

Make me a grave where'er you will, In a lowly plain or a lofty hill; Make it among earth's humblest graves, But not in a land where men are slaves.

I could not rest if around my grave I heard the steps of a trembling slave: His shadow above my silent tomb Would make it a place of fearful gloom.

* * * * *

I ask no monument, proud and high, To arrest the gaze of the passers-by; All that my yearning spirit craves Is bury me not in a land of slaves.

Of the Emancipation Proclamation she wrote:

It shall flash through coming ages, It shall light the distant years; And eyes now dim with sorrow Shall be brighter through their tears.

While Mrs. Harper was still prominently before the public appeared Albery A. Whitman, a Methodist minister, whose important collection, Not a Man and Yet a Man, appeared in 1877, and whose long and ambitious poem, Twasinta's Seminoles, or The Rape of Florida (the latter title being the one most used), was issued in 1884. This writer had great love for his work. In the preface to his second volume he wrote of poetry as follows: "I do not believe poetry is on the decline. I do not believe that human advancement extinguishes the torch of sentiment. I can not think that money-getting is the whole business of man. Rather am I convinced that the world is approaching a poetical revolution. The subtle evolution of thought must yet be expressed in song. Poetry is the language of universal sentiment. Torch of the unresting mind, she kindles in advance of all progress. Her waitings are on the threshold of the infinite, where, beckoning man to listen, she interprets the leaves of immortality. Her voice is the voice of Eternity dwelling in all great souls. Her aims are the inducements of heaven, and her triumphs the survival of the Beautiful, the True, and the Good. In her language there is no mistaking of that liberal thought which is the health of mind. A secret interpreter, she waits not for data, phenomena, and manifestations, but anticipates and spells the wishes of Heaven."

The work of Whitman himself is exceedingly baffling. It is to his credit that something about his work at once commands judgment by the highest standards. If we consider it on this basis, we find that it is diffuse, exhibits many lapses in taste, is faulty metrically, as if done in haste, and shows imitation on every hand. It imitates Whittier, Longfellow and Tennyson; Scott, Byron and Moore. The Old Sac Village and Nanawawa's Suitors are very evidently Hiawatha over again, and Custer's Last Ride is simply another version of The Charge of the Light Brigade. And yet, whenever one has about decided that Whitman is not worthy of consideration, the poet insists on a revision of judgment; and he certainly could not have imitated so many writers so readily, if he had not had some solid basis in appreciation. The fact is that he shows a decided faculty for brisk, though not sustained, narration. This may be seen in The House of the Aylors. He has, moreover, a romantic lavishness of description that in spite of all technical faults still has some degree of merit. The following quotations, taken respectively from The Mowers and The Flight of Leeona, with all their extravagance, will exemplify both his weakness and his strength in description:

The tall forests swim in a crimson sea, Out of whose bright depths rising silently, Great golden spires shoot into the skies, Among the isles of cloudland high, that rise, Float, scatter, burst, drift off, and slowly fade, Deep in the twilight, shade succeeding shade.

* * * * *

And now she turns upon a mossy seat, Where sings a fern-bound stream beneath her feet, And breathes the orange in the swooning air; Where in her queenly pride the rose blooms fair, And sweet geranium waves her scented hair; There, gazing in the bright face of the stream, Her thoughts swim onward in a gentle dream.

In A Dream of Glory occur the lines,

The fairest blooms are born of humble weeds, That faint and perish in the pathless wood; And out of bitter life grow noble deeds To pass unnoticed in the multitude.

The Bards of England discusses many poets. The following is the passage on Byron:

To Missolonghi's chief of singers too, Unhappy Byron, is a tribute due— A wounded spirit, mournful and yet mad, A genius proud, defiant, gentle, sad; 'Twas he whose Harold won his Nation's heart, And whose Reviewers made her fair cheeks smart; Whose uncurbed Juan hung her head for shame, And whose Mazeppa won unrivaled fame. Earth had no bound for him. Where'er he strode His restless genius found no fit abode.

Whitman's shortcomings become readily apparent when he attempts sustained work. The Rape of Florida is the longest poem yet written by a Negro in America, and also the only attempt by a member of the race to use the elaborate Spenserian stanza throughout a long piece of work. The story is concerned with the capture of the Seminoles in Florida through perfidy and the taking of them away to their new home in the West. It centers around three characters, Palmecho, an old chief, Ewald, his daughter, and Atlassa, a young Seminole who is Ewald's lover. The poem is decidedly diffuse; there is too much subjective description, too little strong characterization. Palmecho, instead of being a stout warrior, is a "chief of peace and kindly deeds." Stanzas of merit, however, occasionally strike the eye. The boat-song forces recognition as genuine poetry:

"Come now, my love, the moon is on the lake; Upon the waters is my light canoe; Come with me, love, and gladsome oars shall make A music on the parting wave for you,— Come o'er the waters deep and dark and blue: Come where the lilies in the marge have sprung, Come with me, love, for Oh, my love is true!" This is the song that on the lake was sung, The boatman sang it over when his heart was young.

It is important to note in a consideration of Whitman's method that while he is writing a story about Indians he frequently leaves this to tell how he feels as a Negro. The following stanzas, however, are pertinent to present-day discussion:

'Tis hard to judge if hatred of one's race, By those who deem themselves superior-born, Be worse than that quiescence in disgrace, Which only merits—and should only—scorn! Oh! let me see the Negro, night and morn, Pressing and fighting in, for place and power! If he a proud escutcheon would adorn, All earth is place—all time th' auspicious hour, While heaven leans forth to see, oh! can he quail or cower?

Ah! I abhor his protest and complaint! His pious looks and patience I despise! He can't evade the test, disguised as saint, The manly voice of freedom bids him rise, And shake himself before Philistine eyes! And, like a lion roused, no sooner than A foe dare come, play all his energies, And court the fray with fury if he can! For hell itself respects a fearless manly man.

In 1890 Whitman brought out an edition of Not a Man and Yet a Man and The Rape of Florida, adding to these a collection of miscellaneous poems, Drifted Leaves, and in 1901 he published An Idyl of the South, an epic poem in two parts. It is to be regretted that he did not have the training that comes from the best university education. He had the taste and the talent to benefit from such culture in the greatest degree.

This brief review of the work of three earnest members of the race prompts a few reflections on the whole art of poetry as this is cultivated by the Negro in America. If we may make any reasonable deduction from the work of the poets studied, if we may arrive at any conclusion from the work of Paul Laurence Dunbar and the younger writers of the day, we should say that the genius of the race is subjective and romantic rather than objective and classic. In poetry, least of all arts, does the Negro conceal his individuality. This is his great gift, but also in another way the spur to further achievement. The race should in course of time produce many brilliant lyric poets. Dunbar was a lyric poet; so was Pushkin. The drama and the epic obviously call for more extended information, a more objective point of view, and a broader basis in general culture than many members of the race have so far had the time or the talent or the inclination to give to them.

Again, has one ever asked himself why it is that so much of the poetry of the Negro fails to reach the ultimate standards of art? It certainly is not because of lack of imagination, for God has been generous in the imagery with which he has endowed the race. First of all, last of all, is it not the matter of technique? Many booklets of verse that have been issued show that the writers had not mastered even the ordinary fundamentals of English grammar. For one to think of rivalling Tennyson with his classical tradition when he can not make a clearcut English sentence is out of the question. Further, and this is the most important point, the work of those in question almost never exhibits imagination expressed in intense, condensed, vivid, and suggestive phrase—such phrasing, for instance, as one will find in "The Eve of St. Agnes," which I am not alone in considering the most lavishly brilliant and successful brief effort in poetry in the language. To all of this might be added a refining of taste, something all too frequently lacking and something that can come only from the most arduous and diligent culture. When we further secure such things as these the race may indeed possess not only a Horton, a Harper, or a Whitman, but a Tennyson, a Keats, and even a Shakespeare.

BENJAMIN BRAWLEY

FOOTNOTES:

[477] This paper was read at the biennial meeting of the Association held in Washington, D. C., on August 29, 1917.



CATHOLICS AND THE NEGRO

In order to understand and to gain an adequate idea of what Catholics and their ancient Church have done for the American Negro, it is necessary to take into account the facts and testimony of impartial history in regard to human slavery among the nations, and the influence which the Roman Catholic Church brought to bear on that institution. We must study and remember the conditions and customs in pre-Christian times in regard to slaves, and we should also note the gradual transition from the state of things existing in the heathen world to that prevailing in our modern Christian civilization.

The student of history observes that ideas and principles take their rise and, growing, permeate society, bringing about a change in the morals and manners of a nation. These changes, which may be for good or evil, do not come of a sudden. Even during the Christian ages the principles of the gospel do not always prevail in their fulness and beauty. At times, through the passions of men, non-Christian and pagan ideas gain ground and for a time predominate. It is only by dealing tactfully with human nature and by persistent efforts that the Church has been enabled to make Christian ideals prevail.

At the dawn of Christianity, slavery was an established institution in all countries.[478] Some pagan philosophers, like Seneca, maintained that all men are by nature free and equal, still by the law of nations slavery was upheld in all lands; and it was an axiom among the ruling classes, that "the human race exists for the sake of the few." Aristotle held that no perfect household could exist without slaves and freemen and that the natural law, as well as the law of nations, makes a distinction between bond and free.[479] Plato avowed that every slave's soul was fundamentally corrupt and should not be trusted.[480] The proportion of slaves to freemen varied in different countries, though usually the former were largely in excess of the free population. In Rome for a long time, according to the testimony of Blair, the slaves were three to one. At one time they became so formidable there that the Senate, fearing that if conscious of their own numbers the public safety might be endangered, forbade them a distinctive dress. Atrocious laws regulated the relations of master and slaves. The head of the family was absolute master of his slaves, having over them the power of life and death. Moral and social degradation was the common lot of slaves. Their wretched condition in pagan times was often rendered more intolerable by aggravating circumstances. Many of them had once enjoyed the blessings of freedom, but had been reduced to bondage by the calamities of war. Unlike the Negro slaves of America, they were usually of the same color as their masters; and in some instances, better educated, more refined, and of more delicate frame, than those whom they served. Epictetus, one of the ablest of the Stoic philosophers, was a slave. Horace and Juvenal were the sons of freedmen.[481]

There is something of the ruthlessness of the ancient pagans in the atrocities practiced in later times, and even in our day, by the Mohammedans in Africa. Livingstone, Cameron, and still more recently Cardinal Lavigerie, Archbishop of Carthage, who was furnished with information by his missionaries, declare that at least 400,000 Negroes are annually carried into bondage in Africa by Mussulman traders, and that fully five times that number perish either by being massacred in the slave hunt, or from hunger and hardship on the journey. Thus the lives or liberty of an immense number of the human race are each year sacrificed on the altars of lust and mammon. No pagan government of antiquity ever framed any law aiming at the immediate or gradual extinction of slavery. The same is true of modern nations outside the pale of Christianity.[482]

With the life and teaching of Christ and the preaching of his gospel by his Apostles, began a new era in the history of slavery. The Apostles and their successors pursued a policy that without injustice, violence or revolution, led to the gradual emancipation of the slaves. The labors and influence of the Roman Catholic Church, which have been that of organized Christianity, make a long story, reaching through all the Christian ages. The early Church mitigated the condition of the slave, by teaching him the consoling doctrines of Christ. She taught the slave and master reciprocal duties, prescribing laws that exercised a salutary restraint on the authority of the one, and sanctified the obedience of the other; she contributed to the moral elevation of the slave by leveling all distinctions between bond and free in her temples and religious assemblies.[483] Masters were encouraged to emancipate their slaves by a public ceremony of manumission celebrated in the church on festival days. The dignity and duty of labor for all is inculcated by St. Paul and the early Christian teachers in opposition to the pagan practice, which scorned labor as being only fit for slaves. The absolute religious equality proclaimed in the Church was the negation of slavery as practiced by pagan society. The Church made no account of the social condition of the faithful. Bond and free received the same sacraments. Clerics of servile origin were numerous. The very Chair of St. Peter was occupied by men who had been slaves—Pius in the second century and Callistus in the third.[484] The names of slaves are numbered among the martyrs of the Christian faith and they are inscribed on the calendar of saints honored by the Church.

In giving them a place in religious society, the Church restored to slaves the family and marriage. In Roman law, neither legitimate marriage nor regular paternity, nor even any impediment to the most unnatural unions had existed for the slave. In upholding the moral dignity and prerogatives of the slave, the Church was striking a blow for his civil freedom. Though she was not charged with the framing of the civil laws, she moved the hearts of the slaveowners by moral suasion, and she moulded the conscience of legislators by an appeal to the innate rights of men. In the early Fathers of the Church, like St. Gregory of Nyssa and St. John Chrysostom, the most energetic reprobation of slavery may be found.

The redemption of captives was another work which engaged the pious solicitude of the Church. From the fourth to the fourteenth century Europe was periodically a prey to northern invaders. The usual fate of the vanquished was death or slavery. They who escaped were carried into bondage. A more wretched fate awaited the female sex, for they were reserved to gratify the caprices of their conquerors. Religious orders were founded to succor and redeem them.[485] "Closely connected with the influence of the Church," says Mr. Lecky, "in destroying hereditary slavery, was its influence in redeeming captives from servitude. In no other form of charity was its beneficial character more continually and more splendidly displayed."[486]

Among the forces enlisted in the cause of freedom the most potent came from the Papacy. In every age the voice of the Popes resounded clearly throughout the world in the interests of human freedom. They either commended the slaves to the humanity of their masters, or advocated their manumission, and also condemned the slave trade with all its abuses. Pope Gregory the Great, who occupied the chair of Peter from 590 to 604, wrote: "Since our Blessed Redeemer, the Author of all life, in His goodness assumed our human flesh, in order that by breaking the bond of servitude in which we were held, the grace of His divinity might restore us to our original liberty, it is a wholesome deed by the benefits of emancipation to restore the freedom in which they were born, to men whom nature, in the beginning brought forth free, and whom the law of nations has subjected to the yoke of slavery."[487]

On October 7, 1462, Pope Pius II issued a letter in which he reproved and condemned the slave trade then carried on. Again, a short time later Leo X denounced slavery in 1537. Paul III forbade the enslavement of the Indians. In the later centuries on the revival of slavery by some of the nations, especially among those coming under the power of Mohammedanism in Persia, Arabia, Turkey and Africa, as also on account of the enslavement of Negroes and Indians in the Americas, other Popes proclaimed the Christian law in regard to the cruelties of the slave trade. Again Urban VIII, in 1639, and Benedict XIV, in 1741, were defenders of the liberty of the Indians and blacks even though they were not as yet instructed in the Christian faith.[488] In 1815, Pius VII demanded of the Congress of Vienna the suppression of the slave trade. In the Bull of Canonization of St. Peter Claver, one of the most illustrious adversaries of slavery, Pius IX speaks of the "supreme villainy" of the slave-traders. Gregory XVI, in 1839, published a memorable encyclical in which the following strong language occurs:

"By virtue of our Apostolic office, we warn and admonish in the Lord all Christians of whatever conditions they may be, and enjoin upon them that for the future, no one shall venture unjustly to oppress the Indians, Negroes or other men whoever they may be, to strip them of their property, or reduce them into servitude, or give aid or support to those who commit such excesses or carry on that infamous traffic by which the blacks, as if they were not men, but mere impure animals reduced like them into servitude, contrary to the laws of justice and humanity, are bought, sold and devoted to endure the hardest labor. Wherefore, by virtue of our Apostolic authority, we condemn all these things as absolutely unworthy of the Christian name."[489]

Probably the most memorable statement of the history and Catholic position on slavery is the beautiful letter which Pope Leo XIII, in 1888, addressed to the Brazilian Bishops, exhorting them to banish from their country the remnants of slavery—a letter to which the Bishops responded with their most energetic efforts. Some generous slave-owners freed their slaves in a body, as in the first ages of the Church. Catholic Brazil emancipated its slaves without war or bloodshed. The following are some extracts from the Pope's letter:

"The condition of slavery, in which a considerable part of the human family has been sunk in squalor and affliction now for many centuries, is deeply to be deplored; for the system is one wholly opposed to that which was originally ordained by God and by nature. The Supreme Author of all things so decreed that man should exercise a sort of royal dominion over beasts and cattle and fish and fowl, but never that man should exercise a like dominion over his fellow-man. * * * * * * * * * Monuments, laws, institutions, through a continuous series of ages, teach and splendidly demonstrate the great love of the Church towards slaves, whom in their miserable condition, she never left destitute of protection, and always to the best of her power alleviated. Therefore, praise and thanks are due to the Catholic Church, since she has merited it in the prosperity of nations, by the very great beneficence of Christ, our Redeemer and banisher of slavery, and cause of true liberty, fraternity and equality among men. Toward the end of the fifteenth century, when the base stain of slavery was almost blotted out from among Christian nations, the Catholic Church took the greatest care that the evil germs of such depravity should nowhere revive. Therefore, she directed her provident vigilance to the newly-discovered regions of Africa, Asia and America, for a report had reached her that the leaders of the expeditions, Christians though they were, were wickedly making use of their arms and ingenuity to establish and impose slavery on those innocent nations. Indeed, since the crude nature of the soil which they had to overcome, nor less the wealth of metals which had to be extracted by mining, required very hard work, unjust and inhuman plans were entered into; for a new traffic was begun, slaves being transported for that purpose from Ethiopia, which at that time, under the name of the slave trade, too much occupied those colonies."[490]

The fact that the Catholic Church has been a leader of mankind to light and Christian liberty is attested by leading non-Catholic scholars and historians. The historian Lecky, who holds no brief for Catholicism, says: "The Catholic Church was the very heart of Christendom and the spirit that radiated from her penetrated into all the relations of life. Catholicism laid the very foundations of modern civilization. Herself the most admirable of all organizations, there was formed beneath her influence, a vast network of organizations—political, municipal and social—which supplied a large proportion of the materials of almost every modern structure. In the transition from slavery to serfdom, and in the transition from serfdom to liberty, she was the most zealous, the most unwearied and the most efficient agent."[491] The French Protestant Guizot says: "There can be no doubt that the Catholic Church struggled resolutely against the great vices of the social state—against slavery, for instance. These facts are so well known that it is needless for me to enter into details."[492]

Speaking of the development of the colored race under Catholic influence, Dr. Blyden, a noted Negro scholar, wrote in Frazer's Magazine for May, 1870, the following words, which he afterwards incorporated into his Christianity, Islam, and the Negro Race:

"The thoughtful and cultivated Protestant Negro, though he may, ex animo, subscribe to the tenets of the particular denomination to which he belongs, as approaching nearest to the teaching of God's word, yet he cannot read history without feeling a deep debt of gratitude to the Roman Catholic Church. The only Christian Negroes who have had the power to successfully throw off oppression and maintain their position as freemen were Roman Catholic Negroes—the Haitiens; and the greatest Negro the Christian world has yet produced was a Roman Catholic—Toussaint L'Ouverture. In the ecclesiastical system of modern, as was the case in the military system of ancient Rome, there seems to be a place for all races and colors. At Rome the names of Negroes, males as well as females, who have been distinguished for piety and good works, are found in the calendar under the designation of saints."[493]

Coming to America, we find that from the beginning of our history, the Christian forces, which in the past strove to civilize and Christianize the old world, have exerted themselves in behalf of the oppressed in the New World. Catholic missionaries have always felt constrained to carry out the injunction of the Divine Savior to his apostles, "Go ye into the whole world and preach the Gospel to every creature."[494] Their object was not to gain gold or worldly fortune, but to bring the light of Christian truth to the minds of savage aborigines; to win souls to Christ. To those missionaries, as the Church teaches, the souls of the children of all races are equally precious in the sight of God, whatever may be their individual or racial character. It is for this that they left in young manhood, their relatives and comfortable homes, with a probability of never returning. In early ages, they brought Christianity and civilization to peoples and nations of the lands of the Eastern Hemisphere. After the discovery of the New World by Columbus, they were with the explorers of North and South America. From about 1615 we find them laboring among the Indian tribes from Quebec in Canada to California in the West. Intrepid apostles like Marquette, Breheuf, Menard, Millet, Lallemant, Jogues, Le Moyne, Dablon, Garnier, and a host of others like them blazed the way through the wilderness to labor and suffer and die for the salvation of the Indians. They made records in the service of Christ among the Hurons, Algonquins, Iroquois and Mohawks. To the South, in Florida, Spanish Franciscans fell victims to the treachery of Creeks and Seminoles. In the middle of the last century, before the coming of the settlers, Father De Smet spent nearly forty years among the tribes of the great Western plains and in the Rocky Mountain region. Other missionaries in Western Canada penetrated the North as far as the Arctic Circle. In the seventies and eighties of the nineteenth century, a frail and slender man, in the person of the learned and saintly Archbishop Charles J. Seghers, journeyed thousands of miles, to bring the message of the Master to the red men in the vast territory of distant Alaska. In California, Arizona and Texas, the traveler meets with many evidences and monuments of the work of early Spanish Catholic missionaries among the Indians. The records show that in some instances, the missionaries were accompanied by Negroes. Probably the first Negro whose name is recorded in North American history is that of Estevan, or Stephen, who accompanied Father Marcos de Niza, in 1536, on a missionary expedition into the territory of the present States of Arizona and New Mexico.[495]

It is at a later period, however, than that of these early missionaries, that the coming of the Negro as a notable part of the population of the American Colonies begins. This growth takes its rise with the revival of the slave trade in America after the first importation of slaves brought to Jamestown, Virginia, in 1619. There was long a demand for laborers, and thus an increasing number of slaves were brought from Africa to the various colonies on the Atlantic seaboard, from Massachusetts to Louisiana. British ships at that time supplied not only English colonies with slave labor, but also those of France and Spain.[496] Catholic colonists were confined to Maryland and Louisiana. They also had slaves in their homes and on their plantations, but it is known that they provided for their religious needs and were obliged by their religion to regard their slaves as human beings and not as mere chattels. Under Lord Baltimore's government in the English Colony of Maryland, the Catholic Proprietary himself tells us in his answer to the Lords in 1676, concerning the law that had been enacted "to encourage the baptizing and the instructing of those kinds of servants in the faith of Christ."[497] There had been remissness towards the slaves in this respect among other sections of the population, but such denominations were spurred to action by the example of Catholics. The work of Spanish and French missionaries, as Dr. Woodson points out, influenced the education of the Negro throughout America.[498] The freedom and welfare of the unhappy slaves were especially promoted in the famous "Code Noir," the most humane legislation in their behalf which had been devised before the repeal of slavery. In 1724, M. de Bienville drew up the "Code Noir," containing all the legislation applicable to slaves in Louisiana, which remained in force until 1803. This code, signed in the name of the King, and inspired by Catholic teaching and practice, was probably based on a similar code, which was promulgated in 1685, in Santo Domingo, by Louis XIV, King of France. The Edict ordained that all slaves be instructed and that they be admitted to the sacraments and rites of the Roman Catholic Church. It allowed the slave time for instruction, worship and rest, not only every Sunday, but every festival usually observed by the Church. It prohibited under severe penalties all masters and managers from corrupting their female slaves, and provided for the Christian marriage of the slave. It did not allow the Negro, husband, wife or infant children, to be sold separately. It forbade the use of torture or immoderate and inhuman punishments. It obliged the owners to maintain their old and decrepit slaves. If the Negroes were not fed or clothed as the law prescribed, or if they were in any way cruelly treated, they might apply to the procurer, who was obliged by his office to protect them. A somewhat similar edict, known as the Spanish Code, was promulgated in the Spanish West Indies in 1789.

At the time of the Revolutionary War such Catholic patriots as Charles Carroll, of Carrollton, the Polish General Kosciuszko, and General Lafayette, of France, gave evidence of their interest in the improvement of the Negro. Kosciuszko provided in his will that the property which he acquired in America should be used for the purchase of slaves to be educated for higher service and citizenship.[499] Lafayette persistently urged that the blacks be educated and emancipated.[500]

The impression seems to prevail in some quarters that the Catholic Church in the United States has been indifferent to the welfare of the Negro. Sir Harry H. Johnston in his work, The Negro in the New World, rather unjustly asserts that the Church maintains "nothing in the way of Negro education and has never at any time shown particular sympathy or desire to help the Negro slave." At the same time he acknowledges that the Roman Catholic Church in the West Indies and South America has been the great opponent of slavery. Johnston states "that the infractions of the Code Noir," and the increased mal-treatment of slaves and free mulattoes did not take place until the Catholic order of Jesuits had been expelled from Saint Dominique about 1766. Here, as in Brazil, and Paraguay, they had exasperated the white colonists by standing up for the natives or the Negro slaves; and in Hispaniola they had endeavored to exact from the local government a full application of the various slave-protecting edicts. Whatever faults and mistakes they may have been guilty of in the nineteenth century, the Jesuits played, for two hundred years, a noble part in acting as a buffer between the Caucasian on the one hand, and the backward peoples on the other.[501]

Before the emancipation of the slaves in the United States, great difficulties prevented the Catholic Church from benefiting the slaves, especially in those parts where the Church had no adherents and no freedom to act. The Church had but a limited number of clergy and small means. The most of the South was predominantly Protestant and in some sections, penal laws were in force against Catholics. In many States laws were enacted against the instruction of slaves in any manner whatever.

Notwithstanding these obstacles, we find Catholic schools in Washington and Baltimore educating Negro children as early as 1829.[502] The Rt. Rev. John England, the first Catholic Bishop of Charleston, South Carolina, who held his office from 1820 until his death in 1842, cared much for the poor friendless slaves. He began to teach them, founding a school for males under the care of a priest, and a school for girls under the care of the Sisters of Mercy. He was compelled to suspend the slave schools by the passage of a law making it criminal to teach a slave to read and write, but he continued the schools for emancipated blacks.[503] After the Civil War, the authorities of the Church were better enabled to take an active part in meeting the religious needs of the Negro. The Plenary Councils of Baltimore invite the colored people of our country to enter the Catholic Church. To her pastors the Negro is a man with an immortal soul to save. Rome, writing to the Bishops of the United States, on January 31, 1866, in preparation for the Second Plenary Council of Baltimore, declares: "It is the mind of the Church that the Bishops of the United States, because of the duty weighing upon them of feeding the Lord's flock, should take council together, in order to bring about in a steady way the salvation and the Christian education of the lately emancipated negroes." When assembled in Council the Bishops of the United States cordially seconded the wishes of Rome by quoting the very words in an entire chapter devoted to the question of the salvation of the colored race. The Council declares: "This is true charity, if not only temporal prosperity of men be increased, but if they are sharers in the highest and inestimable benefits, namely, of that true liberty by which we are called and are sons of God, which Christ, dying on a cross and smiting the enemy of the human race, obtains for all men without any exceptions whatsoever."[504] Eighteen years later, in 1884, the Third Plenary Council, in the same city, renewed the exhortations of the preceding council. Among other things it states: "Out of six millions of colored people there is a very large multitude who stand sorely in need of Christian instruction and missionary labor; and it is evident that in the poor dioceses, in which they are mostly found, it is most difficult to bestow on them the care they need without the generous cooperation of our Catholic people in more prosperous localities.... Since the greatest part of the Negroes are as yet outside the fold of Christ, it is a matter of necessity to seek workmen inflamed with zeal for souls, who will be sent into this part of the Lord's harvest."[505]

With the encouragement of the higher authorities of the Church, who sought the spiritual welfare and progress of the race, religious orders and missionary associations took up the work for the Negro. The first of these was the Fathers of the Society of St. Joseph, founded by Cardinal Vaughan, of England. They are known as the Josephites and now have priests and missionaries in nearly all Southern States and dioceses. There are also laboring in this field Fathers of the Holy Ghost, as also members of the Society of the African Missions, and the Society of the Divine Word. Furthermore, there are a number of colored and white Sisterhoods conducting orphanages, academies and Christian Schools for colored children.

In the Second and Third Plenary Councils, the Bishops of the Catholic Church in the United States as a body took up the cause of the Negro race. The Bishops have when occasion offered, by word and deed, shown their friendship and zeal in behalf of the Negro. They have individually raised their voices for humanity and the black man. Cardinal Gibbons, who has long been the leading prelate among the American Bishops, has not only often spoken a good word for the Negro, when the occasion called for it, but has proved by actions his Christian spirit and heroic charity. Among the many instances of his zeal and self-sacrifice, it is related that when he was a young priest in charge of the parish of Elk Ridge, near Baltimore, smallpox broke out in the village, and a general exodus at once followed. One old Negro man, lying at the point of death, had been abandoned by his family and was left alone in his cabin, without food or medicine. Father Gibbons, hearing of the case, hastened to the old man's relief; he procured everything necessary for him, and stood by and tended him until he died. He then procured a coffin and having placed the corpse in it, carried it to the graveyard and buried it with his own hands.[506] A similar incident is told of Rev. J. A. Cunnane, of Upper Marlboro, Maryland, now a pastor in Baltimore. When stationed in Charles County he attended an old colored man during an epidemic of smallpox, "took the body to the grave on a wheelbarrow, and with his own hands buried it."[507]

Cardinal Gibbons, some years ago, wrote a letter in which occur the following sentiments:

"What then is the first need of the colored people? A sound religious education; an education that will bring them to a practical knowledge of God, that will teach them their origin and the sublime destiny that awaits them in a better world; an education that will develop their superior being, that will inspire them with the love of wisdom and hatred for sin, that will make them honest, moral and God-fearing men. Such an education will elevate and ennoble them and place them on a religious footing with the white man.

"And secondly, it is a matter of observation that few colored people are mechanics. Now, to be a factor in their country's prosperity, to make their presence felt and to give any influence whatever to their attempts to better their status, it is absolutely necessary that, besides a sound religious training they should be taught to be useful citizens; they should be brought up from childhood to habits of industry. They should be taught that to labor is honorable, and that the idler is a menace to the commonwealth. Institutions should be founded wherein the young men may learn the trades best suited to their inclinations. Thus equipped—on the one hand well-instructed Christians, on the other skilled workmen—our colored people may look forward hopefully to the future. I am happy to bear testimony from personal observation to the many virtues exhibited among so many of the colored people of Maryland, especially their deep sense of religion, their gratitude for favors shown, and their affectionate disposition."[508]

The Cardinal used his great influence against the lynching evil and in an article in the North American Review for October, 1905, pronounced lynching "a blot on our American civilization."[509] It should be stated too that in Catholic countries of Central and South America we rarely ever hear of lynching nor of unnatural crimes which provoke it. In an address announcing "Colorphobia" as a "malignantly unchristian disease," Mr. John C. Minkins, a journalist, not long ago told a Baptist Ministers' Conference of Providence, Rhode Island, that the lynchings in the United States are nearly all in States where there are scarcely any Catholics. He based his statements on figures from the Research Bureau of the Negro Industrial Institute at Tuskegee, Alabama.[510]

In March, 1904, Cardinal Gibbons wrote the following letter to the Rev. George F. Bragg, of Baltimore:

"In reply to your letter of yesterday, I hasten to say that the introduction of the 'Jim Crow' bill into the Maryland Legislature is very distressing to me. Such a measure must of necessity engender very bitter feelings in the colored people against the whites. Peace and harmony can never exist where there is unjust discrimination, and where the members of every community must constantly strive for its peace, especially now in the hour of our affliction. While calamity and disaster are frowning upon our city, mutual helpfulness should be the common endeavor and no action should be lightly taken which would precipitate enmities, strife and acrimonious feelings. The duty of every man is to lighten the burdens that weigh heavily upon his neighbor to the full extent of his power. It is equally the duty of every member of a community to avoid any action which is calculated to make hard and bitter the lot of a less fortunate race. Furthermore, it would be most injudicious to make the whole race suffer for the delinquencies of a few individuals, to visit upon thousands who are innocent that punishment and chastisement which should be meted out to the guilty alone."

Hostile legislation to the colored people was opposed by a noted Catholic layman of Maryland, the Hon. Charles J. Bonaparte, Attorney General of the United States, under President Roosevelt. Mr. Bonaparte rendered service and wrote sympathetic words to Mr. Bragg, in 1904, concerning the proposed restriction of the elective franchise. He said: "Whatever the restrictions imposed, they should be the same for all citizens; there should not be one law for white men and another law for black men, one law for Americans of two generations and another for Americans of three."[511]