This last type, it is true, is sometimes regarded with suspicion. Many men and women in the South fear the progress of the negro. They do not realize that the South cannot really make satisfactory progress while any great proportion of the population is relatively inefficient. Some fear the negro's demand to be treated as a man. On the other hand, many negroes demand to be treated as men, while ignoring or perhaps not realizing the fact that, to be treated as a man, one must play a man's part. As Booker Washington put the matter, many are more interested in getting recognition than in getting something to recognize. Many are much more interested in their rights than in their duties. To be sure the negro is not alone in this, for the same attitude is to be found in immigrants coming from the socially and politically backward states of Europe. The ordinary negro, however, apparently does not think much of such problems of the future, though no white man is likely to know precisely what he does think. He goes about his business or his pleasure seemingly at peace with the world, though perhaps he sings somewhat less than he once did. He attends his church and the meetings of his lodge or lodges, and works more or less regularly. Probably the great majority of negroes more nearly realize their ambitions than do the whites. They do not aspire to high position, and discrimination does not burn them quite as deeply as the sometimes too sympathetic white man who tries to put himself in their place may think.

There are, however, some individuals to whom the ordinary conditions of any negro's life appear particularly bitter. With mental ability, education, and aesthetic appreciation often comparable to those of the whites, and with more than normal sensitiveness, they find the color line an intolerable insult, since it separates them from what they value most. They rage at the barrier which shuts them out from the society which they feel themselves qualified to enter, and they are always on the alert to discern injuries. These injuries need not be positive, for neglect is quite as strong a grievance.

These individuals all spell negro with a capital and declare that they are proud of their race. They parade its achievements—and these are not small when enumerated all at once—but they avoid intimate association with the great mass of negroes. They are not at all democratic, and in a negro state they would assume the privileges of an aristocracy as a matter of right. It would seem that their demand for full political and social rights for all negroes has for its basis not so much the welfare of the race as a whole, as the possibility of obtaining for themselves special privileges and positions of leadership. They are not satisfied merely with full legal rights. In those States where there is no legal discrimination in public places, their denunciation of social prejudice is bitter. They are not content to take their chances with other groups but sometimes are illogical enough to demand social equality enforced by law, though by this phrase they mean association with the whites merely for themselves; they do not wish other negroes less developed than themselves to associate with them.

In any city where there is any considerable number of this class, there is a section of negro society in which social lines are drawn as strictly as in the most aristocratic white community. To prove that the negroes are not emotional, these aristocrats among them are likely to insist upon rigid formality in their church services and upon meticulous correctness in all the details of social gatherings. Since many of these individuals have a very large admixture of white blood, occasionally one crosses the barrier and "goes white." Removal to a new town or city gives the opportunity to cut loose from all previous associations and to start a new life. The transition is extremely difficult, of course, and requires much care and discretion, but it has been made. The greater part of them nevertheless remain negroes in the eyes of the law, however much they strive to separate themselves in thought and action from the rest of their kind. It is this small class of "intellectuals" who were Booker T. Washington's bitterest enemies. His theory that the negro should first devote himself to obtaining economic independence and should leave the adjustment of social relations to the future was denounced as treason to the race. Washington's opportunism was even more obnoxious to them than is the superior attitude of the whites. They denounced him as a trimmer, a time-server, and a traitor, and on occasion they hissed him from the platform. From their safe refuges in Northern cities, some negro orators and editors have gone so far as to advocate the employment of the knife and the torch to avenge real or fancied wrongs, but these counsels have done little harm for they have not been read by those to whom they were addressed. Perhaps, indeed, they may not have been meant entirely seriously, for the negro, like other emotional peoples, sometimes plays with words without realizing their full import.

On the whole there is surprisingly little friction between the blacks and the whites. One may live a long time in many parts of the South without realizing that the most important problem of the United States lies all about him. Then an explosion comes, and he realizes that much of the South is on the edge of a volcano. For a time the white South attempted to divest itself of responsibility for the negro. He had turned against those who had been his friends and had followed after strange gods; therefore let him go his way alone. This attitude never was universal nor was it consistently maintained, for there is hardly one of the older negroes who does not have a white man to whom he goes for advice or help in time of trouble—a sort of patron, in fact. Many a negro has been saved from the chain gang or the penitentiary because of such friendly interest, and many have been positively helped thereby toward good citizenship. Nevertheless there has been a tendency on the part of the whites to remain passive, to wait until the negro asked for help.

Undoubtedly there is now developing in the South a growing sense of responsibility for the welfare of the negro. The negro quarters of the towns, so long neglected, are receiving more attention from the street cleaners; better sidewalks are being built; and the streets are better lighted. The sanitary officers are more attentive. The landowner is building better cabins for his tenants and is encouraging them to plant gardens and to raise poultry and pigs. The labor contractor is providing better quarters, though conditions in many lumber and construction camps are still deplorable. Observant lawyers and judges say that they see an increasing number of cases in which juries evidently decide points of doubt in favor of negro defendants, even where white men are concerned. Socially minded citizens are forcing improvement of the disgraceful conditions which have often prevailed on chain gangs and in prisons. Nor is this all. More white men and women are teaching negroes than ever before. The oldest university in the United States points proudly to the number of Sunday schools for negroes conducted by its students, and it is not alone in this high endeavor. Many Southern colleges and universities are studying the negro problem from all sides and are trying to help in its solution. The visiting nurses in the towns spend a large proportion of their time among the negroes, striving to teach hygiene and sanitation. White men frequently lecture before negro schools. Since the beginning of the Great War negro women have been encouraged to aid in Red Cross work. Negroes have been appointed members of city or county committees of defense and have worked with the whites in many branches of patriotic endeavor. Negroes have subscribed liberally in proportion to their means for Liberty Bonds and War Savings Stamps and have given liberally to war work.

The growth of a sense of responsibility for the welfare of the negro upon the part of the more thoughtful and more conscientious portion of the white population has reduced racial friction in many communities. White women are evincing more interest in the morals of black women than was usual fifteen or twenty years ago. Ostracism is more likely to visit a white man who crosses the line. There is no means of knowing the actual amount of illicit intercourse, but the most competent observers believe it to be decreasing. Though the percentage of mulattoes has increased since 1890, according to the census, the figures are confessedly inaccurate, and the increase can be easily accounted for by the marriage of mulattoes with negroes, and the consequent diffusion of white blood. An aspiring negro is likely to seek a mulatto wife, and their children will be classed as mulattoes by the enumerators.

Except for the demagogues, whose abuse of the negro is their stock in trade, the most bitter denunciations come from those nearest to him in economic status. The town loafers, the cotton mill operatives, the small farmers, particularly the tenant farmers, are those who most frequently clash with both the impertinent and the self-respecting negro. In their eyes self-respect may not be differentiated from insolence. If a negro is not servile, they are likely to class him as impertinent or worse. The political success of Blease of South Carolina, Vardaman of Mississippi, and the late Jeff. Davis of Arkansas is largely due to their appeal to these types of whites. The negro on the other hand may resent the assumption of superiority on the part of men perhaps less efficient than himself. Obviously friction may arise under such conditions.

The mobs which have so often stained the reputation of the South by defiance of the law and by horrible cruelty as well do not represent the best elements of the South. The statement so often made that the most substantial citizens of a community compose lynching parties may have been partially true once, but it is not true today. These mobs are chiefly made up from the lowest third of the white community. Perhaps the persistence of the belief has prevented the wiser part of the population from stamping out such lawlessness; perhaps some lingering feeling of mistaken loyalty to the white race restrains them from strong action; perhaps the individualism of the Southerner has interfered with general acceptance of the idea of the inexorable majesty of the law which must be vindicated at any cost. Yet, in spite of all these undercurrents of feeling, sheriffs and private citizens do on occasion brave the fury of enraged mobs to rescue or to protect. Attempts to prosecute participants in such mobs usually fail in the South as elsewhere, but occasionally a jury convicts.

The tradition that, years ago, lynching was only invoked in punishment of the unspeakable crime is more or less true. It is not true now. The statistics of lynching which are frequently presented are obviously exaggerated, as they include many cases which are simply the results of the sort of personal encounters which might and do occur anywhere. There is a tendency to class every case of homicide in which a negro is the victim as a lynching, which is manifestly unfair; but even though liberal allowance be made for this error, in the total of about 3000 cases tabulated in the last thirty years, the undisputed instances of mob violence are shamefully numerous. Rape is by no means the only crime thus punished; sometimes the charge is so trivial that one recoils in horror at the thought of taking human life as a punishment.

Yet it must not be forgotten that over certain parts of the South a nameless dread is always hovering. In some sections an unaccompanied white woman dislikes to walk through an unlighted village street at night; she hesitates to drive along a lonely country road in broad daylight without a pistol near her hand; and she does not dare to walk through the woods alone. The rural districts are poorly policed and the ears of the farmer working in the field are always alert for the sound of the bell or the horn calling for help, perhaps from his own home. Occasionally, in spite of all precautions some human animal, inflamed by brooding upon the unattainable, leaves a victim outraged and dead, or worse than dead. Granted that such a crime occurs in a district only once in ten, or even in twenty years; that is enough. Rural folks have long memories, and in the back of their minds persists an uncontrollable morbid dread. The news of another victim sometimes turns men into fiends who not only take life but even inflict torture beforehand. The mere suspicion of intent is sometimes enough to deprive such a community of its reason, for there are communities which have brooded over the possibility of the commission of the inexpiable crime until the residents are not quite sane upon this matter. Naturally calmness and forbearance in dealing with other and less heinous forms of negro crime are not always found in such a neighborhood. This fact helps to explain, though not to excuse, some of the riots that occur.

The better element in the South, however, opposes mob violence, and this opposition is growing stronger and more purposeful. Associations have been formed to oppose mob rule and to punish participants. Where reputable citizens are lukewarm it is largely because they have not realized that the old tradition that lynching is the proper remedy for rape cannot stand. If sudden, sharp retribution were inflicted upon absolute proof, only for this one cause, it is doubtful whether much effective opposition could be enlisted. Yet wiser men have seen defiance of law fail to stop crime, have seen mobs act upon suspicions afterward proved groundless, have seen mob action widely extended, and have seen the growth of a spirit of lawlessness. Where one mob has had its way, another is always more easily aroused, and soon the administration of the law becomes a farce. In some years hardly a third of the victims of this summary process have been charged with rape or intent to commit rape. As a consequence the sentiment that the law should take its course in every case is steadily growing.[1]

[Footnote 1: The statistics on lynching do not always agree. Those compiled at Tuskegee Institute list 38 cases for 1917 and 62 for 1918. The National Association for the Advancement of Colored People in its report Thirty Years of Lynching (1919) reports 67 cases for 1918, and 325 cases for the five-year period ending with 1918, of which 304 are said to have occurred in the South.]

Though mob fury has broken out on occasion in every Southern State, Maryland, West Virginia, Kentucky, and North Carolina are measurably free from such visitations. Over considerable periods of time, Georgia comes unenviably first, followed by Mississippi, Texas, and Louisiana. These four States have furnished a large majority of the lynchings. The other States range between the two groups, though in proportion to the negro element in its population Oklahoma has had a disproportionate share. It may be said that the lynchings occur chiefly in those sections or counties where the numbers of whites and negroes are nearly equal. They are fewer in the black belt and in those counties and States where whites are in an overwhelming majority.

No man has been wise enough to propose any solution of the negro question which does not require an immediate and radical change in human nature. As the proportion of negroes able to read and write grows larger, they will certainly demand full political rights, which the mass of the whites, so far as any one can judge, will be unwilling to allow. Deportation to Africa—proposed in all seriousness—is impossible. Negro babies are born faster than they could easily be carried away, even if there were no other obstacle. The suggestion that whites be expelled from a State or two, which would then be turned over to negroes, is likewise impracticable. Amalgamation apparently is going on more slowly now, and more rapid progress would presuppose a state of society and an attitude toward the negro entirely different from that which prevails anywhere in the United States. There is left then the theory that, with increasing wealth and wider diffusion of education, or even without them, he negro must take his place on equal terms in the American political and social system. This theory, of course, requires an absolute reversal of attitude upon the part of many millions of whites.

Color and race prejudice are stubborn things, and California and South Africa are no more free from such prejudices than the Southern States. In fact, South Africa is today wrestling with a problem much like that of the United States and is succeeding no better in solving it. The movement of negroes to the North and West, if continued on any large scale, seems likely to mean simply the diffusion of the problem and not its solution.



CHAPTER VIII

EDUCATIONAL PROGRESS

Apologists for Reconstruction have repeatedly asserted that the Reconstruction governments gave to the South a system of public schools unknown up to that time, with the implication that this boon more than compensated for the errors of those years. The statement has been so often made, and by some who should have known better, that it has generally been accepted at its face value. The status of public education in the South in 1860, it is true, was not satisfactory, and the percentage of illiteracy was high. Any attempt to distract attention from these facts by pointing out the great proportion of the Southern white population in colleges and academies is as much to be deprecated as the denial of the existence of public schools at all.[1]

[Footnote 1: Some States had done little for public schools before 1860, but others had made more than a respectable beginning. Delaware established a "literary fund" in 1796, Tennessee in 1806, Virginia in 1810, Maryland in 1813, and Georgia in 1817. Kentucky and Mississippi soon followed their example; North Carolina began to create such a fund in 1825; Alabama, Delaware, Georgia, Kentucky, Maryland, North Carolina, and South Carolina appropriated a part or the whole of their shares of the "surplus" distributed by the Federal Government under the Act of 1836 to increase these funds or establish new ones for the support of schools; and some States levied considerable taxes for the support of educational institutions.]

In general the public schools of the South began as charity schools, but this was also the case in several of the older States in other parts of the country. These schools were generally poorly taught in the early years, and it has been questioned whether the training which the pupils received compensated them for the humiliating acknowledgment of poverty which their attendance implied. The amount of money available was small, and the teacher was generally inefficient or worse, but these "old field schools" did help some men on their way. Several States went beyond the idea of charity in education, and some of the towns and cities established excellent schools for all the people.

The literary fund in North Carolina, for example, amounted to nearly $2,250,000 in 1840. The rapid increase of this fund had led to the establishment of public schools in 1839. To every district which raised $20 by local taxation, twice that amount was given from the income of the literary fund. With the election of Calvin H. Wiley as state superintendent of education in 1852, substantial progress began. In 1860 there were over 3000 schools, and the total expenditure was $279,000. The number of illiterates had fallen proportionately and actually, and ten years more of uninterrupted work would have done much to remove the stigma of illiteracy. The school fund was left intact during the Civil War, and most of the counties continued to levy school taxes. A part of the fund was lost, however, through the failure of the banks in which it was invested, and the remainder was squandered by the Reconstruction government. In spite of all discouragements, Superintendent Wiley held on until deposed by the provisional governor in 1865. It is hardly an exaggeration to say that the schools of this State were better in 1860 than they were in 1880.

During the Reconstruction period a system of schools was established in every one of the seceding States. On paper these schemes were often admirable. Usually they were modeled after the system in the State from which some influential carpetbagger came, and under normal conditions, if honestly and judiciously administered, they would have answered their ostensible purposes and would have done much to raise the intellectual level of the population. Conditions, however, were not normal. The production of wealth was hindered, and taxes had been increased to the point of confiscation. In States which had been ravaged by war, and of which the whole economic and social systems had been dislocated, an undue proportion of the total social income was demanded for the schools. Under existing conditions the communities could not support the schemes of education which had been projected. This fact is enough to account for their failure, for when an individual or a community is unable to pay the price demanded, it matters little how desirable or laudable the object may be.

As if to make failure doubly certain, the schools were neither honestly nor judiciously administered. Much money was deliberately stolen, and much more was wasted. Extravagant salaries were paid to favorites, and unnecessary equipment was bought at exorbitant prices. The authorities in several States seemed more interested in the idea of educating negro children with white children than in the real process of education. Though in but four States—South Carolina, Mississippi, Louisiana, and Arkansas—were mixed schools the only schools, such an arrangement was understood to be the ultimate goal in several other States. Several of the state superintendents were negroes, and others were carpetbaggers dependent upon negro votes. Before the end of Reconstruction, several of these were forced to flee to avoid arrest for malfeasance in office. In those States where mixed schools alone were provided, white children did not attend and were thus cut off from educational opportunities at public expense. Where separate schools were provided, the teachers were often carpetbaggers who strove "to make treason odious." It is hardly surprising that some parents objected to having their children forced to sing John Brown's Body and to yield assent to the proposition that all Southerners were barbarians and traitors who deserved hanging.

Just after the close of the Civil War, thousands of white women went South to teach in schools which were established for negroes by Northern churches or benevolent associations. Every one who reads the reports of such organizations now, fifty years after, must be touched by the lofty faith and the burning zeal which impelled many of these educational missionaries; but he must also be astonished by their ignorance of the negro and their blindness to actual conditions. They went with an ideal negro in their minds, and at first, they treated the negro as though he were their ideal of what a negro ought to be. The phases through which the majority of these teachers went were enthusiasm, doubt, disillusionment, and despair. Some left the South and their charges, holding that conditions were to blame rather than their methods; but others were clearsighted enough to realize that they had set about solving the problem in the wrong way.

Beginning with the assumption that the negro was equal or superior to the white in natural endowment and burning with resentment against his "oppressors," they attempted to bridge the gap of centuries in a generation. They were anxious to bring the negro into contact with the culture of the white race and thereby they strengthened the conclusion to which the negro had already jumped that educational and manual labor were an impossible combination. Then, too, in order to prove the sincerity of their belief in the brotherhood of mankind, they entered into the most intimate association with their pupils and their families. Some of them, we know, were compelled to struggle hard to overcome their instinctive repugnance to such intimacy. All of them taught by implication, and some by precept as well, that the Southern whites who held themselves apart were enemies to the blacks. That these teachers did some good is undoubted, but whether in the end a true balance would show more good than harm is not so certain.

When the native whites resumed control after the days of Reconstruction, their first thought was to reduce the expenses of the State. Tax levies were cut to the bone, school taxes among them. The school funds did not always suffer proportionately, however. In 1870, when the whites secured control in North Carolina, the expenditure for public schools in that State was $152,000. In 1874, the school revenue was over $412,000, and the number of white pupils was almost the same as in 1860; in addition 55,000 negroes were receiving instruction, but the school term was only ten weeks. The negro seems to have received in the first years of the new regime a fair share of the school money, but that share was not large. The reaction from Reconstruction extravagance was long-continued, and perhaps has not disappeared today.

Though the South was unable properly to support one efficient system, it now attempted to maintain two, one for whites and the other for blacks. Necessarily both systems were inadequate. The usual country school was only a rude frame or log building, sometimes without glass windows, in which one untrained teacher, without apparatus or the simplest conveniences, attempted to give instruction in at least half a dozen subjects to a group of children of all ages during a period of ten to fifteen weeks a year. Often even this meager period was divided into a summer and winter term, on the plea that the older children could not be spared from the farms for the whole time or that bad roads and stormy weather prevented the youngest from attending during the winter.

Though it seems almost incredible under such conditions, something was nevertheless accomplished. Many children, it is true, learned little or nothing and gave up the pretense of attending school. Others, however, found something to feed their hungry minds and, when they had exhausted what their neighborhood school had to offer, they attended the academies which had been reestablished or had sprung up in the villages nearby or at the countyseat. Between 1875 and 1890, it was not at all uncommon to find in such academies grown men and women studying the regular high school subjects. Some had previously taught rural schools and now sought further instruction; and others had worked on the farms or had been in business. Men of twenty-five or thirty sat in classes with town children of fifteen or sixteen, but made such a large proportion of the total attendance that they did not feel embarrassed by the contrast in ages.

In the eighties there were scores of these academies, institutes, and seminaries in the towns of the South. They were not well graded; the teachers may never have heard of pedagogy. Their libraries were small or altogether lacking, and their apparatus was scanty; but in spite of these drawbacks an unusually large proportion of the students were desirous to learn. Many teachers loved mathematics or Latin, and some of the students gained a thorough if narrow preparation for college. An examination of college registers of the period shows a considerable proportion of students of twenty-five or thirty years of age. There is even a case where a college student remained out a term in order to attend a session of the Legislature to which he had been elected. The college students of the late seventies and early eighties were serious minded and thought of questions as men and not as boys. Though the clapper of the college bell was sometimes thrown into the well or the president's wagon was transferred to the chapel roof, these things were often done from a sort of sense of duty: college students were expected to be mischievous. Yet the whole tone of college life was serious. There were no organized college athletics, no musical or dramatic clubs, no other outside activities such as those to which the student of today devotes so much of his attention, except, of course, the "literary societies" for practice in declamation and debating.

Though many towns established graded schools before 1890 by means of special taxes, the condition of rural education at this time was disheartening. The percentage of negro illiteracy was falling, because it could not easily be raised, but the reduction of white illiteracy was slow. The school terms were still short, and many of the school buildings were unfit for human occupation. On the other hand, the quality of the teachers was improving. The short term of the schools was being lengthened by private subscription in some districts, and new and adequate buildings appeared in others. Progress was evidently being made, even if it was not obtrusive, and in that progress one of the leading factors was the Peabody Fund.

In 1867 George Peabody, a native of Massachusetts but then a banker of London, who had laid the foundation of his fortune in Baltimore, placed in the hands of trustees $2,100,000 in securities to be used for the encouragement of education in the Southern States. The Fund was increased to $3,500,000 in 1869, though a considerable part consisted of bonds of Mississippi and Florida which those States refused to recognize as valid obligations. The chairman of the trustees for many years was Robert C. Winthrop of Massachusetts, and the other members of the board were distinguished men, both Northern and Southern. The first general agent, as the active administrator was called, was Barnas Sears, who at the time of his election was president of Brown University.

Dr. Sears was an unusual man, who comprehended conditions in the South and was disposed to improve them in every feasible way by using the resources at his command. He had no inflexible program and was willing to modify his plans to fit changing conditions. The income of the Fund appears small in this day of munificent foundations, but it seemed large then; and its effects were far-reaching. Sears was not an educational reformer in the modern sense. He seems to have had no new philosophy of education but took the best schools of the nation as a standard and strove to bring the schools of the South up to that standard. Through the aid of the Fund model schools were established in every State. The University of North Carolina opened its doors to the teachers of the State for professional training during the summer and was apparently the first of the summer schools now so numerous and popular. Direct appropriations in aid of schools were made out of the Fund, provided the community by taxation or subscription raised much larger sums. The Peabody Normal College at Nashville, Tennessee, was founded, and no effort was spared to develop a general interest in public education. Advice to legislatures, trustees, or communities was given when asked but so tactfully that neither resentment nor suspicion was aroused.

Before his death, Dr. Sears had chosen Dr. J.L.M. Curry as his successor, and the choice was promptly ratified by the trustees. Dr. Curry was a thorough Southerner, a veteran of both the Mexican and the Civil War. He had first practiced law and had sat in the House of Representatives of the United States and of the Confederate States. At the time of his election to the management of the Peabody Fund he was a professor in Richmond College, Virginia, and a minister of the Baptist Church. He had a magnetic personality, an unyielding belief in the value of education for both white and black, and the temperament and gifts of the orator. As a Southerner, he could speak more freely and more effectively to the people than his predecessor, who had done the pioneer work. During the years of his service, Curry therefore gave himself chiefly to the development of public sentiment, making speeches at every opportunity before societies, conventions, and other gatherings. As he himself said, he addressed legislatures "from the Potomac to the Rio Grande."

While the influence of the Peabody Fund and its agents was large, it was not the only influence upon the educational development of the South. There were throughout that section men who saw clearly that the main hope centered in education for black and white. They talked in season and out, though sometimes with little apparent result, for the opposing forces were strong. Among these forces poverty was perhaps the strongest. It is difficult to convince a people who must struggle for the bare necessities of life that taxation for any purpose is a positive good; and a large proportion of the families of the rural South handled little money. This was true even for years after the towns began to feel the thrill of growing industrialism. It has sometimes seemed that the poorer a man and the larger the number of his children, the greater his dread of taxes for education.

Then, too, the Southern people had followed the tradition of Jefferson that the best government is that which assumes the fewest functions and interferes least with the individual. Many honest men who meant to be good citizens felt that education belonged to the family or the church and could not see why the State should pay for teaching any more than for preaching, or for food, or clothing, or shelter. There were, of course, those claiming to hold this theory whose underlying motives were selfish. They had property which they had inherited or accumulated, and they objected to paying taxes for educating other people's children. It must be said, however, that as a class, the larger taxpayers have been more ready to vote higher taxes for schools than the poor and illiterate, whose morbid dread of taxation has been fostered by the politician.

There were others who were cold to the extension of public education on account of the schools already existing. In many towns and villages there were struggling academies, often nominally under church auspices. Towns which could have supported one school were trying to support two or three. In few cases was any direct financial aid given by the religious organization, but the school was known as the Methodist or the Presbyterian school, because the teaching force and the majority of the patrons belonged to that denomination. The denominational influence behind these schools was often lukewarm toward the extension of public education, and the ministers themselves had been known to make slighting references to "godless schools." There was still another class of people who really opposed public schools because they did not believe that the masses should be educated. This class was, however, small and is perhaps more numerous in other sections of the Union than in the South.

Last, but by no means the least, of the obstacles to general public education was the question of its influence upon the negro. The apparent effects of negro education were not likely to make the average white man feel that the experiment had been successful. The phrase that "an educated negro was a good plough-hand spoiled" seemed to meet with general acceptance. The smattering of an education which the negroes had received—it would be difficult to call it more—seemed to have improved neither their efficiency nor their morals. As a result there were many white people so shortsighted that they would starve their own children rather than feed the negro.

To all of these obstacles in human nature were added the defects of the tax system. Almost invariably the tax was levied by the Legislature upon the State as a whole or upon the county, and the constitutions or the laws in some cases forbade the progressive smaller division to levy special taxes for any purpose. Graded schools began, however, to appear in the incorporated towns which were not subject to the same tax limitations as the rural districts, and in time it became easier to levy supplementary local taxes by legislative act, judicial interpretation, or constitutional changes.

Gradually public sentiment in favor of schools grew stronger. The legislatures raised the rate of taxation for school purposes, normal schools were established, log schoolhouses began to be replaced by frame or brick structures, uniform textbooks became the rule and not the exception, teachers' salaries were raised, and the percentage of attendance climbed upward, though there was still a remnant of the population which did not attend at all. The school term was not proportionately extended, since a positive mania for small districts developed—a school at every man's door. In the olden days large districts were common, and many of the children walked four or five miles to school in the morning and back home in the afternoon. No one then dreamed of transporting the children at public expense. The school authorities were often unable to resist the pressure to make new districts, and necessarily a contracted term followed. In 1900 the average school term in North Carolina was not longer than in 1860, though much more money was spent, and the salaries were little higher. It must be remembered, of course, that no appropriations were made for negro education before the Civil War.

Both during and after the War many schools were opened for negroes by Freedmen's Aid Societies, various philanthropic associations, and denominational boards or committees. As public schools were established for negroes, some of these organizations curtailed their work and others withdrew altogether. Others persisted, however, and new schools have been founded by these and similar organizations, by private philanthropy, and also by negro churches. As a result there are independent schools, state schools, and Federal schools. The recent monumental report of the Bureau of Education reports 653 schools for negroes other than regular public schools[1]. Of these 28 are under public control, 507 are denominational schools (of which 354 are under white boards and 153 under negro boards), and 118 are classed as independent. This last group includes not only the great national schools, such as Tuskegee and Hampton, but small private enterprises supported chiefly by irregular donations. These private and independent schools owned property valued at $28,496,946 and had an income of over $3,000,000. State and Federal appropriations at the date of the report reached about $963,000.

[Footnote 1. Negro Education, Bureau of Education Bulletins 38 and 39 (1916). This work supersedes all previous collections of facts upon negro education.]

During the first years after the downfall of the Reconstruction governments the negro received a fair proportion of the pittance devoted to public schools. Governor Vance of North Carolina, in recommending in 1877 an appropriation to the University for a "professorship for the purpose of instructing in the theory and art of teaching" went on to state that "a school of similar character should be established for the education of colored teachers, the want of which is more deeply felt by the black race even than the white.... Their desire for education is a very creditable one, and should be gratified so far as our means will permit." Instead of establishing the chair of pedagogy recommended by Governor Vance, the Legislature appropriated the money to conduct the summer school for teachers at the University. An appropriation of equal amount was made for negroes and similar allowances have been continued to the present. Proportionately larger appropriations have been made for the whites in recent years. Other States have established normal schools for negroes, but in none of them is the supply of trained negro teachers equal to the demand.

The negro public schools were organized along the same lines as the white, so far as circumstances permitted, but the work was difficult and remains so to this day. The negro teachers were ignorant, and many of them were indolent and immoral. In only a few places in the South do whites teach negroes in public schools. The enthusiasm for education displayed just after emancipation gradually wore off, and many parents showed little interest in the education of their children. Education had not proved the "open sesame" to affluence, and many parents were unwilling or unable to compel their children to attend school. As a contributory cause of this reluctance the poverty of the negro must be considered. It was difficult for the negro to send to school a child who might be of financial aid to the family. To many negro parents it seemed a matter of little moment to keep a child away from school one or two days a week to assist at home. It must also be remembered that the negro tenant farmer is migratory in his habits and that he often moved in the middle of the short term. Consequently the whole value of the term might easily be lost by the transfer. It is not surprising that the final product of such unstable educational conditions was not impressive.

The idea of the first educational missionaries to the negroes of the South was to turn them into white men as soon as possible by bringing them into contact with the traditional culture of the whites through the study of Latin, Greek, mathematics, and sometimes Hebrew, especially in the case of students for the ministry. The attempt was made to take the negro, fresh from slavery and with no cultural background, through the course generally pursued by whites. Numerous "universities" and "colleges" were founded with this end in view. Hampton Institute with its insistence upon fitting education to the needs of the race was unique for a time, though later it received the powerful support of Tuskegee Institute and its noted principal and founder, Booker T. Washington. The influence of this educational prophet was great in the North, whence came most of the donations for private schools. In imitation many mushroom schools have recently added "rural" or "industrial" to their names, but few of them are doing work of great value. Where the school appeals chiefly to the negro for support, liberal use is made of such high-sounding names as "college" and "university." The negro still thinks that the purpose of education is to free him from manual labor, and he looks with little favor upon a school which requires actual industrial training. For the same reason he is quick to protest when the attempt is made to introduce manual training into the public schools.

Partly because of this opposition on the part of the negroes themselves, partly because industrial training is more expensive than purely academic training, and partly because such training has only recently been recognized as part of education, the South has made little provision for the industrial education of the negro at public expense. According to the Report on Negro Education, few of the agricultural and mechanical schools maintained partly by the Federal land grants and partly by the States are really efficient. A few state or city schools also give manual training. About one-third of the private schools for negroes offer industrial courses, but much of this work is ineffective—either so slight as to be negligible or straight labor done in return for board and tuition and without regard to educational value. Hampton and Tuskegee are known to do excellent work, and a few of the smaller schools are to be classed as efficient; but in the great majority of negro schools the old curriculum is still followed, and the students gladly submit to its exactness. Why study something so plebeian as carpentry when one may study such scholarly subjects as Latin or Greek?

Most institutions for negroes desire to do work of college grade. Some with not a single pupil above the elementary grades nevertheless proudly call themselves colleges. Other so-called colleges have secondary pupils but none in college classes.

Thirty-three institutions do have a total of 1643 students in college classes and 994 students in professional courses, but these same schools enroll more than 10,000 pupils in elementary and secondary grades. Some of them are attempting to maintain college classes for less than 5 per cent of their enrollment, and the teaching force gives a disproportionate share of time to such students. Two of these thirty-three institutions have nearly all the professional students, and two have nearly half the total number of college students. Only three can properly be called colleges—Howard University at Washington, Fisk University, and Meharry Medical College at Nashville, Tennessee.

While several of the Southern States have greatly increased their expenditures for schools since 1910, in some cases more than doubling them, the proportion devoted to negro schools has not been greatly increased, if indeed it has been increased at all. For example, in North Carolina, which assigns for negro education much more than the average of the States containing any considerable proportion of negroes, the total paid to negro teachers in 1910-11 was $340,856, as against $1,715,994 paid to white teachers. Five years later, negro teachers received $536,272, but white teachers received $3,258,352. In other words, in the former year all the negro teachers received one-fifth as much as all the whites, while five years later they received about one-sixth; that is, something less than one-third the total number of children received about one-seventh of the money expended for instruction. A part of this wide difference in expenditure may be explained or even defended. The districts or townships which have voted additional local taxes are usually those in which there are comparatively few negroes. The average salary paid to negro teachers, although low, is as large as can be earned in most of the occupations open to them, and any sudden or large increase would neither immediately raise the standard of competency nor insure a much larger proportion of the ability of the race. The percentage of school attendance of negro children is lower than in the case of white children. Very few negro children, whether because of economic pressure, lack of ability, or lack of desire for knowledge, complete even the fifth grade. Among negroes there is little real demand for high school instruction, which is more expensive than elementary instruction. Therefore, the proportion of the total funds spent for negro education might properly be less than their numbers would indicate. If the proportionate amount spent today for the instruction of certain racial groups of the foreign population could be separated from the total, it would be found that less than the average is spent upon them for the same reasons. However, when all allowances have been made, it is obvious that the negro is receiving less than a fair share of the appropriations made by the Southern States for education.

The inadequate public schools for negroes have been excused or justified upon the ground that private and church schools are supplying the need. This is true in some localities, for the great majority of negro private schools, no matter by what name they are called, are really doing only elementary or secondary work. These schools, however, only touch the beginnings of the problem and have served in some degree to lessen the sense of responsibility for negro education on the part of the Southern whites. Where there is one of these schools supported by outside philanthropy, the public school is likely to be less adequately equipped and supported than in the towns where no such school exists. But at best, these schools can reach only a small proportion of the children.

The difficulty lies in public sentiment. As a rule the tax rate is fixed by the State but collected by the county, and the county board divides the amount plus any local taxes levied, among the schools. Districts of the same number of pupils may receive widely varying amounts, according to the grade of instruction demanded. Generally, a part of the fund is apportioned per capita, and the remainder is divided according to the supposed special need of the districts. A white district which demands high grade teachers is given the necessary money, if possible. Few colored schools have advanced pupils, and only sufficient funds for a cheaper teacher or teachers may be provided. Colored districts are often made too large. The white districts ask so much that little more than the per capita appropriation is left for the colored schools. The negroes are politically powerless and public sentiment does not demand that money be taken from white children to be given to negroes.

Mention should be made of several funds which have been established by philanthropists for the education of the negro. The John F. Slater Fund, founded by a gift of $1,000,000 in 1882, has now reached $1,750,000. The greater part of the income is devoted to the encouragement of training schools. No schools are established by the Fund itself, but it cooeperates with the local authorities and the General Education Board. The Jeanes Fund of $1,000,000 established by a Quaker lady, Miss Anna T. Jeanes of Philadelphia, expends the greater part of its income in helping to pay the salaries of county supervisors for rural schools. These are usually young colored women, who work under the direction of the county superintendents and visit the rural schools. They give simple talks upon hygiene and sanitation, encourage better care of schoolhouses and grounds, stimulate interest in gardening and simple home industries, and encourage self help. Their work has been exceedingly valuable. The Phelps Stokes Fund of $900,000, founded by Miss Caroline Phelps Stokes, is not wholly devoted to the negroes of the South. It has been expended chiefly in the study of the negro problem, in founding fellowships, and in making possible the valuable report on negro education already mentioned. In 1914, Mr. Julius Rosenwald of Chicago offered to every negro rural community wishing to erect a comfortable and adequate school building a sum not to exceed $300, provided that the community would obtain from private or public funds at least as much more.

The interest of the General Education Board is not limited either to negro or even to Southern education, but it has done much for both. This great foundation has paid salaries of state supervisors of negro schools in several States and has cooeperated with the Jeanes Fund in maintaining county supervisors of negro schools. It has appropriated over half a million dollars to industrial schools and about one-fourth as much to negro colleges. Farm demonstration work, of which more is said elsewhere, is also of aid to the negroes. The Board has realized, however, that the development of negro schools is dependent upon the economic and educational progress of the whites, and has contributed most to white schools or to objects of a nature intended to benefit the whole population.

All testimony points to the conclusion that there is now real enthusiasm for education among the Southern whites. The school terms are being extended, often by means of local taxes levied in addition to the minimum fixed by the State; the quality of the teaching is improving; and popular interest is growing. In many sections, the school is developing into a real community center. Good buildings are replacing the shacks formerly so common. North Carolina is proud of the fact that for more than fourteen years an average of more than one new school a day has been built from plans approved by the educational department. More and more attention is being paid to the surroundings of the buildings. School gardens are common, and some schools even cultivate an acre or two of ground, the proceeds of which go to furnish apparatus or supplies. Many of the Southern towns and cities have schools which need not fear comparison with those in other sections.

The crying need is more money which can come only in two ways, by reforming the system of taxation, and by increasing the amount of taxable property. All through the South the chief reliance is a general property tax with local assessors who are either incompetent or else desirous of keeping down assessments. The proportion of assessment to value varies widely, but on the average it can hardly be more than fifty per cent; and, as invariably happens, the assessment of the more valuable properties is proportionately less than that of the small farm or the mechanic's home. The South is growing richer, but the conflict with the North set the section back thirty or forty years, while the remainder of the country was increasing in wealth. Even today the South must build two school systems without the aid of government land grants, which have had so much to do with the successful development of the schools of the Western States, and without the commercial prosperity which has come to the East. The rate of taxation levied for schools in many Southern communities is now among the highest in the United States.

During the past ten years, hundreds of public high schools have been established, more than half of which are rural. Some still follow the old curriculum, but a new institution known as the "farm life school" is now being developed. Many other schools have such a department attached and usually give instruction in household economics as well. The General Education Board estimates that $20,000,000 has been spent for improved buildings since the appointment of professors of secondary education in Southern universities. This, by the way, is one of the most useful contributions of the Board. These men, chosen by the institutions themselves as regular members of the faculty but with their salaries paid by an appropriation from the Board, may give a course or two in the university, but their chief duties are to coordinate the work of the high schools and to serve as educational missionaries. They go up and down the States, exhorting, advising, and stimulating the people, and the fruits of their work are present on every hand.

The South has a superabundance of colleges. Some of them have honorable records; others represent faith and hope or denominational zeal rather than accomplishment. Some of the older institutions were kept open during War and Reconstruction but others were forced to close. With the return of white supremacy old institutions have been revived and new ones have been founded. The number of students has increased, but the financial difficulties of the institutions have hardly diminished. Few had any endowment worth considering, and the so-called state institutions received very small appropriations or none at all. Good preparatory schools were few and, since the colleges were dependent upon tuition fees, many students with inadequate preparation were leniently admitted. Preparatory departments were established for those students who could not possibly be admitted to college classes. Necessarily the quality of work was low, though many institutions struggled for the maintenance of respectable standards. One college president frankly said: "We are liberal about letting young men into the Freshman class, but particular about letting them out." It was not uncommon for half of a first year class to be found deficient and turned back at the end of the year, or dismissed as hopeless. Obviously this was a wasteful method of determining competency.

Vanderbilt University at Nashville, Tennessee, founded in 1873 by the gifts of "Commodore" Vanderbilt, was the first Southern institution with anything approaching an adequate endowment and was the first to insist upon thorough preparation for entrance, though it was compelled to organize a sub-freshman class in the beginning. Its policy had considerable influence both upon college standards and upon the growth of private preparatory schools. The development of public schools, for a time, had made the work of colleges in general more difficult, because they supplanted scores of private academies which had done passably well the work of college preparation and yet were not themselves able to prepare students for college in the first years of their existence. For years it was difficult in many localities for a young man to secure proper preparation, and the total of poorly prepared students applying for admission to the colleges increased. The number of towns and cities which have established high schools or high school departments has since increased rapidly, and today a larger and larger proportion of college students comes from public schools.

Since 1900, the resources of the colleges have greatly increased. States which appropriated a few thousand dollars for higher education in the early nineties now appropriate ten or even twenty times as much to their universities, agricultural colleges, and normal and technical schools for women, and have appropriated millions for new buildings. Many of the denominational colleges have obtained substantial endowments. The General Education Board up to 1914 had subscribed over $3,000,000 to Southern colleges and universities on condition that the institutions raise at least three times as much more. Southern men who have accumulated wealth are realizing their social responsibility. Several recent gifts of a million dollars or more are not included in the sum mentioned above, and many smaller gifts or bequests likewise.

Standards of work have been raised with increasing income. As elsewhere the effect of the reports of the Carnegie Foundation has been patent. The stronger institutions have brought up their requirements to the minimum, on paper at least, and to a great extent in fact. Some of the weaker institutions have dropped the pretense of doing college work; others have accepted the position of junior colleges doing two years of college work and giving no degrees. The States exercise little or no supervision over the quality of work done for college degrees, and some institutions continue to grant diplomas for what is really secondary work, but the fact that they are not up to the standard is known and the management is generally apologetic.

No other phase of Southern life is more hopeful and more encouraging than the educational revival. True, judged by the standards of the richer States, the terms of the rural schools are short and the pay of the teachers is small; but both are being increased, and no schools are exercising more wholesome influence. The high schools are neither so numerous nor so well equipped as in some other States, but nowhere else is such evident progress being made. There are no universities in the South which count their income in millions, but the number of institutions adequately equipped to do efficient work is already large and increasing. The spirit of faculty and students is admirable, and the contact of the institutions and the people of the Southern States is increasingly close and full of promise.



CHAPTER IX

THE SOUTH OF TODAY

The South of the present is a changing South with its face toward the future rather than the past. Nevertheless the dead hand is felt by all the people a part of the time, and some of the people are never free from its paralyzing touch. Old prejudices, the remembrance of past grievances, and antipathies long cherished now and then assert themselves in the most unexpected fashion. The Southerner, no matter how much he may pride himself upon being liberal and broad, is likely to make certain reservations and limitations in his attitude. There are some questions upon which he is not open to argument, certain subjects which he cannot discuss freely and dispassionately. Some Southerners have so many of these reservations that conversation with them is difficult unless one instinctively understands their psychology and is willing to avoid certain subjects. The past has made so powerful an impression upon them that it has affected their whole attitude of mind.

Time, travel, association, engrossing work, and economic prosperity have weakened many of these prejudices and antipathies, however, and the Southerner is becoming free. There are individuals who will always be bound by the past; there are some men, and more women, who are yet "unreconstructed"; there are neighborhoods and villages where men and women yet live in the past and absolutely refuse to attempt to adjust themselves cheerfully to changed and changing conditions. This is not true of the Southern people as a whole. In fact there is danger that the younger generation will think too little of the past. Much of the Old South is worthy of preservation, and it is never safe for a country or a section to break too abruptly with its older life.

Economically the South has prospered in proportion as the new spirit has ruled. The question of secession is dead, and the man who refuses today to treat it as past history but grows excited in discussing it is not likely to be successful in his business or profession. The men of the New South spend little time in discussing the relative wisdom of Jefferson Davis and Robert Toombs or the reasons for the failure of the Confederacy. The Southerners accept the results of the War, and all except a negligible minority are convinced that the preservation of the Union was for the best. To be sure they believe, partly through knowledge but more largely through absorption, that the Confederate soldier was the best fighting man ever known and that the War might have been won if the civil government had been wiser, but on the whole they are not sorry that secession failed. They thrill even today to Dixie, and The Bonnie Blue Flag, but this feeling is now purely emotional.

All the Southern States have felt, though unequally, the effects of industrialism. The South Atlantic States have been most influenced by this movement, but even Mississippi and Arkansas have been affected. In many sections the traveler is seldom out of sight of the factory chimney. Some towns, in appearance and spirit, might easily seem to belong to a Middle Western environment but for the presence of the negro and the absence of the foreign born. The population in these Southern towns is still overwhelmingly American. In no States except Maryland and Texas did the foreign born number as many as 100,000 in 1910, and Mississippi, North Carolina, and South Carolina each had less than 10,000 at that time. The highest percentage of foreign born was 8.6 per cent in Delaware, the lowest 0.3 per cent in North Carolina. In the South as a whole the proportion of foreign born whites was only 2.5 per cent.

The laborers in the Southern shops and mills today are not only native born but almost altogether Southern born. The South has been a great loser through interstate migration. Other sections also have lost but the excess of those departing has been replaced by the immigration of foreign born. Comparatively few have come to the South from other sections except in Florida, Arkansas, Oklahoma, and Texas, and fewer foreign born have settled in the South. As a result, the percentage of increase of population is less for the South, if Oklahoma be omitted, than for the United States as a whole. Many of the laborers are of rural origin or are only a generation removed from the farm. They preserve the individualistic attitude of the rural mind and have learned little of collective action. Labor unions have made small progress except in a few skilled trades and class consciousness has not developed in the South.

The important industries have thus far been few and they have kept rather close to the original raw material. The South does not spin all the cotton it produces, does not weave all the yarn it spins, and does not manufacture into clothing any considerable quantity of the cloth it weaves. The greater part of both yarn and cloth is coarse, though some mills do finer work. Little bleaching or printing, however, is done. The South is a land of curious economic contrasts. It produces sugar but buys confectionery. It produces immense quantities of lumber but works up comparatively little, and this mainly into simple forms. It produces iron and steel in considerable quantities but has few machine shops where really delicate work can be done. It does not manufacture motor cars, electric or even textile machinery or machine tools, nor does it make watches or firearms in appreciable quantities. In short, the South carries some of the most important raw materials only a step or two toward their ultimate form and depends upon other parts of the country for the finished article.

Years ago the story was told of a Georgia funeral at which that State furnished only the corpse and the grave. Georgia, and other States too, can do much more today, if the funeral be not too elaborate. It can furnish a cotton shroud, each year of finer quality. The knitting mills of the South are able to supply an increasing proportion of the population with hose and underclothing, and a number of the mills are gaining a national trade through advertising. If demanded, Southern-made shoes may be found, and a Southern-made coffin may be drawn on a Southern-made wagon by Southern-bred horses and perhaps, though improbably, in harness of local manufacture also.

The South was once the richest section of the Union. The vicissitudes of the Civil War rendered it poor, but now it is rapidly growing richer and since the beginning of the Great War has shown a phenomenal accumulation of new capital. During this great struggle some of the cotton mills made in a single month profits as large as they were formerly accustomed to make in a year. Even though the farmer received for his cotton much more than usual, the price of cloth would still have yielded a profit to the manufacturer if cotton had been twice as high. Other enterprises have likewise been profitable, and when normal conditions are restored this capital will seek new investment. While prophecy is dangerous it seems probable that manufacturing in the South will grow as never before; and new forms of investment must be found, as the rural districts cannot furnish any greatly increased supply of labor for cotton manufacturing though the towns can supply some adult labor for other forms of industry.

The labor question is beginning to grow serious in some localities, though it is difficult to discover whether the problem is chiefly one of getting labor at all or of getting it at something like the wages formerly paid. Apparently, however, the industrial growth of the South has been more rapid than that of population. Heretofore the farmer has had little difficulty in obtaining some sort of assistance in cultivating his land, and this abundance of labor has lessened the demand for agricultural machinery. Now the migration of the negro to the North has created a shortage of labor which must force the farmer to purchase machinery. Too much man and horse power has been employed upon Southern farms in proportion to the results achieved. The South has been producing a large value per acre but a small value per individual. If the South is to become permanently prosperous, fewer persons must do the work and must even increase the production.

A practical cotton-picking machine would help to solve some of the South's problems, as any family can plant and cultivate after a fashion much more cotton than it can pick. Many attempts to produce such a machine have been made, but simplicity, efficiency, and cheapness have not yet been attained. Like the reaper and binder, a machine of this sort is needed for only a small portion of the year, but in that short period the need is extreme. Such a machine would revolutionize the tenant system, would permit a larger production of food, and at the same time would set labor free for other occupations. Meanwhile the general rate of wages in agriculture has risen and must rise still further, as it has done in other occupations. Any student of economics who draws his conclusions from observation of life as well as from books realizes how large a part custom plays in determining wages, and hitherto farm wages have been very low and labor has been inefficient in the South.

The economic future of the South must rest upon the advance of the farmer. This thesis has already been developed at length in another chapter, where the present unsatisfactory organization and conditions of agriculture were also discussed. Improvement, however, is already becoming evident. Cotton furnishes two-fifths of the value of all farm products, with corn, hay, tobacco, and wheat following in the order named. Gradually the West is ceasing to be the granary and the smokehouse of the Southern farmer, but the South does not yet feed itself. In 1917 only Maryland, Delaware, Virginia, and Oklahoma produced a surplus of wheat, though it is estimated that the South as a whole reduced its deficiency by more than 35,000,000 bushels. The abnormal prices of agricultural products since 1915 have brought many farmers out of debt and set them on the road toward prosperity, but many have not yet realized that they are no longer objects of commiseration. Though the high prices of war times have brought prosperity to the farmer, the crying necessity today is a larger production per man employed.

The political, as well as the economic, condition of the South today is full of interest. Politically the common man is in control, and as a rule he selects men of his own type to represent him. The primary was almost universal in the South when the West was only thinking of it as a radical innovation. The day of aristocratic domination is over, if indeed it ever really existed. In many instances descent from well-known ancestors who have held high positions has proved a positive detriment to a political candidate of today. Some of the successful politicians, as might be expected, are demagogues. States differ in the number of politicians of this type, and the same State may vary from year to year. It may at the same time send a demagogue and a statesman to the Senate. Men are permitted to hold offices, both national and state, for longer periods than formerly, and, as a result, in recent Democratic Congresses Southern men have held the most important chairmanships.[1]

[Footnote 1: North Carolina, for example, had in the 65th Congress, the chairmanship of the Committees on Finance and on Rules in the Senate, and on Ways and Means, Rules, Judiciary, and Rivers and Harbors in the House, besides other chairmanships of less account. Seldom in the whole history of the country has the representation of any State been so powerful.]

That the Southern representation in Congress is equal in ability, culture, and character to that of the Old South or to that of even thirty years ago can hardly be seriously maintained. There are in Congress a few men today who recall the best traditions of Southern leadership; there are more who are mediocre and parochial. For the most part they come from law offices in country towns, and have the virtues and the limitations of their environment. They are honest financially, if not intellectually, and do not consciously yield to "the interests." They are correct in their private lives and likely to be somewhat bigoted. Many are convinced that cities are essentially wicked and conceive them to be inhabited by vampires and parasites. Few can think in national terms, and fewer have either knowledge or comprehension of international relations. For a generation the South was excluded from any real participation in national affairs and was wholly occupied with local questions. It is therefore difficult for such men to realize the present position of the United States in world politics. With much perturbation of spirit the rank and file followed the President in the steps leading up to the Great War, though some of the would-be leaders attempted to rebel. On the other hand, some of the most valuable men in the great crisis were Southerners.

The dominant party in the South is called Democratic, but the name has little of its original significance today. The representative is likely to follow the sentiment of his district if he can discover it. Some of the Southern Democrats advocate doctrines which are far removed from traditional democracy, for Populistic ideas have not entirely died out and some of the farmers still demand special privileges, which, however, they would be the first to deny to any one else. Democracy in the South really means the white man's party, and the Democratic doctrines are those in which it is thought the majority of the white men of the State or section believe for the time. Though the negro is no longer a voting power, the malign influence of the negro question persists.

Since the South as a whole favors prohibition of the liquor traffic the representatives of the people are almost unanimously in favor of prohibition, forgetting all constitutional scruples and all questions of state rights. The sentiment for woman suffrage is not yet overwhelming and consequently, as might be surmised, conscientious scruples prevent representatives from voting for the extension of the franchise. In two States, however, the friends of woman suffrage, though not strong enough to pass a constitutional amendment, have realized their aim by a brilliant coup. Since most elections are practically settled in the primaries, the legislatures of Texas and Arkansas gave women the right to vote in such elections. In other words, women were given the right to help nominate candidates, though they are excluded from the formal elections. Whether these acts will stand in the courts has not been determined. Missouri and Tennessee have recently given national suffrage to women, and Oklahoma has given full suffrage.

The negro has been practically eliminated as a voter, but the decision of the Supreme Court in the Oklahoma case may make necessary the revision of some state constitutions. Enough restrictions remain, however, to make white supremacy reasonably secure for the present. As the aim is one upon which the white South is practically agreed, some other expedients will be devised if those now in use must be discarded. There is absolutely no desire for a wholesale restoration of the negro vote, though, of course, Republican conventions denounce the disfranchising acts and constitutional amendments. If the control of the Southern States should be gained by the Republican party, unlimited negro suffrage would hardly be restored unless such action were forced by the party in the nation at large. In the last extremity the South would suffer loss of representation rather than face the consequences of unrestricted negro suffrage.

Socially the South is in a state of ferment. Old standards are passing, some of them very rapidly, and the younger generation is inclined to smile at some of the attitudes of the old. The "typical Southerner" who nourishes within the pages of F. Hopkinson Smith and Thomas Nelson Page is extremely rare outside of them. Most of the real Southern colonels are dead, and the others are too busy running plantations or cotton mills to spend much time discussing genealogy, making pretty speeches, or talking about their honor. Not so many colonels are made as formerly, and one may travel far before he meets an individual who fits the popular idea of the type. He is likely to meet more men who are cold, hard, and astute, for the New South has developed some perfect specimens of the type whose natural habitat had been supposed to be Ulster or the British Midlands—religious, narrow, stubborn, and very shrewd.

A sense of social responsibility is developing in the South. Kindness has always been shown to the unfortunate and the afflicted, but it has been exhibited toward individuals by individuals. If a Southerner heard of a case of distress in his neighborhood, he was quick to respond. Real neighborliness has always existed, but the idea of responsibility for a class was slow to develop. Such an idea is growing, however. More attention has been given to the condition of jails and almshouses during the last ten years than in the whole preceding century. To be sure, the section is now becoming rich enough to afford the luxury of paupers, but the interest in socialized humanitarian endeavor lies deeper. Perhaps the fact that negroes formed the larger part of the criminal and dependent classes had something to do with the past neglect. The Old Testament doctrine that the criminal should suffer the consequences of his act has had its effect, and the factor of expense has not been forgotten. Some of the States still permit county commissioners to commit the care of the poor to the lowest bidder. On the other hand the poorhouse has been transformed into a "Home for the Aged and Infirm" in some States, and inspections of public institutions by the grand jury are becoming more than merely cursory. State boards of charities are being established, and men have even attacked members of their own political parties on the charge of incompetence, cruelty, or neglect of duty as keepers of prisons or almshouses. Hundreds of towns have their associated charities, and scores have visiting nurses. Where there is only one nurse, she visits negroes as well as whites, but many towns support one or more for negroes as well.

In former days orphans were "bound out," if no relatives would take them, and in that case they might not always be properly treated. At the present time not only States and municipalities support asylums, but religious denominations and fraternal orders manage many well-conducted institutions. The problem of the juvenile delinquent is being recognized, as several States already have institutions for his care. So far little has been done for the young negro offender, whose home training is likely to be most deficient and who needs firm but kindly discipline; but the consciousness of responsibility for him also is developing. Increasing prosperity alone cannot account for the multiplication of these agencies for social betterment. A new social interest and a new attitude of mind are revealed in these activities.

There are still some communities where social position is based upon birth and where the old families still control; but these regions are becoming less numerous. The Old South was never quite so aristocratic as the North believed, and today the white South is much more nearly a democracy than New England. Even in 1860 this was true of some parts of the South, as compared with some parts of New England. The rural South was always democratic except in comparatively limited areas, and it is so everywhere today. In those communities which have felt the new industrial spirit the question of birth plays little part. Any presentable young man can go where he chooses. In such communities the tendency—apparently inevitable in industrial societies—to base social distinctions upon wealth and business success is beginning to show itself. The plutocrats, however, are not yet numerous enough to form a society of their own and must perforce find their associates among their fellow townsmen.

One does not lose social position in the South by engaging in business or by working with his hands. It may easily happen that in the afternoon you may purchase a collar or a pair of shoes from a young man whom you will meet in the evening at the house of the local magnate. The granddaughter of a former governor or justice of the Supreme Court comes home from her typewriter and her brother from the cotton mill or the lumber yard. Social life in a small town—and most Southern towns are small—is simple and unpretentious, although here too the influence of prosperity is beginning to be manifest. Social affairs are more elaborate than they were ten or fifteen years ago, and there is also less casual expression of informal hospitality. The higher prices of food and the increasing difficulties of the servant problem have doubtless put some restraint upon the spirit of hospitality but perhaps more important is the fact that more of the men must keep regular hours of business and that women are developing interests outside the home.

Social affairs are almost entirely in the hands of women. The older men come somewhat unwillingly to receptions in the evening, but the presence of a man at an afternoon tea is unusual. The Southerner of the small towns and cities puts away play with his adolescence. The professional man seldom advertises the fact that he has gone hunting or fishing for a day or a week, as it is thought to be not quite the thing for a lawyer to be away from his office for such a purpose. Golf has gained no foothold except in the larger towns, and even there the existence of the country club is often precarious. Few males except college youths will be seen on the tennis court, if indeed there be one even in a town of five thousand people. Professional men keep long hours, though they might be able to do all their work in half the time they spend in their offices.

The theory of the Old South contemplated different spheres of activity for men and women. The combined influence of St. Paul and Sir Walter Scott is responsible for a part of this theory, though its development was probably inevitable from the structure of society in the Old South. A woman's place was the home. As a girl she might live for enjoyment and spend her time in a round of visits, but she was expected to give up frivolity of all sorts when she married. Society in the South was almost entirely the concern of the unmarried. Women seldom took a prominent part in any organization, and a woman speaking in public was regarded as a great curiosity. Not so many years ago the missionary society, and perhaps the parsonage aid society, were almost the only organizations in which women took a part. In recent years church and educational organizations have multiplied, and today there are numerous women's clubs devoted to many different objects. Southern women are active in civic leagues, associated charities, and other forms of community endeavor; they are prominent in various patriotic societies; and there are many suffrage societies. Where the laws permit, women are members of school boards; they often head organizations of teachers composed of both men and women, and at least one woman has been chosen mayor of a town.

Women have done more than the men to keep alive in the South the memories of the past. Perhaps because the women of the older generation suffered more than the men, they have been less willing to forget, and their daughters have imbibed some of the same feeling. The Daughters of the Confederacy have been more bitter than the Sons of Veterans or than the veterans themselves. The effect of recent events upon their psychology has been interesting. In the Great War their sons and grandsons were called to go overseas, and the national government was brought closer to them than at any other time for more than forty years. It is idle to insist that before this there had been any ardent affection in the South for the United States. There had been acceptance of the national situation, perhaps an intellectual acknowledgment that all may have been for the best, but no warm nationalism had been developed before the Great War came. Loyalty was passive rather than active.

The closing of the chasm has been hailed many times, notably at the time of the Spanish War, but no keen observer has been deceived for a moment. The recent world crisis, however, seems to have swept aside all hindrances. Perhaps the people, and particularly the women, were unconsciously yearning for a country to love and were ready for a great wave of patriotism to carry them with it. During the week following the declaration of war more national flags were displayed in the South than had been shown in the memory of the oldest resident, for except on public buildings the national flag has not been commonly displayed. At this time houses which had never shown a flag were draped, and merchants were chided because they could not supply the demand.

Quite as a matter of course the president of the Daughters of the Confederacy became president of the Red Cross Auxiliary which was organized at once. Women were eager to receive instruction in folding bandages, and knitting became the order of the day. Women threw themselves with all their energy into various activities. Canteen work was organized if the town was a junction point, and every instalment of "selected men"—for the word "drafted" was rejected almost by common consent—was sent away with some evidence of the thoughtfulness of the women of their home town. Women have been prominent in raising money for the Red Cross and the Y.M.C.A. and have done valiant service in selling War Savings Stamps and Liberty Bonds. There has been some shaking of heads, and some exponents of the sheltered life have criticized this invasion of what had been supposed to be the sphere of men, but the women have gone ahead. Indeed their alacrity has seemed to indicate that they are glad to have an excuse to throw aside the restraints which have hitherto bound them. Women and girls have approached men whom they did not know on the streets to ask for contributions or to urge the purchase of stamps or bonds, and only those who know the South can realize what a departure from traditional standards of feminine conduct such actions indicate. The business woman has been a familiar figure for years, but she was sheltered by the walls of her office or shop. On the street she was held to a certain code and was criticized if she failed to observe it. But here also the old order is changing and giving place to new.

The power of public opinion is very great in the South. While this may be true of rural or semi-rural communities in any part of the land, nowhere else does collective opinion exert such overwhelming force as in the Southern States. Perhaps this phenomenon is a survival from Reconstruction days and after. Since certain attitudes toward the negro, for example, were defended on the ground of the necessity of protecting womanhood, a certain standard must be demanded from women, and every man claimed a sort of prescriptive right to assist in laying down rules for such conduct on her part. For a long time the women of the South, consciously or unconsciously, were subject to these unwritten rules. Today in increasing numbers the women, particularly the younger women, are declaring their independence by their conduct. It has not become a feminist revolt, for many have not thought out the situation and have not recognized the source of their restrictions. The statutes of some of the Southern States, moreover, still contain many of the old common law restrictions upon women's independence of action. More and more women are asserting themselves, however, and are demanding the right to guide themselves. The negro woman has been held up as the reason for denying the vote to the white woman, but this excuse no longer is accepted willingly. Women are inquiring why the vote of the negro women should be any more of a menace than the vote of the negro man, and there seems to be no satisfactory answer. If the women make up their minds and agree, they will gain their ends.

Though women in the South as elsewhere form a majority of the church membership, they have not had equal rights in church administration. During 1918, several denominations granted full laity rights, though the bishops of the Southern Methodist Church referred the action of the General Conference back to the Annual Conferences. This is of course only temporary delay. An unusually large percentage of the adult population holds membership in one or other of the Protestant denominations. The Roman Catholics are reported as being in a majority in Louisiana, as might be expected owing to French descent, and in Kentucky, Delaware, Maryland, and Texas the proportion is considerable. It is less in Arkansas, Oklahoma, and West Virginia. In Virginia, North Carolina, South Carolina, Georgia, Alabama, Mississippi, and Tennessee, the proportion of Catholics is still smaller, though the latest (1918) official Catholic statistics for the even States last named show 7 bishops, 415 priests, 635 churches, and 211,000 Catholics. The principal denominational affiliations of the Southern people, white and black, are with the various Baptist or Methodist bodies, with a strong Presbyterian influence. In eleven of the Southern States the Baptists are by far the largest denomination, though the Methodists lead in two. These two denominations taken together are in a large majority in every State except Delaware, Maryland, and Louisiana. Presbyterians and Episcopalians are well distributed throughout the whole section and have exercised an influence altogether out of proportion to their numbers. Presbyterianism came in with the great Scotch-Irish migration of the eighteenth century, and though many of the blood have gone over to other denominations, the influence of the Shorter Catechism still persists. In the older States attempts were made to establish the Anglican Church in the colonial era, and the governing classes were naturally affiliated with it.

Both these organizations had to give way to the great wave of religious enthusiasm which swept the section early in the nineteenth century. Baptist and Methodist missionaries, many of them unlettered but vigorous and powerful, went into the remotest districts and swept the population into their communions. They preached a narrow, strait-laced, Old Testament religion, but it went deep. They believed in the verbal inspiration of the Bible, and so far as they could they interpreted it literally, laying emphasis upon the future, the rewards of the righteous, and the tortures of the damned. Life upon this earth was regarded as simply a preparation for the life to come. One is sometimes tempted to believe that these spiritual guides deprecated attempts to improve conditions here on earth lest men should grow to think less of a future abode. It is easy to understand why such a doctrine of future reward should have appealed to negroes, and it is perhaps not surprising that the poor upon the frontier likewise found comfort and solace in it. ears ago the social position of the great majority of the Methodists and Baptists was distinctly below that of the Episcopalians and Presbyterians. In recent years many Methodists and Baptists have grown prosperous. Instead of being bare barns, their church edifices are often the most ornate and costly in the town or city. A Methodist or a Baptist can have none of the former feeling of martyrdom now, when in numbers and wealth his denomination is so powerful.[1]

[Footnote 1: Except these five, other church organizations have few members. There are a few Congregationalists, almost entirely the result of post-bellum missions to the negroes. White and negro Lutheran churches are scattered through the Southern States, and in Kentucky and Tennessee the Disciples are important. Here and there other denominations have gained a foothold, but their numbers are insignificant in the South as a whole.]

Though the evangelical religious teaching of former days has been modified and softened, it has been softened only and not superseded. The result of this emphasis upon the other world has been to make men look somewhat askance at worldly amusement. The idea so prevalent in other sections that the people of the South are convivial and mercurial in temperament is erroneous. It would be more nearly correct to say that gravity, amounting almost to austerity, is a distinguishing mark of Southerners. In any Southern gathering representing the people as a whole there is little mirth. There is much more Puritanism in the South today than remains in New England. The Sabbath is no longer observed so strictly as twenty years ago, perhaps, but only recently has it been considered proper to receive visits on Sunday or to drive into the country. As for Sunday golf or tennis, the average community would stand horror-struck at such a spectacle. Sermons are frequently preached against dancing, card-playing, and theater-going, and members have been dismissed from Baptist, Methodist, and Presbyterian churches for indulging in these forbidden amusements.

The older generation, however, is losing in the fight to maintain the old standards of conduct and belief. In spite of disapprobation, bridge clubs flourish and the young people will dance and go to the theater, though even yet most Southern cities are known as "poor show towns." Today men go to the post office on Sunday, read the Sunday papers, and ride on Sunday trains. The motor car makes its appearance on Sunday, though it would be interesting to know how many of those riding really feel conscience free, for many who have liberal ideas still have Calvinistic nerves. Young ministers occasionally preach sermons for which they would have been charged with heresy not many years ago and openly read books which would have been considered poisonous then. Men speak of evolution now and show familiarity with authors who were anathema to the older generation.

Lately some of the town and city churches have been developing the social and humanitarian side of religious work, but the greatest number manage to collect only enough money to keep the organization alive. They are like engines which can get up enough steam to turn the wheels slowly and painfully but lack sufficient power to do effective work. In fact, there is strong opposition to any pastor who attempts to influence the decision of the congregation on any social question. Many towns and rural communities have several churches, though their population and wealth may be hardly large enough to support one properly. This condition, however, is not peculiar to the South. Here and there in the country districts a new type of pastor has appeared. He is a good farmer himself, interested in better farming and able to discuss fertilizers and methods with his parishioners. He is not afraid that prosperity will turn his members away from their church duties but considers that improving the economic conditions of the neighborhood is quite as vital a part of his work as ministering to their spiritual needs. Largely because of the work of some of these men the exodus to the towns has slackened in some neighborhoods and contributions to the work of the church have been greatly increased.

This movement from country to town has become a serious matter in some localities. The social level of neighborhoods once attractive because of the presence of families of intelligence and character has fallen. The land of the families which have moved to towns has been turned over to tenants, either whites of a lower status or negroes, the standards of the community have suffered in consequence, and the atmosphere of some of these communities has become depressing. Such conditions, however, are not peculiar to the South but have been observed in central New York and in New England. Better roads, the motor car, and improvement in communications have helped to check this cityward movement, and, on the whole, the educational, economic, and social standards of the country districts generally are higher than they were ten years ago.

Generally speaking, the South is a law-abiding section. This is true even when the negroes are included, and as the prohibitory laws are enforced more strictly, it is becoming increasingly true. The chain gang which was so common years ago has been discontinued in hundreds of counties, chiefly for lack of convicts, though partly for humanitarian reasons. The offenses of the negro were, for the most part, petty larceny, gambling, and offenses against public order. Affrays are certainly less frequent since the spread of prohibition, and larceny seems to be decreasing, though statistics of crime are few and unreliable. The gambling is usually nothing more than "craps," or "African billiards" as they call it now. Among the whites, offenses against property are few. In many rural counties a white man is seldom charged with theft, fraud, or forgery. A white man is occasionally arraigned for "disposing of mortgaged property," or for malicious mischief, including the destruction of property.

The homicide rate, however, is high. Generally the figures given include the negro, and he is somewhat more homicidal than the white, but the white rate is among the highest in the world. Blood feuds actually exist in the Southern Appalachians, though perhaps their number is not so large as is commonly believed. The moonshiner's antipathy to revenue officers leads him to use firearms upon occasion, but homicide occurs also in intelligent communities where the general tone is high. Individuals of excellent standing in business or professional life sometimes shoot to kill their fellows and in the past have usually escaped the extreme penalty and often have avoided punishment altogether. It would seem that life is held rather cheaply in many Southern communities.

Until recently much of the South has remained a frontier, as some of it is to this day, and in frontier communities men are accustomed to take the law into their own hands and are reluctant to depend upon inadequate or ineffective police protection. Despising physical cowardice, the individual prides himself upon his ability to maintain his rights and to protect his honor without calling for assistance. Frontiersmen are quick to resent an affront, and when their veracity is impugned they fight. The word "lie" is not considered a polite mode of expressing dissent. All over the South, in every class of society, one finds this sensitiveness to an accusation of lack of veracity. Such a theory of life dies hard. The presence of a less advanced race is perhaps not conducive to self-control. The dominant race, determined to maintain its position of superiority, is likely to resent a real or fancied affront to its dignity. A warped sense of honor, a sort of belated theory of chivalry, is responsible for some acts of violence. A seducer is likely to be called to account and the slayer, by invoking the "unwritten law," has usually been acquitted. Such a case lends itself to the display of flamboyant oratory, and the plea of "protecting the home" has set many murderers free. Perhaps the South is becoming less susceptible to oratory; at all events this plea now sometimes fails to win a jury. Defendants are occasionally convicted, though the verdicts are usually rendered for manslaughter and not for murder.