DARKWATER

These are the things that people think about who are alive: themselves and their family homes; their neighbors; their work and service; leadership, reason, and women and children; beauty, death, and war. To this reflection, I just want to add my perspective: I have experienced the world, but I haven't been completely part of it. I've observed the human drama from a hidden corner, where all the outer tragedy and comedy have mirrored themselves in a small, personal way. Because of this inner struggle of souls, the external human experience has shown itself to me in unique and sometimes enlightening ways. For this reason, and this reason alone, I dare to write again about topics that great minds have already expressed deeper thoughts on, hoping that I might capture a fresh perspective, if not as profound, drawn from the heart of my own challenges and those of my people.

Between the serious arguments of logic, I've tried to include some small touches of what could be considered poetry. They are gestures toward Beauty, not worthy of standing alone; yet oddly, in my mind, as I reach the end, I’m unsure whether I value the Thought more than the Fancy—or the Fancy more than the Thought, or why the book ends up being playful instead of firmly grounded in unyielding truth. But this is always—isn’t it?—the Riddle of Life.

Many of my words here are adapted from other publications, and I want to thank the Atlantic, the Independent, the Crisis, and the Journal of Race Development for allowing me to reuse them.

W.E. BURGHARDT DU BOIS.
New York, 1919.

I believe in God, who created all nations from one blood that lives on this planet. I believe that all people, regardless of being black, brown, or white, are brothers, differing over time and opportunity in their appearance, talents, and characteristics, but not in any fundamental way, and equal in spirit and the potential for endless growth.

Especially do I believe in the Black Race: in the beauty of its creativity, the warmth of its spirit, and its strength in the humility that will eventually inherit this chaotic world.

I believe in pride for my race, my heritage, and myself: in self-pride that’s so strong it rejects injustice to others; in pride for my lineage that’s so significant it doesn’t look down on anyone’s parents; in pride for my race that’s so honorable it neither disrespects the weak nor seeks approval from the strong, understanding that we can be brothers in Christ, even if we’re not related by marriage.

I believe in Service—humble, respectful service, from shining boots to uplifting souls; because Work is Heaven, Idleness is Hell, and the reward is the "Well done!" from the Master, who called all those who work hard and feel burdened, making no distinction between the dirty, sweating hands of cotton workers in Georgia and the prominent families of Virginia, since any distinction not based on actions is unholy and not divine.

I believe in the Devil and his angels, who recklessly try to limit the chances of struggling humans, especially if they are black; who insult the fallen, attack those who can't fight back, assume the worst and work to make it happen, hating the image their Creator placed on a fellow soul.

I believe in the Prince of Peace. I believe that war is murder. I believe that armies and navies are essentially just flashy displays of oppression and injustice, and I believe that the cruel domination of weaker and less privileged nations by stronger and more privileged ones ultimately leads to the downfall of that strength.

I believe in freedom for everyone: the space to spread their arms and souls, the right to breathe and to vote, the freedom to choose their friends, enjoy the sunshine, and travel on the railroads, free from discrimination; thinking, dreaming, and working as they wish in a realm of beauty and love.

I believe in educating children, whether they are black or white; guiding young souls into vibrant pastures and calm waters, not for money or comfort, but for a life filled with a grand vision of beauty, goodness, and truth; so we don't forget, and the children of our ancestors, like Esau, trade their birthright in a great nation for just a meal.

Finally, I believe in patience—patience with the weaknesses of the weak and the strengths of the strong, the prejudices of the ignorant and the ignorance of the blind; patience with the slow victory of joy and the wild lessons of sorrow.

I was born by a golden river and under the shadow of two great hills, five years after the Emancipation Proclamation. The house was charming, with clapboards going up and down, neatly trimmed, and it had five rooms, a small porch, a lovely front yard, and incredibly delicious strawberries in the back. A South Carolinian, who had recently moved to the Berkshire Hills, owned all of this—tall, thin, and black, with golden earrings, and prone to religious trances. We were his temporary tenants for a while.

My people were part of a large clan. Two hundred years ago, Tom Burghardt came through the western pass from the Hudson with his Dutch captor, "Coenraet Burghardt," unhappy in his captivity and gaining his freedom by volunteering for the Revolution during a time of crisis. His wife was a small, black Bantu woman who never adjusted to this unfamiliar land; she would hug her knees and sway while singing softly:

Tom died around 1787, but he fathered many sons, including one named Jack, who fought in the War of 1812. Jack and his wife, Violet, had a big family with impressive names: Harlow and Ira, Cloë, Lucinda, Maria, and Othello! I have vague memories of my grandfather, Othello—or "Uncle Tallow"—a brown man with a strong voice, smelling of tobacco, who sat upright in a tall chair because his hip was broken. He was probably a bit lazy and liked to indulge in drinking. In any case, my grandmother had a sharp tongue and often scolded him. This grandmother was Sarah—"Aunt Sally"—a tall, strict Dutch-African woman, with a prominent nose, but beautiful eyes and golden skin. They had ten or more children, the youngest being Mary, my mother.

Mother had dark, shiny bronze skin, with a slight wave in her black hair, deep black eyes, and a kind, solid face. She gave off an air of endless patience, but there was a quiet determination hidden in her softness. Our family were small farmers on Egremont Plain, situated between Great Barrington and Sheffield, Massachusetts. The plots of land were too small to support the large families that lived on them, so we were always struggling financially. I don’t remember ever feeling cold or hungry, but I do recall that shoes, coal, and sometimes flour weighed on my mother’s mind during the winter, and getting a new suit was a big deal!

Around the time I was born, economic pressure was transforming families from farmers to "hired" workers. Some resisted and moved west, while others headed to the city to work as cooks and barbers. My mother spent several years doing housework in Great Barrington, and after a heartbreaking experience with a cousin who moved to California, she met and married Alfred Du Bois and moved to town by the golden river where I was born.

Alfred, my father, must have looked amazing in that little valley surrounded by those huge hills. He was small and had a beautiful face, lightly kissed by the sun, with curly hair that mostly showed his African heritage. He was a dreamer by nature—romantic, lazy, kind, and not very dependable. He had the potential to be a poet, an adventurer, or a Beloved Vagabond, depending on the life he found himself in; unfortunately, that life offered him very little. His father, Alexander Du Bois, hid a passionate rebellion against the world behind a stern and serious exterior. He was also small, but stocky. I remember the first time I saw him in his home in New Bedford—he had close-cropped white hair, a tough, lined face, but a refined demeanor, with a gray eye that could either twinkle or glare.

Long ago, Louis XIV forced two Huguenots, Jacques and Louis Du Bois, to settle in the wilds of Ulster County, New York. One of their descendants, Dr. James Du Bois, a wealthy, carefree bachelor, made his fortune in the Bahamas, where he owned plantations with the Gilberts. There, he took a beautiful young mulatto slave as his mistress, and they had two sons: Alexander, born in 1803, and John, later on. They were handsome, clear-eyed boys who were white enough to "pass." He brought them to America and enrolled Alexander in the famous Cheshire School in Connecticut. He visited him often, but on one last visit, he suddenly died. He left no will, and his relatives quickly took advantage of this, claiming his property, apprenticing their grandfather to a shoemaker, and then abandoning him.

Grandfather took his bitter medicine like a champion. Despite the intense struggle inside him against this treatment, he didn’t say a word against those who wronged him nor did he ask for help. He tried his luck in various places, including Haiti, where my father was born during his brief, restless stay. Eventually, Grandfather became the chief steward on the passenger boat between New York and New Haven; later, he worked as a small merchant in Springfield; and finally, he retired to spend his days in New Bedford. He always held his head high, did not tolerate insults, and made few friends. He was not just a "Negro"; he was a man! Yet, the pressure from society was too strong even for him. Back then, just like now, a Black man had either Black friends or none at all, lived in a Black world or lived in isolation. A few strong, honorable Black men earned the respect of this quiet, bitter man in New York and New Haven. Even if he didn’t fully agree with their social circles, he stood with them in the fight against discrimination. So, when the white Episcopalians of Trinity Parish in New Haven made it clear they didn’t want Black people as fellow Christians anymore, he led the movement that established St. Luke's Parish and served for many years as its senior warden. He is buried in Grove Street Cemetery, alongside Jehudi Ashmun.

Beneath his stern exterior was a very human man. Secretly, he wrote poetry—forced, desperate pieces from a lost soul. He loved women in his commanding way, marrying three beautiful wives one after the other, holding onto each with a kind of desperate, if unfeeling, affection. As a father, he was, of course, a failure—hard, controlling, inflexible. His four children reacted in typical ways: one remained a thin spinster until well past middle age, the spitting image of her father; one died; one entered the white world, and her children are now white, completely unaware of their Black heritage; the fourth, my father, bent under grandfather’s pressure but did not break—maybe it would have been better if he had. He submitted and then rebelled, asked for forgiveness and forgot why, became the harshly loved favorite, who ran away, went wild, roamed, loved, and married my brown mother.

So, with certain circumstances finally leading to my birth, with a mix of Black heritage, a bit of French, a touch of Dutch, but, thank God! no "Anglo-Saxon," I arrive at my childhood days.

They were really happy. We moved back to Grandfather Burghardt's home early on—I can barely remember its stone fireplace, big kitchen, and lovely woodshed. Then this house went to other branches of the family, and we moved to rented places in town—one charming spot "upstairs," with a big yard full of shrubs and a stream; another house next to a railroad, with endless distractions and amazing playmates; and finally back to the quiet street where I was born—down a long lane into a simple, cozy cottage, with a living room, a small sitting room, a pantry, and two attic bedrooms. Here, my mother and I lived until she passed away in 1884, because my father started his restless wanderings early on. I last remember urgent letters asking us to come to New Milford, where he had opened a barber shop. Later, he became a preacher. But my mother no longer believed in his dreams, and he soon disappeared from our lives into silence.

From the age of five until I was sixteen, I attended a school located on the same grounds—down a path, into a spacious yard, with a large choke-cherry tree and two buildings, one made of wood and the other of brick. This is where I got to know my world, and I quickly developed my own standards of judgment.

Wealth didn’t hold any special attraction. However, the presence of wealth surrounded us. The river where I was born looked golden because of the wool and paper waste that contaminated it. The gold belonged to them, not us; but the shine and shimmer were for everyone. To me, it all made sense, and I accepted it without complaint. I genuinely looked down on the poor Irish and South Germans who worked in the mills, and I naturally identified with the rich and well-off as my true companions. This is the nature of the snobbish!

Most of the people in our town were, of course, the well-off, moving down the social ladder, but rarely falling into poverty. As a playmate to the kids, I saw the homes of nearly everyone, except for a few immigrant New Yorkers that none of us liked. The houses I visited made an impression on me, but they didn’t blow me away. Many were larger than mine, with newer and fancier things, but they didn't feel any different in essence. I think I surprised my hosts more than they surprised me, as I felt completely at home and truly happy, while they probably saw me as just an ordinary person, even though my brown skin and curly hair must have seemed unusual to them.

Yet I was definitely one of them. I was a central figure and sometimes the leader of the group of boys in town. We were loud, but we weren't really that bad—and, looking back, my mother's calming influence played a big role in that. She didn't try to make me flawless. To her, I was already flawless. She just warned me about a few things, especially bars. In my town, the bar was the gateway to trouble. The best families had their alcoholics, and the worst families had little else.

Very gradually—I can't pinpoint the exact moments, although I remember a few sudden shifts here and there—I began to accept that I was different from other kids. At first, I thought my difference was tied to my ability to grasp lessons better than most and to recite them with a certain carefree, almost mocking ease that earned me some disapproving looks. Then, slowly, I realized that some people, a few, even several, actually viewed my brown skin as a liability; there were times when I was painfully aware that some individuals even considered it a crime. I wasn’t discouraged for a moment—though, of course, there were days filled with secret tears—instead, I was motivated to work even harder. If they beat me at anything, I was determined to make them work for it! I remember once challenging a big, tough farmer boy to a fight, knowing he could beat me; and he did. But from then on, he was polite.

As time went on, I didn’t feel so much disowned and rejected as I did lifted into a higher realm and made part of a greater mission. Sometimes I almost felt sorry for my pale companions, who were not chosen by the Lord and who didn’t see in their dreams any glorious adventures for golden treasures.

Even with girls, my unusual fantasies came through. Of course, in our town, it was considered uncool for boys aged twelve and fourteen to show any obvious interest in girls. We put up with them with a sense of superiority, and occasionally they joined our games, where I participated just as effortlessly as everyone else. It was only when strangers visited, or during the summer when boarders arrived, or when the older girls matured that I picked up on the small hesitations in public and the subtle concerns about what others might think. That’s when I felt a surge of defiance! I lifted my chin and headed off to the mountains, where I looked out over the world below and strained to see beyond the shadows of the hills.

I graduated from high school at sixteen, and I spoke about "Wendell Phillips." This was my first taste of the world's applause. There were flowers and smiling faces, music and marching, and there was my mother's smile. She was lame then, a bit weary, but very happy. It was her big day, and later that year she peacefully passed away. I felt a certain joy to see her finally at rest, as she had worried all her life. I didn't fully grasp my own loss at that moment; that realization came in the following years. Now it was a mix of overwhelming joy and the solemn feeling of wings! Finally, I was stepping beyond the hills and into the world that eagerly awaited me.

There was a little pause—a strange pause. I got the sense that I was almost too young for the world. Harvard was my dream destination, but my white friends hesitated and my Black friends stayed quiet. Harvard was a powerful word in that small town, and even the sons of the mill owners aimed lower. Eventually, it was tactfully explained that my place was in the South with my people. A scholarship at Fisk had already been arranged, and my summer earnings would cover the travel costs. My relatives complained, but after a moment, I felt a weird joy! I forgot, or didn’t fully realize, the odd irony that I wasn’t seen as a real citizen of my hometown, with a future and a career, but was instead being sent to a distant place among strangers who were considered (and really were) “my own people.”

Ah! the excitement of that journey, with a hint of adventure, as I stepped into the land of slaves; the unforgettable experience of that first dinner at Fisk with the "colored" community and sitting across from two of the most beautiful people God ever showed to the eyes of a seventeen-year-old. I immediately lost my appetite, but I was incredibly happy!

As I look back over the years, even if not perfectly clear, but through the growing fog of desire and reflection, I see my life split into four distinct phases: the Age of Miracles, the Days of Disillusion, the Discipline of Work and Play, and the Second Miracle Age.

The Age of Miracles started with Fisk and ended with Germany. I was filled with the joy of being alive. I felt unstoppable. I was the captain of my soul and the master of my destiny! I wanted to act! It happened. I wished! The wish was fulfilled.

Now and then, from the emptiness, the big sword of hate would flash to remind me of the fight. I remember once, in Nashville, accidentally bumping into a white woman on the street. Polite and eager, I tipped my hat to apologize. That was thirty-five years ago. Since then, I have never consciously tipped my hat to a Southern white woman.

I think that behind all my apparent successes, there were many failures and disappointments, but the realities were so overwhelming that they erased even the memory of other dreams and desires. Just take a moment to consider how incredible it all was for a seventeen-year-old who had just escaped a narrow valley: I wished, and suddenly my people came dancing around me—vibrant in color, joyous in laughter, filled with sympathy, need, and longing; darkly beautiful girls—"colored" girls—sat next to me and actually talked to me while I sat there speechless or chatted about my grand dreams. Boys with my own experiences and from my own world, who understood me, worked alongside me to come up with meaningful solutions. I eagerly studied under teachers who offered subtle support, sensing some part of the Veil and gently lifting it so we darker souls could glimpse other worlds.

I willed it, and suddenly, I was walking under the elms of Harvard—the name that captivated me, the college of my wildest dreams! I needed money; scholarships and prizes came my way—not everything I wanted or worked for, but all I needed to stay in school. Commencement arrived, and standing in front of the governor, president, and serious, gowned men, I shared some astonishing truths, waving my arms and breathing quickly! They cheered with what now seems like unnecessary enthusiasm, but back then! I walked home on a cloud of glory! I applied for a fellowship and got it. I announced my plan to study in Germany, but Harvard had no more fellowships available for me. However, a friend told me about the Slater Fund and how the Board was looking for promising Black men to educate. I didn’t hesitate at all. I jumped at the opportunity.

The trustees of the Slater Fund politely excused themselves. They admitted that they had previously sought out talented Black boys to educate, but after failing to find any, they had stopped their search. I went at them hard! I hit them with testimonials and mid-year and final grades. I made it clear, boldly, that they were just "stalling"! Despite the chairman, Ex-President Hayes, trying to explain and justify their position, I accepted no excuses and dismissed their explanations. I now wonder why he didn’t just dismiss me as a conceited meddler, but instead, he smiled and gave in.

I crossed the ocean in a daze. I kept thinking, "This can't be real; I must be dreaming!" I can relive it all—the little Dutch ship—the blue waters—the smell of fresh-cut hay—Holland and the Rhine. I saw the Wartburg and Berlin; I traveled through the Harz region and climbed the Brocken; I visited the Hanseatic towns and the cities and villages of South Germany; I admired the Alps in Bern, the Cathedral in Milan, Florence, Rome, Venice, Vienna, and Pest; I looked at the borders of Russia; and I sat in Paris and London.

On the mountains and in the valleys, at home and in school, I encountered men and women like I never had before. Gradually, they transformed from just white people to simply folks. The connection that underlies all life struck me. I didn’t feel any less passionately Black, but being "Black" took on a larger, more inclusive meaning of humanity and global friendship. I sensed that I was standing not against the world, but against the limitations of American narrow-mindedness and racial bias, with the wider, more enlightened world behind me encouraging me forward.

I built great castles in Spain and lived in them. I dreamed and loved and wandered and sang; then, after two long years, I suddenly fell back into "black"-hating America!

My days of disillusionment weren’t disappointing enough to bring me down. I was still supported by a deep faith, even though I could faintly see the shadow of disaster looming around me. I started to realize how much of what I had called Will and Ability was just plain Luck! What if my good mother had chosen to rely on a steady income from my childhood labor instead of risking it on the uncertain payoff of my higher education? What if that pompous old village judge, whose dignity we often disturbed and whose apples we stole, had gotten his way and sent me off to a "reform" school to learn a "trade" as a child? What if Principal Hosmer had lacked faith in "darkies" and, instead of teaching me Greek and Latin, had taught me carpentry and how to make tin pans? What if I had missed out on a Harvard scholarship? What if the Slater Board had, just like now, clear ideas about where the education of Black people should end? What if and what if! As I sat down calmly on solid ground and reflected on my life, a deep fear took hold of me. Was I the strong leader or just a pawn of mischievous spirits? Who was I to challenge a world filled with color prejudice? I give myself credit for not hesitating or wavering despite these thoughts; I just stubbornly got to work, and that is where I found whatever salvation I’ve achieved.

First came the challenge of making a living. I wasn't picky or difficult to satisfy. I simply got on my knees and asked for work, anything and anywhere. I reached out to Hampton, Tuskegee, and a dozen other places. They politely turned me down, expressing their regrets. The trustees of a rural Tennessee town thought about hiring me but ultimately got cold feet. Then, out of the blue, Wilberforce offered me a job teaching Latin and Greek for $750 a year. I was thrilled!

I didn’t know much about Latin and Greek, but I was familiar with Wilberforce. The influence of that great name reached down to southern Ohio, where Southerners had found relief at Tawawa Springs and where white Methodists had established a school; then came the small bishop, Daniel Payne, who turned it into a school for the African Methodists. This was the school that attracted me, and when I received reconsidered offers from Tuskegee and Jefferson City, I turned them down; I was really grateful for that initial offer.

I went to Wilberforce with big dreams. I wanted to help create an amazing university. I was ready to work day and night. I taught Latin, Greek, English, and German. I helped with discipline, got involved in social activities, asked to give lectures on sociology, and started writing books. But I found myself hitting a brick wall. Nothing moved despite my constant efforts! And if it did move, it quickly fell back asleep.

Of course, I was too impatient! The challenges of many years couldn't be solved in just a few days. I jumped right into trying to fix the problem before I realized it. Wilberforce was a church-based school for African Americans. There, I faced issues like underprepared students, an inadequate facility, the complex politics of church leadership, and the traditional views of a small town. This was my first real experience in a Black community, and it left me feeling both incredibly inspired and deeply disheartened. I felt inspired by the children—hadn't I interacted with kids from around the world, and didn't I see the same eagerness, the same joy for life, the same intelligence here as I did in New England, France, and Germany? But then, there were the constraints, the myths, the obstacles; the overwhelming pressure from the outside world pushing us down; the harsh realities of this internal world—its struggles and setbacks—its pettiness and small-mindedness—its grief and tragedy—its absurdity!

In all this, I felt completely trapped. No matter how much I struggled, worked, or fought, it seemed like I was getting nowhere and achieving nothing. I had all the youthful impatience, but no experience with the messy complexities of life. For the first time, it hit me that there were limits to my determination. The time of miracles was over, and a long, challenging path of hard work stretched out before me.

I had, of course, my victories here and there. I challenged the bishops in the issue of public extemporaneous prayer, and they gave in. I confronted the poor, pressured president in his office, and still got re-elected to my position. I was slowly making progress, but quickly losing faith in the worth of the progress I was making. Was this really where I should start my life's work? Was this the job I was meant to do? What business did I have teaching Greek when I had studied people? I became convinced I had made a mistake. So, I decided to leave Wilberforce and look for opportunities elsewhere. Thus, the third phase of my life began.

First, in 1896, I got married—a young girl, beautifully dark-eyed and as dedicated and good as a German housewife. Then I took a job to study Black people in Philadelphia for the University of Pennsylvania—one year at six hundred dollars. How did I have the courage to do these two things? I don't know. Yet they felt like my salvation. Staying at Wilberforce without pursuing my ideals would have meant spiritual death. Both my wife and I were without a home. I dared to seek a home and a temporary job. But it was a different kind of courage than in my younger days. I was ready to accept that even the best of men could fail. I still intended to be the captain of my soul, but I understood that even captains aren’t all-powerful in uncharted and stormy seas.

I did a thorough piece of work in Philadelphia. I worked morning, noon, and night. Nobody really reads that thick book on "The Philadelphia Negro," but people treat it with respect, and that makes me feel better. The Black community in Philadelphia didn't welcome me with open arms. They were naturally resistant to being studied like an odd species. I encountered those complex social dynamics and inner struggles within my own community again and in different forms. They made me reflect deeply. I realized I didn’t know as much about my own people as I thought I did, and when President Bumstead invited me to Atlanta University the following year to teach sociology and study the African American community, I gladly accepted, with a salary of twelve hundred dollars.

My real work happened in Atlanta for thirteen years, from my twenty-ninth to my forty-second birthday. Those were years of significant personal growth, of building and breaking ideals, of hard work and play. This is where I truly found myself. I lost most of my quirks. I became more broadly human, formed my closest and most meaningful friendships, and studied people deeply. I became well-acquainted with the actual situation of my community. I realized the overwhelming challenges they faced. At Wilberforce, I was their critical observer. In Philadelphia, I was their detached and scientific investigator, using tools to examine closely. It only took a few years in Atlanta to push me into a passionate and protective stance. I witnessed the racism of white people in a way I had never imagined before—raw and unapologetic! The slight discrimination that had once seemed significant to me faded into nothing before this massive, brutal force of oppression. Each day, I found it harder to hold back my growing anger against injustice and misrepresentation.

With all of this came a stronger and tougher version of myself. The waves of birth, love, and death washed over me. I experienced life in all its contradictions, filled with tears and wild joy. I stepped into full manhood, surrounded by the remnants of some ideals but with others reaching for the stars; marked and a little stern, but holding onto the precious gift of laughter and resolved, even stubbornly, to keep fighting the good fight.

At last, no matter how much I hesitated and held back, I had to confront the major Decision. The final and most important door of my life stood slightly open. After all my dreaming, studying, and teaching, what was I going to do in this intense struggle? Despite all my youthful arrogance and boldness, I discovered beneath it a reluctance and a new fear of being too forward, which came from critical self-reflection and high standards of effectiveness; but against my hope for unity among my race and despite my strong desire to support, follow, and think rather than to lead, inspire, and make decisions, I found myself unexpectedly in the role of leader for a significant group of people battling against another, larger group.

Nor could anything I did prevent this fight from becoming personal. Believe me, I tried. That first gathering of a group of passionate supporters at Niagara Falls was filled with genuine selflessness. By the second meeting at Harper's Ferry, it felt like a serious crusade, but to the indifferent, harsh judgment of the world, it just appeared to be the baseless envy of fools against a remarkable man, Booker Washington.

Of the movement, I was the reluctant leader. I hated that role. For the first time, I faced criticism and actually cared about it. Every ideal and habit of my life was harshly misinterpreted. I, who had always tried hard to appreciate good work and who had never intentionally given in to envy, was accused by honest Black people of being small-minded and jealous, while white people claimed I was ashamed of my race and wanted to be white! And this was said about me, whose one true passion had always been my belief in my Black heritage!

Way back in my childhood, I sold the Springfield Republican and wrote for Mr. Fortune's Globe. I dreamed of becoming an editor someday. Now, I am an editor. During my vibrant college years, I envisioned a strong organization to fight for the rights of the Black community. The National Association for the Advancement of Colored People is that organization, and it continues to grow. In the tough times at Wilberforce, I imagined a future where I could speak freely to my people and about them, bridging two worlds. I'm doing that now. In my study in Atlanta, I started to worry that my radical beliefs might harm the college , leading either to my silence or the institution's downfall. Powers and authorities haven't silenced me yet, and Atlanta is still thriving.

It all began—this new Age of Miracles—because a few people in 1909 decided to properly celebrate Lincoln's Birthday by demanding the complete emancipation of African Americans. I answered their call. My salary for a year wasn't guaranteed, but it was the "Voice without reply." The outcome has been the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People, The Crisis, and this book, which I'm finishing on my Fiftieth Birthday.

Last year I faced death and found its features not unkind. But it wasn't my time yet. However, in nature, sometime soon and when my days are full, I will die, quietly, I hope, with my face turned toward the South and East; whether dreaming or without dreams, I’m sure I will enjoy death as much as I have enjoyed life.

O Silent God, You whose voice from far away in mist and mystery has left us yearning in these scary times—

Listen to us, good Lord!

Listen to us, Your children: our faces clouded with doubt are ridiculed in Your Sanctuary. With our hands raised, we face Your Heaven, O God, crying:

Please listen to us, Lord!

We are no better than anyone else, Lord; we are just weak and flawed human beings. When our demons cause trouble, curse the doer and the action—curse them as we curse them, do to them everything and more than they have done to innocence and vulnerability, to womanhood and home.

Have mercy on us, miserable sinners!

And yet, whose guilt runs deeper? Who created these demons? Who raised them in crime and fed them with injustice? Who violated and corrupted their mothers and grandmothers? Who profited from their crimes and grew fat and wealthy off public wrongdoing?

You know, good God!

Is this Your justice, Father, that deceit is easier than purity and that the innocent are punished for the sins of those who have not been touched by guilt?

Justice, O Judge of people!

Why do we pray? Is the God of our ancestors not dead? Have not seers witnessed Your cold and lifeless body stark against the dark and swirling smoke of sin, where the bitter shapes of countless dead constantly bow?

Awake, you who sleep!

You are not dead, but flown far away, up hills of endless light, through blazing corridors of suns, where worlds are filled with good and gentle men, with strong and free women—far from the deception, black hypocrisy, and false purity of this shameful speck of dust!

Come back, Lord; please don’t let us be lost in our sin!

From the desire for the body and the desire for the blood,—

OMG, save us!

From a desire for power and a desire for wealth,—

Oh my God, save us!

From the combined deceit of tyrants and savages,—

Oh my God, save us!

A city was in turmoil, God our Lord, and from its depths emerged twin Murder and Black Hate. The night was stained red; the sounds of death and rage echoed through the air and shook beneath the stars where church steeples silently pointed to You. And all of this was to satisfy the greed of greedy men who hide behind the mask of revenge!

Hear us, Lord!

In the pale, quiet morning, we looked at what we had done. We covered our ears and held our restless hands, but they—didn’t they shake their heads and sneer and shout with bloody mouths: Stop the crime! The phrase was a joke, because they train a hundred crimes while we fix just one.

Bring us back, Lord!

Look at this injured and broken being, dear God; it was a humble Black man who worked hard and sweated to save a little from the meager pay he received. They told him: Work and Rise! He worked. Did this man do something wrong? No, but someone said that someone else did—someone he had never seen or met. Yet because of that man's wrongdoing, this man lies injured and dead, his wife exposed to shame, and his children facing poverty and hardship.

Listen to us, heavenly Father!

Doesn't this justice of hell stink in Your nostrils, God? How long will the rising tide of innocent blood scream in Your ears and beat in our hearts for revenge? Pile the pale frenzy of blood-crazed beasts who commit such acts high on Your Altar, Jehovah Jireh, and burn it in hell forever and ever!

Forgive us, good Lord; we’re not sure what we’re saying!

Bewildered we are and filled with passion, driven crazy by the chaos of a crowded and ridiculed and slaughtered people; straining at the supports of Your throne, we raise our bound hands and challenge You, God, by the bones of our stolen fathers, by the tears of our dead mothers, by the very blood of Your crucified Christ: What does this mean? Tell us the plan; give us the sign!

Speak up, God!

Sit no longer blind, Lord God, deaf to our prayers and unresponsive to our silent suffering. Surely You, too, are not just a pale, bloodless, heartless being, O Lord!

Oh! Christ of all mercy!

Forgive the thought! Forgive these wild, blasphemous words! You are still the God of our ancestors, and in the depths of your being lie some gentle dark hues of the evening, some shadows of the velvet night.

But whisper—speak—call, great God, for Your silence is white terror to our hearts! The way, O God, show us the way and point us the path!

Whither? North is greed and South is blood; inside, the coward, and outside, the liar. Whither? To death?

Amen! Welcome, deep sleep!

Whither? To life? But not this life, dear God, not this. Let the cup pass from us, tempt us not beyond our strength, for there is that clamoring and clawing within, to whose voice we would not listen, yet shudder lest we must,—and it is red. Ah! God! It is a red and awful shape.

Pause!

In the distant East, a star flickers.

Vengeance is Mine; I will handle it, says the Lord!

Your will, O Lord, be done!

Kyrie, have mercy!

Lord, we have spoken these desperate, uncertain words.

We ask You to hear us, good Lord!

We lower our heads and listen quietly to the crying of women and young children.

We ask You to hear us, good Lord!

Our voices fade into silence and darkness.

Listen to us, good Lord!

In the night, O God of a land without God!

Agreed!

In silence, oh Silent God.

Pause!

High in the tower, where I sit above the loud complaints of the sea of humanity, I know many souls that swirl and pass by, but none intrigue me more than the Souls of White Folk.

I have a unique insight into them. I can see into and through them. I look at them from different perspectives. I don’t come as an outsider because I’m part of them—I share their thoughts and speak their language. My understanding isn’t like that of a traveler or a colonial with fond memories, words, and amazement. It’s not the way servants perceive their masters, or how classes see one another, or how a capitalist views a worker. Instead, I see these people stripped bare, from behind and the side. I understand their inner workings. I know their thoughts, and they know that I know. This awareness makes them feel embarrassed one moment and angry the next. They deny me the right to exist and call me an unwanted child! To them, my words are just bitterness, and my soul is filled with pessimism. Yet, as they preach, show off, shout, and threaten, hunched over while clutching at bits of truth and fantasies to cover their vulnerability, they rush by my weary gaze, and I see them forever exposed—ugly, human.

The realization of personal whiteness among people around the world is a pretty recent development—specifically a 19th and 20th-century issue. In ancient times, such a distinction would have seemed ridiculous. During the Middle Ages, skin color was met with mild curiosity; even up to the 18th century, we were trying to shape our national identities into a single, great, Universal Man, passionately overlooking color and race as much as social class. Today, everything has shifted, and the world has suddenly and emotionally discovered that it is white, and because of that, it feels superior!

This idea that out of all the colors of God, only whiteness is inherently and obviously better than brownness or tan leads to strange behaviors; even the kind-hearted people in power, when they talk to me about the weather, good fortune, and struggles, are always adding an underlying melody and tone to their actual words, saying:

"My poor, not-white friend! Don't cry or get angry. I understand that the weight of God’s curse is heavy on you. Why? That's not for me to say, but stay strong! Do your work in your humble place, praying to the good Lord that one day you may be reborn in heaven above, where there is only love—white!"

I don't laugh. I ask seriously, without a smile:

"But what on earth is whiteness that one should want it so badly?" Then always, somehow, some way, silently but clearly, I come to understand that whiteness is the ownership of the earth forever and ever, Amen!

Now, what happens to a person or a nation when it passionately starts to believe something as extraordinary as this? It’s obvious that nations are embracing this belief more every day. Wave after wave, each more intense than the last, is crashing this new ideology of whiteness onto the shores of our time. At first, the effects are amusing: the swagger of the Southerner, the arrogance of the reckless Englishman, the shout of the troublemaker who leads your crowd. Next, it seems to stifle the generous enthusiasm for what we once thought was great; freeing a slave is found to be acceptable only if it also frees his master! Are we noticing sleepy struggles in black Africa, angry complaints in India, or triumphant cheers in Japan? "To your tents, O Israel!" These nations are not white!

After the more humorous moments and the cooling of generous excitement come subtler, darker actions. All things considered, the claim that White people hold the title to the universe is flawed. It should, at the very least, seem believable. It's so easy, through emphasis and omission, to make kids believe that every great soul the world has ever known was a white person's soul; that every great thought the world has ever come across was a white person's thought; that every great deed the world has ever accomplished was a white person's deed; that every great dream the world has ever sung was a white person's dream. In other words, that if we were to remove everything from the world that couldn't fairly be attributed to White people, the world would, if anything, become even greater, truer, and better than it is now. And if all of this is a lie, isn't it a lie for a significant cause?

Here it is that the comedy turns into tragedy. The first minor note is struck, all unknowingly, by those decent people who, because of their noble upbringing, feel a strong desire to share their privilege with others—the obligation of the noble to those of lower status. This sense of duty assumes two things: a true connection to that heritage and a genuine appreciation for it by those who are less fortunate. As long as humble black individuals, overflowing with gratitude, receive barrels of old clothes from kind-hearted and generous white people, there is much mental peace and moral satisfaction. But when the black man starts to challenge the white man's claims to certain supposed inheritances from the founding fathers in terms of pay and status, authority and education; and when his response to charity is sullen anger instead of humble cheerfulness; when he insists on his right to act boldly and be reckless,—then the illusion is suddenly shattered and the philanthropist is quick to think that black people are disrespectful, that the South is justified, and that Japan wants to go to war with America.

After this, the descent into Hell is easy. On the pale, white faces that the huge waves toss upward to my tower, I repeatedly see, over and over, a manifestation of human hatred, a deep and passionate hatred, immense in its vague expressions. Down through the green waters, at the bottom of the world, where people move around, I’ve seen a man—an educated gentleman—turn pale with anger because a quiet, black woman was sitting alone in a Pullman car. He was white. I’ve seen a grown man curse a little child who wandered into the wrong waiting room looking for its mother: "Hey, you damn black—" He was white. In Central Park, I’ve witnessed the upper lip of a calm, peaceful man twist back in an angry snarl because black people drove by in a car. He was a white man. We’ve seen, you and I, city after city drunk and furious with uncontrollable bloodlust; mad with murder, destroying, killing, and cursing; torturing human victims because someone accused of a crime happened to share the same skin color as the mob's innocent victims, and that color wasn’t white! We’ve seen—Merciful God! in these chaotic times and in the name of Civilization, Justice, and Motherhood—what haven’t we seen, right here in America, of orgy, cruelty, barbarism, and murder committed against men and women of Negro descent.

Up through the foam of green and churning waters rises this immense mass of hatred, in wilder, fiercer violence, until I look down and realize that today, for the millions of my people, no misfortune—be it death, disease, failure, or defeat—could occur that wouldn't make the hearts of millions of their fellow humans beat with intense, vengeful joy! Do you doubt it? Ask your own conscience what it would say if the next census reported that half of black America was dead and the other half was dying.

Unfortunate? Yes, unfortunate. But what exactly is the misfortune? Is it mine? Am I, in my darkness, the only one who suffers? I feel pain. And yet, somehow, beyond the suffering, beyond the trapped anger that pounds against the bars, beyond the hurt that crazes, a deep pity rises within me—pity for a people who are imprisoned and captivated, held back and made miserable for such a cause, for such a fantasy!

Conceive of this country, among all people, on a mission to make the "World Safe for Democracy"! Can you picture the United States condemning Turkish atrocities in Armenia while the Turks remain quiet about the violence in Chicago and St. Louis? What is Louvain compared to Memphis, Waco, Washington, Dyersburg, and Estill Springs? In short, what is the Black man but America's Belgium, and how can America criticize Germany for actions that it carries out, just as brutally, within its own borders?

A genuine and valuable ideal liberates and elevates a society; a false ideal traps and diminishes it. Tell people, sincerely and often: "Honesty is the best policy, knowledge is power; treat others the way you want to be treated." Share this message and live by it, and the nation will progress in that direction, if not directly reach it. But if you tell a people: "The only virtue is to be white," they'll quickly come to the tragic conclusion, "Eliminate the 'black'!"

Isn't this the reality of present-day America? Isn't this its reckless progress? Are we not increasingly, day by day, coming to see the statement "I am white" as the one fundamental principle of our practical morality? Only when this basic, unwavering rule is at stake do we defend what’s right with national urgency and decisiveness. Murder can swagger, theft can reign, and prostitution can flourish, yet the nation reacts with only sporadic, half-hearted attention. But let the murderer be black, the thief brown, or the perpetrator of sexual violence have any African ancestry, and the wave of righteous indignation sweeps across the country. And this fact wouldn't make the anger any less justifiable if we didn't all know that it is blackness that is condemned and not the crime itself.

In the terrible disaster of World War, when the white world briefly paused from beating, slandering, and murdering us to turn on each other, we, the Darker Peoples, watched in mild amazement.

Among some of us, I have no doubt that this sudden plunge of Europe into chaos brought immense surprise; to others, across a wide area, it brought the satisfaction of those who have been deeply wounded; but I think the majority of us watched quietly and sadly, in serious contemplation, recognizing the prophecy of our own souls.

Here is a civilization that has bragged a lot. Neither Roman nor Arab, Greek nor Egyptian, Persian nor Mongol ever took himself and his own perfection as seriously as the modern white man does. We, whose shame, humiliation, and deep insult his boasting often caused, were never fooled. We looked at him openly, with ancient eyes, and saw simply a human being, weak and pitiful and cruel, just like we are and were.

These supermen and world-conquering demigods didn’t pay attention to our lowly words, even when we silently pointed out their vulnerabilities. Maybe we, as simpler and more primitive people, have been the most affected in the chaos of recent years by the complete failure of white religion. We’ve scoffed in something like contempt as we've observed smooth apologies and tired explanations. None of that fooled us. A nation's religion is its essence, and in that regard, white Christianity is a dismal failure.

Nor would we be unfair in this criticism: We know that we, too, have failed, just like you, and have turned down many Buddhas, just as you have denied Christ; but we acknowledge our human weaknesses, while you, claiming to be above humanity, endlessly mock our shortcomings.

The number of white people who are genuinely practicing the kindness and selflessness of Jesus Christ is so small and insignificant that it could easily be a topic for jokes in Sunday supplements and in publications like Punch, Life, Le Rire, and Fliegende Blätter. In her foreign mission efforts, the incredible self-deception of white religion is highlighted: earnestly, the white world sends five million dollars worth of missionary work to Africa each year, while in the same year it pours an additional twenty-five million dollars into the production of the worst kind of gin. Peace to the augurs of Rome!

We can agree without debate that religious ideals have always surpassed their very human followers. So, let’s shift our focus to more practical matters of honor and fairness. Today's world revolves around trade. The world has become a marketplace; history has become economic history; living now means making a living. Is it really necessary to ask how much genuine bravery and honorable behavior can be found in this? Certainly, there’s some. The creation of global credit systems is based on a strong, achievable belief in our fellow humans. But in the end, it’s such a basic and simple step that at times it feels more like honor among thieves, as the revelations of fraud and deception in the business world and its major modern centers have sparked a loud call for a revolution in our fundamental methods and ideas about industry and commerce.

We don’t, for a second, forget the robberies of the past from different times and cultures when trade was always a risky bet; but wasn’t there a certain honesty and openness in the wrongdoing that suggested a healthier sense of morality? There are more merchants today, more reliable deliveries, and greater overall prosperity, but isn’t there also a rise in bigger thieves, deeper injustices, and more hardened selfishness within that prosperity? Regardless of that, the finer sense of honor that has occasionally emerged among progressive groups of people has been strangely and significantly dulled. Take our primary industry—war. The Middle Ages painstakingly crafted rules of fairness—equal weapons, equal notice, equal conditions. What do we see today? Machine guns against spears; conquests wrapped in the guise of religion; mutilation and rape disguised as culture—all celebrated with great enthusiasm for the supposed superiority of white soldiers over black ones!

War is terrible! The grim reality is clear, and the world knows it all too well. But has it only become terrible recently, now that white men are fighting other white men under similar conditions, with equal weapons and the same waste of resources, while surgeons and nurses stand by?

Think about the wars we've experienced in the last ten years: in German Africa, British Nigeria, French and Spanish Morocco, China, Persia, the Balkans, Tripoli, Mexico, and several other places—weren't those terrible as well? Keep in mind, there were no Red Cross funds for most of these wars.

Look at little Belgium and her sad situation, but has the world really forgotten Congo? What Belgium is going through now is nothing compared to what she has inflicted on black Congo since Stanley's grand dream of 1880. Through the dark forests of deepest Africa traveled this modern Sir Galahad, in the name of "the noble-minded men of several nations," to bring commerce and civilization. What was the result? "Rubber and murder, slavery in its worst form," wrote Glave in 1895.

Harris states that King Leopold's regime caused the death of twelve million natives, "but what we who were behind the scenes felt most acutely was the reality that the true disaster in the Congo was widespread destruction and killing in a broader sense. The invasion of family life, the ruthless tearing down of every social boundary, the breaking apart of every tribal law, the introduction of criminal behaviors that left the chiefs of the people in shock—in short, a genuine avalanche of filth and immorality flooded the Congo tribes."

Yet the fields of Belgium were vibrant, the cities were cheerful, and art and science thrived; the suffering that contributed to this civilization went unnoticed because the world around was doing the same kind of thing elsewhere on its own.

As we saw the dead faintly through gaps in the battle smoke and heard the distant curses and accusations of comrades, we darker-skinned men said: This is not Europe losing its mind; this is not a departure from sanity; this is Europe; this apparent horror is the true essence of white culture—beneath all culture,—laid bare and visible today. This is where the world has ended up,—in these dark and terrifying depths, not in the shining and transcendent heights it bragged about. Here is where the strength and energy of modern humanity have truly gone.

But can't the world respond and ask: "What better thing do you have to show? What have you done or would do better than this if you had the world's influence today? Painting with all the chaotic, hateful colors the fragile facade of European culture— is it not better than any culture that developed in Africa or Asia?"

It is. There’s no doubt about that, and there never has been; but why is it better? Is it better because Europeans are better, nobler, greater, and more gifted than others? It’s not. Europe has never produced and will never produce a single human being who can’t be matched or surpassed in every area of human achievement by Asia and Africa. If you want to, run the numbers, and show me the Europeans who, honestly, surpass Nefertari, Mohammed, Rameses and Askia, Confucius, Buddha, and Jesus Christ. If we could compare the thousands of lesser figures in the same way, the outcome would be the same; but we can’t do this because of the willfully cultivated ignorance in white schools, which choose to remember Napoleon and forget Sonni Ali.

The greatness of Europe has come from the vast stage on which it has performed, the solid foundations it has built upon, and a natural human capability that is no greater (or perhaps just as great) as that of other times and cultures. In other words, the true reasons for the success of European civilization are rooted outside of Europe—back in the shared struggles of all humanity.

Why is Europe considered great? Because of the strong foundations that its powerful past has provided: the iron trade of ancient, dark Africa, the religion and empire-building of yellow Asia, and the art and science from the diverse Mediterranean shores—east, south, west, and north. Where she has built securely on this great past and learned from it, she has moved forward to greater and more magnificent human achievements. But where she has ignored, forgotten, and mocked this past, she has revealed the ugly side of suffering humanity—she has acted like the foolish empires that have come before her!

If European achievements in culture have been greater, then so too may her failures have been greater. What kind of failure and in what ways does the World War represent? Was it national jealousy like that of the seventeenth century? But Europe has done more to break down national barriers than any previous culture. Was it fear of the balance of power in Europe? Not really, except in the complex issues of the Balkans. So what does Hauptmann mean when he says: "Our jealous enemies forged an iron ring around our chests and we knew our chests had to expand— that we had to break apart this ring or else we had to stop breathing. But Germany will not stop breathing and so it happened that the iron ring was forced apart."

Where is this expansion headed? What is this vital force, deemed essential for a great European nation? Clearly, it’s overseas expansion; it’s colonial growth that explains, and only adequately explains, the World War. How many of us today truly understand the current idea of colonial expansion and the relationship of white Europe to the black, brown, and yellow world? Put simply, that idea is this: It is the responsibility of white Europe to divide up the darker world and manage it for Europe’s benefit.

Europe has largely accomplished this. The Western world is utilizing black and brown individuals for all the roles that people can understand. Gradually, white culture is developing the notion that "darkies" are naturally meant to be the workhorses for white people. It would be foolish to think otherwise, says the so-called cultured society, in increasingly loud agreement. The justifications grow and contort in the voices of merchants, scientists, soldiers, travelers, writers, and missionaries: Darker people are considered limited both in intellect and in physicality; they come from a troubled and inferior lineage; they are seen as weaker and less valuable; they lack courage in the face of modern weaponry; they are thought to be devoid of feelings, dreams, and love; they are labeled as foolish, illogical idiots—"half-devil and half-child."

Such as they are, civilization must, of course, raise them, but in a sober and limited way. They are not just dark white men. They are not "men" in the way Europeans are men. To the very limited extent of their shallow abilities, they can be made useful to whites, to raise cotton, gather rubber, fetch ivory, dig diamonds—and they should be paid what white men think they are worth—white men who see them as almost worthless.

Such degradation of men by other men is as old as humanity itself and isn't unique to any one race or group. Throughout history, men have tried to portray their victims as fundamentally different from themselves—endlessly different in spirit and blood, strength and intelligence, race and ancestry. However, it has been up to Europe and modern times to identify the universal mark of meanness—color!

Such is the silent revolution that has taken hold of modern European culture in the late nineteenth and twentieth centuries. Its peak occurred during the Boxer Rebellion: White supremacy was almost global, Africa was devastated, India was colonized, Japan was isolated, and China was weakened, while white America prepared for conflict with mixed-race Mexico and multiracial South America, all while lynching its own Black citizens. A temporary setback to this agenda was caused by Japan, and the white world immediately recognized the threat posed by such "yellow" confidence! What kind of world would it be if yellow-skinned people were treated like whites? The eventual defeat of Japan quickly became a topic of serious consideration and intrigue, from St. Petersburg to San Francisco, from the Gates of Heaven to the Little Brothers of the Poor.

The use of people for the benefit of those in power isn't a new concept in modern Europe. It's as old as time itself. However, Europe intended to implement it on a scale and with a level of detail that no previous society ever imagined. The vastness of it — the boldness of the idea — is what gives it its modern twist.

The idea of Europe wasn't a sudden creation; it was a solution to longstanding issues. It's clear to today's white civilization that keeping the white working class oppressed can't last much longer. Education, political power, and a deeper understanding of industry will lead to a fairer distribution of wealth soon. The era of extreme wealth is coming to an end for individual white nations. But there's still an opportunity. There's a chance for massive exploitation for outsized profits, not just for the very wealthy, but also for the middle class and workers. This opportunity lies in the exploitation of people of color. That's where the allure of profit exists. There are no labor unions, votes, questioning citizens, or troublesome consciences here. These individuals can be worked to exhaustion and shot or harmed in "punitive" actions if they resist. In these oppressed regions, "industrial development" could amplify every horror from Europe's industrial past, including slavery, violence, disease, and injury, with the only measure of success being profits!

This theory of human culture and its goals has woven itself into our everyday thinking so thoroughly that few people notice. Everything great, good, effective, fair, and honorable is seen as "white"; everything mean, bad, clumsy, cheating, and dishonorable is viewed as "yellow"; bad taste is considered "brown"; and the devil is depicted as "black." Variations of this theme constantly appear in art and stories, newspaper headlines, movies, sermons, and school books, leading to the belief that the King can do no wrong— a White Man is always right, and a Black Man has no rights that a White Man feels obliged to respect.

There must be the necessary despising and hatred of these savage half-men, this unclean canaille of the world—these dogs of men. All around the world, this message is being spread. It has its literature, it has its secret propaganda, and above all—it pays!

There's the catch—it's profitable. Rubber, ivory, and palm oil; tea, coffee, and cocoa; bananas, oranges, and other fruits; cotton, gold, and copper—they, along with countless other items that dark, sweating bodies hand up to the white world from grimy pits, generate wealth, and a lot of it. But out of all that the world gains, the black world only receives the small scraps that the white world tosses to it with contempt.

It's no surprise, then, that in the practical world of reality, there's jealousy and conflict over controlling the labor of millions of oppressed people, the right to exploit the colonies around the world where this wealth can be found—not always freely given, but certainly attainable through violence and oppression. It was this competition for the labor of people of color that led to the World War. Other reasons have been casually mentioned, and there were certainly other contributing factors, but they were secondary to this huge desire for the riches and hard work of the oppressed world.

Colonies, we call them, these places where "blacks" are cheap and the earth is rich; they are those outlands where, like a swarm of hungry locusts, white masters can settle to be served like kings, wield the lash of slave drivers, abuse girls and wives, become as wealthy as Croesus, and send home a stream of gold. They circle the globe, these places, but they are mainly found in the tropics, among its darker-skinned populations: in Hong Kong and Anam, in Borneo and Rhodesia, in Sierra Leone and Nigeria, in Panama and Havana—these are the El Dorados toward which the world powers reach with eager hands.

Germany, finally one and united and secure on land, looked across the seas and saw England with sources of wealth ensuring a luxury and power that Germany could not hope to match by the slower methods of exploiting her own peasants and workers, especially with these workers half in revolt. She immediately built her navy and jumped into a fierce competition for colonies inhabited by darker peoples. She turned to South America, China, Africa, and Asia Minor like a hound straining on the leash—impatient, suspicious, irritable, with bloodshot eyes and dripping fangs, ready for the terrible command. England and France crouched warily over their hard-earned gains, growling and alert, but gnawing industriously, while the blood of the darker world satisfied their greedy appetites. In the background, cut off from the route to the seven seas, sat Russia and Austria, snarling and snapping at each other and at the last Mediterranean gateway to the El Dorado, where the Sick Man struggled with poor health, and where millions of serfs in the Balkans, Russia, and Asia presented a feast for greed almost as great as Africa.

The fateful day arrived. It was inevitable. The reason for war is the readiness for war; and of everything Europe has done over the last century, nothing compares to the energy, thought, and time put into preparing for mass destruction. The main reason for this preparation was conquest, and not in Europe, but primarily among the darker peoples of Asia and Africa; conquest, not for integration and improvement, but for trade and oppression. For this, and mostly this, did Europe prepare itself at a terrible cost for war.

The red day arrived when the spark was ignited in the Balkans, and Austro-Hungary claimed a piece that brought her closer to the world's main route; she took one piece and readied herself for another. Then came that strange chorus of challenges, those rising suspicions, digging into all reasons for distrust, rivalry, and hatred, but saying little about the real and biggest cause.

Each nation felt its deep interests at stake. But how? Not, for sure, in the death of Ferdinand the Warlike; not, for sure, in the old, half-forgotten revanche for Alsace-Lorraine; not even in the neutrality of Belgium. No! But in owning land overseas, in the right to colonies, the opportunity to extract endless tribute from the darker world— from laborers in China, from starving farmers in India, from Black people in Africa, from dying islanders in the South Pacific, from Indigenous people of the Amazon—all this and nothing more.

Even the broken support we had pinned our hopes for lasting peace on—the laborers' union—the forefront of that crucial movement for human rights we had built so much upon, even this was swept away like a straw in the wind of kings and emperors. In fact, the downfall had been hinted at when “international” Socialists in Germany and America nearly excluded people of color from the realm of industrial justice. They had been subtly bribed, but effectively: Were they not privileged whites, and shouldn’t they benefit from the spoils of exploitation? High wages in the United States and England might very well be the skillfully manipulated outcome of slavery in Africa and forced labor in Asia.

With the dog-in-the-manger theory of trade, where there’s an insistence on making excessive profits and exploiting the most vulnerable, a new form of imperialism emerged—the desire for every nation to claim as much of the earth as possible, or at least enough to ensure profits as big as those of rival nations. In places that couldn’t be entirely controlled by one dominant nation, a policy of "open door" was adopted, but this "door" was open only to "white people." When it came to the darkest and weakest populations, Europe shared a single consensus—what Hen Demberg from the German Colonial Office referred to as the agreement with England to uphold white "prestige" in Africa—the belief in the divine right of white people to take what didn’t belong to them.

The world market that everyone desperately wants today is the one where labor is cheapest and most vulnerable, and where profits are highest. This labor remains cheap and vulnerable because white society looks down on “darkies.” If someone has the audacity to suggest that these workers should have the same opportunities as white workers to rise up through voting, self-advocacy, and education, they are quickly dismissed. They can’t do it, and even if they could, they won’t, because they are seen as enemies of the white race, and whites will rule forever and everywhere. This hatred and disdain for the people from whom Europe seeks to extract luxuries have led to such jealousy and conflict between European nations that they have turned against one another and have fought like wild animals. Such is the result of human hatred.

But what about the darker world that observes? Most people belong to this world. Together with Black individuals, East Indians, Chinese, and Japanese, they make up two-thirds of the global population. Believing in humanity means believing in people of color. If the betterment of humanity depends on people, then the future of this world will ultimately be in the hands of darker nations.

What, then, is this dark world thinking? It thinks that, as wild and terrible as this shameful war was, it is nothing compared to the fight for freedom that Black, Brown, and Yellow people must and will wage unless their oppression, humiliation, and insults by the White World come to an end. The Dark World will put up with its current treatment only as long as it has to, and not a moment longer.

Let me repeat this and stress it to avoid any confusion: The World War was mainly a greedy and jealous battle for control over the exploitation of darker races. As such, it is and should be seen as just the beginning of the armed and angry response from these oppressed and violated peoples. Right now, Japan is knocking on the door of justice, China is raising its half-bound hands to knock next, India is struggling for the freedom to knock, Egypt is grumbling quietly, and the Black communities in South and West Africa, the West Indies, and the United States are just starting to wake up to their shameful slavery. So, is this war the end of wars? Can it really be the end as long as there are those who, even while preaching peace, continue to look down on and exploit darker peoples? If Europe holds onto this illusion, then this is not the end of world war—it's just the beginning!

We see Europe's biggest flaw right where we found Africa's and Asia's— in human hatred and the contempt for others. The difference is that Europe has the painful lessons of the past to learn from, along with the amazing outcomes of broader tolerance, empathy, and love among people. It also confronts a much larger, infinitely larger, population than any previous civilization has ever dealt with.

It’s interesting to see the United States viewing itself, first, as a natural peacemaker, and then as a moral hero in this terrible time. No nation is less suited for this role. For two centuries or more, America has proudly led in human hatred

Instead of being a shining example of democracy and the potential for human unity, America has become a terrible example of its shortcomings and failures, especially for Black, brown, and Asian communities. This is despite the fact that there hasn't been a real failure; Native Americans aren't disappearing, Japanese and Chinese populations haven't threatened the country, and the experience of Black suffrage has improved the lives of twelve million individuals at a pace likely unmatched in history. But what does that matter? America, the Land of Democracy, wanted to believe in the failure of democracy when it came to people of color. Without any justification, it established a caste system, rushed into war preparations, and took over tropical colonies. Today, it stands alongside Europe in its worst violations against civilization. It seeks to be among the great nations that determine the fate of "lesser breeds without law," and at times, it feels ashamed of the many "new" white immigrants whom its democracy has elevated to positions of power. While the barriers against Irish, German, Russian Jewish, Slavic, and "dago" immigrants have been ineffective, America takes a firm and unwavering stand against Black people, supported by the new public policy in Europe. It trains its immigrants to look down on "blacks" from the moment they arrive, and they convey that sentiment back to the lower classes in their home countries.

All of this I see and hear from my tower, above the roar of the seven seas. From my narrow windows, I gaze into the night that stretches beneath the cloud-covered stars. To the east and west, storms are erupting—powerful, ugly whirlwinds of hatred, blood, and cruelty. I refuse to accept them as unavoidable. I won’t believe that everything that happened in the past has to happen again today before the sunlight brightens the silver seas.

If I cry out in the middle of this chaos of powerful forces, will my cry be meaningless just because it’s only a cry—a small, human cry in the midst of overwhelming darkness?

Back beyond the world and surrounded by these wild, white faces of the terrifying dead, why will this Soul of White People—this modern Prometheus—remain trapped by his own limitations, held back by a story from the past? I hear his powerful cry echoing through the world, "I am white!" That's fine, O Prometheus, divine thief! Isn't the world big enough for two colors, for many different glimmers of the sun? Then why consume your own insides if I respond just as proudly, "I am black!"

"Semper novi quid ex Africa," shouted the Roman proconsul, echoing the judgment of forty centuries. Yet some people attempt to write world history while ignoring this incredible continent. Today, many believe that Africa is distant from the core of our pressing social issues and especially from our global conflict.

Always Africa is offering us something new or a transformation of something ancient. On its dark surface emerged one of the earliest, if not the earliest, self-sustaining civilizations, which grew so powerful that it still provides outstanding examples for thinkers and speakers. From its deeper and more isolated forests came, if we can believe many recent scientists, the first forging of iron, and we know that agriculture and trade thrived there when Europe was still a wilderness.

Almost every human empire that has emerged in the world, both material and spiritual, has faced some of its biggest crises on the continent of Africa, from Greece to Great Britain. As Mommsen stated: "It was through Africa that Christianity became the religion of the world." In Africa, the final wave of Germanic invasions reached its peak just as Byzantium was about to fall, and it was through Africa that Islam came to take on its significant role as a conqueror and civilizer.

With the Renaissance and the expanded world of modern thought, Africa arrived just as suddenly with her timeless gift. Shakespeare's "Ancient Pistol" cries:

He reflects on a tale of gold from the times of Punt and Ophir to those of Ghana, the Gold Coast, and the Rand. This idea drove the world's greed to rush down the warm, enigmatic shores of Africa in search of profit, leading to the birth of true global commerce, even if it began primarily as a trade in the bodies and souls of people.

The current issue at hand is simply democracy struggling helplessly against racial barriers — flowing, seeping, boiling, and foaming to break through, constantly overwhelming the rising tide of white men in its backwash, while being held back by those who envision future empires of greed built on the backs of black, brown, and yellow people enslaved.

The accusation from Africa against Europe is serious. For four hundred years, white Europe was the main supporter of the trade in human beings that took away a hundred million people from black Africa, changed the nature of its social life, disrupted organized government, distorted traditional industries, and extinguished the advancement of culture. Today, instead of taking workers from Africa to far-off slavery, industry based on a new form of slavery is coming to Africa to take away the natives' land, force them to work, and claim all the profits for the white world.

It’s hardly necessary to remind the reader of the basic facts behind these sweeping claims. A recent law in the Union of South Africa allocates nearly 250 million acres of the best land to 1.5 million white people, while leaving 36 million acres of swamp and marsh for 4.5 million Black people. In Rhodesia, over 90 million acres have been nearly taken away. In the Belgian Congo, all the land was declared state property.

Slavery in everything but name has been the backbone of the cocoa industry in St. Thome and St. Principe, as well as in the mines of the Rand. Gin has become one of the biggest European imports, increasing by fifty percent in ten years and now totaling at least twenty-five million dollars a year. Talented Black individuals have been systematically removed, stripped of power, excluded from influential positions, and discredited in the eyes of their communities, while a class of white overseers and governing officials has emerged everywhere.

Naturally, the situation isn’t all bleak. David Livingstone has had successors, and Europe has contributed something valuable to Africa in terms of education and industry. Still, the scale of injustice is alarmingly high; but even more concerning, it hasn’t sparked any global outcry. A prominent Englishman, who has been aware of African issues for decades, honestly states today: "There is no genuine international conscience to which you can appeal."

Additionally, that treatment shows no clear signs of decreasing. Today in England, the Empire Resources Development Committee suggests treating African colonies as "crown estates" and using intensive scientific methods to exploit both land and labor to help pay off the English national debt after the war! German thinkers, aware of the huge demand for raw materials that would follow the war, had similar exploitation plans. "It’s the obvious, common-sense view of the African situation," says H.G. Wells, "that as long as these valuable regions of raw materials remain divided among several competing European empires, each focused on exploiting its 'possessions' for its own gain and at the expense of the others, there can be no lasting peace in the world. It’s impossible."

We, who fought against war; who, in a nightmare of blood and suffering, barely kept our sanity by imagining a world organized for peace; who are striving for industrial democracy and organizing Europe to eliminate the causes of war,—we, more than anyone, should not be willing to leave the underdeveloped world as the biggest temptation, not just to wars fueled by international rivalries, but to the most terrible wars—that arise from the uprising of the enraged against those who look down on them.

Think about it, reader—if you were a well-educated person today, but born as a Japanese, Chinese, East Indian, or Black individual, how would you feel and what would you think? In the current chaos, what would your perspective and plans for the future be? Clearly, you would seek freedom for your people—freedom from insults, segregation, poverty, and physical oppression. If the attitudes of Europe and America continue to rely on the same policies as they have in the past, then the only course of action for a well-educated person of color would be to organize openly and definitively for a struggle against Europe. This might involve secret underground efforts, like in Egypt and India, and possibly in the United States; or through an open build-up of military power, as seen in Japan; or via urgent modernization attempts, as in China—but action must be taken. You represent the overwhelming majority of humanity. Surrendering would be far worse than death. There's no escape unless the white world abandons the kind of disrespect indicated by the term "yellow," or the implications of "chink" and "black"; unless it discards the idea of color-based servitude associated with the term "white," which suggests everything respectable and every place worth living in—otherwise, trouble is inevitable!

It is, therefore, critically important after a concerning delay to see the true Pacifist emerge. Both England and Germany have recently been justifying their claims to parts of black Africa based on the desires and interests of the black inhabitants. Lloyd George has stated that "the general principle of national self-determination applies at least to German Africa," while Chancellor Hertling once expressed support for a discussion "on the reconstruction of the world's colonial possessions."

The call for an Africa for Africans to take the place of the current ruthless scramble for exploitation by individual countries comes from very different sources. African Americans demand that "the conquered German colonies should not be given back to Germany, nor should they be kept by the Allies. This is a chance to create a nation that may never come again. Thousands of people of color, tired of white arrogance and hypocrisy, view this as their race's only hope."

Sir Harry H. Johnston recently said: "If we’re going to talk, as we often do, sentimentally but rightly about restoring Poland’s nationhood, about addressing the separatist sentiments in Ireland, and about what should be done for the oppressed nations of Europe, then we can hardly leave out the countries of Africa."

Laborers, black laborers, on the Canal Zone write: "Out of this chaos may come the great awakening of our race. There is reason to celebrate. If we don’t seize this opportunity now, we might never figure out how to solve the race issue. It’s up to the British Negro, the French Negro, and the American Negro to step up and launch a national campaign, together and as one, with this goal in mind."

From British West Africa comes the bitter complaint that the West Africans should have the right or opportunity to determine their own future, a notion that hardly crosses the mind of the European politician. The Balkan States being allowed to join the Council of Peace and choose the government under which they will live is seen as perfectly normal because they are Europeans, yet no one outside of Europe, not even the most radical supporters of human equality, is given any rights other than to meekly accept the fate that Europe decides for them.

Here’s the risk and the responsibility; a true pacifist will strive to organize not just the people in white nations to protect against exploitation and profit-making, but will also recognize that lasting change can only happen by including the most marginalized and exploited communities across the globe. Global philanthropy, similar to national philanthropy, needs to focus on empowerment and prevention rather than just relief and religious conversion. A deep respect for humanity must be established worldwide, with Africa serving as a symbol of this commitment.

Black Africa, which includes British, French, Belgian, Portuguese, Italian, and Spanish territories, as well as the independent nations of Ethiopia and Liberia, while excluding Egypt and North Africa on one side and South Africa on the other, covers an area of 8,200,000 square miles and has a population of over one hundred million black people, with fewer than one hundred thousand white people.

Commercial exploitation in Africa has produced bigger results than most people think. Before World War I, about $200,000,000 worth of goods was coming out of black Africa each year, including a third of the world's rubber supply, a quarter of all cocoa, and nearly all cloves, gum arabic, and palm oil. In return, Africa was getting back one hundred million in cotton cloth, twenty-five million in iron and steel, and about the same in food, as well as probably twenty-five million in alcoholic beverages.

Here are the beginnings of a modern industrial system: iron and steel for long-term investment, sure to deliver big returns; fabric as the cheapest trade for valuable raw materials; alcohol to stimulate the desires of the locals and make it easier to take land and break down traditional laws; eventually forced and contracted labor managed by white overseers to ramp up and organize the production of raw materials. These resources can be endlessly expanded: cotton could compete with the southern United States, and fruits and vegetables, hides and skins, lumber and dyes, coffee and tea, grains and tobacco, as well as various fibers can easily follow organized and systematic labor.

Is this really a paradise of industry that we're imagining? It's much more likely to be a nightmare. With current plans, there will be no voice, law, or customs to protect workers—no trade unions, no eight-hour workdays, no factory regulations—none of the vital laws developed in modern times to protect people from being reduced to the status of beasts of burden. All the awful exploitation that civilization has been pushing to the slums and hidden corners will find a silent place to thrive. If we can't bring the slave from Africa, we can bring slavery to Africa.

Who are the people who live here? They are brown and black, with curly and straight hair, short and tall, and long-headed. From them, in ancient times, came the beginnings of Egypt; among them later emerged cultural hubs like Ghana, Melle, and Timbuktu. Kingdoms and empires thrived in Songhay and Zimbabwe, and art and industry flourished in Yoruba and Benin. They have faced every human disaster in its most terrible form, and yet today they still carry remnants of a powerful past— their work in iron, their weaving and carving, their music and singing, their tribal governance, their town meetings and marketplaces, and their fierce courage in battle.

Missionaries and commerce have brought some good along with their negative impacts. In black Africa today, there are over a thousand government schools and about thirty thousand mission schools, with around three-quarters of a million students attending regularly. In a few instances, higher education is provided to the sons of chiefs and chosen students. These early efforts at education aren't much for such a huge continent, and there's no overall standard or specific plan for development, but still, the children of Africa are starting to learn.

In black Africa today, only about one-seventeenth of the land and one-ninth of the people in Liberia and Abyssinia are roughly independent, though they are threatened and controlled by European capitalism. Half of the land and the people are under the control of Portugal, France, and Belgium, with the clear intention of exploiting them for the benefit of Europe, enforced through a system of caste and racial servitude. From this perilous low point of development, two paths emerge: one is represented by roughly three percent of the people in Sierra Leone, the Gold Coast, and French Senegal, who are moving toward modern development; the other path, followed by a quarter of the land and people, has local self-government and native customs and could potentially develop an indigenous culture in their own unique way if left undisturbed. One-tenth of the land, which is sparsely populated, is being monopolized for white settlers to create an African Australia. Additionally, there are four and a half million people in the South African Union being pushed into landless servitude through every modern means available.

Before World War tendencies were strongly toward the destruction of independent Africa, the industrial slavery of the masses of black people, and the encouragement of white immigration, when possible, to keep the black population in subjection.

Against this idea, let’s introduce the vision of a new African World State, a Black Africa, applying to these communities the powerful statements that have recently been widely and perhaps carelessly shared with the world: acknowledging the American Federation of Labor's declaration that "no people should be forced under a sovereignty they do not wish to live under"; recognizing in President Wilson's message to the Russians, the "principle of the undictated development of all peoples"; acknowledging the resolution from the recent conference of the Aborigines Protection Society of England, which states, "that in any reconstruction of Africa that may result from this war, the interests of the native inhabitants, as well as their wishes, to the extent that those wishes can be clearly determined, should be acknowledged as among the key factors that influence the decision of their fate." In other words, recognizing for the first time in modern history that Black people are human.

It might not be possible to establish this state all at once. With the victory of the Entente Allies, the German colonies, covering a million square miles and home to half a million Black inhabitants, should serve as a starting point. This would provide Black Africa with its initial foundation. Beginning with the German colonies, two more groups of colonies could be included for obvious reasons. Neither Portugal nor Belgium has demonstrated a particular ability to govern colonial peoples. Valid reasons may be put forth in both cases, but it would be reasonable for Belgium to begin her significant task of reorganization after World War I without the burden or temptation of colonies. Similarly, Portugal realistically faces a choice of either handing over her colonies to an African State or to another European State in the near future. These two additional sets of colonies would bring an extra 1,700,000 square miles and eighteen million people. However, it wouldn't be fair to strip Germany, Belgium, and Portugal of their colonies unless, as Count Hertling once insisted, the entire issue of colonies is addressed.

How far will the modern world acknowledge nations that aren't really nations, but instead a dominant group overpowering a mass of oppressed people? Is it not possible to create a world with cohesive nations, empires of self-governing entities, and colonies of less developed peoples under compassionate international oversight?

The real challenge would be straightforward. Is England planning to create nations in India and Nigeria made up of brown and black people that would eventually become independent, self-governing entities with a strong voice in the British Imperial Government? If not, these regions should either gain independence immediately or, if they aren't ready for that, be placed under international supervision and protection. It's possible that France, with its generous spirit, might embrace a Black France—a larger Senegal in Africa; but it seems that ultimately, all of Africa south of twenty degrees north latitude and north of the Union of South Africa should be part of a new African State. Somaliland and Eritrea should be handed over to Abyssinia, and then with Liberia, we would begin with two small, independent African states and one large state under international oversight.

Does this sound like an impossible dream? No one could blame you for thinking that before 1914. I, myself, would have agreed back then. But since the nightmare of 1914-1918, since we’ve seen the impossible happen and the unspeakable become so common that it no longer shocks us; in a time when Russia has overthrown her Czar, England has given women the right to vote and is in the process of granting Home Rule to Ireland; when Germany has embraced parliamentary government; when Jerusalem has been freed from the Turks; and the United States has taken control of its railroads,—is it really so unrealistic to imagine an Africa for the Africans, guided by organized civilization?

No one would expect this new state to be independent and self-governing from the beginning. However, unlike current plans for Africa, the world would expect independence and self-government to be the only real goal of the experiment. Initially, we can’t imagine a better way to govern this state than through the same international control by which we hope to manage the world for peace. A fascinating and insightful comparison has been made by Simeon Strunsky: "Just as the shared ownership of the northwest territory helped unite the colonies into the United States, wouldn’t joint and benevolent control of Africa and other less developed regions of the world be a foundation on which a future global federation could be established?"

From the British Labor Party comes this statement: "Regarding the colonies of the various warring nations in tropical Africa, from coast to coast, the British Labor Movement rejects any support for the imperialist idea that these territories should become the spoils of any country, be exploited for the benefit of capitalists, or be used to further the militarists' governmental goals. Given that it's unrealistic to allow the different peoples involved to determine their own futures, we suggest that the best way to serve humanity is for all the warring nations to completely abandon any aspirations of an African Empire; instead, the current colonies of the European Powers in tropical Africa, as well as the boundaries of this area, should be transferred to the proposed Supernational Authority, or League of Nations."

Lloyd George himself has said about the German colonies something that’s hard to limit just to them: "I have said many times that they are to be handled by a conference, whose decisions should primarily consider the wishes and interests of the native people living in those colonies. None of those areas is populated by Europeans. Therefore, the key point should be that the inhabitants should be placed under an administration that they find acceptable, with one of its main goals being to prevent their exploitation for the benefit of European capitalists or governments."

The special commission for the government of this African state must, of course, be chosen with great care and consideration. It should represent not just governments, but also civilization, science, commerce, social reform, and charitable efforts without pushing any specific religious agenda. It must include not just white individuals, but also educated and trained individuals of African descent. The guiding principles for such a commission should be clearly understood. Firstly, the global labor movement should recognize by now that no industrial democracy can thrive on industrial oppression, whether within the same country or among different countries, since the world today is so close to a shared industrial unity. Therefore, it is impossible to permanently elevate skilled labor in any one country without also improving the conditions of unskilled labor. Likewise, there can be no lasting uplift for American or European workers while African laborers remain enslaved.

Secondly, creating a new African State doesn’t mean separating all the black people in the world. It's too late in history to revert to the idea of total racial segregation. The new African State wouldn’t involve moving the twenty-seven million black people from the western world, Africa, or bringing in black people from Asia. Black people in the United States and other parts of the Americas have earned the right to tackle their challenges where they are, but they could still provide technical experts, thought leaders, and cultural ambassadors to support their counterparts in the new Africa from time to time.

With these two principles, the practical policies for governing the new states should include a comprehensive system of modern education that reflects the current government, religion, and customary laws of the locals. There shouldn’t be any drastic interference with the surprisingly effective African systems of local self-government through family and tribe; no sudden attempts at religious conversion through propaganda should take place. Clearly harmful customs and unsanitary practices need to be phased out gradually, but the overarching government, established from the outside, should emulate the best practices of colonial administrators and build on recognized and established foundations rather than creating entirely new and theoretical plans.

The real push to modernize Africa should happen through schools instead of churches. In ten years, twenty million Black children should be in school. Within a generation, young Africans should grasp the basics of modern culture, and groups of talented African students could be attending the world’s top universities. From the start, the general government should include both Black and white officials, and later on, local people should be integrated as well. Taxation and industry could embrace modern ideals of industrial democracy, steering clear of private land monopolies and poverty, while encouraging cooperation in production and the fair distribution of income. The challenges around capital and revenue would be much less significant than many people think. If a skilled British administrator in Nigeria could develop a cocoa industry worth twenty million dollars a year with just $1,500, imagine what could be achieved across all of Africa, without alcohol, crime, and deception?

Capital could not only be built up in Africa but also drawn from the Western world, with one key difference from how things are today: there wouldn’t be any outrageous returns offered that would lure civilized countries to shift toward colonial trade and invest resources and labor that are required by the local population, but instead would yield the same modest profits that legitimate domestic industries provide.

There’s no point in saying that the ideal of an African State, governed in this way and aiming for independence and self-governance, is impossible to achieve. The first and most important thing is for the civilized world to believe in its possibility. Because of a crime (possibly the greatest crime in human history), the modern world has been taught to look down on people of color. Educated and decent people are seriously asking if it’s really possible to uplift Africa. Are Black people fully human, or if they are, have they developed enough to absorb, even with kind guidance, any significant part of modern culture? Hasn’t this been tried in Haiti and Liberia, and failed?

It’s impossible to overlook the remarkable reality that a global campaign, starting with the slave trade and ending with the refusal to capitalize the word "Negro," has led to a passionate defense of slavery by assigning blame for every cruelty to black people. This has ultimately resulted in the clear modern benefit of demeaning blacks. This phenomenon has unknowingly conditioned millions of honest, modern individuals to believe that black people are sub-human. This belief isn't rooted in science, as it would otherwise be seen as a tentative idea, ready to be retracted when faced with facts. It’s not based on history, because it is completely contradicted by the experiences of Egyptians, Greeks, Romans, Byzantines, and Arabs. Additionally, it doesn’t stem from a careful examination of the social progress of people of African descent today in Africa and America. Instead, it’s a deeply ingrained, passionate legacy that cannot be swayed by arguments or facts. Only a belief in humanity can help the world move beyond its current biases regarding race.

Those who believe in people, who understand what black individuals have accomplished throughout human history, and who have made an effort to follow, even on a surface level, the story of the rise of black people in Africa, the West Indies, and the Americas today know that our current disdain for black individuals has no scientific basis worth considering. It is simply a harmful mindset. It could be dismantled just as easily as our belief in war, our international animosities, our outdated views on women's roles, our fear of educating the masses, and our belief in the inevitability of poverty. If we choose to, we can start a final great movement for humanity in Africa. With Africa restored, Asia would be secure, and Europe would certainly be victorious.

I haven't talked about North and South Africa because I was focused on the main population of the Black race. However, it's evident that for Central Africa to develop, Egypt needs to be free and independent, which is crucial for the path to a free and independent India. At the same time, Morocco, Algeria, Tunisia, and Tripoli should become part of Europe, embracing modern development and self-governance. South Africa, having taken away its Black workers and their land, must recognize the local indigenous people and people of color as equals within its society.

The hands that Ethiopia will soon reach out to God are not just hands of helplessness and prayer, but are instead hands filled with pain and hope; strong, weathered, and built for the real work of the world; they are hands of support for the struggling masses of a troubled world; they are hands of assistance for a suffering God!

Twenty centuries before Christ, a massive cloud hovered over the seas and settled in Africa, nearly erasing the culture of Egypt. It lingered there for five hundred years until a remarkable black woman, Queen Nefertari, "the most respected figure in Egyptian history," ascended to the throne of the Pharaohs and uplifted her people and the world. Twenty centuries after Christ, Black Africa—subjugated, violated, and humiliated—now lies at the feet of the invading Europeans. Across the treacherous sea, a black woman weeps and waits with her children in her arms. What will the future hold? Will it be the age-old horrors—war and wealth, murder and luxury? Or could it be something new—a fresh peace and a true democracy of all races—a united humanity of equals? "Semper novi quid ex Africa!"

Her soul was beautiful, so she kept it hidden beneath a delicate layer of humility and fear, from which her anxious face occasionally showed through, a mix of white, blue, and pale gold—beautiful like dawn or the laughter of a child. She sat in the Hither Isles, well enclosed between the This and Now, on a low silver throne, leaning on its armrests, sadly gazing up at the sun. The Hither Isles are flat, cold, and swampy, filled with dull gray light and all kinds of slimy, creeping creatures, along with piles of dirt, clouds of dust, and the noise of constant scraping and feeding.

She hated them, and as her hands and busy feet brushed away the dust and grime, her soul sat like a queen, gazing at the great hill to the west, which glowed brilliantly golden in the sunlight and above the sea.

The sea sighed, and so did the princess' soul, because she was lonely—very, very lonely—and tired of the routine of life. So she felt happy to see someone moving in Yonder Kingdom on the mountainside, where the sun shone warmly. When the king of Yonder Kingdom, dressed in silk and wearing a golden crown, accompanied by his dog, walked down by the restless waters and sat next to the armrest of her throne, she wondered why she couldn’t love him and run away with him up the shining mountainside, away from the dirt and dust that lay between the This and Now. She looked at him and tried to feel happy because he was handsome and nice to look at—this king of Yonder Kingdom, tall and straight, thin-lipped, with a fair complexion and a tan. So, once again, on this last day, she tried to ignite life into his unusually dull spirit—to light a fire in his cold soul to warm her own, to make his senses come alive. He blankly listened to her heartfelt words, staring and curling his long mustache in deep thought. Then he said:

"We've discovered more gold in Yonder Kingdom."

"To hell with your gold!" blurted the princess.

"No, it's mine," he insisted.

She looked up. "It belongs," she said, "to the Empire of the Sun."

"Nah—the Sun is ours," said the king calmly as he looked toward where the other Kingdom glowed above the sea. She looked too, and a gentleness filled her eyes.

"No, no," she whispered, pausing as she raised her eyes above the sea, over the hill, and up into the sky where the sun hung silently and magnificently. Its robes were a heavenly blue, edged and embroidered in vibrant flame, and its crown was one massive gem, shining in brilliant glory that made even the sun’s own face look dark—the darkness of pure light. With tear-filled, blinded eyes, she looked into that shapeless, blazing face and felt in its gentle, sad glow an unfathomable understanding. With sudden, wild abandon, she stretched her arms toward it, pleading, begging, and imploring, and behold!

"Blacks and dagoes," said the king of Yonder Kingdom, glancing casually back and lighting a carefully rolled wisp of fragrant tobacco on his lips. She looked back, too, but with a mix of wonder and fear, for it seemed—

A beggar was crawling through the swamp, dragging himself through the mud and muck. He was small, bald, and dark-skinned, dressed in tattered clothes, soaked in filth, and hunched from hard work. Yet still, she felt something about him, and it seemed—

The king of Yonder Kingdom relaxed more comfortably next to the silver throne and let out a small swirl of light-blue smoke.

"I can't stand beggars," he said, "especially the ones who are brown or black." He then pointed at the beggar's group and laughed—a harsh laugh filled with disdain and mockery. The princess looked and shrank on her throne. He, the beggar man, was—what exactly? But his group—this dirty, shabby, colorful bunch of vacant, dull-faced misery and wickedness—was crawling over the land, and he and they seemed almost hunched under the scorpion whip of a tall skeleton that looked like Death, and the twisted woman whom people called Pain. Yet they all moved as one.

The King of the Yonder Kingdom laughed, but the princess shrank in her throne. When the king saw her like that, he took a gold coin from his purse and tossed it carelessly into the crowd. She watched it with mesmerized eyes—how it rose, floated, spun, and struggled in the air, then seemed to burst, and its light and shine flew upwards while its worthless parts fell down. She glanced at the king, but he was lighting a match. She watched the discarded coins sink into the mud, but the sunlight hit the back of a beggar’s neck, and he turned his head.

The beggar passing by turned his head, and the princess sat up straight on her throne; he looked her way, and she leaned forward on her silver seat; he gazed at her slowly, and suddenly she recognized in that formless, dark, and fiery face the same soft, joyful spark of complete understanding that she had seen many times before. She saw the pain of countless years and endless love that softened it. She saw the intense fire of the sun, along with the cold, rigid responsibilities of the upper realm. Everything she had seen and hoped to see in the bright, burning sun was present once more, along with countless expressions of human tenderness, yearning, and love. In that moment, she understood. She rose as if a dream had come true, with a serious expression and eager eyes.

With her rose the king of Yonder Kingdom, almost eagerly.

"You'll come?" he exclaimed. "You'll come and see my gold?" And then, in a burst of generosity, he added, "You'll have a golden throne up there when we get married."

But she, looking up with a bright smile, replied gently: "I'm coming."

So they rode up and down—the black beggar man and his entourage of Death and Pain, and then there was a pause; then a lone black dog that sniffed and whined as he ran, and then another pause; next came the king of Yonder Kingdom in his robes, followed by another pause; and finally, the princess of the Hither Isles, with her face turned towards the sun and a loving light in her eyes.

And so they marched and struggled on through endless years and distances, and the black beggar constantly looked back past death and pain toward the maid, while the maid kept moving forward with eyes full of love. But always, the king of Yonder Kingdom's great, smooth shoulders stood between the princess and the sun like a storm cloud.

Now, finally, they approached the top of the hillside, and there the king eagerly dug into the earth, exposing its golden treasures—all green, gray, and rusted—while the princess strained her tearful eyes upward at the beggar, caught between Death and Pain, who turned his slim back against the glow of the setting sun and stood solemnly in his dignified presence, surrounded by a halo and transformed, reaching out his long arms, as the heavens sparkled with jewels against a golden backdrop.

A moment later, the princess stood there, shocked and overwhelmed. Then, with one determined tug, she revealed the white flowers on her chest and, grabbing her own red heart, held it up high with one hand while gathering her robe tightly with the other.

The king of Yonder Kingdom looked up quickly, curious, still touching the ground, and saw the gift of her bleeding heart.

"It's a Black person!" he growled darkly; "it might not be."

The woman trembled.

"It's a black!" he said fiercely. "It's neither God nor man, but a black!"

The princess stepped up.

The king grabbed his sword and looked north and east; he lifted his sword and looked south and west.

"I’m looking for the sun," the princess sang, and set off toward the west.

"Never!" shouted the king of Yonder Kingdom, "because that would be blasphemy and corruption and the source of all evil."

So, lifting his huge sword, he swung with all his strength and then some. The blade came down with a hiss, cutting into that small, white hand that held a heart until it flew off, dismembered and weightless, up into the sunlit air. The blow fell again, splitting the whimpering dog until its final cry echoed through the stars. The strike came down once more, tearing into the earth. It shook, broke apart, and opened up into a chasm as wide as the earth from heaven, deep as hell, and empty, cold, and silent.

On that distant shore shone the great Empire of the Sun in warm and joyful light, while on this side, in cold and dark shadows, lay the Hither Isles and the hill that was once golden but now was green and covered in muck; below was the sad and moaning sea, and between Here and There flew the severed hand and dripped the bleeding heart.

Then from the depths of the princess's soul rose a cry of deep despair—one that only mothers who have lost their children and lovers who have been betrayed truly understand. Balancing on the crumbling edge of that great emptiness, the princess hung there, her eyes filled with longing and her fading ears straining against the overwhelming beauty of the sky.

Out from the mud and darkness stumbled the king, shouting, "Back—don't be an idiot!"

But through the thin air pulsed the calm and steady warmth of the sun, softly saying "Jump!"

And the princess jumped.

For fifteen years, I was a youth teacher. Those years were part of the prime and vitality of my younger adulthood. They were filled with intense work, anxious self-reflection, constant planning and replanning, disillusionment, and increasing wonder.

The teacher's life is twofold. He lives in a kind of fear. He often appears stiff, almost insincere, hiding himself from those intense eyes. No eyes are as direct, penetrating, or all-seeing as the wonder-filled eyes of youth. You enter a room: to the left is a tall window, bright with colors of red and gold and sunlight. Here are rows of books and there is a table. Dark blackboards cover the walls to the right, and beside your desk is the delicate ivory of a finely sculpted head. But you notice none of this: you only see silence and eyes—fringed, soft eyes; hard eyes; big and small eyes; eyes here so filled with beauty that it brings tears to your throat; eyes there so hardened by sorrow that laughter wells up to push it back; eyes through which the mockery and ridicule of hell or the pulse of some high heaven may suddenly shine through. Ah! That significant pause before the class—that prayer and blessing—how much of my life it has shaped and filled.

I struggled hard against pretending in front of my class. I tried to be natural, honest, and straightforward, but it was really tough. What would you say to a soft, brown face surrounded by a thousand waves of gray-black hair, suddenly asking, "Do you trust white people?" You don’t, and deep down you know you don’t, no matter how much you wish you could; yet you stand up and lie and say you do; you have to say it for her sake and for the world’s; you repeat that she needs to trust them, that most white people are honest, and all the while you're lying, and every silent, watchful eye knows you’re lying, and miserably you sit and keep on lying, all for the greater glory of God.

I taught history, economics, and something called "sociology" at Atlanta University, where, as Mr. Webster used to say, we professors sat on sofas instead of just chairs. I was lucky in my teaching because my students were vividly aware of a real social issue that we were all part of and wanted to solve. There was little chance that our teaching or their thinking would become purely theoretical. Work and wages were exciting realities for all of us. What did we study? I can best explain it by sharing a concrete human case that constantly caught our attention and needed understanding, interpretation, and whatever insights I could offer.

St. Louis stretches out where big rivers converge—wide like Philadelphia, but three stories tall instead of two, with broader streets and a dirtier atmosphere, against the dull brown of calm, wide rivers. The city spills over into the valleys of Illinois and lies there, squirming under its grimy cloud. The other city is dusty and hot beyond imagination—a feverish Pittsburgh in the Mississippi Valley—a massive, relentless, terrifying entity! It's the kind that crushes people and calls for some sort of living superhuman—a giant of achievements, a clang of terrifying accomplishments.

Three men wandered into this place. They weren’t kings or wise men, but they carried a significance—maybe even greater—than what kings had in the past. One of them came from the North—strong and bursting with energy, a man of intense power, who had all the might of modern industry in his huge hands and turned flour, meat, iron, steel, clever chemicals, wood, paint, and paper into countless tools from a stripped earth. He was someone who saw nothing, knew nothing, and sought nothing except the production and sale of goods; he rolled out miles of iron tracks, tons of food, metal, and wood, coal, oil, and lumber, until the tangled networks in the East and real St. Louis resembled the red, throbbing veins of a giant heart.

Then from the East, drawn in by the crash of thunder and lightning, came the Foolish Man—foolish from stealing from the ages, but as human as anything God ever created. He was the servant of the miracle worker. He was the one the thunderbolts hit and energized into gasping vitality. The sound of his labored breathing shook the stillness of this vast valley, and the strength of his powerful arms made the whole nation tremble.

And then finally, from the South, like a quiet whisper, came the third man—black, with big eyes and even bigger memories; nervously eager yet carrying the deep softness and timeless calm that come from that eternal race whose history isn't just from one day, but stretches across endless ages. Here, without a doubt, was the perfect place for these uniquely driven forces, for these world-changing and time-altering forces, for these human beings on their extraordinary missions.

Yesterday I rode through East St. Louis. It's the kind of place you quickly recognize—tireless and lacking any restful greenery; hard and uneven streets; crude, cold, and even hateful in appearance; conventional, of course, in the business district, but just beyond that you see the ruts and hollows, the stench of poorly managed sewage, unguarded railroad crossings, saloons outnumbering churches, and churches that cater to saloons; homes that are ridiculously cramped and new, prostitutes who are free and happy, gamblers living it up, a town "wide open," shameless and straightforward; massive factories spewing out stench, filth, and flames—these and all other things so familiar in the world’s marketplaces, where industry prevails over thought and products overshadow people. May I also mention how yesterday I rode through this city past walls scorched by flames and over gray ashes; on streets almost soaked with blood and beside ruins, where the bones of dead men, newly bleached, stared at me in gloomy wonder?

Across the river, in the larger city, where the bronze statue of St. Louis—this just and stern king—glares down with angry, frightened eyes from the rolling heights of Forest Park, which doesn’t recognize him or care about him, there’s something similar, but this city is bigger and older, and the forces of evil have been somewhat restrained by those who have envisioned a better life and yearned for it; but east of St. Louis, there’s a land free from taxes for big industries; a place where you can buy corrupt politicians for much less than you’d pay for franchises or permits in a modern city. There, too, you can avoid paying off the powerful entity that drains the industry out of St. Louis. In fact, East St. Louis is a paradise for high and frequent dividends and for amassing wealth to be spent in St. Louis, Chicago, New York, and when the world returns to normal, overseas.

So the Unwise Men pouring in from the East—falling, scrambling, rushing into America at a million a year—ran, walked, and crawled to this chaotic hub of workers. They earned higher wages than ever before, but not all of it came in cash. Part of it, a sneaky part, was transformed into whiskey, prostitutes, and gambling. They laughed and enjoyed themselves. What a shame! Hadn't their mothers cried enough? It was a lively town. There was no pretense here, just a straightforward wickedness, raw and unfiltered. Sure, there were moments that revealed the underlying brutality and fragile civility. For instance, a man was once lynched for fighting in the public square; a mayor who tried to "clean up" was publicly assassinated; there were always thefts and rumors of theft, until St. Clair County became a whisper of shame in the ears of good men; but there were also good wages, a bunch of raucous troublemakers, and wild Saturday night parties. Gamblers, both big and small, went wild in East St. Louis. The small-time gamblers used cards and roulette wheels to swindle the workers' weekly pay. The big-time gamblers dealt in meat and iron and undermined the foundations of society. All the gods of chance displayed their wild attire here, above the brown flood of the Mississippi.

Then the world changed; civilization, initially focused on culture, transformed itself for intentional violence in Europe, Asia, America, and the Southern Seas. Hands that produced food created explosives, and iron meant for railways was repurposed for weapons. The needs of everyday people were overlooked in the face of powerful interests. Streams of gold, earned by the world's workers, flowed into the hands of gamblers and fueled the destructive forces of East St. Louis.

Wages had been increasing before the World War. Gradually but relentlessly, the skilled and educated had banded together and threatened the wealth of the powerful, and slowly the powerful had given in. Even the common workers, the poor and uneducated, had repeatedly pulled themselves up to the city walls, struggling to get ahead; but, sadly, there were too many hands and too many mouths, and the feet of the Disinherited kept arriving across the sea to this old El Dorado.

War brought subtle changes. Wages stayed the same while prices went up. It wasn’t that the white American worker was facing starvation, but there was a more important question—whether he would have to give up his living room, his Victrola, and even the dream of owning a Ford car.

There was chaos among the workers—they were fighting each other and climbing on each other's backs. The skilled and savvy ones, teaming up even more effectively than before, negotiated with the strong and kept them in check with harsh threats. Meanwhile, the less skilled and more clueless ones were frustrated at the bottom and, like before, tried to rally the uneducated to stand together against both the wealthy and the skilled laborers.

It was here that a beam of otherworldly light emerged from the East—a strange victory of good amidst evil that the workers could hardly believe. They slowly watched the gates of Ellis Island close, as the footsteps of the annual million men faded away, until the flow of immigrants from overseas was halted by the shadow of death just when new violence was opening fresh markets around the globe for American industry; and the giants with thunderbolts stomped and roared, peering out across the world and calling for men, always—men!

The Unwise Men laughed and forced unwilling dollars from the hands of the powerful, envisioning a future when labor, as they understood it, would thrive; they imagined this day with justice and fairness, except for one thing: the sound of the moans of the Disinherited, who still lay outside the walls. When they heard this moan and realized it didn’t come from across the seas, they were initially shocked and claimed it wasn’t real; then they grew furious and insisted it shouldn’t be happening. Quickly, they turned to look into the dark red depths of the South, filled with fear and hatred in their hearts!

What did they see? They saw something they had been told to laugh at and mock; they saw what the headline of every newspaper article, the falsehood of every inexperienced reporter, the exaggeration of every news story, and the misrepresentation of every speech and book had taught them was a group of contemptible people, inhuman; at best, ridiculous; at worst, the target of violence and rage.

What did they see? They saw nine and a half million people. They saw the aftermath of slavery, legally and systematically kept ignorant, crushed by insults and degraded by ongoing and brutal injustice. They saw a community whose defenseless women have been violated by thousands and whose men have been lynched by hundreds in front of a mocking world. They saw a group of people with bloody heads, yet unyielding, working diligently for wages fifty percent lower than the national average and under conditions that shame civilization, maintaining homes, raising children, and holding on to hope against all odds. They witnessed the greatest industrial miracle of modern times—former slaves becoming free men and rising out of despair through their own efforts, despite the most despicable opposition ever witnessed— they saw all this, and what they saw, the distraught employers of America saw too.

The North called out to the South. A cry of anger erupted from the cotton monopolists and industrial tycoons of the new South. Who dared to "interfere" with their workforce? Who wanted to claim their Black slaves except for them? Who respected and loved "Blacks" as they did?

They used all the tools of modern oppression: taxes, city laws, licenses, state laws, local regulations, mass police arrests, and of course, the particularly Southern tactics of mobs and lynching. They desperately appealed to the United States Government; they begged on their knees and cried about the "suffering" of their poor, misguided Black friends, and yet, despite this, Northern employers could simply offer two to three dollars a day, and between a quarter and half a million Black workers rose up and poured into the North. They went to the mines in West Virginia because the war needed coal; they went to the industries in New Jersey and Pennsylvania because the war needed ships and iron; they went to the automobile factories in Detroit and the freight operations in Chicago; and they went to East St. Louis.

Fear crept into the hearts of the Unwise Men. It wasn’t that their pay was cut—they actually saw increases. They earned not just enough to get by, but a salary that covered some basic comforts and, in East St. Louis, many of life's harsh realities. What they feared wasn’t losing the things they were accustomed to or facing poverty, but the certain end of their hopes and ambitions. While fear was newly born in the Unwise Men, the Black man came into a world steeped in fear; poverty in its most brutal form was his parent and constant companion. He was quietly moving north to escape hunger, humiliation, oppression, and the looming threat of death.

Here, in the vast valley that Father Marquette saw as peaceful and golden, overflowing with fruit and rivers, drowsy beneath the gaze of God—here was everything needed for human tragedy, every aspect of the modern economic paradox.

Ah! That hot, expansive plain of East St. Louis is something to behold. The rivers are stained with sweat, labor, and refuse, like small lakes along the low and heavy banks; flatboats drift and weave among them, and above, the steamboats glide on massive steel bridges, gracefully spanning from one shore to the other. Everywhere you look, there are brick structures—tall, black and red chimneys, flames flickering. The ground is cluttered with cars, metal, tracks, trucks, boxes, crates, and piles of coal and rubber. Towering cranes and grim elevators rise above stacks of dark, dirty lumber. And always below is the water—vast and still, gray-brown and yellow.

This is the setting for the tragedy: the powerful machinery of the modern world driven by the brutal demands of society, stirred today by a dazzling vision of profit and needing just hands, hands, hands! Fear of losing out and greed in the hearts of the powerful; the combined cleverness of the modern worker, skilled at crafting and in the routine of labor, enjoying the world's riches and yearning for more; the fear of poverty and disdain for "scabs" in the hearts of the workers; the silent longing in the hearts of the oppressed; the echo of laughter heard at the base of the Pyramids; the steady, determined stride of the laborers; fear of Death's Shadow in the hearts of those marginalized.

We wonder, and maybe there’s no answer, how far the leader of the world's industry can go with his actions, despite the heartbreaking consequences of those actions? How far can people strive for a bit of comfort, pushing past the terrible shadow of poverty, even if it means depriving others, whom society considers lesser? How far can those who rise from the depths of despair force those with resources to share with those who are hungry?

The answers to these questions are tough, but one answer stands out above all: justice starts with the most vulnerable; the struggles of the most disadvantaged—the struggles of the black community—should be prioritized, while the challenges faced by the corporate elite come last.

East St. Louis wasn't really concerned about all the discussion of human issues, as long as its grocery stores and bars were doing well, its industries were thriving, and its bankers were getting rich. Stupidity, corruption, and greed reigned in City Hall. The new black residents were taken advantage of just as happily as the white Poles and Italians; the rent for rundown houses kept rising, the streetcar lines reported cheerful profits, and crimes by both white and black individuals flourished in the shadows. The educated and skilled climbed on the backs of the less informed; the laborers worked harder to organize their peers and negotiate with their employers.

Nor were the new black workers fools. They had no interest in making life harder for their coworkers; they wanted to increase their own paychecks. They were also eager to get involved in the new union movement. But the unions didn’t want them. Just as employers controlled the meat and steel industries, they aimed to control labor and secure a better deal for themselves. In the skilled trades, they succeeded. The best electrician in the city was denied entry to the union and chased out of town because he was black. No black builder, printer, or machinist could join a union or find work in East St. Louis, regardless of their skill or character. But regardless of the terrible conditions in the stockyards, the dust from the aluminum factories, and the sweat from the lumber yards, determined black workers couldn’t be kept away.

They were invited to join the workers' unions here, and they accepted. White and Black workers went on strike at the aluminum factory in the fall and won higher wages and better hours. Then in the spring, they went on strike again to make bargaining mandatory for the employer, but this time they faced new challenges. The fire of war had reached America; the government and the courts intervened and demanded no delays, no strikes; the work had to continue.

The demand for workers grew stronger. Black men flocked in, and white workers were filled with rage. Their anger was directed at those in power, but it was powerless here because employers had the government backing them; it was aimed at established union workers, who had benefited from the labor of the unskilled and disadvantaged, as well as those they could push out of the competition for any reason, whether due to race, bias, or deceit; ultimately, the frustration of the white workers was aimed at these new Black newcomers, who seemed to threaten their last hope of controlling common labor.

These angers flared up, and the union leaders, fearing the backlash and aware of their own guilt—not only in a broader sense for climbing to power over the misfortunes of their less fortunate peers but also for their role in transforming East St. Louis into a miserable town filled with alcohol and vice—quickly sought to deflect the impending storm away from themselves. What they wanted was right in front of them: here were Black men, guilty not only of competing for jobs that white men could have held at wartime wages, even if they couldn’t fill them, but also guilty of simply being Black! It was this Blackness that the unions targeted with their accusations. This was where they committed the unforgivable sin. This was where they stepped into the Shadow of Hell, where, in an instant, the struggle for wages and protection against industrial oppression turned East St. Louis into the focal point of the oldest and most vile type of human oppression—race hatred.

The whole situation led to this terrible change. Everything in the history of the United States— from slavery to Sunday newspapers, from denying voting rights to residential segregation, from "Jim Crow" trains to a "Jim Crow" military draft— all this history of discrimination and insult built up to make people think that unleashing their unchecked anger against 12,000,000 humble, hardworking individuals was a way to fix the industrial problems of the past. It was the logic of a broken plate, which, scarred by its history, only cracks again along the same lines of past destruction.

So hell broke loose in East St. Louis! The white men even forced black union members out of their unions, and when the black men, beaten at night and assaulted, fought back and shot at the attackers, five thousand rioters emerged and surged like a massive storm from noon until midnight; they killed, beat, and murdered; they smashed the heads of children and stripped the clothes off women; they drove victims into the flames and hanged the helpless from light poles. Fathers were killed in front of their mothers; children were burned; heads were chopped off with axes; pregnant women crawled and gave birth in dark, wet fields; thieves looted houses while firebrands followed; bodies were thrown from bridges; and rocks and bricks flew through the air.

The Black people fought. They struggled with the mob like cornered animals. They pushed them back from the densest area of their homes and left the white dead in the street, but the clever mob trapped the Black men between the factories and their houses, knowing they were only equipped with their dinner pails. Firefighters, police officers, and militia members stood with their hands at their sides or even eagerly joined the mob.

It was the old world horror come to life again: all that Jews went through in Spain and Poland; all that peasants endured in France, and Indians in Calcutta; all the human evil that had been unleashed over the ages they carried out in East St. Louis, while the rags of six thousand half-naked Black men and women fluttered across the bridges of the calm Mississippi.

The white South laughed—it was incredibly funny—the "blacks" who had gone North to escape slavery and lynching encountered the anger of the mob they had tried to escape. Groups rushed North from Mississippi and Texas, suspiciously on time and with generous offers to bring these workers back to a somewhat better situation. The man from Greensville, Mississippi, who wanted a thousand got six, because, in the end, things weren't so straightforward.

No, the end wasn’t straightforward. On the contrary, the issue raised by East St. Louis was surprisingly complicated. The average American, fed up with the ongoing "Black problem," only sees another anti-Black mob and wonders not when we will resolve this issue, but when we can be rid of it for good. The student of social issues sees yet another milestone in the victorious journey of labor unions; they regret that violence and destruction should accompany this progress— but, what can you do? War is part of life!

Despite their self-satisfied arguments, the facts were clear: East St. Louis, a major industrial hub, lost 5,000 workers—good, honest, hard-working people. It wasn't the criminals, whether they were black or white, who left East St. Louis. They're still there and they’ll remain. But half of the honest black workers have disappeared. The weakened labor force in the mid-Mississippi Valley can't be replenished from Ellis Island, because in Europe, men are dead and injured, and when recovery happens, it will create a European demand for labor that this era has never experienced. The vision of industrial leadership has emerged among the giants of American industry and finance. However, it can only be achieved if there are workers available to do the jobs—the skilled laborers, the unskilled laborers, the willing laborers, the well-paid laborers. The current organized forces, no matter how cleverly arranged, aren't sufficient to meet America's needs; but there is another group of workers, 12 million strong, who are the rightful beneficiaries of America’s industrial progress. They will be utilized simply because they need to be—but their use means East St. Louis!

East of St. Louis are major cities like Chicago, Indianapolis, Detroit, Cleveland, Pittsburgh, Philadelphia, and New York. In each of these places, as well as in smaller cities, there’s not only the industrial unrest caused by war and changes in work but also a demand for workers, an influx of Black people, and a conscious effort to turn people's minds—especially those of workers—toward racial hatred against Black individuals. In all these centers, attempts similar to what happened in East St. Louis have taken place, with varying degrees of success. Nevertheless, African Americans stand today as the most significant strategic group in the world. Their contributions are essential, their spirit and character are admirable, and their vision transcends that of any other group of workers. They have the potential to restore culture to the world if their strength is aligned with the movements that advocate for justice rather than succumbing to the hidden animosities that promote barbarism. They must fight, and they will fight!

Rising on wings, we cross the rivers of St. Louis again, winding between the towers of industry that overshadow and drown the towers of God. Far in the distance, we see the green of fields and hills; but below us is the river, blue—brownish-gray, hinting at hidden gold. Drifting through partially flooded lowlands, with shanties, crops, and stunted trees, past struggling corn and scattered villages, we rush toward the Battle of the Marne and the West, escaping this terrible Battle of the East. Westward, dear God, the fire of Your Mad World stains our Heaven. Our responding Hell rolls eastward from St. Louis.

Here, in a small example, is the kind of economic mess that constantly came up for me and my students to tackle. We couldn't approach its resolution with the scholarly detachment and academic serenity typical of most white universities. To us, this was Life and Hope and Death!

How should we approach this problem, not just as Black people, but as men and women of a new century, working to create a new world? First of all, this isn't just a simple matter of racial conflict. There are no distinct races in the sense of separate, pure groups of people, differing in achievements, development, and capacity. There are large groups—sometimes sharing a common history, sometimes common interests, and sometimes common ancestry; increasing shared experiences and current interests overshadow the idea of common blood. Today, the world is made up, not of races, but of the powerful commercial group of master capitalists, predominantly white and international; the national middle classes of various nations—white, Asian, and Latin American—who share strong familial ties, common languages, and shared histories; the international working class of all races; and the marginalized, oppressed groups of indigenous people, mainly Asian, Latin American, and Black.

Two questions come up regarding the work and relationships of these groups: how to provide goods and services to meet people's needs, and how to fairly and adequately fulfill those needs. There's no doubt that we've moved from a time when it was nearly impossible to meet the basic needs of most people, even with significant effort, to a time when our technology can produce enough for everyone, as long as everyone can claim their share. Thus, our main ethical question today is, how can we justly distribute the world's resources to meet the essential needs of the majority?

What prevents us from answering this question? Dislikes, jealousies, and hatreds—like the racial tensions in East St. Louis; the jealousy between English and Germans; the animosity between Jews and Gentiles. But these are, ultimately, just surface issues that stem more from long-standing habits than from current realities. They endure and are fueled by deeper, more powerful forces. If the white workers in East St. Louis were confident that Black workers wouldn't threaten their jobs and livelihoods, their racial hatred wouldn’t have escalated to violence. If Black workers in the South could earn a decent living in fair conditions at home, they wouldn't feel the need to undercut their white counterparts.

The shadow of hunger in a world that never has to be hungry drives us to war, murder, and hatred. But why does hunger loom over so many people? Clearly, it's because, in the organization of work, a few individuals end up with more wealth than they can possibly use, while many others have less than what is necessary to live decently. In earlier economic times, we justified this as the reward for thrift and sacrifice, and as the punishment for ignorance and crime. The response to this is clear: sacrifice deserves no such reward, and ignorance warrants no such punishment. The main takeaway from our current understanding is that the disparity between wealth and poverty today cannot be fully explained by the thriftiness or ignorance of the rich and the poor.

Yesterday we corrected a significant mistake when we understood that owning labor doesn't lead to increased production. The world figured this out a long time ago, but black slavery reemerged in America as an incomprehensible throwback, a deliberate wrongdoing. The emancipation of black slaves liberated America. Today, we’re questioning another form of ownership—the ownership of the materials that create the goods we need. Private ownership of land, tools, and raw materials might have stimulated production at one point in economic development and didn’t significantly disrupt fair distribution. However, as technical production became more complex and lengthy, owning these resources turned into a monopoly, making the rich richer and the poor poorer. Therefore, we’re now challenging this ownership; we’re calling for general agreement on which materials should be privately owned and how those materials should be utilized. We’re quickly approaching the day when we will reject all private property in raw materials and tools, insisting that distribution depends not on the power of those who control the materials, but on the needs of the majority.

Can we do this and still produce enough goods, accurately assess people's needs, and fairly determine who qualifies as "people"? How do we plan to achieve these goals today? Someone decides whose needs should be met. Someone organizes production to address these needs. What stops the same skill and foresight from being applied in the future as it has in the past? The required amount and type of human talent doesn’t need to be lessened—in fact, it could be significantly increased with proper incentives and rewards. Are we currently fostering the necessary talent? On the contrary, it isn't the Inventor, the Manager, and the Thinker who are benefiting from industry today, but rather the Gambler and the Thief. A well-organized industry could easily eliminate the Gambler's Profit and the Monopolist's Interest, and by offering a more thoughtful distribution of wealth and recognition, attract more talent and commitment to public service than we can currently muster. If we eliminate interest and profit, think about the savings that could result; but more importantly, imagine the magnitude of the change when we let the enigmatic Someone decide, based on public opinion, whose needs should be prioritized. This is the significant and genuine change that is on the horizon for future industry.

But this isn’t the need of the revolution nor, perhaps, its true starting point. What we need to figure out at some point is who gets to be called "people." Right now, at the start of this industrial shift, we’re acknowledging that economic classes have to change. Workers’ wages must go up, and employers’ profits must be limited. But how far should this change extend? Should it apply to all people and all work around the globe?

Certainly not. We aim to apply it slowly and with some hesitation to white men and even more cautiously to white women, but we have largely decided that black people, brown people, and mostly yellow people will not be among those whose needs should be heard and whose wants should be addressed in the large organization of global industry.

In my classes, I wasn't just focused on proving that this was unfair—actually, I didn't need to. They understood its deep injustice from painful experiences, simply because they were Black. What I needed to demonstrate was that no significant restructuring of industry could truly last if most people were excluded. These marginalized communities must either be part of the future industrial democracy or bring about a change in the world.

Of course, the foundation of such a system must be a strong ethical ideal. We need to truly consider the needs of humanity. We should care about the needs of everyone. We have to move past the allure of exclusivity. In a world full of people, many are lonely. The wealthy are lonely. We're all desperate for connections, yet we shut people out and create barriers, supporting the myth of the Elect and the Superior, even though the vast majority of people are capable of achieving greater and greater heights. Sure, there are differences between individuals and groups, and there always will be, but these differences will be about beauty, talent, and interests, not necessarily about ugliness, stupidity, and hatred.

The meaning of America is the start of understanding the Crowd. The crowd isn't as refined as a Versailles garden party of Louis XIV, but it's way more organized than the Sans-culottes and has endless potential. What a world it will be when human possibilities are unleashed, when we truly connect with one another, and when the stranger is no longer seen as a potential criminal or a definite inferior!

What holds us back from achieving the ideals mentioned earlier? Our profits from degradation, our colonial exploitation, and our American attitude toward Black people. Remember East St. Louis! Think back to slavery and Reconstruction! Do we want the needs of Black Americans met? Absolutely not, and that rejection is the biggest obstacle today to restructuring work and redistributing wealth, not just in America but globally.

Everyone should participate in the future industrial democracy of the world. To achieve this, people need to be educated in intelligence and an appreciation for what is good and beautiful. Today's Big Business—essentially the Science of Human Wants—needs improvement by removing the costs of waste, which is Interest, and random outcomes, known as Profit, turning all income into a personal wage for the services provided by the individual; recognizing that no person's contribution is so significant that it allows one to label another as an idler or to claim superiority in tasks they cannot perform themselves. Above all, industry should serve the needs of the many, not just the few, and people like Black individuals, Native Americans, Asians, and Pacific Islanders should be included among the many, just like Germans, French, and English.

In this upcoming industrial socialization, we need to be cautious of the same tyranny of the majority that has characterized democracy in lawmaking. For example, future economics must still include a certain amount of machine-like work and quick obedience and submission. This is simply a result of the tough realities of the physical world. We should accept this with the reassuring idea that this routine doesn’t have to require twelve hours a day or even eight. With work available for everyone and everyone working, three to six hours should be enough and would leave plenty of time for leisure, exercise, study, and hobbies.

But what should we say about work where spiritual values and social distinctions come into play? Who will be Artists and who will be Servants in the future? Or will we all be artists and all serve?

Three bishops sat in San Francisco, New Orleans, and New York, looking gloomily into three flickering fires that cast and recast trembling shadows on the walls lined with books. Three letters rested in their laps, which said:

"And you, Valdosta, in the state of Georgia, are not the least among the cities of America, for from you will come a governor who will lead my people."

The white bishop of New York frowned and impatiently tossed the letter into the fire. "Valdosta?" he thought, "That’s where I’m going for the governor’s wedding of little Marguerite, my white flower—" Then he lost focus on the letter in his thoughts, but the paper glowed bright red in the fireplace.

"Valdosta?" said the black bishop of New Orleans, shifting uncomfortably in his chair. "I need to go there. Those folks are behaving oddly. I have no idea where all this unrest and movement will end up. And then there's poor Lucy—" He tossed the letter into the fire but watched it closely as it burned green. "Stranger things than that have happened," he said slowly, "'and you will hear of wars and rumors of wars... for one nation will rise against another and one kingdom against another.'"

In San Francisco, the priest from Japan, who was abroad to explore unfamiliar places, sat in his lacquer chair, his face resembling soft yellow, wrinkled parchment. Slowly, he wrote in a large, golden book: "I have been oddly summoned to the Val d' Osta, where one of those religious groups that are so common here will welcome a prophet. I will go and report back to Kyoto."

So in the fading light of the day before Christmas, three bishops gathered in Valdosta and observed its mills and warehouses, its broad sandy streets, bathed in the warm glow of a red sunset. The governor looked up the street nervously as he helped the bishop of New York into his car and welcomed him warmly.

"I’m worried," said the governor, "about the Black community. They’re acting strangely. I can’t shake the feeling that Fleming is behind it."

"Fleming?"

"Yes! He's running against me next term for governor; he's a rebel; wants black people to vote and all that—excuse me for a moment, there's someone I know—" and he rushed over to the black bishop, who had just gotten off the "Jim-Crow" car, and shook his hand warmly. They spoke quietly. "Look carefully," said the governor as they parted, "and let me know what you find out." Then, turning back to his guest, he asked, "You don't mind, do you? I'm really worried! I've never seen black people act like this. They're leaving in droves and those who stay are becoming bold! They seem to be expecting something. What's going on, Jim?"

The driver mentioned that there was some kind of Chinese official in town, and everyone wanted to catch a glimpse of him. He took a different route.

It all happened very suddenly. The bishop of New York, dressed in full regalia for the early wedding, stepped out onto the back balcony of his mansion, just as the setting sun painted the sky with crimson clouds of glory in the East and set the West ablaze.

"Fire!" shouted a jokester in the crowd that was gathering to celebrate a southern Christmas Eve; everyone laughed and ran.

The bishop of New York didn't get it. He looked around. Was it that dark little house in the back that was on fire? Forgetting his robes, he rushed down—a brave, white figure against the sunset. He found himself in front of an old, black, rickety stable. He could hear the mules stamping inside.

No. It wasn’t fire. It was the sunset glowing through the cracks. Behind the hut, its glory rose toward God like flaming wings of cherubim. He paused until he heard the faint wail of a child. Quickly, he stepped inside. A white girl crouched in front of him, by the mules' feet, holding a baby in her arms—a tiny baby that wailed weakly. Behind the mother and child stood a shadow. The bishop of New York turned to the right, curiously, and saw a Black man in bishop's robes that faintly echoed his own. He turned away to the left and saw a golden Japanese man in golden garments. Then he heard the Black man mumble behind him: "But He was to come the second time in clouds of glory, with the nations gathered around Him and angels—" At that moment, a shaft of glorious light fell directly on the child, while outside came the sound of countless feet and the whirring of wings.

The bishop of New York leaned down quickly over the baby. It was Black! He stepped back in disgust, barely listening to but still hearing the Black bishop, who spoke almost apologetically:

"She's not really white; I know Lucy—you see, her mom worked for the governor—" The white bishop spun around and almost stepped on the yellow priest, who was kneeling with his head down in front of the pale mother, offering incense and a gift of gold.

The bishop of New York hurried out into the night. The cherubim's wings were folded dark against the stars. As he rushed down the front staircase, the governor was running up the street steps.

"We're gonna be late!" he exclaimed nervously. "The bride is waiting!" He rushed the bishop to the waiting limo, asking him anxiously, "Did you hear anything? Do you hear that noise? The crowd is getting really big in the streets and it looks like there's a fire over to the east. I've never seen so many people here—I’m scared there might be violence—a mob—a lynching—I’m scared—listen!"

What was it that he heard beneath the sound of countless feet? Deep in his heart, a sense of wonder grew. What could it be? Ah, he realized! It was music—a powerful and majestic chord. It rose higher as the brightly-lit church pierced the night, sweeping beautifully toward them. The music soared so high and clear; it seemed to surround them from above, behind, and all around. The governor, pale and shaken, crouched in the car; but the bishop whispered softly as the ecstasy surged in his heart:

"Such beautiful music, such wedding music! What choir is that?"

The woman looked at me sternly; I looked away. I had spoken at length to the small audience about the disenfranchisement of my people in society, politics, and industry, all while trying to avoid her cold, green gaze. When I finished, I shook tired hands, but she was ready to pounce. I knew what was coming and steeled myself.

"Do you know where I can find a good colored cook?" she asked. I denied any guilty desires. She stepped closer and annoyingly shook a finger in my face.

"Why won't Black people work?" she panted. "I've been giving money for years to Hampton and Tuskegee, and yet I can't find decent servants. They won't make an effort. They're lazy! They're unreliable! They're disrespectful, and they quit without any notice. They all want to be lawyers and doctors and" (she spat the word out with anger) "ladies!"

"God forbid!" I replied seriously, and then, being of noble lineage and not wanting to hurt an innocent girl of unknown age, I ran; I ran home and wrote a chapter in my book, and here it is.

I talk and talk bitterly as a servant and the child of a servant because my mother spent five or more years of her life in menial work. My father's family got away, although my grandfather, who was a boat steward, had to fight hard to be treated like a man instead of a servant. He battled and succeeded. My mother's family, on the other hand, during my childhood, was balanced precariously between being farmers and being laborers. The local Irish people had two options: the factory or the kitchen, and most chose the factory, with all its dirt, noise, and low pay. The factory was closed off to us. Our little plots of land were too small to support most of us. A few clung almost resentfully to their old homes, low red buildings huddled on a wide flat area; but the children stirred restlessly and often walked to town to see its wonders. Gradually, they drifted away—a waiter here, a cook there, helping out for a few weeks in Mrs. Blank's kitchen when she had summer boarders.

Instinctively, I've hated that kind of work my entire life. I detested it and wanted to avoid it. Why? I couldn't say. If I had been born in Carolina instead of Massachusetts, I probably wouldn't have escaped the stigma of "service." The allure of better wages and comfort would have quickly silenced my moral objections; yet I know I would have resisted for a long time, even in Carolina, because deep down I understood that’s where Hell was.

I mowed lawns on contract, did "chores" that let me be my own person, sold newspapers, and sold tea—anything to escape the shadow of the terrible thing that threatened to consume my soul. Once, and only once, I felt the sting of its grip. I was twenty and had graduated from Fisk with a scholarship to Harvard; however, I needed money for travel, clothes, and living expenses until the scholarship started. Fortson was a fellow student in the winter and a waiter in the summer. He suggested that the Glee Club Quartet from Fisk spend the summer at the hotel in Minnesota where he worked, and that I come along as "Business Manager" to arrange for gigs on the way back. We were all excited, but we had no idea about waiting tables. "Don't worry," Fortson said, "you can hang out in the dining room during meals and carry out the big wooden trays of dirty dishes. This way, you'll learn about waiting and earn good tips and get free meals." I was skeptical, but I agreed to go.

I walked into that big and flashy hotel at Lake Minnetonka with a sense of dread. The bold architecture, large verandas, luxurious furniture, and even more extravagant dresses left us in awe. The long loft set aside for us, with its neat little beds, was comforting; the work wasn’t hard,—but the meals! There were no meals. Initially, before the guests ate, a dirty table in the kitchen was quickly piled with inedible scraps. We newbies were the only ones who came to eat, while the guests’ dining room, filled with tempting aromas and sights, made our stomachs growl! Eventually, even the pretense of serving us meals faded away. We were convinced we were going to starve when Dug, one of us, made a shocking discovery: the waiters were stealing their food and they took the best stuff. We hesitated but then decided to steal, too (or at least they did, and I shared), and we all started to gain weight because the treats were amazing. You slipped a little here and hid it there; you cut extra portions and placed fake orders; you darted into the darkness and hid in corners to eat and eat! It was a grim situation. I hated it. I was too much of a coward to steal much myself, but not cowardly enough to turn down what others stole.

Our job was easy, but boring. We stood around and watched overly dressed people stuff their faces. For the most part, we were treated like furniture and were expected to act the part. I paid more attention to the waiters than to the guests. I noticed that it paid off to be entertaining and to grovel. One particular Black man drove me crazy. He was smart and skilled, but one day, I saw his face while he was serving a group of men; he was acting like a clown—crouching, grinning, using a thick accent even though he usually spoke good English—ah! it was a heartbreaking sight, and he made more money than any waiter in the dining room.

I didn’t care about the actual work or the type of work, but it was the dishonesty and deception, the flattery and manipulation, the strange idea that the worker and the diner had no shared humanity. It was unsettling. It was deeply and fundamentally wrong. I stood there, staring and thinking, while the other guys rushed around. Then I noticed one overweight guy, feeding at a lavish trough, who couldn’t find his waiter. He signaled for me. It wasn’t his voice since his mouth was too full. It was his manner, his presence, his assumption. That’s how Caesar commanded his soldiers or Cleopatra her servants. Even dogs would recognize the gesture. I didn’t. He might still be calling for all I know because something within me froze. I didn’t look at him again. Right then and there,

I would work my hands off for a fair wage, but for "tips" and "handouts," never! Fortson was a devout, honest guy who saw "tips" as just a part of life, like a rite of passage; but the hotel that summer surprised even him in other ways. One night, he came to us all flustered and asked us to help him write a letter to the absentee owner, detailing the wild and crazy happenings at midnight in the rooms and hallways among "tired" businessmen and their escorts. We listened, wide-eyed and eager, and wrote it all out bravely. The owner didn’t thank Fortson. He didn’t even reply to the letter.

When I finally walked out of that hotel and left behind menial work for good, I felt like I had been forced to smell worms and manure at the roots of flowers for way too long.

"Cursed be Canaan!" shouted the Hebrew priests. "He will be a servant of servants to his brothers." With what typical self-satisfaction did the slaveholders believe that Canaanites were Black and their "brothers" were white? Aren't Black people servants? Therefore! It was on such spiritual myths that the anachronism of American slavery was built, and this was the degradation that once elevated menial servants to the status of aristocrats among people of color. House servants received some basic decencies of food, clothing, and shelter; they could more easily get their master's attention; their personal qualities and character became known, and bonds formed between slave and master that evolved from friendship to love, from mutual service to mutual kinship.

Naturally, as a result, the West Indian servant transitioned from slavery into citizenship, since few West Indian masters—and even fewer Spanish or Dutch masters—were heartless enough to sell their own children into slavery. That was not the case for the English and Americans. With a harshness and indecency rarely seen in the civilized world, white masters on the mainland sold their mixed-race children, half-brothers and half-sisters, and their own wives in all but name, into lifelong slavery by the hundreds and thousands. They created a specific branch of the slave trade for this purpose, and the white elites of Virginia and the Carolinas made more money from this business during the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries than from any other source.

The sound of the door of opportunity echoed in the ears of the Black house servant, turning the entire landscape of Black progress like a great pivot. The change was slow but significant. When emancipation occurred, both before and after 1863, the house servant still had certain advantages. He possessed whatever education his race had gained, and his white father, no longer able to sell him, often provided him with land and protection. Despite this, the appeal of house service for Black people was fading. The way forward for the newly freed Black community was no longer through the kitchen door, with its wide hall, pillared porch, and flower-filled yard beyond. Instead, as every Black person soon understood, it lay in breaking free from menial servitude.

In 1860, 98 percent of Black people were servants and serfs. By 1880, 30 percent were servants and 65 percent were serfs. The percentage of servants then increased slightly and decreased again until 21 percent were in service in 1910, and likely much less than 20 percent today. This is a sign of our progress, but Black people will not achieve true freedom until this oppressive mark of slavery and medievalism has dropped to below 10 percent.

Not only are fewer than one in five of our workers servants today, but the nature of their service has changed. Among the million menial workers, there are 300,000 upper servants—skilled men and women of integrity, like hotel waiters, Pullman porters, janitors, and cooks, who, if they had been white, could have relied on the labor movement to elevate their work from servitude, standardize their hours, define their responsibilities, and replace tips, old clothes, and leftover food with a decent, regular wage. But the labor movement turned its back on these Black men when the white world made its voice loud. Negroes are servants; servants are Negroes. They closed off the possibility of escaping to factories and trades for their peers and sealed the hatches, so that the 300,000 wouldn’t become workers on par with white men in pay and respect.

But if the upper servants couldn’t escape to modern industrial conditions, how much more did they weigh down the bodies and souls of 700,000 washerwomen and household workers—uninformed, unskilled leftovers of a wealthy industrial system. Their pay was the lowest and their hours the longest of all workers. The personal humiliation of their work is so severe that any decent white man would rather harm his daughter than let her grow up to such a fate. Across the world and in all races, there is no greater source of prostitution than this level of menial service, and the Black race in America has largely avoided this fate simply because their inherent decency leads Black women to prefer irregular and temporary relationships with men they like instead of selling themselves to strangers. To these sexual morals is added (in self-defense) a revolt against unjust labor conditions, which expresses itself in "soldiering," sulkiness, minor theft, unreliability, and quick, fruitless changes of employers.

Indeed, here among American Black people, we have shown the final and worst refuge of industrial class division. Menial work is outdated—leftover from medieval barbarism. So why does it persist? Why do we stay quiet about it? Why, in the minds of so many decent and forward-thinking individuals, does the entire Black issue come down to simply getting a cook or a maid?

No one understands better than I the potential of a top-notch domestic service system. I’ve seen kids who were like spiritual sons and daughters to their employers, girls who were genuine friends to their mistresses, and elderly servants who were respected and cherished. However, in every one of these situations, the Servant went beyond being just a Menial, and the Service was valued more than just a Wage. To achieve this kind of transformation consistently and on a wide scale, we need the same revolution in household help as we’ve seen in factory work and public service. While organized industries have been gradually shaping their workers into self-respecting, well-compensated individuals, and public service is starting to attract the most educated and capable thinkers, domestic service continues to fall short and insists on trying to develop the best individuals from the worst circumstances.

The reason for this perversion, in my opinion, is twofold. First, the once-great state of Service has sadly declined, yet it still struggles to survive; second, the current miserable state of the outcasts in the world, looking with bloodshot eyes at the gates of the industrial paradise.

The Master spoke no greater word than that which said: "Whoever wants to be great among you should be your servant!" What is greater than personal service? Surely, no social service or mass effort can truly be effective and beautiful without the personal support from one person to another. It is the purest and holiest of duties. A glimpse of this truth endured in those who created the First Gentlemen of the Bedchamber, the Keepers of the Robes, and the Knights of the Bath, the highest nobility that surrounded an anointed king. And it doesn't change today in what mothers do for their children or daughters for their mothers, in all the personal care in the traditional home; this is service! Think of what friendship has meant, not just in spiritual support, but in physical assistance. In today's world, what requires more love, sympathy, knowledge, sacrifice, and patience than caring for children, preparing food, maintaining and organizing the home, providing personal attention and companionship, and looking after bodies and their clothing—what greater, more intimate, more sacred services are there than these?

And yet we are degrading these services and looking down on them, mocking them and treating them poorly, first by giving them to the lowest, least competent, and worst-trained people around, and then by complaining like spoiled kids if our babies are ignored, our biscuits are soggy, our homes are messy, and our baths are not done. If someone suggests that the solution to this behavior is to improve the situation of those doing the work, our anger becomes even worse and harder to understand. We refer to them by their first names, tarnishing a sacred connection; we push them to the back entrances; we make sure their meals are anything but a respectful event or a relaxing break, usually just a rushed, criticized bite taken amidst trash; we demand, not genuine, but bought respect, and we leave them exposed to insults from our kids and our husbands.

I remember a girl—she was so pretty, with a rosy glow on her cheeks and her charming curviness! She had come to the valley that summer to "do housework." I met her and walked home with her in the exciting shadows to an old village house I knew well; then as I was about to leave, I found out she was there alone for the weekend with just one young white man representing the family. He was probably a "gentleman" and all that, but for the first time in my life, I realized what a trap was being set at the feet of my community's daughters, lured in by church and state.

Not only does the harm done to the lower classes impact them, but Society and Science suffer too. The unit we aim to establish as the center of society—the Home—misses out on the benefits of scientific innovation and ideas. It has taken a tremendous effort, and quite some time, to gain a foothold for the vacuum cleaner, washing machine, power tools, and chemical agents. In our frantic attempt to cling to the last remnants of slavery and medieval practices, we not only resist these advancements but also try to use education and government power to train the servants that don’t come naturally.

In the meantime, the chaotic rush to leave the house service continues for everyone who can scramble or run. The labor union's rules aren’t just about increasing wages; they also aim to prevent any similarities between artisans and servants. There’s no real difference in skill and training between a subway guard and a Pullman porter, but a whole world separates their union cards.

Yet we remain quiet. Lowly jobs aren't seen as a "social problem." They aren't really talked about. There's no plan for their "reform." There’s only one solution: Get away! Take yourself and your kids out of the shadow of this terrible situation! Hire help, but don’t ever be one yourself. In fact, subtly but surely, being able to hire at least "a maid" is still society's mark of respectability, while "a man" is the first word of privilege.

All of this is because we still consciously and unconsciously cling to the "manure" theory of social organization. We believe that underneath organized human life are necessary duties and services that no real person should be forced to do. We push down the outcasts and half-people, whom we hate and look down on, and try to build above it—Democracy! On such foundations is built a Theory of Exclusiveness, a belief that the world moves forward by excluding the majority from the benefits of culture, so that a gifted minority can flourish. Through this mindset, the modern democrat reaches a point where they are willing to assign two capable men and two strong horses to help one elderly woman take her morning air.

Here the absurdity ends. Here all honest minds stop and ask: Is menial work permanent or necessary? Can't we move cooking from the home to the scientific lab, just like laundry? Can't machines, operated by skilled and well-paid workers, handle our cleaning, sewing, moving, and decorating? Can the education of children become an even more significant profession than caring for the sick? And shouldn't personal service and companionship be tied to friendship and love, where they truly belong and from which they can never be separated without causing degradation and pain?

In short, can we all—regardless of race or wealth—look forward to a world of service without actual servants?

A miracle, you say? That's right. And it can only be done by the Immortal Child.

It happened in Waco, Texas.

The prison guard laughed. "I don't know," he said, "I hadn't thought of that." He paused and gazed at the stranger with curiosity. In the dim twilight, he noticed the man's unusual height and soft, dark eyes. "An odd person for the colonel to know," he thought; then he spoke again, "But that guy over there is trouble, a natural thief, and should be locked up for life; he got ten years last time—"

Here, the promoter's voice, coming from inside, interrupted; he was leaning over his calculations, sitting next to the colonel. He was slender, with a sharp nose.

"The inmates," he said, "would cost us $96 a year for their meals. Well, we can manage to keep it under $125 each. Now, if these guys work hard, they can complete this line in twelve months. It should be operational by next April. Shipping costs will drop by fifty percent. Just think, you'll be a millionaire in under ten years."

The colonel jumped. He was a stocky, short guy with a clean-shaven face and a certain refined look about his features; the word millionaire sounded great to him. He pondered—he pondered a lot; he could almost hear the rumble of the extremely expensive car that was approaching down the road, and he said:

"I guess we might as well hire them."

"Sure," answered the promoter.

The voice of the tall stranger in the corner interrupted here:

"Will it be a good thing for them?" he asked, somewhat uncertain.

The colonel shifted his position. "The guard has unusual friends," he thought to himself. "What’s this guy doing here, anyway?" He looked at him, or more accurately, at his eyes, and for some reason, he suddenly felt a sense of warmth toward him. He said:

"Well, at least it can't hurt them; they're past that."

"It'll be good for them, then," said the stranger again.

The promoter shrugged. "It'll be good for us," he said.

But the colonel shook his head impatiently. He felt the urge to justify himself in front of those eyes, and he replied, "Yeah, it’ll do them good; or at least it won’t make them any worse than they already are." Then he started to say something else, but sure enough, the sound of the car pulling up at the gate interrupted him, and they all stood up.

"It’s settled, then," said the promoter.

"Yeah," said the colonel, turning back to the stranger. "Are you heading into town?" he asked with the polite charm typical of white men toward each other in a small Southern town. The stranger said he was. "Then hop in my car. I need to talk to you about this."

They walked out to the car. As he left, the stranger glanced back at the convict. He was a tall, muscular Black man. His face was dark with anger, featuring a low forehead, thick, drooping lips, and bitter eyes. Despite his dejected look, there was a sense of rebellion around his mouth. He was hunched over a pile of stones, hammering away without much enthusiasm. Next to him stood a twelve-year-old boy—pale, with a frightened, cunning expression. The convict looked up, and their eyes met. The hammer slipped from his hands.

The stranger turned slowly towards the car, and the colonel introduced him. He didn't quite catch his name, but he mumbled something as he presented him to his wife and young daughter, who were waiting.

As they spun around, the colonel began to speak, but the stranger had picked up the little girl and they chatted quietly all the way home.

In some way, they weren’t quite sure how, but they sensed that the man was a teacher and, of course, he had to be a foreigner. The long, cloak-like coat gave it away. They rode through the illuminated town at dusk and finally stopped in front of the colonel's mansion, with its eerie pillars.

The woman in the back seat was thinking about the guests she had invited to dinner and was wondering if she should invite this man to stay. He seemed cultured, and she figured he was some friend of the colonel's. It would be quite interesting to have him there, along with the judge's wife and daughter and the rector. She spoke almost without thinking:

"You'll come in and take a break for a bit?"

The colonel and the little girl insisted. For a moment, the stranger looked like he was going to refuse. He mentioned he had some errands for his dad around town. Then, for the child's sake, he agreed.

Up the steps they went and into the dark living room where they sat and talked for a long time. It was an interesting conversation. Afterwards, they didn't remember exactly what was said, but they all recalled a certain strange satisfaction from that long, quiet talk.

Finally, the nurse arrived for the hesitant child, and the hostess thought to herself:

"We'll have a cup of tea; you’ll be dry and tired."

She rang the bell and turned on a bright light. They all looked at the stranger at once, since they could barely see him in the dim twilight. The woman gasped in surprise, and the colonel half-stood in anger. The man was definitely mixed race; even if he didn't acknowledge his Black heritage, their experienced eyes could tell. He was tall and upright, and his coat resembled a Jewish gabardine. His hair was styled in tight curls that fell down the sides of his face, and his skin had an olive, almost yellow tone.

A harsh command nearly slipped from the colonel's lips but stopped as he locked eyes with the stranger. Those eyes—where had he seen them before? He remembered them from many years ago. The gentle, tear-filled eyes of a brown girl. Memories flooded back, and his face paled and tightened. Those eyes continued to pierce through him, even as they turned slightly away toward the staircase, where the child, dressed in white, lingered with her nurse and waved goodnight. The lady sank into her chair, thinking, "What will the judge's wife say? How did the colonel end up inviting this man here? How can we get rid of him?" She regarded the colonel with a look of disapproving shock.

Just then, the door opened and the old butler walked in. He was an elderly Black man with curly white hair, and he carried a large silver tray filled with a china tea set. The stranger stood up slowly and extended his hands as if to bless the food. The old man hesitated in confusion, stumbled, and then, with a sudden look of joy in his eyes, fell to his knees, causing the tray to crash to the floor.

"My Lord and my God!" he whispered; but the woman yelled, "Mom's china!"

The doorbell rang.

"Oh my gosh! The dinner party is here!" the lady exclaimed. She turned toward the door, but there in the hall, wearing her pajamas, was the little girl. She had sneaked down the stairs to see the stranger again, and the nurse above was calling out without success. The woman felt panicked and scolded the nurse, but the stranger had opened his arms, and with a joyful cry, the child nestled into them. They heard snippets about the "Kingdom of Heaven" as he slowly climbed the stairs with his little, white bundle.

The mother was happy for anything that could help her get rid of the intruder, even if just for a moment. The bell rang again, and she rushed to the door, which the lingering Black maid was just opening. She didn’t notice the stranger’s shadow as he slowly came down the stairs and stopped by the newel post, dark and silent.

The judge's wife entered. She was an elderly woman, frilled and powdered to look somewhat youthful, and dressed beautifully. She stepped forward, smiling with her hands outstretched, but when she reached the stranger, it was as if a chill hit her, and she shuddered and exclaimed:

"What a draft!" she said as she wrapped a silk shawl around herself and shook hands warmly; she completely forgot to ask who the stranger was. The judge walked in, oblivious, lost in thought about a confusing theft case.

"Eh? What? Oh—uh—yeah,—good evening," he said, "good evening." Behind them was a young woman in her youthful prime, elegantly dressed, stunning in both face and figure, with diamonds adorning her lovely neck. She entered gracefully but paused with a slight gasp; then she laughed cheerfully and said:

"Excuse me. Wasn’t that odd? I thought I saw behind your man"—she paused, but he must be a servant, she reasoned—"the shadow of large, white wings. It was just the light on the drapes. It really startled me." And she smiled again. With her was a tall, handsome, young naval officer. Hearing his lady mention the servant, he barely glanced at him, but casually held out his gilded cap, and the stranger carefully placed it on the rack.

Last came the rector, a man of forty, and well-dressed. He started to walk past the stranger, stopped, and looked at him curiously.

"I’m sorry," he said. "I’m sorry—I think we’ve met before?"

The stranger said nothing, and the hostess anxiously urged the guests to move on. But the rector stayed behind, looking confused.

"Of course, I know you. I’ve seen you somewhere before," he said, putting his hand vaguely to his head. "You—you remember me, right?"

The stranger quietly moved his cloak aside, and to the hostess's immense relief, he walked out the door.

"I never knew you," he said quietly as he walked away.

The woman mumbled some lame excuse about intruders, but the rector stood there with annoyance clearly showing on his face.

"I’m so sorry," he said to the hostess distractedly. "It’s a real pleasure to be here—I just felt like I recognized that guy. I’m sure I knew him at some point."

The stranger had gone down the steps, and as he did, the nurse, hanging back at the top of the staircase, rushed down after him, grabbed his cloak, shook with fear, hesitated, and then knelt in the dirt.

He gently brushed his hand against her and said, "Leave now, and don't do that again!"

With a cheerful shout, the maid left the house, which had its door wide open, and ran north. The stranger headed east into the night. As they went their separate ways, a long, low howl rose shakily, echoing through the darkness. The colonel's wife inside felt a shiver.

"The bloodhounds!" she exclaimed.

The rector replied nonchalantly:

"Another one of those convicts escaped, I guess. Honestly, they need tougher measures." Then he paused. He was trying to recall that stranger's name.

The judge's wife looked around for a draft and adjusted her shawl. The girl glanced at the white drapes in the hallway, but the young officer was leaning over her, and the energy of life surged through her veins.

Howl after howl echoed in the night, grew louder, and faded away. The stranger walked quickly along the road and into the dense forest. There, he stopped and stood still, tall and unmoving.

A mile up the road, a man was running—tall, strong, and black—with a face marked by crime, wearing stripes like a convict, and shackles on his legs. He ran and jumped in quick, short steps, his chains clinking with each movement. He fell and got back up while the howling of the hounds grew louder behind him.

Into the forest he leaped, crept, jumped, and ran, soaked in sweat; when he saw the tall figure rise in front of him, he suddenly stopped, dropped his hands in frustration, and sank down, panting on the ground. A greyhound burst out of the woods behind him, howling, whining, and fawning at the stranger's feet. Hound after hound barked, leaped, and lay there; then silently, one by one, with their heads bowed, they backed away toward the town.

The stranger cupped his hands and offered the man some water to drink, cooled his overheated head, and carefully removed the chains and shackles from his feet. Slowly, the convict stood up. Daylight was breaking above the treetops. He gazed into the stranger's face, and for a moment, a sense of joy washed over the marks on his face.

"Why, you're black too," he said.

Then the convict looked eager to explain himself.

"I never had a chance," he said quietly.

"Don't steal," the stranger said.

The man got angry.

"But what about them? Can they steal? Didn’t they take a whole year’s worth of work, and then when I stole to avoid starving—" He looked at the stranger.

"No, I didn't steal just to avoid starvation. I stole for the thrill of it. I can't seem to stop myself from stealing. It feels like when I see something, I just have to take it—but, yes, I'll try!"

The convict looked down at his striped outfit, but the stranger had taken off his long coat; he wrapped it around him and the stripes vanished.

In the early morning, the Black man headed towards the small log farmhouse in the distance, while the stranger watched him. There was a fresh energy in the day. The Black man's expression brightened, and the farmer was happy to have him. All day, the Black man worked harder than ever. The farmer provided him with some cold food.

"You can sleep in the barn," he said, turning away.

"How much do I get a day?" asked the Black man.

The farmer frowned.

"Listen up," he said. "If you sign a contract for the season, I'll pay you ten dollars a month."

"I won't sign any contract," said the Black man firmly.

"Yes, you will," said the farmer, menacingly, "or I'll call the prison guard." And he smirked.

The convict slumped and shuffled to the barn. As night fell, he looked out and saw the farmer leave. Slowly, he crept out and sneaked toward the house. He peered through the kitchen door. No one was there, but dinner was set as if the mistress had prepared it and stepped out. He ate hungrily. Then he looked into the front room and listened. He could hear quiet voices on the porch. On the table lay a gold watch. He stared at it, and in a moment, he was right next to it—his hands were on it! Quickly, he slipped out of the house and slouched toward the field. He spotted his employer coming along the road. He fled back in panic and around to the front of the house, when suddenly he stopped. He felt the intense, dark eyes of the stranger and saw the same dark, cloak-like coat where the stranger sat on the doorstep talking with the mistress of the house. Slowly, feeling guilty, he turned back, entered the kitchen, and quietly placed the watch where he had found it; then he rushed wildly back toward the stranger, arms outstretched.

The woman had set the table for her husband and, after leaving the house, walked over to a neighbor's. She was gone for only a short time, and when she returned, she noticed a dark figure on the doorstep under the tall red oak. She thought it was the new Black man until he spoke softly:

"Will you give me some bread?"

Reassured by the voice of a white man, she quickly responded in her gentle Southern accent:

"Of course."

She was a small woman and had once been attractive, but now her face showed the effects of hard work and worry. She was anxious and always in her head, wishing and wanting for something more. She went inside and brought him some cornbread and a glass of cold, creamy buttermilk; then she came back out and sat next to him. She started, almost instinctively, to share her life story with him—the things she had done, what she hadn’t done, and what she had hoped for. She talked about her husband and the new farm they were trying to purchase. She mentioned that it was tough to find Black workers. She believed they should all be in a chain gang and forced to labor. Even then, some would escape. Just yesterday one had gotten away, and another had fled the day before.

At last, she talked about her neighbors, sharing how nice they were and how awful.

"And do you like all of them?" asked the stranger.

She was hesitant.

"Most of them," she said; and then, looking up into his face and taking his hand, as if he were her dad, she said:

"There’s no one I hate; no, not at all."

He glanced away, holding her hand in his, and said softly:

"You love your neighbor like you love yourself?"

She paused.

"I try—" she started, and then looked in the same direction he was looking; down under the hill where a small, half-destroyed cabin was located.

"They're Black," she replied briefly.

He looked at her. Suddenly, she felt confused and insisted, even though she didn't know why.

"But they're Black!"

With a sudden impulse, she got up and quickly lit the lamp that was just inside the door, holding it above her head. She saw his dark face and curly hair. She screamed in terrified anger and ran down the path, and just as she did, the black convict came running up with his hands outstretched. They collided in the middle of the path, and before he could stop, he had crashed into her, causing her to fall hard to the ground, lying there pale and still. Her husband came rushing around the house, shouting and cursing.

"I knew it," he said. "It's that runaway black guy." He held the black man pinned to the ground and raised his voice to yell. Down the highway came the prison guard, along with a hound, a mob, and a gun. They paused across the fields. The farmer signaled to them.

"He attacked my wife," he gasped.

The crowd growled and moved quietly. They lifted the struggling, writhing Black man right to the branch of the red oak, while others carried the dazed woman. As she stumbled toward the house, she looked around for the stranger with longing, but the stranger was gone. And she didn't tell any of her guests.

"No—no, I don’t want anything,” she insisted, until they left her, thinking she was asleep. For a while, she lay still, listening to the crowd leave. Then she got up. She shivered as she heard the creaking of the branch where the body hung. But she bravely crawled to the window and looked out into the moonlight; she saw the dead man writhe. He stretched his arms out like a cross, looking upward. She gasped and clung to the window sill. Behind the swaying body, down where the small, half-collapsed cabin sat, a single flame flickered up amid the distant shouts and cries of the crowd. A fierce joy surged up through the terror in her soul and then faded away as she watched the flame rise. Suddenly, it swirled into one massive crimson column that shot up to the sky and cast wide arms against the darkness until, above the world and behind the bound and swaying figure below, a large crimson cross hung, quivering and burning.

She buried her throbbing, painful head in a flood of tears, too afraid to look, because she already knew. Her chapped lips moved:

"Hated and rejected by people."

She knew, and the sheer horror of it lifted her heavy, drooping eyelids. There, towering like heaven and spanning the earth, hung the stranger on the crimson cross, torn and bloodied, with a crown of thorns on his head and pierced hands. She stretched out her arms and screamed.

He didn’t hear. He didn’t see. His calm dark eyes, filled with sadness, were fixed on the writhing, twisting body of the thief, and a voice floated through the night winds, saying:

"Today you will be with me in Paradise!"

The rule of men is about managing the individual actions of many people toward a specific goal. Ideally, this goal should be the greatest good for everyone, but no human group has ever achieved this ideal due to ignorance and selfishness. The simplest objective would be to rule for the benefit of One, meaning the Ruler; or the Few—his favorites; or many—the Rich, the Privileged, the Powerful. Democratic movements within groups and nations are constantly happening, aiming to expand the number of people who benefit from the rule. In 18th-century Europe, this effort became so widespread that there was an attempt at universal representation, and the philosophy of the movement claimed that if Everyone ruled, they would rule for Everyone, thus seeking Universal Good through Universal Suffrage.

The real challenge of this program was the widespread ignorance. Most people, even the smarter ones, not only knew very little about each other but even less about how people act in groups and the basic principles of industry. They could only apply universal suffrage to what they were familiar with or only partially understood: they were knowledgeable about personal and manual labor, individual craftsmanship, agriculture and trade, taxes, or seizing private property for public purposes and land rental. With these issues, they tried to make changes. Under the banner of "Freedom," they loosened the hold of selfish interests by limiting manual labor, securing the right to their own craftsmanship, regulating public taxes, redistributing land ownership, and promoting free trade and barter.

While they were doing this despite strong opposition, a completely new way of working suddenly emerged. The abruptness of this "Industrial Revolution" in the 19th century was partly coincidental—in the case of Watt's teakettle—partly a natural progression, like in the matter of spinning, but mainly driven by the resolve of powerful and intelligent people to gain the advantages of privileged individuals, as seen in the foreign slave trade.

The result was, on one hand, a massive and unprecedented growth of industry. Life and society in the late 19th and early 20th century revolved around industry in all its forms, language, and achievements: the goal of life was to produce goods. In the face of this overwhelming reality, the new democracy was shocked and powerless. It couldn't govern because it didn't understand: an unassailable empire of trade, business, and commerce dominated the world, while the Freedom of 18th-century philosophy stood at its door, blocking the way. Some of those who had escaped the oppression of the Middle Ages became the oppressors of the industrial age.

There was a backlash. People mocked "democracy" and politics, and instead promoted Fate and Philanthropy to govern the world—Fate that granted divine right to rule to the Captains of Industry and their made Millionaires; Philanthropy that organized large relief efforts to at least slow down the bleeding from the bigger wounds caused by industry.

At this time, the lowest-paid workers, who toiled the hardest and suffered the most, began to grumble and resist, and among these were the American Black population. Lions have no historians, so their hunts make for exciting and rewarding stories for humans. Black people had no poets, which is why it’s often said that American philanthropy freed the slaves. In reality, Black people revolted through armed rebellion, by refusing to work, by using poison and committing murder, by escaping to the North and Canada, by inspiring and empowering the abolitionist movement, and by supplying 200,000 soldiers and many more civilian supporters during the Civil War. This war was not fought for the freedom of Black people, but rather it was a conflict between two industrial systems, one of which was bound to fail because it was outdated, and the other destined to succeed thanks to the Industrial Revolution.

When the Black man was freed, the Philanthropists aimed to apply the Philosophy of Democracy passed down from the 18th century to his situation.

There was an opportunity here to experiment with democratic governance in a fresh way, specifically against the new industrial oppression, using a workforce that was still outside its grasp. With plenty of land spread out, essential products like cotton, rice, and sugar cane, and a solid education system, there was a unique chance to create a new modern democracy in industry in the southern United States that could set an example for the world. If this was accomplished by Black people, it would promote a new unity among individuals and help eliminate the deep-seated animosities along racial lines.

Efforts were made. The 14th and 15th amendments granted the right to vote to both white and black workers, and they quickly set up a public school system and started addressing the land issue. The United States government was actively looking into the distribution of land and resources—"40 acres and a mule"—and the rising price of cotton created a straightforward path to economic independence. Cooperative movements started to develop on a large scale.

But sadly! Not only were the former slave owners strongly opposed to this experiment, but the industrialists in the North also viewed any attempt at industrial democracy as a threat. Their objections were rooted in racial issues, and Reconstruction is remembered in history as a significant movement for white people's self-assertion against the perceived overreach of marginalized black individuals, rather than as a genuine struggle for the rights of both black and white workers.

The outcome was the disenfranchisement of Black people in the South and a global effort to limit democratic progress to white races while distracting them with racial animosity towards darker races. This initiative, while it certainly contributed to the improvement of white labor conditions, also disproportionately concentrated wealth and power in the hands of major European industrial leaders and enabled modern industrial imperialism.

This sparked renewed efforts among white European workers to understand and use their political power for reform through democratic control.

Whether labeled as Communism, Socialism, or something else, these initiatives are neither new nor unusual nor dreadful, but rather age-old and striving for a fully justifiable human ideal—the only ideal worth pursuing: guiding individual actions in industry to achieve the greatest good for everyone. Marxism was one method to achieve this goal, advocating for the elimination of private ownership of machines and materials. There were two major objections to this idea. The first was an attack on its fundamental democratic basis: modern European white industry does not even theoretically aim for the good of everyone, but only for all Europeans. This objection went largely unanswered—indeed, some Socialists openly excluded Black and Asian people from their plans. This made it easy to shift into a kind of syndicalism that advocates for socialism only for skilled workers while leaving unskilled workers in their struggles.

This brings us back to the basics. It forces us to take another look at the foundations of democracy.

Who can be left out of having a say in how people are governed? Over and over, the world has replied:

The Uninformed
The Naive
The Cautious
The Reluctant

That is, we have assumed that only the educated should vote, or those who know how to lead others, or those who are not under protective guardianship, or those who strongly desire the right.

These limitations aren't reasons to widely distribute the ballot; instead, they're justifications for restricting it that cater to the interests of today's real rulers. We often say things like, "Ignorant people shouldn't vote." What we really mean is, "No civilized society should have citizens who are too ignorant to take part in government," and this leads us to the conclusion that no society is truly civilized if its citizens are too ignorant to have a say in how it's run. In other words, education shouldn't be a requirement for political control—political control actually drives popular education.

Once again, making experience a requirement for voting is ridiculous: it would halt the spread of democracy and turn political power into something inherited, based on class, caste, race, or gender. Some have argued, quite seriously, that only white people, Englishmen, or men are truly capable of exercising authority in a modern state. This argument falls apart: just yesterday, it was only Englishmen of noble birth, or people of "blood," or rulers "by divine right" who were deemed worthy of leadership. Today, the civilized world is led by the descendants of those who were considered incapable of ever forming a self-governing society just a century ago. In every modern state, every generation, and indeed every year, people who lack experience in addressing political issues must go to the polls and try out new ways of governing. This, and only this, is how civilization will advance.

Again, what is this theory of kind guardianship for women, for the masses, for Black people—for "inferior groups without rights"? It is just the same old argument for privilege, the same outdated belief that some people in the world know better what is best for others than those others know for themselves, and who can be trusted to handle it better.

In reality, no one truly knows themselves except for their own soul. The vast and incredible knowledge of this amazing universe is held within the hearts of each individual. To access this powerful pool of experience, knowledge, beauty, love, and action, we need to reach out to everyone, not just a few select individuals. The more limited our outreach, the poorer our culture; the broader our outreach, the more magnificent the possibilities. Human nature is infinite. We make it limited by excluding the masses, by trying to speak for others, interpret for them, and ultimately end up serving our own interests and treating the world as our personal property. If that were all there was to it, it would be crime enough—but it’s more than that: our ignorance prevents us from creating a greater world; we push away a world filled with the play of dogs and the laughter of children, the music of Black folks and the worship of Asians, the love of women and the strength of men, and we try to express the Will of the World through a group of feeble elders.

There are people who see voting not as a right for everyone, but as a privilege for a select few. They say certain people and groups, "They don’t need the vote." This is often said about women. It's argued that everything women could achieve with voting can be handled by others on their behalf; that they have influence and connections, and that giving them the vote would just double the number of votes. Similarly, we hear that American Black people can rely on other voters to do all the things they could achieve themselves with the vote, and even more, because white voters are seen as more knowledgeable.

Further than this, it’s argued that a lot of the people who are disenfranchised see these realities. "Women don’t want the vote" has been a very effective counter-argument, so much so that many men have taken comfort in saying: "When they want to vote, then—" Similarly, we’re constantly told that the "best" Black individuals avoid politics.

Such arguments demonstrate a curious misunderstanding of the foundation of the case for democracy that the case needs to be continually restated and emphasized. We must remember that if the theory of democracy is correct, the right to vote is not just a privilege, nor simply a way to address the needs of a specific group, and certainly not merely a matter of acknowledged want or desire. Democracy is a way of achieving the greatest measure of justice for all people. Throughout history, the world has tried various methods to reach this goal, most of which can be grouped into three categories:

The approach of the kind dictator.
The approach of the chosen few.
The approach of the marginalized groups.

The approach of placing the governance of a people in the hands of a strong leader has significant benefits when that leader possesses strength, capability, genuine dedication to the public good, and an understanding of what that good requires. However, such a combination is rare, and choosing the right leader is very challenging. Relying on force to make the selection promotes physical strength, luck, and manipulation; making the choice based on birth simply shifts true power from the sovereign to the minister. Ultimately, the responsibility for choosing leaders must rest with the voters.

Then comes the problem: who gets to choose? The previous answer was: a select few, like the wise, the privileged, the capable. Many people think corruption is what caused those aristocracies to fail. That's not the case. The most effective aristocracy, like the best monarchy, struggled due to a lack of understanding. The leaders didn’t know or grasp the needs of the people, and they could not find out because, ultimately, only the individual, no matter how humble, understands their own situation. They might not know how to fix it, or even recognize what’s wrong; but they know when something hurts, and only they know how that hurt feels. Or if they’ve sunk so deep that they can't feel, understand, or complain, and don’t even realize they are hurt, God help their country, because it not only lacks knowledge, but has also destroyed the sources of knowledge.

As soon as a nation realizes that the vast wealth of knowledge lies within the minds and hearts of its individual citizens, which it can use to create a fair government, it increasingly encourages those citizens to choose their leaders and assess the fairness of their actions.

Even here, though, the temptation is to seek wisdom only from citizens of a certain rank or those deemed valuable. Certain classes are often left out, either quietly or openly. For example, women have been left out of modern democracy due to the enduring belief in female subordination and the argument that their husbands or male family members would take care of their interests. Of course, most husbands, fathers, and brothers do want to look out for them, as much as they understand or recognize women's needs. But remember the core of the argument: in the end, only the person suffering truly knows their suffering, and no society can be strong if it ignores the insights of mothers, wives, and daughters. We only need to look at the troubling dynamics between the sexes globally and the issues affecting children to see how urgently we need this excluded wisdom.

The same arguments apply to other excluded groups: if a race, like the Black race, is excluded, then as long as that race is a part of the economic and social structure of the country, the feelings and experiences of that race are essential for achieving the broadest justice for all citizens. If the “submerged tenth” is excluded, then once again, we lose an experience of immense value, and they must be quickly uplifted to a position where they can speak for themselves. Similarly, children must be educated, mental illness prevented, and only those who cannot be trained to advocate for themselves should be placed under the guardianship of others.

The real argument for democracy is that the people are the source of endless life and unlimited wisdom that leaders need. A particular group today may not be knowledgeable, but through a democratic government that values not only the individual but also their feelings and experiences, they can educate not just individuals but also generation after generation, building a wealth of wisdom. Democracy is the only way to share the collective experience of humanity for the benefit of the future, and if democracy tries to exclude women, people of color, the poor, or any group based on inherent traits that don’t affect intelligence, then it undermines itself and fails to live up to its name.

From this perspective, we can clearly identify both the weaknesses and strengths of the current criticism regarding the expansion of voting rights. It's the responsibility of a modern government to ensure that the number of uninformed people within its borders is kept to an absolute minimum. Additionally, every government has a duty to increase the number of eligible voters of legal age as quickly as possible. These potential voters shouldn't be seen as participants in a restricted resource, but rather as contributors to new national insight and strength.

The addition of new wisdom, fresh perspectives, and different interests can certainly be bewildering and confusing at times. Nowadays, those who have a voice in the political arena have shared their desires and struggles. This has led to a greater or lesser balancing of their conflicting interests. The emergence of new concerns and complaints disrupts the old balance. However, this is definitely a necessary first step towards a larger equilibrium where no human soul is overlooked. While these interests may not all be fully realized, they will be acknowledged and given as much consideration as possible within the context of conflicting interests. The challenge for government moving forward will be to minimize the unavoidable conflict of human interests.

From this perspective, it's easy to see why certain disenfranchised groups strongly demand the right to vote. When women ask for the vote, they aren't seeking a privilege; they're asserting a necessity. You might not see it that way, and you could argue that women don't need the right to vote. In fact, many women might agree with you. However, women do need the vote. They need it to restore balance in a world that is severely out of whack due to the harsh neglect of women's and children's rights. No matter how well-meaning and informed a man may be, he can't understand women's needs as well as women do themselves. Denying women the right to vote is a conscious choice to turn away from understanding and remain in ignorance.

The same goes for American Black people: the South constantly claims that having white people in a caring, protective role over Black people is the best approach. They believe that white people not only know better what Black people need than they do, but that they are also eager to meet those needs. As a result, Black people are left feeling ignorant and powerless. They can't "understand" Black people; they can't protect them from exploitation and violence; and overall, instead of a loving protective role, we see chaos and exploitation. If Black people could speak for themselves in the South instead of being spoken for, and if they could advocate for themselves instead of relying on the occasional support from white citizens, the South would have a much healthier form of democracy.

So, too, with the people of darker skin tones around the globe. No global federation, no real international body—can shut out Black, Brown, and Asian communities from its discussions. They must participate and be represented fairly based on their numbers in the world’s council.

It should not be assumed that giving women the right to vote won't come with a cost. For many years, it will complicate our politics. It may even alter the current state of family life. It will allow thousands of inexperienced individuals to vote without the necessary knowledge. Most importantly, it will disrupt some of the current privileges of men and likely annoy them significantly for quite some time.

So, enfranchising Black people meant rebuilding society, with all the corruption, bribery, and incompetence alongside the creation of public schools and progressive social laws. Today, it would mean that Black men in the South should be treated with respect, have their wishes acknowledged, and their rights as men recognized. Every white Southerner who wants to maintain a status of superiority, who believes in a system of inherited servants and a privileged upper class, or who harbors resentment towards certain races due to their traits, would oppose this.

Notwithstanding this, if America is ever going to be a government that offers broad justice to every citizen, then every citizen must have the right to vote. There might be temporary exclusions, until the uninformed and their children are educated, or to prevent too sudden an influx of inexperienced voters. But these exclusions can only be temporary if justice is to prevail.

The idea that all government should be based on the consent of the people is accepted and clear. Additionally, the approach of modern democracy has given today's governments access to greater levels of efficiency, capability, and even talent than what ancient or medieval states could have imagined. It’s reasonable to believe that this significant progress can continue to grow among all races and nations.

Even though we have significant differences and abilities, there's no scientific reason to think that any individual, regardless of race or gender, can't achieve normal human development if they are given a fair chance. Unfortunately, this belief is frequently denied. It's denied so loudly and so often, with such strong conviction, that many people who don't think deeply seem to believe that most humans aren't truly human and don't deserve humane treatment or opportunities. This highlights how utterly ignorant we are of one another. We're often surprised to find people who think like we do. We don't really interact with each other; we engage with our perceptions of one another, and few have the willingness or the courage to challenge their own beliefs. The men who claim the most passionately that women are inherently inferior are often those who are closest to them—husbands, brothers, and sons. They're the ones who find it hardest to consider women as equals or to recognize that women's rights deserve to be respected by men. Similarly, those who live closest to Black people are often the ones who most adamantly claim that it's impossible to coexist with Black individuals unless they're in positions of servitude or social exclusion. This shows that those closest to an issue can be the most blind to it, while the history of humanity is essentially the story of recognizing our shared humanity among increasingly broader groups.

If the foundations of democracy are seen as strong, how can we make democracy work effectively in places where it currently fails—especially in industry? Marxists claim that industrial democracy will naturally come after the public owns the machines and materials. However, their opponents argue that just nationalizing machines and materials wouldn’t be enough because most people don’t understand the industrial process. They don’t know:

There's no doubt that the control of machines and materials is a major reason for the power of industrial tyrants over ordinary workers, and that this control today comes just as much from luck and dishonesty as from hard work and intelligence. As far as it stems from luck and dishonesty, the case for public ownership of capital is undeniable, even if it means some disruption of established rights and inheritance. This is becoming widely accepted across the civilized world. But what about the accumulation of wealth from hard work and intelligence—would democracy in industry interfere so much that it discourages enterprise and makes it impossible to manage the complex industrial processes of modern times effectively?

The knowledge of what to do in industry and how to do it to achieve the final products is in the hands and minds of the workers and managers, while the public judges the outcome. Therefore, it's not really a question of whether the world will accept democratic control, but rather how such control can be ignored for long when people grasp the basics of industry. How can civilization continue to allow one person or a small group to secretly decide what goods will be produced—whether it's bread or champagne, overcoats or silk socks? Is it possible to keep such immense power away from the people?

But it might be timely to ask: has our experience in electing public officials led us to believe that we could run railways, cotton mills, and department stores through popular vote? The answer is clear: no, it hasn’t, and the reason is a lack of interest in politics and the tyranny of the majority. Politics haven’t addressed the everyday issues that matter most to people—like work and wages; or if they have, it's been in a vague and indirect way. When voting affects the vital, everyday interests of everyone, nominations and elections will require more informed participation. Also, consider the huge untapped and misused potential of public rewards to attract talent and expertise for the state’s service. If millionaires can purchase science and art, can’t the democratic state offer more than just money but also the larger ideal of the common good?

There still remains, however, the issue of the Majority.

What’s causing the undeniable reaction and concern that the citizens of a democracy constantly experience? I believe it's the inability to grasp the full importance of the shift in power from a privileged few to an all-powerful majority, and the belief that simply having majority rule is the final answer to governance; that majorities have no responsibilities, that they govern by divine right. While it's true that government should be based on the consent of the people, does the agreement of a majority at any given moment really reflect the consent of everyone? Does the minority, even if it's small, unpopular, and out of style, not deserve to be treated with respect?

I remember that great little high school textbook, "Nordhoff's Politics," where I first learned about government. It opens one of its key chapters with the line: "The first duty of a minority is to become a majority." This statement holds some truth, but it also contains a dangerous misconception: that any minority unable to become a majority deserves no consideration. But what if the outvoted minority is always going to be a minority? Women, for example, can rarely expect to be a majority; artists will always be few; talent is always rare, and Black people in this country make up only about ten percent. To oppress such minorities, to intimidate and insult them, and to call a system that crushes ideas and individuality while claiming to be a democracy just because it follows majority rule is clearly a dangerous distortion of the true democratic ideal. This is where democracy in America and elsewhere often falls short—not in its goals, but in its methods. We have tried to elevate any random majority and grant it the power to rule as if by divine right. We have scorned and belittled minorities as if they were usurpers when their only "crime" was not sharing our ideas or appearance. Efficiency, talent, and genius often find no place in such an environment. It's no surprise that revolts happen and blatant tactics are employed to pretend that the policies we support or the people we like are backed by an entirely fictional majority vote.

Are the methods of such a revolt smart, no matter how great the provocation and wrong may be? If the absolute rule of the majority is frustrating and ineffective, is it really any more ineffective than the absolute rule of individuals or privileged classes has been in the past? Is turning from a majority dictator to a smaller, privileged group or a single person likely to fix things for good? Are we going to take a step back a thousand years just because our current problem is confusing?

Surely not, and also, the solution to absolutism is in involving these same minorities in discussions. Just as the king-in-council succeeded the king through divine authority, future democracies must embrace and support minorities, and be willing to regard the most unconventional, humble, and marginalized groups as “people.” This approach is essential for gaining the consent of the governed. In the future, societies and governments won’t assume that just because they have the raw power to impose currently dominant ideas, it’s best to do so without engaging thoughtfully with the perspectives of smaller groups and individuals. Proportional representation, both physically and spiritually, must happen.

That this method is becoming popular is evident in the minority groups of modern legislatures. Instead of artificially trying to split all possible ideas and plans between two major parties, modern legislatures in advanced nations are seeing the rise of smaller and smaller minority groups, while government is managed through temporary coalitions. For a while, we criticized this and tried to view it as a distortion of the only viable method of practical democracy. Today, we are slowly realizing that governing through temporary coalitions of small and diverse groups can be a very effective way to express the will of the people and to liberate the human spirit. The only barrier to the quicker development of this governance by allied minorities is the fear of external war, which is repeatedly used to force these vibrant, human, thoughtful groups into cold, thoughtless, and lethal machines.

The people who step up at the beginning of the 20th century to lead others must believe firmly that no nation, race, or gender has a monopoly on talent or ideas; that no group is so small that it deserves to be overlooked as part of the whole and as an essential, respected part of humanity; and that, above all, no group of twelve million Black individuals, even though they are physically at the mercy of a hundred million white majority, can be stripped of their voice in government and their right to self-development without striking at the very foundations of democracy and human progress. The criticism directed at universal suffrage today is actually a call for power from consciously capable minorities—but these minorities make a grave mistake when they think that less democracy will lead to greater efficiency for themselves and their peers. No modern nation, no matter how tempting, can close off opportunities to its women, peasants, laborers, or marginalized groups. Future citizens of the world will be shocked to discover that as recently as 1918, great and advanced nations were desperately trying to limit the development of talent and individuality to one gender—that is, to half the population; and they will likely learn that similar efforts to restrict humanity to one race lasted a hundred years longer.

The idea that the majority is always right leads to an almost comedic insistence on a boring level of sameness. It requires everyone to be the same or face exclusion. At the same time, its biggest accusation against those who rebel is this very desire for individuality: the suffragette is said to want to be a man, the socialist is accused of resenting the rich, and the black man is seen as wanting to be white. The thought that any of these individuals might just want to be themselves is unimaginable to the average person who idolizes the majority. Yet, of all possible worlds, may the good Lord save us from one where everyone looks, thinks, and acts just like their neighbor.

The world has come to understand the harm that a privileged few can inflict on the majority of a nation. This truth has been presented to us so clearly that we tend to believe that a privileged and empowered majority can't equally harm a nation. As insane, cruel, and wasteful as the tyranny of the few over the many may be, it isn't any more dangerous than the tyranny of the many over the few. Violent revolutions often end the tyranny of the few, but the spiritual losses from oppressed minorities can be immense and deadly, remaining unknown and unrecognized because their ideas, dreams, and abilities are stifled by brute force.

If we now have a democracy that includes everyone, with all men and women having the right to vote, what should this democracy do? How will it operate? What will be its focus?

The irony confronting the modern world today is that democratic governance is often restricted in its management of human interests. People are involved in agriculture, forestry, mining, food production, construction, clothing and machinery manufacturing, transportation of goods and individuals, sharing information, distributing products, providing public and private services, educating, promoting science, and producing art.

In this complex mix of activities, the theory of government has so far only established very broad rules of behavior, defining the boundaries of seriously anti-social actions like fraud, theft, and murder.

The idea was that within these limits was Freedom—the ability to think, act, and move as one chooses. The actual reality of freedom turned out to be much narrower in one way and much wider in another. When it comes to Truth, Faith, and Beauty, the old rules were unreasonably strict, while modern rules are undeniably foolish. This is where the future and powerful struggle for Freedom must and will take place. Here in the skies and on the mountaintops, the air of Freedom is vast, nearly endless, because up here, in the highest reaches, individual freedom doesn’t harm anyone, and thus, no one has the right to restrict it.

On the flip side, in the valleys of the tough, unyielding laws of matter and the social demands of time, production, and human interaction, the constraints on our freedom are strict and unforgiving if we want to survive and prosper. This doesn't mean that everything here is controlled by undeniable "natural" law that doesn't require human choices regarding raw materials, machinery, prices, wages, information sharing, education for kids, and so on; but it does mean that decisions here must be constrained by harsh realities and grounded in science and human needs.

Today, the scientific and ethical limits of our industrial activities are not controlled by scientists, educators, and thinkers; nor is the decision-making power held by the public whose welfare these decisions impact. Instead, control of industry is mainly in the hands of a powerful few, who prioritize their own interests over the well-being of others. Therefore, the creation of industry rules is not a collective effort, but rather the domain of a select few. Those who govern industry focus not on the needs of humanity, but on their own desires. They operate quietly, often secretly, resisting laws as they see them as obstacles to the "freedom of industry," while also opposing open discussions and transparent establishment of work, wealth, and wage rules, arguing that harsh natural law does not allow for interference by democracy.

These issues today aren’t subjects for open discussion or decision-making. They are tightly regulated. Who’s in charge of them? Who establishes these internal, yet influential, rules? Very few know. Some claim and believe these rules are “natural”—part of our unavoidable physical world. Some of them likely are; but many are obviously just the self-serving demands imposed by the powerful individuals who today dominate industry. This is where modern people insist that Democracy replace the cleverly hidden, yet painfully obvious, Monarchy.

In industry, monarchy and the aristocracy are in charge, and some who call themselves democratic believe that democracy can never be part of this world. They argue that industry relies on technical knowledge and skill, making it the privilege of a few. They highlight the failures of attempts at democratic control in industry, just as we used to point to Spanish-American governments, and they not only criticize the failures of Russian Soviets—they even take up arms to stop what could be the biggest experiment in industrial democracy the world has ever seen. These people insist: We must control labor or civilization will collapse; we must control white labor in Europe and America; most importantly, we must control yellow labor in Asia and black labor in Africa and the South, or we won't have tea, rubber, or cotton. And yet, is it really so easy to give up on the dream of democracy? Must industry dominate people, or can people take charge of industry? And if people don't control industry, can they ever truly hope to make laws, educate children, or create beauty?

The issue of making industry democratic is huge, and no one can deny that. We need to promote empathy and understanding that allows for the greatest personal freedom while still maintaining necessary public oversight; we need to choose leaders based on their skills rather than just their charm. We should be open to deferring to knowledge and science, and assess outcomes rather than just methods; finally, we must acknowledge that how goods are distributed—the issues of wages and income—is an ethical matter, not just a technical one, and it requires serious public consideration rather than secrecy and hidden agendas. All of this requires time and growth. It won't happen overnight with a sudden revolution, nor will it unfold gradually over a thousand years. Instead, it progresses day by day, piece by piece, as people learn and evolve, and as children are raised in truth.

These steps are often straightforward: gradually increasing public democratic ownership of industries, starting with basic public utilities and monopolies, and expanding responsibly as we gain experience; using taxation to limit inheritance and to capture unearned gains for public benefit, starting (but not stopping) with a "single tax" on monopolized land values; and educating the public in business practices through cooperation in buying and selling, as well as in industrial methods through shop committees and manufacturing guilds.

But beyond all this must come the Spirit—the desire for human brotherhood among all colors, races, and beliefs; the need for everyone’s needs to be met. Perhaps the greatest contribution of modern socialism to the world is not its ideology or principles, but the idea behind its powerful word—Comrade!

In the Land of the Heavy Laden, a gloomy day arrived. The King, who sat on the Great White Throne, looked up and saw from afar that the hills around were filled with enemy feet, and the sound of their mockery weighed heavily on the King's ears, for the King cared for his enemies. So the King raised his hand in the sparkling silence and gently said, "Call the Servants of the King." Then the herald stepped in front of the throne and announced, "Thus says the High and Mighty One, who lives in Eternity and whose name is Holy— the Servants of the King!"

Now, there were a hundred and forty-four thousand servants of the king—loyal and courageous, strong and quick-witted; also, there were wise women and women incredibly beautiful and graceful. Yet, on this bleak day when the King called, they were weighed down by the dust of the enemy, their eyes were blinded by the glint of his spears, and they hid their faces in fear and stayed silent, not moving even at the King's command. So the herald called out again. The servants shrank back in shame, but no one stepped forward. However, the third call from the herald reached a woman far away. She immediately set aside her baking and sweeping, the clanging of pots; she put down her chatting and gossiping, and her sewing, and she stood before the King, saying: "Your servant, O Lord."

Then the King smiled—a wondrous smile that made the setting sun break through the clouds, hardening the hearts of the King’s men. In a soft voice, the King said, so quietly that even those listening could barely hear: "Go, strike down my enemies, so they stop doing evil in my sight." The woman quivered and trembled. Three times, she looked up to the hills and saw the enemies rushing forward in their fury. And when she saw, she shrank back—three times she shrank back and crawled to the King’s feet.

"Oh King," she exclaimed, "I am just a woman."

And the King replied, "Alright, Mother of Men."

And the woman said, "No, King, but I am still a virgin." To which the King responded: "Oh virgin, created by Man, you shall be the Bride of God."

And yet the third time, the woman flinched at the thunder in her ears and whispered, "Dear God, I'm black!"

The King said nothing, but moved the covering from his face and looked at her, and behold! it was dark.

So the woman went out on the hills of God to fight for the King, on that gloomy day in the land of the Heavy Laden, when the wicked were furious and plotted something foolish.

I remember four women from my childhood: my mother, cousin Inez, Emma, and Ide Fuller. They embodied the roles of the widow, the wife, the maiden, and the outcast. In terms of color, they were brown and light brown, yellow with brown freckles, and white. They lived not for themselves, but for men; they were named after the men they were connected to, rather than reflecting their own identities.

They weren’t just people; they were connections, and those connections were wrapped in mystery and secrecy. We didn’t know the truth or believe it when we heard it. Motherhood! What was that? We didn’t really know or care much. My mom and I were good friends. I liked her. After she passed away, I loved her with a deep sense of personal loss.

Inez was a beautiful brown-skinned cousin who got married. What was marriage? We didn’t know, and neither did she, poor thing! For her, it ended up meaning a bunch of kids, poverty, a drunken, cruel partner, sickness, and death. Why?

There was no sweeter sight than Emma—slim, straight, and delicate, deeply flushed with the passion of youth; but her life was a wild, terrible fight to suppress her natural, intense joy of love. She suppressed it and turned into a cold, calculating mockery.

Last there was that awful outcast of the town, the white woman, Ide Fuller. What she was, we did not know. She represented to us embodied filth and wrong—but whose filth, whose wrong?

Grown up, I see the issue facing these women clearly; I hear everywhere around me the unreturned call of youthful love, no less glorious for its sincere, straightforward physical passion. Why is it unreturned? Because the young people are too broke to marry, and even if they do marry, they're too broke to have kids. So, they turn in three directions: to marry for financial support, to what men call shame, or to something even worse than nothing. It's an unbearable contradiction; it has to change or the foundations of culture will start to crumble and collapse.

The world wants healthy babies and smart workers. Today, we refuse to let people combine both and force thousands of smart workers to remain childless at a huge cost to their moral well-being, or we condemn them if they break our foolish conventions. Only by giving up their intelligence and the opportunity to do their best work can most modern women have children. This is the curse of women.

All women today are held back because the world they are entering tries to honor both virgins and mothers, yet ultimately disdains motherhood and exploits virgins.

The future woman needs to have a career and financial independence. She needs to be knowledgeable. She should have the choice of motherhood on her own terms. The current aversion to women's freedom must end if we ever want to escape the brutal nature of men's freedom; we don't gain strength by protecting the weak in their weakness, but by empowering weakness to be free and strong.

The world has to choose between the free woman and the ghostly figure of the prostitute. Today, it fluctuates between the prostitute and the nun. Civilization has to demonstrate two things: the glory and beauty of bringing life into the world, and the necessity and responsibility of power and intelligence. This, and only this, will create the perfect union of love and work.

All of this is about women—but what about Black women?

The world that wants to honor women deliberately overlooks its darker counterparts. They seem, in a way, to represent that hidden Sadness:

Yet the world must pay attention to these daughters of sorrow, from the primal black All-Mother of humanity down through the ghostly crowd of powerful women who walked in the mysterious dawn of Asia and Africa; from Neith, the original mother of all, whose feet touch hell, and whose mighty hands hold up the heavens; all religion, from beauty to beast, rests on her eager breasts; her body carries the stars, while her shoulders are adorned with the dragon; from black Neith down to

through dusky Cleopatras, dark Candaces, and darker, fiercer Zinghas, to our own day and our own land,—in gentle Phillis; Harriet, the crude Moses; the sybil, Sojourner Truth; and the martyr, Louise De Mortie.

The father and his worship is Asia; Europe is the precocious, self-centered, ambitious child; but the land of the mother is and has always been Africa. In a subtle and mysterious way, despite her complex history, full of slavery, polygamy, and hard work, the influence of the African mother permeates her land. Isis, the mother, is still the titular goddess, in thought if not in name, of the dark continent. This doesn't seem to be just a survival of the historical matriarchy that all nations pass through—it feels like more than that—as if the great black race, in advancing up the steps of human culture, contributed not only the Iron Age, the cultivation of the land, and the domestication of animals, but also, with special significance, the concept of motherhood.

"No mother can love more deeply, and none is more deeply loved than the Black mother," writes Schneider. Robin recounts the story of a slave who chose to buy his mother’s freedom instead of his own. Mungo Park notes: "Everywhere in Africa, I've observed that there's no greater insult to a Black person than to insult his mother. 'Hit me,' says a Mandingo to his enemy, 'but don’t insult my mother!'" The Krus and Fantis express the same sentiment. People along the Zambezi and the great lakes cry out in sudden fear or joy: "O, my mother!" And the Herero swears (an endless oath) "By my mother's tears!" "Just like the mist in the swamps," exclaims the Angola Black person, "that’s how deep the love for father and mother runs."

A student observing life in today's Gold Coast talks about the village headman's role, saying: "It's a challenging job he's assigned, but he has powerful support from the women in his family, who could be his aunts, sisters, cousins, or nieces. Since their interests align completely with his, these supportive women naturally raise their children to respect the headman. This makes his leadership within the family straightforward and manageable. 'The hand that rocks the cradle rules the world.' Imagine the positive impact the mothers of the Gold Coast and Ashanti could have in the local governance system with proper guidance based on their traditions!"

Schweinfurth states about one tribe: "The connection between a mother and her child that lasts a lifetime is the standard of love displayed among the Dyoor," and Ratzel adds:

In line with the natural relationship, the mother is the primary influence on children. From the Zulus to the Waganda, the mother serves as the most significant advisor at the courts of fierce leaders like Chaka or Mtesa; sometimes sisters step in for her. Even among chiefs with hundreds of wives, family ties remain the strongest, and it’s evident that women, despite often carrying heavy burdens, are highly respected among the Black communities, as shown by the many Black queens, the medicine women, and the involvement of women in public meetings allowed by various Black cultures.

As I think back through the memories of others, tracing my family history, it’s always my mother that stands out—the distant little mother of my grandmothers, who cried her life away in song, missing her lost palm trees and fragrant waters; the tall, bronze grandmother with a pointed nose and sharp eyes, who loved and scolded her cheerful black husband as he lounged in his tall oak chair; and above all, my own mother, with her soothing brown features—the rich velvet of her skin, the soulful dark brown of her eyes, and the small brown-capped waves of her midnight hair as it lay freshly parted on her forehead. In all these distant memories, it’s the mothers and the mothers of mothers who truly matter, while fathers remain shadowy figures.

Based on this African mother-idea, the westward slave trade and American slavery hit like a disaster. In the harsh realities of the human trafficking and the sudden, unprepared freedom, the great balance of society shifted dramatically from a time in 1800—when America had only about eight black women for every ten black men—to a point in 1870—when there were nearly eleven women for every ten men in our Black population. This was just the outward number reflecting social chaos; underneath were issues like polygamy, polyandry, concubinage, and moral decline. The Black slaves in the West Indies, especially among the semi-free artisans, fought desperately against all this. They revived their ancient household gods, and when Toussaint and Cristophe established their kingdom in Haiti, it was rooted in old African tribal connections, grounded in the mother-idea.

The heavy burden of slavery weighed down on Black women. They had no legal recognition of marriage, no legal families, and no legal rights over their children. While customs and religion sometimes filled the gaps that the law left, one only has to look at advertisements like the following to understand the hell within the system:

The Presbyterian synod of Kentucky told the churches it oversees in 1835: "Brothers and sisters, parents and children, husbands and wives are being ripped apart and allowed to see each other no more. These events happen daily among us. The screams and suffering often seen during these times loudly reveal the injustice of our system. There isn’t a neighborhood where these heartbreaking scenes aren’t visible. There isn’t a village or road that doesn’t witness the sorrowful march of shackled outcasts whose grieving faces show they have been forcefully removed from everything their hearts cherish."

A sister of a president of the United States said: "We Southern ladies are flattered by being called wives, but we are really just the mistresses of harems."

Out of this, what kind of black women could emerge in today’s world? Some quickly respond to this question in harsh terms, claiming casually and repeatedly that black slavery produced nothing good in womanhood; that infidelity and impurity are their legacy and remain their experience.

Fortunately, such an exaggerated accusation is simply impossible to be true. The half-million women of African descent who lived at the beginning of the 19th century became the mothers of two and a quarter million daughters by the time of the Civil War and five million granddaughters by 1910. Can all these women be corrupt and yet the oppressed race continue to thrive in wealth and character? It’s impossible. However, salvaging the remnants of self-respect from the past has been an incredibly difficult task. I truly doubt that any other race of women could have maintained their integrity through such a horrific ordeal.

Alexander Crummell once said of his sister: "In her youth, all the fragile tenderness of her gender was brutally violated. In the fields, in the basic cabin, in the press room, in the factory, she was surrounded by rough, ignorant men. She had no opportunity for delicate restraint or gentle modesty. From her childhood, she was the unfortunate target of the most crude desires. All the qualities of her gender were completely overlooked. When the instinct for chastity emerged, she had to fight fiercely for the ownership and control of her own body and often endured pain and suffering for her virtuous self-defense. By the time she reached adulthood, all the gentle instincts of her womanhood were mercilessly trampled. At the age of marrying—always rushed under slavery—she was paired off like the livestock on the plantation, not to be the partner of a beloved and chosen husband, but to produce human beings for the fields or the auction block."

Down in such a mess has the black motherhood of this race struggled—starving its own crying children to raise their arrogant masters; forging chains for its children that even shocked the moral compass of a morally vacant world. Many men and women in the South have lived in a union as sacred as Adam and Eve and had their brown and golden children, but because the darker woman was powerless, her chivalrous and lighter partner could abandon her at his whim and openly mock the body he had secretly disrespected.

I will forgive the white South a lot on its final judgment day: I will forgive its slavery, because slavery is an ancient practice; I will forgive its fight for a cause that was lost and its sentimental recollection of that struggle; I will forgive its so-called "pride of race," the passion of its fiery spirit, and even its amusing, old-fashioned posturing; but one thing I will never forgive, neither in this world nor the next: its wanton and ongoing and relentless disrespect for black womanhood, which it tried and continues to try to exploit for its own desires. I cannot forget that it is these Southern gentlemen who smug Northern hypocrites today want to entrust with our women’s eternal fate—men who refuse to grant my mother, wife, and daughter the signs of courtesy and respect that he gives to others everywhere, except for prostitutes and courtesans.

The outcome of this history of insult and degradation has been both terrifying and remarkable. It has created the haunted prostitute, the fighter, and the hardworking individual; but it has also brought forth a capable womanhood, whose power comes from its freedom and whose purity was achieved through facing temptation rather than being confined and restricted.

To no modern race do its women mean as much as they do to Black people, nor is their meaning so deeply realized. As one of our women writes: "Only a Black woman can say 'when and where I enter, in the quiet, undisputed dignity of my womanhood, without violence and without begging or needing special favors, then and there the whole Black race enters with me.'"

They arrived first, in earlier times, like foam shimmering on dark, quiet waters—snippets of strong, dark womanhood here and there casually brought to the world's attention. Initially, they naturally took on the role of the ancient African mother of humanity, powerful and proud, whose very essence pushed back against the wilderness of oppression and disdain. Such was that cousin of my grandmother, whom western Massachusetts remembers as "Mum Bett." Marked for life by a blow she received while defending her sister, she escaped to Great Barrington and became the first slave, or one of the first, to be declared free under the Bill of Rights of 1780. The son of the judge who freed her writes:

It was these strong women who established the foundation of today's great Black church, with its five million members and ninety million dollars in assets. One of the early mothers of the church, Mary Still, writes in a charming way in the 1840s:

From this spiritual heritage emerged two remarkable women of war-time—Harriet Tubman and Sojourner Truth.

For eight or ten years before the start of the Civil War, Harriet Tubman regularly attended anti-slavery conventions, lectures, and other meetings. She was a black woman of medium height with a cheerful face, missing her upper front teeth, dressed in simple but tidy clothes, and always carrying an old-fashioned purse by her side. Normally, as soon as she sat down, she would fall into a deep sleep.

She was born a slave in Maryland in 1820, with the scars of the whip on her body; she had also become partially deaf and may have been mentally affected by a blow to her head during childhood. Still, she was one of the most significant figures in the Underground Railroad and was a leader for fugitive slaves. She escaped in 1849 and arrived in Boston in 1854, where she was welcomed into the homes of prominent abolitionists, and everyone listened intently to her unique stories. She was completely illiterate, had no understanding of geography, yet year after year, she ventured into the slave states and personally guided over three hundred fugitives north without losing a single one. A standing reward of $10,000 was offered for her capture, but as she stated, "The whites cannot catch us, for I was born with the charm, and the Lord has given me the power." She was one of John Brown's closest advisors, and only severe illness kept her from being at Harper's Ferry.

When the war began, she quickly made her way to the front lines, moving through her own secret routes, supporting the armies in the field, and acting as a guide, nurse, and spy. She accompanied Sherman on his famous march to the sea and was with Grant at Petersburg, and throughout the camps, the Union officers greeted her with silent respect.

The other woman was different—tall, thin, with dark skin and a serious expression, carrying the weight of the world on her shoulders. She escaped from slavery and gave up her original name to take on the name Sojourner Truth. She remembers: "I can recall when I was a little girl, how my old mother would sit outside in the evenings, looking up at the stars and groaning. I'd ask her, 'Mommy, why are you groaning like that?' And she'd reply, 'I'm groaning because of my poor children; they don’t know where I am, and I don’t know where they are. I look up at the stars, and they look up at the stars!'"

Her determination was based on strong faith in the ultimate good. Wendell Phillips recalls being in Faneuil Hall when Frederick Douglass was one of the main speakers. Douglass was outlining the injustices faced by the Black community, and as he spoke, he became increasingly passionate, ultimately declaring that they had no hope for justice from white people—no hope except in their own strength. It would come down to violence! They had to fight for themselves. Sojourner Truth was sitting, tall and dark, in the front row facing the stage, and in the quiet that followed Douglass's speech, she spoke out in her deep, unique voice, which could be heard throughout the hall:

"Frederick, is God really dead?"

Such strong, basic types of Black womanhood in America seem to some to limit its possibilities. They overlook a different but equally deserving, more refined type of Black woman who embodies a delicate sense of beauty and a pursuit of self-realization, which is as much a part of the Black experience as its unique strength and joyful laughter. George Washington wrote with thoughtful respect to a Black woman in 1776, expressing that he would "be happy to see" her at his headquarters whenever she wished, a person "to whom nature has been so liberal and beneficial in her dispensations." This young woman, Phillis Wheatley, shared her simple yet impactful poetry with a world that marveled at her uniqueness. By today's standards, her work may seem modest, yet we still feel her ambitious spirit and call out to her in her own words:

Perhaps even more than strength and skill, human compassion and sacrifice stand out as defining traits of Black womanhood. Long ago, before the Declaration of Independence, Kate Ferguson was born in New York. Freed, widowed, and having lost her children before she turned twenty, she embraced the children from the streets of New York, both white and Black, taught them, found them homes, and, along with Dr. Mason from Murray Street Church, created the first modern Sunday School in Manhattan.

Sixty years later, Mary Shadd emerged from Delaware. She was tall and slim, with a captivating beauty that can be described as mulatto. Well-educated and lively, with determination shining in her sharp eyes, she wholeheartedly joined the great Canadian migration when thousands of hunted black men rushed north for safety. She became a teacher, editor, and lecturer; traveling on foot through winter snow, navigating through crowds and chaos to attend conventions and meetings, and ultimately serving as a recruiting agent for the United States government to enlist Black soldiers in the West.

After the war, the contributions of Black women toward freedom and progress stand out as some of the most remarkable stories in their history. One person who represents this is Louise De Mortie, a free-born girl from Virginia who spent most of her life in Boston. Her strong forehead, full lips, and dark eyes revealed her emotional depth and intelligence. She started a successful career as a public reader. Then the War and the Call came. She went to the orphaned Black children of New Orleans—moving from freedom into disrespect and hardship, facing the threat of yellow fever. She worked hard and had dreams. In 1887, she raised funds and created an orphanage, and that same year, at only thirty-four years old, she passed away, simply stating: "I belong to God."

As I look around me today in this hidden world of mine, even though my brothers are making noise and achieving great things, I instinctively feel and know that it’s the five million women of my race who truly matter. Black women (and women whose grandmothers were black) are currently providing our teachers; they are the foundation of the social settlements we call churches; and they have undoubtedly contributed to three-fourths of our church property. If we have, as seems likely, over a billion dollars in accumulated wealth today, who can say how much of it has come from the hard work of servant girls, washerwomen, and women laboring in the fields? As creators of two million homes, these women are finding incredible ways to express our strength, beauty, and understanding of the truth.

In the United States in 1910, there were 4,931,882 women of African descent; over 1.2 million of them were children, another million were girls and young women under twenty, and 2.5 million were adults. Overall, these women were largely uneducated—about a quarter of those aged fifteen to twenty-five couldn't write. These women are experiencing not just a moral shift, but an economic revolution as well. Their grandmothers married at ages twelve and fifteen, yet twenty-seven percent of these women today who are over fifteen are still single.

Yet these Black women work hard. In 1910, there were two and a half million Black households in the United States. From these homes, two million women and girls over the age of ten went to work every day—more than half of the Black female population, compared to one-fifth of white women. These women are a group of workers fighting for their daily survival like men; they are becoming more independent and moving towards economic freedom! They provided a million farm laborers, 80,000 farmers, 22,000 teachers, 600,000 domestic workers and laundresses, and 50,000 in trades and retail.

The family structure, which represents the ideal of the culture these people were born into, isn't founded on the concept of an economically independent working mother. Instead, its ideal references the protected harem where the mother initially takes on the roles of caregiver and homemaker, while the father is the only provider. What is the unavoidable outcome of the conflict between these ideals and the reality within the colored community? Broken families.

Among native white women, one in ten is separated from her husband by death, divorce, or abandonment. Among Black individuals, the ratio is one in seven. Is the cause racial? No, it's economic, since there's the same high ratio among white immigrants. The breakdown of the modern family is a result of current working and sexual conditions, hitting laborers particularly hard. Black individuals are in a uniquely challenging position because the wages of male breadwinners are below the standard, while there are many job opportunities for Black women in certain domestic roles and increasingly in other industries. So, while fathers and brothers struggle with low wages both in rural areas and cities, the sisters and mothers are drawn to urban jobs. Consequently, Black women often outnumber men nine or ten to eight in many cities, leading to what Charlotte Gilman bluntly refers to as "cheap women."

What should we say about this new economic equality in a large working class? Some people, both inside and outside the race, lament it. "Back to the homes with the women," they shout, "and higher wages for the men." But how impossible this is has been demonstrated by the conditions of war. The halt of foreign migration has undoubtedly increased wages for Black men—but it hasn’t just raised wages for Black women; it has also opened up a multitude of new opportunities for them to earn a living. In fact, here, in a small view and with differences highlighting gender equality, lies the industrial history of labor in the 19th and 20th centuries. We cannot take away the new economic freedom of women. We cannot confine women to their homes again or force them all, under threat of severe consequences, to be nurses and housekeepers.

What is the message of these Black women to America and the world today? The advancement of women is, alongside the issue of racial inequality and the peace movement, our most significant modern cause. Now that these two movements—women's rights and racial equality—are coming together, this combination carries profound significance.

In previous years, women had a clear path: to be beautiful, to be adored, and to have children. That was their expected destiny, and if they happened to be unattractive, hurt, or unable to have kids, it was conveniently overlooked in silence. As partial compensation for this limited future, society has showered women with politeness—its chivalry, bows, and courtesies—all the respect that used to be reserved for courts and kings, now seeking expression. The rebellion of white women against this predetermined fate has recently taken on impressive dimensions, but it is the uprising of an elite group of intellects and talents—the middle class and everyday people still follow the designated path, receiving the almost mocking respect of men.

From black women in America, though, (and from some others as well, but mainly from black women and their daughters' daughters) this veil has been kept away without any sign of apology, and they have been openly trampled under the feet of men. They have been rejected, seemingly for reasons that are particularly frustrating to thinking human beings. When a man steps up with an idea, an action, a vision, we don’t ask how he looks—but what his message is. It’s only of fleeting interest whether the messenger is attractive or unattractive—the message is what matters. This, which is obvious among men, has only been partially true in the past if the messenger was a woman. The world still tends to want women to primarily be beautiful, and if they are not, people complain and ask, "What else are women for?" Beauty "is its own excuse for being," but there are other reasons, as most men know, and when the white world dismisses black women because it doesn’t find them beautiful, the black world rightfully asks two questions: "What is beauty?" and, "If you think they are ugly, so what? If lack of beauty and being unconventional or eccentric in appearance or actions don’t stop men from accomplishing great things and reaping rewards, why should it stop women?"

Other things being equal, all of us, regardless of race, would prefer to be attractive and well-dressed; but most of us are not. One of the biggest revolts of this century is against the cruel idea that no woman is truly a woman unless she meets current beauty standards. In many ways, Black women in America have escaped this notion. Since they aren’t expected to be just decorative, they’ve prepared themselves for work rather than just dressing up for entertainment. Their stronger minds understand that if a woman is clean, healthy, and educated, she is as appealing as anyone can be and far more valuable than many of her peers. If, in addition to that, she happens to be light-skinned and has straight hair— and some men prefer that— then that’s fine; but if she is dark or brown and has beautiful natural curls (which we consider the most beautiful thing on earth), that is hardly a valid reason for her spiritual confinement or exclusion.

The attempt to do this for Black Americans has ironically backfired. The white society's limited view of beauty pushes black women away, yet it simultaneously requires them as vital human beings—an enviable position, as many white women realize. As a result, only black women are held to the standard that "handsome is as handsome does," meaning they are only expected to be as beautiful as they naturally are, but they are expected to be efficient, strong, fertile, muscular, and capable of hard work. If they marry, they have to be able to help support their children as independent workers, since their partners’ pay often makes it impossible for one person to solely provide for the family.

Overall, women of color earn about the same as white women for similar jobs, except in some higher positions, while men of color earn between 25% to 75% less than white men. The outcome is interesting and has three effects: the economic independence of Black women increases, the breakdown of Black families likely happens more often, and the rate of illegitimate children is rising more slowly among them than other signs of progress, similar to what was once observed in Scotland and Bavaria.

What does this mean? It foresees a major dilemma that the entire world of civilization, despite its will, will have to face at some point: the unpartnered mother or the childless wife. I hope for a world where women's freedom and married motherhood are completely intertwined, but until that happens, I see more promise for the future in the betrayed girl-mothers of the black belt than in the childless wives of the white North. I have more respect for the colored servant who embraces her genuine desire for motherhood than for her white counterpart who sacrifices children for material things. From a form of sexual freedom that we find shocking today will eventually come a time when we no longer pay men for work they don’t do, just to support their desires; we will pay women what they earn and demand that they work for it; we will allow those individuals who are knowledgeable enough to vote, whether they are black or female, white or male; and we will prevent race suicide, not by further burdening those who are already overwhelmed, but by honoring motherhood, even when the absent father neglects his responsibilities.

"Wait until the lady walks by," said a white guy from Nashville.

"She's not a lady; she's black," replied another.

So a few women are born free, and some, despite facing insults and stigma, achieve freedom; but our women in black have had freedom forced upon them with contempt. With that freedom, they are purchasing an unrestrained independence, and as costly as it is, it will ultimately be worth every insult and struggle. Today, the dreams of their mothers are becoming reality. We still face poverty and degradation, immorality, and harsh labor; but we also have a large group of Black women who, for their strength of character, purity of spirit, and selfless dedication, easily stand alongside any group of women in the civilized world. Additionally, among our five million women, there is the emergence of new revolutionary ideals that will surely influence the thoughts and actions of this country over time.

For this, their promise, and for their hard past, I honor the women of my race. Their beauty—those deep, mysterious midnight eyes, tangled hair, and soft, full faces—means perhaps more to me than to you, because I was born to its warm and subtle charm; but their value is yours as well as mine. No other women on earth could have emerged from the hell of force and temptation that once engulfed and still surrounds black women in America with half the modesty and grace that they possess. I've always felt like bowing down to them in all humility, seeking to bring some tribute to these long-suffering victims, these burdened sisters of mine, whom the world, the so-called wise, white world, loves to affront and ridicule and wantonly insult. I have known women from many lands and nations—I have known and seen and lived alongside them, but none have I known to be more sweetly feminine, more unwaveringly loyal, more earnestly dedicated, and more instinctively pure in body and soul than the daughters of my black mothers. This, then—a small gesture—to their memory and inspiration.

If a person dies, will they live again? We don't know. But what we do know is that our grandchildren live on and keep evolving toward perfection as they are nurtured. All human issues, then, revolve around the Immortal Child, and their education is the most important issue of all. To illustrate my point, can I take, as an example from the countless lives out there, the life of one forgotten child?

It’s been nineteen years since I first met Coleridge-Taylor. We were in London, in a gloomy hall where many men and women had gathered, mostly drawn by the beautiful World’s Fair in Paris, with a few slipping over to London for the Pan-African meeting. We came from Cape Colony and Liberia, from Haiti and the States, and from the Islands of the Sea. I recall the stiff young officer who came with credentials from Menelik of Abyssinia; I remember the bitter black American who whispered about how an army from the Sudan might someday cross the Alps; I remember Englishmen like the Colensos, who sat and talked with us; but most of all, I remember Coleridge-Taylor.

He was a small, anxious guy with a dark-golden complexion and wild hair. His fingers constantly fidgeted, searching for hidden keys, and he was always filled with enthusiasm—full of life. His wife, who he had been married to for over a year, was also dark in her way but had a calm and quiet demeanor. Her soft contralto voice often left us captivated when she sang, and her silences were filled with understanding.

Several times we met at public events, and then they invited me to their home—a cozy little cottage with a gate and garden, tucked away in the endless suburbs of London. I vaguely remember over the years a room in comfortable disarray, filled with music—music scattered on the floor and on the chairs, music floating in the air as the host rushed to the piano now and then to turn a memory into a melody—making some reference come alive.

And finally, because it was the last time, I saw Coleridge-Taylor in a huge crowd of people inside the Crystal Palace. We entered facing the stage and barely dared to look around. On stage was a full orchestra, a chorus of eight hundred voices, and several world-famous soloists. He left his wife sitting next to me, and she was very quiet as he went up to raise the conductor's baton. It was one of the first performances of "Hiawatha's Wedding Feast." We sat in complete focus, and when the last, haunting music faded away, the great chorus and orchestra stood as one to celebrate the master; he turned toward the audience, and for the first time, we saw that sea of faces behind us—the countless people whose voices blended into one powerful cheer of joy! It was a moment that doesn't come often in life. It felt, and was, prophetic.

This young man who emerged as one of the most prominent modern English composers had a straightforward and uneventful career. His father was a Black surgeon from Sierra Leone who came to London to study. While he was there, he met an English girl, and this son was born in London in 1875.

Then a series of opportunities arose. His father couldn't make it and went back to Africa, leaving the child's support to his struggling working mother. The child showed signs of musical talent, and a kind workingman gifted him a small violin. A musician, looking out from his window, saw a little dark boy playing marbles on the street with a tiny violin in one hand, and offered him lessons. He eventually got into a charity school with a teacher who had an understanding mind and recognized genius when he saw it; and finally, his beautiful child's voice caught the attention of the choirmaster of St. George's in Croydon.

So by happy accident, his path was clear. He felt no hesitation within his soul. He was one of those lucky individuals who don't have to go through a Wander-Jahre, but are born ready to sail and navigate their journey. Even at just four years old, he was already a musician, confidently stepping into his life's work as a choirboy and violinist. He graduated with honors from the Royal Academy of Music in 1894 and soon married the daughter of one of his professors. That was when his life truly began, and while it might not have had much physical adventure in the routine of a modern city, it was filled with a nearly overwhelming outpouring of his spiritual nature. To him, life wasn't just about sustenance—it was a creative fire; ideas, plans, and melodies glowed within him. He lived to create, to act, to achieve; to experience the brilliant glory of powerful nights and the soft Amen of dawns was his ultimate joy. Songs, piano and violin pieces, trios and quintets for strings, incidental music, symphonies, orchestral and choral works rushed from his hands. These weren't laboriously crafted or flimsy compositions made to achieve quick popularity. Instead, they were vibrant pieces that needed to be expressed and sung—they couldn't wait for the slower process of years, rushing to the world as if their young creator knew that God had granted him only a day. His entire active life was barely a decade and a half, yet during that time, without wealth, friends, or influence, and in the face of possibly the most critical, skeptical, and least imaginative civilization of the modern world, he established his name so high as a creative artist that it won't be forgotten anytime soon.

And this was just one side of the man. On the other hand was the kind-hearted, empathetic friend, always ready to help, never able to say no, generous with every ounce of his being. Imagine a young musician, a family man, who at the time of his death held positions as an Associate of the Royal College of Music, Professor at Trinity College and Crystal Palace, Conductor of the Handel Choral Society and the Rochester Choral Society, Principal of the Guildhall School of Music, where he managed the choral choir, the orchestra, and the opera. He often led music festivals across Great Britain and served as a judge for competitions. Despite all of this, his home was always open to friends, welcoming them with warmth, and he was always ready to offer sympathy and support.

When someone like him dies, it should make us stop and think. We might say his cause of death was pneumonia, but we all know it was just overworking—using a finely-tuned instrument too often, too continuously, and carelessly, which prevents it from lasting its normal lifespan. We can talk about wasting resources like wood, water, food, and fuel, but the real and unforgivable waste of modern civilization is the loss of talent and genius—the death of capable, essential people who shouldn’t have to die; who, for the sake of the world, deserve time to relax, freedom from distractions, expert medical care, and genuine compassion.

Coleridge-Taylor's life work was not complete; it was just getting started. He experienced only his early period of creative genius, when melody and harmony sparkled and danced in a subtle, compelling, and more than promising abundance. He didn’t live to do the organized, constructive work in the full, calm power of midday—the thoughtful finishing of the evening. In future records, his name will always be held in high regard, but with the invaluable gift of time, who can say how high it might have reached?

Why did he work so tirelessly, almost wildly? We can be sure it was because he faced a significant choice with unwavering determination and without any thought of giving in—the choice that the cynical, carefree, busy modern world lays grimly before its greatest souls: survival or beauty, basic needs or ideals. Time and again, we see more deserving individuals turning to the easier, cheaper option—the popular portrait, the sensational novel, the catchy song. The choice isn't always between the best and the worst, the noble and the empty; too often, it's between hunger and something to grasp. So when we see a man who is working hard to make a living yet refuses to settle for petty compromises or unworthy tasks, giving away a "Hiawatha" for barely anything, stealing moments to gaze at the stars when a world full of coal offers far more warmth and comfort, we recognize that this man is a hero in a way that no flamboyant soldier or deceitful patriot ever could be.

As deep as the original tragedy was in Coleridge-Taylor's life, there was an even deeper one beneath it. He brushed it off lightly, like we all do—those of us who live behind a facade—to cover the deeper pain. Along with us, he had that beautiful, African ability to laugh, a reflection of countless centuries of sunlight. I remember when he once shared a story about a bishop, the neatly dressed English bishop, who looked at the artist seriously through his monocle—studying his hair, color, and figure—and said, quite loud enough for his friends to hear, "Quite interesting—looks intelligent—yes—yes!"

Fortunate was Coleridge-Taylor to be born in Europe and to speak a universal language. In America, he probably wouldn’t have had his career. His talent was recognized (with some anxiety and shock) when it arrived fully formed from across the ocean with an English origin; but if he had been born here, it might never have been allowed to develop. We know in America how to discourage, stifle, and destroy talent when it dares to manifest itself in a dark skin. England, thank God, is slightly more civilized than her colonies; but even there, this young man's path was no bed of roses and just a little thornier than that of white men. He didn’t complain about it—he didn’t

The hints of color discrimination in England stirred in him a deeper and more profound sympathy for his people around the world. He identified with that great group of mixed-race individuals: Pushkin and Dumas, Hamilton and Douglass, Browning, and many others. But he, more than most, understood the call of his heritage when it came, and he listened and responded. He came to America with a strange enthusiasm. He accepted the usual congratulations from the music world with simple and unconscious grace—he was used to that. But when it came to his own people—filled with the bittersweet quality of their voices, their inherent sense of music, their broken, half-articulate expressions—he felt a new excitement. From the slightly dim shadows of his own life, he instinctively perceived the greater tragedy of theirs. His soul longed to give voice and expression to this human experience. He quickly turned to the sorrow songs. He sat at the hesitant feet of Paul Laurence Dunbar and asked (as we sadly shook our heads) for some masterpiece of this world tragedy that his soul could turn into music. Then, typically, he hurried back to England, composed several exquisite harmonies influenced by slave songs, led the Welsh in their singing, listened to the Scots, organized great music festivals throughout England, wrote for Beerbohm Tree, took on another music professorship, promised a trip to Germany, and finally, staggering home one night on his way to his wife and children, collapsed and died just four days later at the age of thirty-seven. They say that in his last moments he rose up and, facing some grand, ghostly choir, lifted his final baton while the immense silence resonated with the last haunting music of his fading ears.

He was buried from St. Michael's on September 5, 1912, with the admiration of kings, music masters, and little children, set to the grand melody of his own music. The tributes that followed him to his grave were especially heartfelt and genuine. The head of the Royal College described the debut of "Hiawatha" as one of the most significant events in modern English musical history and noted the trilogy as one of the most beloved works of modern English music. One critic remarked that Taylor's name, alongside Elgar's, represented the nation's most unique contributions and called his "Atonement" "perhaps the finest passion music of modern times." Another critic highlighted his originality: "Even with the influences at play in Europe today, he held onto his individuality until the end, evolving his style and showcasing new ideas in each subsequent work. His premature death at the age of thirty-seven, a brief life—similar to those of Schubert, Mendelssohn, Chopin, and Hugo Wolf—has deprived the world of one of its greatest voices, one of those rare individuals of modern times who expressed himself through the language of musical song, a lyricist of power and significance."

But the tributes didn’t just come from the artist; with surprising agreement, they highlighted his "genuine character," "the good husband and father," and the "steadfast and loyal friend." And maybe I can't conclude these uncertain words better than by sharing that tribute from someone who called this master a friend, whose lament expressed more depth and passion in the night than Alfred Noyes typically allows himself to convey.

Yet, think about this: to millions of people, this man was completely wrong. First, he should never have been born, because he was the mixed-race son of a white woman. Secondly, he shouldn’t have been educated as a musician—he should have been trained for his "place" in society and to be content with it. Thirdly, he shouldn’t have married the woman he loved and who loved him, because she was white and the niece of an Oxford professor. Fourthly, the children from such a marriage—but why keep going? You already know all this.

If he had been black, like Paul Laurence Dunbar, would the argument have changed? No. He shouldn’t have been born, because he is a "problem." He shouldn’t be educated, because he can’t be educated. He shouldn’t marry, because that means kids, and there’s no place for black children in this world.

In how we treat children, the world hints at its own future and beliefs. Every word and thought points towards the child—towards the immense immortality and endless possibilities that the child symbolizes. It was this kind of thinking that led the Master to say long ago when He saw the faces of babies:

"And anyone who causes one of these little ones to stumble, it would be better for them to have a large millstone tied around their neck and be thrown into the sea."

And yet the mothers and fathers and the men and women of my race often have to stop and ask: Is it worth it? Should we have children? Do we have the right to make human souls face what we're facing today? The answer is clear: If the struggle for human rights against poverty, disease, and racial prejudice is going to be successful, it won't be in our time, but in the time of our grandchildren. We bear the wounds of battle; they will reap the rewards of victory. So, if they are not here because we didn’t bring them into the world, then we are the ones truly failing ourselves. It is our responsibility, then, to ensure the legacy of our heritage, so that one day in this dark world, poverty will be eradicated, privilege will be based on individual merit, and the color of a person's skin won’t limit their opportunities.

If it’s our responsibility as honest people of color, fighting for a significant cause, to bring not just random numbers of children into the world, but as many as we can reasonably raise with some sacrifice to reach their full potential, what should that training essentially be, especially at the start?

The first temptation is to protect the child—to surround them so they don’t know about or even think of the color line. Then, when we can no longer completely protect them, we indulge and pamper and spoil them, as if that would make up for it. From this mindset comes the many spoiled, rebellious, disillusioned children. And shouldn’t we hold ourselves responsible? Because even though the intention was good and the external threat was real, is protection and indulgence really the way to address it?

Some Black parents, realizing this, leave their children to figure things out on their own in this world of racial prejudice. They neither protect nor explain but push them out into school or the streets and let them learn from harsh reality. This can lead to strength, confidence, and independence, but it can also result in confusion, fear, dishonesty, and self-doubt. Overall, it's a harsh and unfair approach, and in some ways, it's just as damaging as overprotecting and pampering. Why not face the facts and be honest? Your child is smarter than you think.

The truth always exists between extremes. It’s not right to expose a child to race awareness too soon; it’s also risky to allow that awareness to develop on its own without thoughtful guidance. With every step of growing understanding, there should be clear and open explanations. Eventually, there will come a time when a mother needs to gently but clearly explain why the little girls next door don’t want to play with “black” children; what really causes the teacher's unkind behavior; and how people can sit in the back of streetcars and the smoker sections of trains and still be decent, respectful individuals.

Remember, too, that in such open discussions you are often speaking to a much clearer understanding than you realize, and that the child's mind still holds what your weary soul may have lost faith in—the Power and the Glory.

Out of small, untainted spirits come amazing strengths and healing remedies. Once the child of color realizes the attitude of the white world and the shameful injustice of it, you’ve given them a powerful reason to live—a drive and motivation for good that is the greatest force humans possess. How many white people would trade their own souls to instill in their children a profound, inspiring, guiding ideal!

With this power comes, in the transforming spirit of childhood, the glory: the vision of achievement, the high ideal. Once the motivation is ignited, it becomes the parent's lifelong mission to guide and shape that ideal; to elevate it from feelings of bitterness and revenge to dignity and self-respect, to growth and accomplishment, to serving others; to push back against any thoughts of cowardice and giving up.

Here, at last, we can speak without hesitation or doubt. We know that as the world improves, our children will experience the things we are fighting for, even if it feels like we're not making progress right now.

So much for the issue of home and our own troubled children. Now let’s look beyond our immediate surroundings to the children of the wider world. What is the true lesson from the life of Coleridge-Taylor? It’s this: purely by chance, this boy was able to nurture his genius. We can assume that hundreds of thousands of boys and girls today are missing out on the opportunity to develop exceptional talents because the odds are stacked against them; and indeed, the majority of children around the world are not being adequately prepared for their future careers and for life itself. Why?

Many people look for explanations in the school curriculum. They passionately debate the value of subjects like Greek, math, and hands-on training, but they all overlook the fundamental reason for our shortcomings in education: we aren't focused on fully developing the child. Instead, the world sees education mainly as a way to support the current system rather than improve it. This is the true reason why conflict, war, and revolutions have characterized humanity's progress instead of reason and meaningful change. Rather than helping the next generation surpass our limited achievements, we demand that they follow in our footsteps. We claim that moral integrity means conforming to current public opinion and that the existing system is the best, insisting that children should be trained to maintain it.

But, it's been said, what else can we do? Can we teach Revolution to those who are inexperienced in the hope that they'll recognize progress? No, but we can openly teach that this world isn’t perfect, but a place of growth: that the goal of education is to foster maturity in people, clear thinking, individual talent and creativity, and a spirit of service and sacrifice—not just a frantic attempt to cling to current institutions; that work is for people and not people for work, and while we need workers to carry out tasks, the main goal of our training is not the job itself but the person—not to uphold the current industrial hierarchy but to enhance human intelligence so that we can reduce drudgery and expand beauty.

Behind our current education system is a philosophy that mocks the naive Founding Fathers who believed it was obvious that "all men are created free and equal." The overwhelming evidence today suggests that many people are oppressed and unequal. But isn’t education the key to creating freedom and equality? Most people today can’t imagine a freedom that doesn’t rely on someone else’s oppression. They don’t desire equality because their happiness often comes from having what others do not. However, could human education help refine the ideal of a maximum level of freedom for every individual, combined with a minimum level of oppression dictated by the harsh realities of the world—rather than some having complete freedom while others experience complete oppression? Furthermore, isn't the equality the world strives for an equality of respect in the assigned human tasks rather than equal ability in performing different tasks? Human equality isn’t about the absence of differences; the vast differences among people don’t imply any sort of superiority or inferiority. And think how different human distinctions could appear if everyone were educated. Today, we categorize people as apes, semi-apes, and humans; tomorrow we might categorize them as Keir Hardies, Roosevelts, and Beethovens—not as equals, but simply as men. Currently, we are forcing some people into educational oppression so that others can enjoy life, justifying it by claiming the work of the world must get done. We are devaluing certain types of work by elevating others and then acting surprised that most people resist training their children only to take over their fathers' jobs.

Given the ideal of maximum freedom for every individual, with no one in slavery and equal respect for all essential tasks, our approach to education becomes much clearer: we focus on developing individuals; making everyone intelligent; and uncovering unique talents and genius. This training, which starts in early childhood and never stops, must be paired with practical training for today's workplace based on carefully analyzed individual abilities and desires.

On the other hand, if we shape our education system to create workers who won’t strike and Black people who are content with their current status in society, we’ve taken on a frustrating challenge. We find ourselves needing to keep the masses uninformed and to limit our own thoughts and expressions to avoid provoking the uneducated. We push moderate reformers and people with innovative and valuable ideas to become radical activists since that’s the only way to get attention for reasonable solutions. Let’s look at our racial issues in the South: the South has invested in Black ignorance; some people from the North suggested limited education, not to improve the lives of Black people, but simply to make the investment more beneficial for the current owners. This approach garnered significant support in the South for schools like Hampton and Tuskegee. But could we really expect this program to satisfy Black individuals in the long run? And was this evasive approach to the real issue the smartest political strategy? No! The real question in the South is about the permanence of the current racial hierarchy. Thus, the formal education of our Black children has become increasingly complex due to certain individuals' strong feelings about their future in America and beyond. The response to this caste education has only reinforced the concept of racial hierarchy worldwide.

Let’s go back to the basics. Children need to learn about the world, what it knows, and how it operates on a daily basis. These elements are interconnected: we can’t teach pure knowledge without real facts, or separate truth from the human mind. Most importantly, we must remember that the goal of education is the child themselves, not just what they do or create.

It is here that a major movement in America has seriously gone astray. There has emerged a movement to make the Public School primarily a tool for production. America is seen as existing for the sake of its mines, fields, and factories, rather than those factories, fields, and mines existing for America. As a result, public schools are focused on preparing the majority of people to be servants, laborers, and mechanics to boost the country’s industrial efficiency.

Those who are against this program, especially if they are Black, are accused of looking down on hard work and humble service. In reality, we Black people are just confronting a global issue for our children: how can we, while producing enough goods and providing necessary services, enhance the knowledge and experience of everyday people and nurture talent for the greater good? Without broader and deeper understanding among the masses, Democracy cannot achieve its bigger goals. Without carefully protecting human skills and talent, the world can't secure the services that are critically needed. Yet today, who attends college, the talented or the wealthy? Who goes to high school, the bright or the affluent? Who does the physical labor of the world, those whose bodies need the exercise or those whose minds and spirits are dulled by manual work? How is the hard work of the world distributed, through fair consideration or the whip of Slavery?

We can't shape the education of future citizens based on today's unacceptable wealth inequality or on physical racial differences. We should aim not to turn men into carpenters but to make carpenters into men.

Colored Americans must, therefore, with strong commitment, educate their children in the best and most comprehensive way possible. They must fill colleges with talented individuals and populate various professions with smart people. Wisdom is of utmost importance. So, pursue wisdom.

But why am I just referring to "colored" children? Isn't the issue of their education really just a more intense version of the challenge of educating all children? Look at our situation in the United States, almost 150 years after the founding of a government based on human intelligence.

If we look at the data from the Thirteenth Census, we see that there were five and a half million illiterate Americans, including 3,184,633 who were white. Considering that illiteracy is a basic and severe measure of ignorance, we can assume that there are about ten million people over the age of ten in the United States who are too uninformed to fulfill their civic responsibilities or to teach industrial skills. Furthermore, it doesn't appear that this illiteracy is decreasing quickly.

For example, nine percent of American children between ten and nineteen years old can’t read or write. Additionally, there are millions of children who, based on the numbers from the 1909-10 school year, are unlikely to learn to read and write because there were 3,125,392 Americans aged six to fourteen who didn’t attend school even one day that year. If we look at the eleven million young people aged fifteen to twenty who are supposed to receive vocational training, we see that nearly five percent of them, or 448,414, are completely illiterate; it’s reasonable to assume that around a million of them haven’t gained enough basic skills to benefit from effective vocational training.

Focusing only on white people, over fifteen percent of white children aged six to fourteen, or 2,253,198, didn't go to school during the 1909-10 school year. Among native white children with native parents aged ten to fourteen, nearly ten percent were not in school that year; 121,878 native white children of native parents aged fifteen to nineteen were illiterate.

If we keep focusing on the children of color, the situation is, of course, much worse.

We can't expect to create skilled workers and informed citizens from a group where more than forty percent of the children aged six to fourteen didn't attend school even once during 1909-10. For the remaining sixty percent, the school year was likely less than five months in most cases. Among Black children aged ten to fourteen, 18.9 percent were illiterate; for those aged fifteen to nineteen, 20.3 percent were illiterate; and among children aged ten to fourteen, 31.4 percent didn't attend school at all in 1909-10.

What’s the problem? It’s straightforward. We’re spending one dollar on education when we should be spending ten. If tomorrow we increased our efforts to educate the next generation ten times, we would only be starting to fulfill our responsibility. The ideal world surrounding our childhood is just the dreams that every generation of kids can make real; yet, we, blinded by our own ignorance and inability, are turning education into a series of sad compromises: How ignorant can we allow a child to become just to make him the best cotton mill worker? What’s the minimum amount that will keep the average young person out of jail? How many months can we cut from a high school curriculum to maximize wheat exports?

If we understood that children represent the future, that the essence of immortality lies in the present child, and that no education that truly educates can ever be too expensive, then we would recognize that the threat of Kaiserism, which demanded spending over 332 billion dollars, is just as urgent as the threat of ignorance. No nation tomorrow will consider itself civilized if it doesn’t provide every individual with free college and vocational training from the best educators available, whether through financial compensation or goodwill.

This world has never really taken children's education seriously. Misguided by our selfish dreams of a personal life that lasts forever, we have overlooked the real and practical immortality found in the lives of future generations. In our pursuit of our own personal growth, we have scorned the potential for ongoing improvement in countless generations to come. Or when we become hopeless about making the current generation better, we jump to useless guesses about a thousand years from now instead of focusing on doing the steady, hard work needed for the next generation.

All our problems revolve around the child. All our hopes and dreams are for our children. Has our own life been a disappointment? Let its lessons protect the children's lives from the same failures. Is democracy not working? Raise citizens who will make it thrive. Is wealth too crude, too foolish, and too easily taken away? Develop workers with integrity, conscience, and intelligence. Have we degraded service with lowly positions? Eliminate the mean spirit and instill a sense of sacrifice. Do we look down on women? Educate them as capable workers and thinkers, not as playthings, or future generations will repeat our biggest mistake. Do we harbor prejudice against darker races? Teach children about the devastating consequences of spiritual degradation and violence, and instill in them that hating "blacks" or "chinks" means crucifying souls like their own. Is there anything we want to achieve with humanity? Accomplish it with the immortal child, with endless time to do so and infinite possibilities to explore.

Is this how we feel about education? It isn't—neither in England nor America, nor in France or Germany, with people of any color. Education in today’s world feels like a burden we have to bear. We avoid it and complain. We do as little as possible, and only when we're threatened with serious consequences do we do more than the bare minimum. If the uneducated masses, eager to learn, rise up, we give them just enough knowledge to calm them down temporarily. If, like during the Great War, we discover that soldiers are too uneducated to operate our machines of death and destruction, we train them— to use those machines. If increasing wealth demands skilled workers, we hurriedly train them—to boost our wealth. But where in this wide world is the grand vision to prepare everyone for everything—to make a universe that is intelligent, active, good, creative, and beautiful? To propose it is to invite shock or massive laughter. It’s impossible. It would be too expensive.

What has been done to one person can be done to all people, if the world puts in enough time and effort. And as for the cost—all the wealth of the world, except for what is absolutely necessary for a decent life and to maintain the civilization we have, should rightfully belong to the children for their education.

I really mean it. In one year, 1917, we spent $96,700,000,000 on war. We wasted it all on killing, injuring, and destroying! Why? Because the ruthless and selfish actions of powerful interests made this horrific path the only clear route to a better future. We did it. We had to do it, and we're relieved that the disgusting nightmare is over. But now, are we ready to invest less in order to create a world where the rise of such evil power becomes impossible?

Do we really want the war to stop?

Then educate the children of this generation at a cost no less and, if needed, a hundred times greater than the cost of the Great War.

Last year, 1917, education cost us $915 million.

Next year, it should cost us at least two billion dollars. We should invest enough money to hire the best teachers available—the top organizing and leadership skills in the country, even if we have to take from the railroads and the meat industry. We should cover both cities and rural areas with the most efficient, clean, and beautiful schools in the world, and we should provide every American child with basic education, high school, and college training, followed by career guidance for making a living.

Is this a dream?

Can we afford to spend less?

Consider our so-called educational "problems": "How can we keep students in high school?" Provide for their basic needs. "Should we teach Latin, Greek, and math to the 'general public'?" If these subjects are valuable, the general public needs them the most. "Who should go to college?" Everyone. "When should cultural education be replaced by technical training for jobs?" Never.

These questions aren't "problems." They're just "excuses" for investing less time and money in the next generation. With ten million dollars a year, what's the best way to educate a million children? The harsh truth is—get rid of nine hundred and ninety thousand of them quickly instead of gradually, and focus on making the other ten thousand well-trained men and women. But who decided on the limit of ten million dollars? Who says it can't be ten billion, as it should be? You and I do, and by saying it, we fail to recognize the gravity of the situation.

We commit wrongs because we've muddled our thinking by tying money to education. We believe that only the rich truly deserve an education when, in reality, just being born should grant you the right to college training. We all know that wealth today is mostly determined by luck of inheritance and personal connections, yet we try to base the right to education on this shaky foundation. The outcome is absurd! We stifle genius; we lock it away; we mock it, while we elevate mediocrity and ignorance to college, adorning them with accolades. For three hundred years, we've denied black Americans access to education and now we exploit this before the entire world: Look at how uninformed and degraded they are! The only thing they're suited for is education in picking cotton and washing dishes. When Dunbar and Taylor come along, we feel a mix of shameful anger and impatient surprise.

A world responsible for this last and greatest war has no right to enjoy or create until it has made the future safe from another Arkansas or Rheims. There’s only one clear way to do this, which is proven and unavoidable: Education, and not just for me or for you, but for the Immortal Child. And that child belongs to all races and all colors. All children are the children of everyone, not just individuals, families, and races. The entire generation must be trained and guided, and from it, like a vast reservoir, we must draw out all genius, talent, and intelligence to benefit the whole world.

For many years, we in this chaotic world have faced death and smiled. Through all our painful tears, we understood how beautiful it was to die for what our souls deemed worthy. Like all true beauty, this act of dying was so simple, so straightforward. The young man, radiant in his youth, stood before us and laughed in his cheerful way—then he was gone. Suddenly, the world was filled with the essence of sacrifice. We stopped our digging and carrying burdens; we turned away from our scraping and twisting of things and words; we paused from rushing around and walking back and forth, and quietly asked: this Death—is this Life? And is its beauty genuine or not? And this is what I am writing about.

My friend, who is fair-skinned and optimistic, told me yesterday, as the weary sun was setting:

"You're too sensitive."

I admit, I am—sensitive. I am artificial. I cringe or am overly confident or stuck. I am intellectually dishonest, blind to art, and I lack a sense of humor.

"Why don't you just quit all this?" she replies triumphantly.

You won't allow us.

"There you go again. You know that I—"

Hold on! I'm answering. Hold on!

I get up at seven. The milkman has ignored me. He hardly pays attention to neighborhoods with people of color. My white neighbor gives me a dirty look. I walk quietly so I don’t bother him. The kids make fun of me as I head to work. The women on the streetcar pull away their skirts or choose to stand. The policeman is aggressive. The elevator operator dislikes serving Black people. My job is uncertain because the white union wants it and doesn't want me. I try to get lunch, but no place nearby will serve me. I walk forty blocks to Marshall's, but the Committee of Fourteen closes down Marshall's; they say white women go there.

"Do all restaurants discriminate?"

No, but how will I know which ones don’t—except—

I rush home through the crowds. They mumble or get upset. I attend a mass meeting. They watch me. I go to a church. "We don’t allow Black people!"

Or maybe I take a different path. I look for new opportunities. "Our employees wouldn’t collaborate with you; our customers would complain."

I’m asking for help with improving social conditions.

"Why—we'll write to you."

I step into the open field of science. Every lab door is locked, and there’s no funding available.

I’m looking for the universal muse, Art; the studio door is locked.

I write literature. "We can't publish stories about people of color like that." That's the only kind I know.

This is my life. It makes me feel foolish. It gives me fake problems. I hesitate, I hurry, I doubt. In short,—I am sensitive!

My pale friend looks at me in disbelief with a curled tongue.

"Are you really going to sit there and tell me that this is what you go through every day?"

Definitely not, I reply quietly.

"Are you just afraid it will happen?"

I'm scared!

"Well, don’t you have the courage to rise above what’s nearly a cowardly fear?"

Totally—totally cowardly is my fear, I admit; but the awful thing is—these things really do happen!

"But you just said—"

They do happen. Not every day—definitely not. But every now and then—rarely, sometimes suddenly; sometimes after a week, sometimes in a string of terrifying minutes; not everywhere, but anywhere—in Boston, in Atlanta. That's the frustrating part. Imagine spending your life searching for insults or for ways to hide from them—flinching (instinctively and despite desperate attempts to be brave) from blows that may not always come, but do; not every day, but each week, each month, each year. Just, perhaps, as you've held back the overwhelming fear and declared, "I am and will be the master of my—"

"No more tickets downstairs; here's one for the smoking area."

You hesitate. You push your doubts aside. After all, a cigarette with Charlie Chaplin—then a white guy pushes past—

"Three in the band."

"Sure thing, sir." And in he goes.

Suddenly, your heart drops. You turn away toward the shimmering purple night and pause again. What's the point? Why not just give in—always take what's offered, always submit to power, whether it's from cannons or disapproval? Then a deep fear rises in your spirit, the real fear—the kind that makes other fears seem trivial; the fear that right at this moment, you are losing your own soul; that you are losing your own soul and the soul of a whole people; that millions of unborn children, in shades of black, gold, and mauve, are being robbed of their future by you because you are too afraid to stand up and fight!

Suddenly, that silly orchestra seat and the comedian with funny feet become a matter of life, death, and eternity; you grasp the foundations of the universe and struggle as you sway back to that overly adorned ticket girl. You hold onto your inner turmoil for chaos and destruction. You choke and sputter, and she, seeing that you're about to make a scene, follows her instructions and tosses the tickets at you with disdain. Then, you slide into your seat and hunch down in the darkness before the film, every nerve on fire! The miserable wave of regret washes over you. To think of tricking puppies into taking your hard-earned money; fattening pigs to despise you and yours; pushing your way through a crowd of cheap and tacky fools—oh my! What a night of enjoyment!

Here, then, is beauty and ugliness, a broad perspective on world sacrifice, a fierce spark of world hatred. What is life, what is death, and how do we confront such a tempting contradiction? Any explanation has to be subtle and complex. No smart or simple word of encouragement, no purely dark despair, can grasp the roots of these issues. And first and foremost, we cannot forget that this world is beautiful. Despite all its ugliness and sin—the petty, horrific tangle of its rotten threads, which few have experienced more closely or frequently than I—regardless of all this, the beauty of this world cannot be denied.

Casting my gaze around, I can't let my eyes linger on the beauty of Love and Friendship, because even if I could find the right words to express it, the truth here is too sacred and the imagination too false. The only beautiful thing we can honestly talk about is the glory of the physical world; this, although the last of all beauties, is divine!

And so, there are depths of human degradation that we shouldn’t explore. Despite their horrible prevalence, we can’t consider them natural. But can we compare even the smallest beauty in the world with its smallest ugliness—not things like murder, starvation, and violence with love, friendship, and creativity—but rather the beauty of the sea, sky, and city, with the minor acts of hatred and thoughtlessness driven by racism, to see if we can maybe derive some rule about beauty and life—or death?

The mountains soar up against the stars, and at their base lie dark, heavy seas. Above float clouds—white, gray, and black—while the clear, intangible air bubbles and sparkles like fresh wine. Last night, we drifted on the calm surface of the sea in the southernmost harbor of Mount Desert. The water flickered and shone. The sun had set, but above the jagged edges of cumulus clouds, dark and pink with light, and in the eastern sky, the beautiful draped mists of evening gathered. The light faded, and a shadowy velvet covered the mountains, a damp depth of darkness behind which all the mysteries of life and death hid, while above, the clouds hung gray and dull; lights flickered and shone along the shore, boats glided in the twilight, and the soft hum of motors droned on. It was the perfect moment to discuss life and its meaning, while stars silently and suddenly shined one by one overhead.

Bar Harbor sits beneath a massive mountain, a huge, stark, black mountain that looms over the town; but as you leave, it suddenly rises, menacingly, until it towers over the town from afar on Frenchman's Bay in overwhelming grandeur, as if to remind everyone that everything else in that small world is insignificant compared to it. Under the cool, watchful gaze of that great mountain, people can't live as carefreely as they do in other summer resorts. In front of nature's unhidden beauty, laid bare on the Maine coast, a certain sense of human awe arises.

God shaped His world magnificently along this stunning coast and intended for people to come here during the weary days of life to worship and rejuvenate their spirits. I have done this, and now I turn to work again. As we move on, the mountains of Mount Desert consistently rise and greet us—serious, rugged, and quiet, seeming unaffected by the bustling world, yet aware of their enduring power.

About us beats the sea—the sail-speckled, restless sea, humming its tune around our flying keel, unaware of the voices of people. The land drops to meadows, dark pine forests, with occasional blue and wistful mountains. Then there are islands—bold rocks rising above the sea, rolling meadows; ships drift through and around them, weather-worn and patched sails, sturdy hulls and smoking, light gray and shining. All the colors of the sea surround us—gray and yellowing greens and uncertain blues, blacks that aren't quite black, tinted silvers and golds and dreamy whites. Long stretches of dark and golden land reach far out into the churning waters, and white gulls glide and cry above them. It’s a striking coast—ground down and battered, scarred, crushed, and carved into massive, frightening shapes. Pines stand everywhere—the little dark and steadfast pines that neither smile nor weep, but just wait and wait. Nearby are islands of flesh and blood, white cottages, tiled and set among meadows. In the distance lie shadowy lands, high mist-hidden hills, mountains boldly outlined yet fading into the sky, faint and unreal.

We glide along the pine-covered shores, cautious of people, and understand how harshly winter kisses these lonely coasts, filling the row of pointed ice houses that climb the hills. We're sailing directly west, and the sun, still two hours high, is casting a fiery glow on the sea that spreads and sparkles like a broad, jeweled path, leading to where the blue and distant land of shadows rises high, leaving, as it moves along, darker shades beyond.

Why don’t those who are scarred from life’s struggles and hurt by its harshness travel to these beautiful places and immerse themselves in the pure joy of living? I wondered about this once while sitting in a Southern home. Outside, the spring of a Georgia February was tempting the bushes with golden hues and filling the soft air with warmth. Around me were people with vibrant skin tones—brown that flushed easily; a soft yellow that’s hard to describe; a creamy duskiness that deepened into rich autumn leaf colors. Yet, the idea of a journey in the world elicited no reaction.

"I think you would enjoy traveling," said the white one.

But no, the idea of a trip seemed to bring them down.

Did you ever see a "Jim Crow" waiting room? There are always exceptions, like in Greensboro—but usually, there’s no heat in winter and no air conditioning in summer; just ignored loafers, train workers, and worn-out, shabby benches. Buying a ticket is a hassle; you stand and wait until every white person at the "other window" is served. Then the exhausted agent shouts across, because all the tickets and cash are over there—

"What do you want? What? Where?"

The agent bullies and contradicts you, rushes and confuses the clueless, gives a lot of people the wrong change, forces some to buy their tickets on the train at a higher price, and sends you and me out onto the platform, seething with anger and resentment!

The "Jim Crow" car is next to the baggage car and engine. It stops out in the open, whether it’s raining, sunny, or dusty. Usually, there’s no step to help you get on, and often the car is a smoking section split in half, forcing you to navigate through the white smokers or have them walk through your area, loud and staring. Your compartment is a half, quarter, or eighth of the oldest car still running on the tracks. Unless it’s an express train, the upholstery is filthy, the floor is grimy, and the windows are dirty. An annoying white newsboy takes up two seats at the end of the car and pesters you to the point of anger to buy cheap candy, Coca-Cola, and trashy, if not offensive, books. He yells and struts around, while a steady stream of white men strolls back and forth from the smoking section to buy and socialize. The white train crew from the baggage car uses the "Jim Crow" car to lounge and freshen up. The conductor takes two seats for himself and his papers, gruffly demanding your tickets before the train has hardly started. It’s best not to ask him for information, even nicely. His info is mainly for white people. Finding lunch or clean water is tough. Lunchrooms either don’t serve Black customers or only serve them in some dirty, poorly run places. And don’t even think about using the restroom! If you need to change trains, be cautious at junctions that usually lack proper facilities and are filled with hostile white folks who can’t stand seeing a “well-dressed Black person.” You might end up sharing space with a sheriff and a couple of quiet or gloomy Black prisoners for part of your trip, and messy laborers will crowd in as night falls, pushing you into the tiniest corner.

"No," said the little lady in the corner (she looked like an ivory cameo and her dress flowed on her like a gentle touch), "we don't travel much."

Pessimism is a form of cowardice. A person who can't openly accept the "Jim Crow" car as a reality and still live with hope is simply afraid of either themselves or the world. There is nothing more shameful than the denial of human brotherhood represented by the "Jim Crow" car in the southern United States; yet, just as undeniably, there is nothing more beautiful than the sunset and moonlight over Montego Bay in Jamaica. Both of these realities exist in our world, and neither can be ignored.

The sun, ready to cross that dreadful boundary we call Night and Death, gathers his army. I can almost see the spears of powerful horsemen shining gold in the light; purple banners blaze in the distance, and the distant rumble of marching troops resonates like the roar of the sea. Across his path, hiding his fiery face, he casts clouds, obscuring his trained artillery. And then the miracle happens. The army moves with a noise too immense for human ears, and the sun sets, leaving the scared moon and blinded stars.

In the twilight, the green-gold palms turn their star-shaped faces and extend their fan-like fronds, lifting themselves proudly, so that no noble leaf has to feel the dirt.

Out from the island, the serpent hill stretches its long form around the bay, pushing back the water and shadows. Ghostly rain falls down, streaking its rough sides, yet it continues to twist and turn, undulating with pine and palm, shining until its low, sharp head and flickering tongue, now gray, pale, and silver in the fading day, kisses the molten gold of the ocean.

Then comes the moon. Like fireflies resting in the hand of God, the city sparkles, softly wrapped by fairy palms. A long, slender finger, powerful in the mist, points darkly towards the Spanish Main, while the Seven Seas foam between its fingers. Above the peaceful, golden-green moon, beneath the rain-soaked earth; and here, all alone, my soul is bound, enchanted!

From such heights of holiness, people turn to take charge of the world. All the smallness of life fades away, and it becomes a grand struggle before the Lord. His trumpet—where does it sound and where to? I go. I saw Montego Bay at the start of World War I. The call for service was as high as heaven and as broad as human emotion, filling the earth. What were minor slights, foolish insults, and trivial issues compared to this call to act, to risk, and to sacrifice? We black folks offered our services to fight. What happened? Most Americans have forgotten the remarkable series of events that stirred the emotions of black America to a boiling point.

First was the refusal to accept Black volunteers for the army, except in the four already established Black regiments. While the nation was actively seeking volunteers for the regular army, it wouldn't allow African Americans to contribute even their fair share of regular soldiers. This led to some dark humor among Black people:

"Why do you want to volunteer?" many asked. "Why should you fight for this country?"

Before we had a chance to respond to this, the army draft bill came up, along with Vardaman and his crew's proposal to exempt Black men. We protested to Washington in various ways, and while we were insisting that Black men should be drafted just like everyone else, the bill passed with two little "jokers."

First, it stated that Black individuals should be drafted but trained in "separate" units; and, secondly, it somewhat unclearly allowed for men to be drafted for "labor."

A wave of fear and unrest spread among Black people, and while we were looking at both these measures with suspicion, we suddenly received the draft registration form. It instructed individuals "of African descent" to "tear off the corner!" Probably never before in the history of the United States has a part of the population been so openly and blatantly discriminated against by the federal government. It was disheartening, and on top of that came the infamous "German plots." It was claimed in various parts of the country with unusual agreement that Germans were working with Black people, and it was further suggested that this would make Black people too dangerous a group to trust with weapons. To us, of course, it seemed that both the discovery and the suggestion came from the same thinly-veiled sources.

Considering carefully this series of events, the American Negro sensed an impending crisis and confronted a confusing dilemma. It was clear that fertile ground was being laid for the spread of disloyalty and resentment among the black community, as they were seemingly forced to choose between forced labor or a "Jim Crow" draft. Obviously, when a minority group is segregated and pushed out of the nation, they can only do one thing—make the most out of their disadvantage. In this case, we called for black officers for the black troops.

General Wood was approached early on and asked to allow suitable candidates into Plattsburg. He refused. We then urged the government to create a "separate" camp for training Black officers. Not only did the War Department hesitate at this request, but there was also strong opposition from within the Black community. They argued that we were going too far. "We will obey the law, but asking for voluntary segregation is an insult to us." However, with some serious reflection, we found clarity. We told our protesting brothers: "We are facing a situation, not a theory. There is no chance of us being accepted into white camps; therefore, we must choose between a 'Jim Crow' officers' training camp or no Black officers at all. Of the two, not having Black officers would be the bigger disaster."

Thus we gradually made our decision. But the War Department still hesitated. It was under a lot of pressure, and when it made its final argument, "We have no space for such a camp," the trustees of Howard University replied, "Use our campus." Eventually, twelve hundred Black cadets were gathered at Fort Des Moines for officer training.

The city of Des Moines quickly spoke out against it, but eventually changed its stance. Des Moines had never seen such a group of Black men before. They quickly became popular among all social classes, and many praises were given for their behavior. Their commanding colonel said their performance was top-notch and stated that they had great potential for leadership roles.

Meanwhile, everyone’s thoughts among the Black community turned to Colonel Young, their highest-ranking officer in the regular army. Charles Young is a heroic figure. He’s the model soldier—quiet, uncomplaining, brave, and effective! From his time at West Point through thirty years of service, he took on every task assigned to him and performed it well; there’s no doubt the army has been almost ruthless in its demands on this outstanding officer. He came through it all with flying colors. In Haiti, in Liberia, in various western camps, in the Sequoia Forests of California, and finally with Pershing in Mexico—he triumphed every time. Just when we were hoping the U.S. government would appoint him to lead the training for Black officers in Des Moines, he was retired from the army due to "high blood pressure!" There’s no denying army surgeons and their judgment in this matter may be justified, but coming as it did, nearly every Black person in the United States believed that the "high blood pressure" that led to Colonel Young's retirement was a prejudiced notion held by the Southern elites who were determined that no Black American should ever hold the rank of General.

To say that Black people in the United States were disheartened by Colonel Young's retirement is an understatement—but there was more trouble. The requirement for Black individuals to be trained separately seemed straightforward, particularly in areas with large Black populations. However, in the North, where individuals were drafted individually, things took an unusual turn. Regiments formed with just one Black soldier, who had to be isolated like a pariah and put in a separate building or even a village, while the commander urgently sent telegraphs to Washington. It’s no surprise that one poor man in Ohio saw no other way out than to take his own life. The entire process of drafting Black soldiers had to be paused until the government could find appropriate methods and locations for their assembly.

Then came Houston. In an instant, the country forgot the entire history of one of the most famous regiments in the U.S. Army and its outstanding service in the Indian Wars and in the Philippines. It was the first regiment called up in the Spanish-American War, and it was the regiment that volunteered without hesitation to clean up the yellow fever camps when others held back. It was one of the regiments to which Pershing said in December:

"Men, I have the authority from Congress to let you know that our people back home are extremely happy and proud of how the soldiers have behaved while in Mexico. I, General Pershing, can proudly say that there has never been a finer group of men under the flag of our nation than what we have here tonight."

The nation also forgot the deep resentment mixed with a faint trace of fear that Black soldiers provoke in the hearts of the white South. It's not just that they fear the Black man will retaliate if he gets the chance, but rather that they all seem to agree that he has a legitimate reason to retaliate, that anyone else in his situation or treated as he is would rebel. Instead of trying to address the root causes of such feelings, most of them do everything they can to suppress the Black man's anger. Is it really so hard to believe that sometimes it spills over, like what happened in Brownsville and Houston?

So in the middle of all this chaos came Houston and East St. Louis. In Houston, Black soldiers, provoked and insulted, suddenly went wild and “shot up” the town. In East St. Louis, white strikers on war work killed and attacked Black workers, and as a result, 19 Black soldiers were hanged and 51 sentenced to life in prison for killing 17 whites in Houston, while for killing 125 Black people in East St. Louis, 20 white men were imprisoned, none for more than 15 years, along with 10 Black men.

Once upon a time, I went on an incredible journey across this land to three corners of our world, covering over seven thousand miles. I experienced the harsh desert and the towering Rocky Mountains. For three days, I traveled from the stunning beauty of Seattle to the bustling energy of Kansas City. Then, I flew for another three days from the raw power of Chicago to the sun-soaked air of Los Angeles, filled with the scent of golden flowers, where people's homes sit comfortably on the broad earth, as if they are kissing her blossoms. I spent three days flying through the vastness of Texas, but all of those will remain untold tales, because during this entire journey, I found only one thing that truly resonated with me and will forever live on in my heart—the Grand Canyon.

It’s a sudden gap in the earth, reaching deep down into its core—a wound where a massive knife has dug and twisted, leaving the edges bruised, scarred, jagged, and throbbing over the white, red, and purple of its strong flesh, while down below—down, down below, in dark and broken veins, the dull and murky flow of the Colorado boils.

It’s terrible. There’s nothing like it. It’s like the earth and sky have gone completely insane. The mountains are twisted, dislocated, and upside down, standing on their tips and casting their insides into the sky. Their ground is air; their atmosphere is blood-red rock turned green. You stand on their roots and drop into their peaks, a tremendous mile.

Look at this mauve and purple mockery of time and space! Check out that peak! No human foot has ever set foot on it. Only the eye of God has looked into that blue shadow. Listen to the sounds of that gorge murmuring: "Before Abraham was, I am." Is that wall a hedge of black or the barrier between heaven and hell? I see greens—are they moss or giant pines? I see specks that could be boulders. The winds always sigh and sink into those sunlit silences. The gorge remains still, unmoved, until I feel a sense of dread. It is a grim thing, unholy, terrifying! It is human—some great drama, unseen and unheard, is unfolding there with its tragedies or mocking comedy, and the laughter of countless years echoes from peak to peak, unheard, unreflected, and unknown.

One throws a rock into the void. It makes no sound. It falls into silence—the echoes of its impact can’t reach that far. It is not—it cannot be just a lifeless, unfeeling, brutal fact—its majesty is too calm—its beauty too divine! It’s not just red, blue, and green, but, oh! the shadows and shades of the entire world, vibrant colors touched with a shy spiritual delicacy. What does it mean—what does it mean? Tell me, dark and raging water!

It isn't real. It's just shadows. The shading of forever. Last night, that patterned palace was filled with darkness—heavy, brooding thoughts and sins, while over here rose the sun-kissed mountains, glowing, blazing, blood-red. It was a dream. This blue and bright morning reveals all those fiery peaks ablaze, while here, formless and hazy, loom the shadowy towers.

I have gone deep into the earth—down, down by sheer and daunting cliffs—down by echoing waters and sunlit meadows; down by green fields and calm waters, by enormous, steep ravines—down by the gnarled and twisted hands of God to the deep, mournful sounds of the yellow river that created this marvel—a little winding river with darkness in its depths and a glory in its flowing hair.

I have seen what no human eye was meant to see. I have desecrated the sanctuary. I have witnessed the terrifying unveiling of the Night, and yet I still live. Before I hid my face, she was standing in her cavernous halls, glowing coldly toward the west—her feet were shadows: her robes, shaded purple, flowed mistily down from her shoulders in formless layers; her head, crowned with pine, was adorned with jeweled stars. I turned away and dreamed—the canyon, with its terrifying depths, called to me; its heights made me shudder. Then suddenly, I stood up and looked. Her robes were falling. At dawn, they appeared purplish-green and black. Slowly she peeled them from her slender and graceful limbs—her cold, gray garments shot through with shadows became visible. Down fell the dark-blue robes, gray-pearled and slipping, leaving a sheer, silky, misty layer, and underneath I caught a glimpse of her limbs made of pure light.

My God! What am I thankful for tonight? For nothing. For nothing but the most ordinary of ordinary things; a table of kind women and men—soft-spoken, warm-hearted, full of human empathy, who welcomed me, a stranger, into their circle. We shared a connection through common books, shared knowledge, and grand ambitions. We could laugh, joke, and think like friends—and the thing—the hateful, murderous, filthy thing that we call "Black-hatred" in America wasn't just absent—it couldn't even be comprehended. It was a bizarre concept that civilized people either laughed at or found confusing. There was no pretentious and elaborate condescension of—"We once had a Black servant"—"My father was an Abolitionist"—"I've always been interested in your people"—there was only the bond of like-minded souls, the genuine respect for the ideas that connected us, the quick courtesy shown to the guest. You left with a quiet sense of loss, knowing that they weren't discussing you behind your back with falsehoods and disrespect. God! It was simply human decency, and I had to be grateful for it because I am an African American, and white America, with some exceptions, is cruel to everything that has black blood—and this was Paris, during the years of salvation, 1919. Fellow Blacks, we must join the democracy of Europe.

Toul! Dim through the thickening darkness of early afternoon, I saw its towers fade into the murky sky. We navigated through misty roads and descended upon the city through the massive openings of its walled fortifications. There lay France—a strange, unknown, unfamiliar France. The city felt stripped of its identity. Through its streets—narrow, winding, old, low, dark, carved, and charming—thousands upon thousands of foreign soldiers in khaki marched, while the echoes bounced back clumsy sounds that were never French. Here was France brought to her knees yet fighting like no other nation had before, reaching out in her dying plea across the seas until her help arrived, and with all its swagger and careless arrogance saved the most honorable nation in the world from the most wicked fate ever devised by fools.

Tim Brimm was playing by the town pump. The sound of bugles from Harlem filled the small streets of Maron in far Lorraine. The narrow streets were muddy. Damp mist and rain drifted through the chilly air above the blue Moselle. Soldiers—soldiers everywhere—Black soldiers, boys from Washington, Alabama, Philadelphia, Mississippi. The wild, sweet, and enchanting music floated through the air. French children watched in amazement—women paused from their laundry. Up in the window stood a Black Major, a Captain, a Teacher, and I—with tears behind our smiling eyes. Tim Brimm was playing by the town pump.

The audience was surrounded by smoke. It rose like a ghost from memories—painful memories of the officer who was nearly dead from pneumonia, his suffering highlighted by the nurses waiting to see if he had to be treated like a private. Memories of that last great morning when the roar of battle called the Ninety-second to its final push. Memories of painful humiliations, determined victories, great triumphs, and bugle calls that echoed from earth to heaven. Like memories framed in the breath of God, my audience looked on me—good, brown faces with big, kind, beautiful eyes—black soldiers of America saving beloved France—and the words flowed in praise and blessing there in the "Y," with its small stash of cigarettes and candies and its old wood stove.

So,” said Madame, “four are dead” — four dead — four tall, strong sons dead for France — sons like the sweet, blue-eyed daughter who was hiding her brave smile in the dusk. It was a small stone house with a front window that looked out over the sidewalk where the feet of Black soldiers marched home. There was a spacious wardrobe, a large fireplace taken over by a new, stylish iron stove. Huge, thick piles of bedding rose in that corner. Outside was the busy kitchen, and up half a flight of stairs was our bedroom that opened onto a tiny courtyard with an arched stone staircase and one green tree. We were a poignant family gathering held together by great sorrow and great joy. How we laughed over the salad that accidentally got brandy instead of vinegar — how we enjoyed the golden pile of fried potatoes and how we examined the postcard from the Lieutenant of the Senegalese — dear little valley of crushed and risen France, on the day when Black troops went "over the top" at Pont-à-Mousson.

Paris, Paris by the purple façade of the opera, the crowd on the Boulevard des Italiens and the grand sweep of the Champs Élysées. But not the Paris the world knows. Paris with its soul stripped bare—anxious, crowded, frantic, rushed; filled with uniforms and mourning bands, with cafés closing at 9:30—no sugar, limited bread, and tears so intertwined with joy that there’s barely any distinction. Paris has been living a nightmare, and even though she wakes, the heavy dread is upon her—it rests on the sand-covered art treasures of the Louvre. Only the flowers remain, always the flowers, the Roses of England and the Lilies of France.

New York! Behind the Statue of Liberty that looks towards free France rise the white cliffs of Manhattan, layered one upon another, with a curving peak, square twin towers, a giant inkwell playfully capped, an ancient pyramid seated majestically; below, wide and powerful low walls; while above, softly outlined against the stormy sky, stands the grand beauty of that Cathedral of the Bought and Buying Poor, reaching for the skies.

Over there, the gray spiderwebs of the Brooklyn bridges stretch over the sea, and here come the ships from all corners of the earth. We move to this fast home on the dark and rising waters and hear, as we approach, the heartbeats of the new world.

New York at night from the Brooklyn Bridge: The bees and fireflies dance and sparkle in their huge nests; curved clouds like the breath of gods hang between the towers and the moon. You can hear the hiss of lightning, the deep thunder of human activity, and a feverish breathing as if some powerful and unstoppable forces are present. The glow of countless lights spreads outward into faint, magical shapes until far away the sound of rushing crowds flows like a blessing into the sea.

New York in the morning: the sun is gently warming the delicate dew in Central Park, and from the Fountain of Plenty, one can look down Fifth Avenue, heading toward the city. The landscape slopes down gracefully from the grand old mansions of the wealthy to the trendy shops of luxury. Egypt and Abyssinia, Paris and Damascus, London and India greet you along the way; churches stand apart while the stores expand into grand emporiums. But all of this is just background noise. Everything revolves around humanity. People stand, fly, walk, and roll by—the poor, the priceless, the famous, and the forgotten; children and grandparents, kings and companions—the parade of the world passes by, framed by stone and jewels, dressed in scarlet and rags. Princes Street and the Elysian Fields, the Strand and the Ringstrasse—these are the Ways of the World today.

New York at twilight, where the Sixth Avenue "L" train rises and soars above the tenements at 110th Street. It glides like a bird with the sky and St. John's above and the lush greens and golds of the Park below. Beyond, there are all the blue mists and mysteries of the distance; below, the city rushes and crawls. Behind echoes all the noise, chaos, worry, and confusion of the vast city trapped within its gloomy, darkening walls, flashing strange and crimson goodbyes. The stars twinkle on the sides.

Again, New York and Night and Harlem. A dark city of fifty thousand rises like magic from the ground. The white world is gone, along with pale lips and straight hair; the West and North are gone—now the East and South are here, victorious. The streets are filled with crowds, leisure, and laughter. Everywhere you see black eyes, brown eyes, and a mix of frizzy and smooth hair, with skin that bursts with vibrant colors and deep, passionate blood. Humanity is packed tightly in towering, close-knit homes stacked above gray shops selling food, clothes, and drinks, with an occasional movie theater. Speakers rally on the corners, lovers play around in the streets, gamblers stroll past the bars, and workers depart wearily for home. Children shout, run, and play, and everything is good, human, beautiful, ugly, and evil, just like life everywhere else.

And then—the Veil. It falls like night over southern seas—vast, sudden, and unresponsive. Hate lurks behind it, along with Cruelty and Tears. As one looks through its complicated, deep pattern of ancient design, one sees blood, guilt, and misunderstanding. Yet it remains there, this Veil, between Then and Now, between Pale and Colored and Black and White—between You and Me. Surely it is a thought-thing, fragile and intangible; yet it is undeniably true and terrifying, and in our small time, you and I cannot lift it. We might feverishly try to unravel its edges and even slowly climb with giant scissors to where its gilded top rests close to the throne of God. But as we work and climb, we will see through streaming eyes and hear with aching ears, lynching and murder, cheating and contempt, degrading and lying, all flashing and pulsing through this vast hanging darkness, where the Doer never sees the Deed, the Victim knows not the Victor, and Each hates All in wild and bitter ignorance. Listen, O Isles, to these Voices from within the Veil, for they express the deepest human hurt of the Twentieth Cycle of that poor Jesus who was called the Christ!

There’s something about Beauty that requires a conclusion. Ugliness can be infinite; it can fade into a gray nothingness. But Beauty has to be whole—whether it’s a field of poppies or a grand life—it has to have an end, and that end is a part of its beauty and triumph. I know some people imagine an eternal beauty. But I can’t. I can picture great, never-ending displays of beautiful things, visions, and actions. But each one has to be complete, or for me, it doesn’t truly exist.

On the other hand, I see Ugliness as something eternal, not because of its essence but because of its incompleteness; yet, its eternal nature doesn't discourage me, because its endless unfulfillment brings me joy. There's nothing new or surprising about it; it's the same old evil that keeps reaching for an end it can never find; it may twist and turn and keep returning in an endless struggle for days on end, but it's the same human suffering and bitter pain. However, Beauty is about fulfillment. It brings satisfaction. It’s always new and unfamiliar. It is the logical choice. Its end is Death—the sweet silence of perfection, the calm and harmony of perfect music. That is the triumph of Beauty.

The spell of beauty is so strong that some people, despite their own knowledge and experience, claim that everything is beautiful. They’re called optimists, and they’re wrong. Not everything is beauty. Ugliness, hatred, and suffering exist alongside all their contradictions and illogicalities; they'll always be here—hopefully with less intensity, but here and eternal, while beauty reaches its ultimate point—Death. We can't magically erase all ugliness with everlasting beauty, because beauty, by its very nature and definition, has its limits and endpoints; but while beauty is both implicit and evident in its conclusion, ugliness continues to struggle in darkness forever. Thus, the ugliness of constant birth fulfills itself and triumphs beautifully only in the end, which is Death.

At last, happiness comes to all of us, in the Court of Peace, where the dead rest so quietly and beautifully. If we were alive, we would listen to the flowers growing. We would hear the birds singing and see how the rain rises, blushes, shines, fades, and dies in beauty. We would experience spring, summer, and the vibrant colors of autumn, and then in winter, beneath the soft white snow, we would sleep and dream of dreams. But we know that being dead, our happiness is a complete and perfect thing, and that for ten, a hundred, or a thousand years, we will rest peacefully, unharmed, in the Court of Peace.

He stood for a moment on the steps of the bank, watching the crowd flowing down Broadway. Few noticed him. Few ever noticed him except in a way that hurt. He felt outside of the world—"nothing!" as he bitterly put it. Snatches of the words from the people passing by reached his ears.

"The comet?"

"The comet—"

Everybody was talking about it. Even the president, as he walked in, smiled condescendingly at him and asked:

"Hey, Jim, are you scared?"

"No," the messenger replied briefly.

"I thought we had traveled through the comet's tail once," the junior clerk chimed in cheerfully.

"Oh, that was Halley's," said the president; "this is a new comet, a total mystery, they say—amazing, amazing! I saw it last night. Oh, and Jim," he turned back to the messenger, "I need you to go down into the lower vaults today."

The messenger followed the president quietly. Naturally, they wanted him to head down to the lower vaults. It was too risky for more important people. He smiled grimly and listened.

"Everything valuable has been taken out since the water started coming in," the president said. "But we're missing two volumes of old records. Why don't you check down there? I imagine it's not very nice."

"Not really," said the messenger, as he walked out.

"Well, Jim, the tail of the new comet hits us at noon this time," said the vault clerk as he handed over the keys; but the messenger quietly went down the stairs. He descended beneath Broadway, where dim light filtered through the hurried footsteps of men; down to the dark basement below; down into the blackness and silence of that lowest cavern. Here, with his dark lantern, he felt his way through the depths of the earth, beneath the world.

He took a deep breath as he pulled back the last heavy iron door and stepped into the stinking muck inside. Finally, he found some peace, and he moved forward in a sluggish way. A big rat jumped past him, and cobwebs brushed against his face. He carefully felt his way around the room, checking each shelf, the muddy floor, and every crevice and corner. Nothing. Then he returned to the far end, where the wall felt different somehow. He knocked and pushed and pried. Still nothing. He was about to leave when something drew him back. He was probing and working again when suddenly the entire dark wall swung open like it was on massive hinges, revealing darkness beyond. He peered inside; it was clearly a secret vault—some hidden spot in the old bank that had been forgotten over time. He stepped in cautiously. It was a long, narrow room with shelves, and at the far end stood an old iron chest. On a high shelf were the two missing volumes of records and some others. He carefully set them aside and approached the chest. It was old, sturdy, and rusty. He examined the large, outdated lock and shined his light on the hinges, which were heavily covered in rust. Looking around, he found a piece of iron and started to pry. The rust had accumulated over a hundred years and had penetrated deeply. Gradually, the old lid lifted, and with a final, soft groan, it revealed its treasure—and he saw the dull shine of gold!

"Boom!"

A low, grinding, echoing crash hit his ears. He jumped up and looked around. Everything was dark and quiet. He fumbled for his flashlight and waved it around. Then he realized! The heavy stone door had closed. He forgot about the gold and faced death head-on. With a sigh, he got to work. Cold sweat trickled down his forehead, but he searched, pounded, pushed, and worked until, after what felt like endless hours, his hand hit a cold piece of metal and the huge door creaked open again on its hinges, then came to a stop when it hit something soft and heavy. He barely managed to squeeze through. There lay the body of the vault clerk, cold and rigid. He stared at it, feeling sick and nauseous. The air felt strangely foul, with a strong, odd smell. He stepped forward, reached out for something, and collapsed across the corpse.

He woke up in a panic, jumped out of the body, and stumbled up the stairs, calling for the guard. The watchman sat there like he was asleep, with the gate swinging open. After taking one look at him, the messenger rushed to the sub-vault. He called out for the guards in vain. His voice echoed eerily. He dashed up into the big basement. Here, another guard lay face down, cold and still. Fear gripped the messenger's heart. He ran up to the cellar floor, into the bank. The oppressive stillness of death was everywhere, and all around him lay the bowed, bent, and stretched forms of men. The messenger hesitated and looked around. He wasn't someone who got easily shaken; but the scene was horrifying! "Robbery and murder," he whispered to himself slowly as he noticed the mangled, oozing mouth of the president, lying half-buried on his desk. Then a new thought hit him: If they found him here alone—with all this cash and all these dead bodies—what would his life be worth? He scanned the room, tiptoed carefully to a side door, and looked back once more. Quietly, he turned the latch and stepped out onto Wall Street.

How quiet the street was! Not a single person was around, and yet it was midday—Wall Street? Broadway? He looked frantically up and down, then across the street, and as he did, a wave of sickening horror gripped him. With a gasp of pure fear, he lunged, leaned dizzily against the cold building, and stared helplessly at the scene.

In the massive stone doorway, a hundred men, women, and children were crushed together, tangled and jammed, packed into that vast, open entrance like garbage in a bin—as if in a wild, desperate dash for safety, they had rushed and trapped themselves to death. Slowly, the messenger made his way along the walls, moistening his dry mouth and trying to process what he saw, calming the shaking in his limbs and the growing fear in his heart. He encountered a businessman, wearing a silk top hat and a formal coat, who had also crept along that smooth wall and now stood utterly stunned, wonder etched on his face. The messenger quickly glanced away and sought the curb. A woman leaned tiredly against a signpost, her head resting motionless on her lace and silk-draped chest. In front of her was a streetcar, silent, and inside—but the messenger just glanced and moved on. A grimy newsboy sat in the gutter, holding up the "last edition" in his raised hand: "Danger!" screamed its bold headlines. "Warnings sent worldwide. The Comet's tail passes by at noon. Deadly gases expected. Close doors and windows. Seek the basement." The messenger read and staggered on. Far out from an upper window, a girl lay gasping, her arms bare in her sleevelets. On a store step sat a little, sweet-faced girl looking up at the sky, and in the carriage beside her lay—but the messenger no longer looked. The tension broke—the fear surged through his veins, and with one last, desperate cry, he sprang forward and ran—ran as only the terrified do, screaming and flailing at the air until, with one final wail of agony, he collapsed on the grass of Madison Square and lay flat and still.

When he stood up, he didn’t look at the still and silent people on the benches. Instead, he walked over to a fountain and splashed water on his face. Then, finding a corner away from the scene of death, he took a moment to gather his thoughts and process everything: The comet had passed by Earth, and this was the end. Was everyone dead? He needed to check and find out.

He knew he had to calm down and keep himself together, or he would lose his mind. First, he needed to find a restaurant. He walked up Fifth Avenue to a well-known hotel and entered its beautiful, eerie halls. He fought off the wave of nausea, grabbed a tray as if it were someone else's, rushed out into the street, and ate hungrily while hiding to avoid the sights.

"Yesterday, they wouldn't have served me," he whispered, as he forced the food down.

Then he walked up the street—looking around, checking his phone, ringing alarms; everything was silent, completely silent. Was nobody here—nobody—he couldn’t allow himself to think that and quickly moved on.

Suddenly, he came to a stop. He had forgotten. Oh my God! How could he have forgotten? He needed to rush to the subway—then he almost laughed. No—a car; if he could just find a Ford. He spotted one. Carefully, he lifted the burden off it and took a seat inside. He tested the gas pedal. There was fuel. He glided away, shivering, and drove up the street. Everywhere he looked, people were standing, leaning, lounging, and lying dead in grim and awful silence. He sped past a wrecked and overturned car; past another filled with a lively group whose smiles still lingered on their death-struck lips; past crowds and groups of cars, stopping by dead policemen; at 42nd Street, he had to detour to Park Avenue to avoid the deadlock. He made his way back to Fifth Avenue at 57th and flew past the Plaza and the park with its quiet babies and silent crowd, until as he rushed past 72nd Street, he heard a sharp cry and saw a living figure leaning wildly out of an upper window. He gasped. The human voice sounded in his ears like the voice of God.

"Hello—hello—help, for God's sake!" cried the woman. "There's a dead girl in here and a man and—and look at those dead men lying in the street and dead horses—please, for the love of God, go and get the police——" And her words turned into frantic tears.

He quickly turned the car in a circle, running over the still body of a child and hitting the curb. Then he hurried up the steps, tried the door, and rang the bell loudly. There was a long pause, but finally, the heavy door opened. They stared at each other in silence. She hadn’t noticed before that he was Black. He hadn’t thought of her as white. She was a woman of about twenty-five—uncommonly beautiful and elegantly dressed, with darkly-golden hair and jewelry. Yesterday, he bitterly reflected, she probably wouldn’t have glanced at him twice. He would have felt like dirt beneath her fancy shoes. She looked at him. Of all the types of men she had imagined coming to her rescue, she never expected one like him. Not that he wasn’t human, but he lived in a world so far from hers, so incomparably distant, that he rarely crossed her mind. Yet as she looked at him with curiosity, he seemed quite ordinary and familiar. He was a tall, dark workingman from the better class, with a sensitive face hardened to stoicism, dressed in poor man's clothes and rough hands. His face was soft and slow, and his manner was both cold and anxious, like embers that are long banked but not extinguished.

So they both paused for a moment and sized each other up; then the reality of the lifeless world outside hit them, and they moved toward each other.

"What happened?" she cried. "Tell me! Nothing's moving. It's completely silent! I see the dead scattered in front of my window as if blown by the breath of God,—and look——" She pulled him through heavy, silky drapes to where, beneath the shine of mahogany and silver, a little French maid lay peacefully in eternal sleep, and nearby, a butler lay flat in his uniform.

The tears flowed down the woman's cheeks as she held onto his arm until the scent of her breath brushed his face, and he felt the shivers coursing through her body.

"I had been locked away in my dark room, developing the pictures of the comet I shot last night; when I came out—I saw the dead!"

"What happened?" she shouted again.

He replied slowly:

"Something—comet or devil—swept across the earth this morning and—many are dead!"

"Lots? Really lots?"

"I've looked around and I haven't seen anyone else alive except you."

She gasped, and they looked at each other in surprise.

"My—Dad!" she whispered.

"Where's he?"

"He headed to the office."

"Where's it at?"

"In the Metro Tower."

"Leave a note for him here and come back."

Then he paused.

"No," he said firmly, "first, we need to go—to Harlem."

"Harlem!" she yelled. Then she got it. She tapped her foot, initially impatient. She glanced back and shivered. Then she confidently made her way down the steps.

"There's a faster car in the garage in the courtyard," she said.

"I don't know how to drive it," he said.

"I do," she replied.

In ten minutes they were zooming toward Harlem on the breeze. The Stutz lifted off and sped like a plane. They took the turn at 110th Street on two wheels and slid with a scream into 135th.

He was gone for just a moment. Then he came back, and his face was pale. She didn't look at him but said:

"You lost someone?"

"I've lost everyone," he said, plainly—"unless——"

He ran back and was gone for several minutes—what felt like hours to her.

"Everyone," he said, and he walked back slowly with something like a film in his hand that he tucked into his pocket.

"I'm sorry, I was selfish," he said. But by then, the car was moving toward the park through the dark and silent streets of Harlem—the still brown faces, the gnarled hands, the simple clothes, and the quiet—the eerie and haunting quiet. They raced out of the park and down Fifth Avenue. They weaved in and out among the stillness, needing no sound of a bell or horn, until the large, square Metropolitan Tower came into view. He gently set the lifeless elevator boy aside; the car shot upward. The office door was open. On the threshold lay the stenographer, and sitting there, staring at her, was the lifeless clerk. The inner office was empty, but a note rested on the desk, folded and addressed yet unsent:

"Come on," she said anxiously. "We need to search the city."

Up and down, over and across, back again—on went that ghostly search. Everywhere was silence and death—death and silence! They hunted from Madison Square to Spuyten Duyvel; they rushed across the Williamsburg Bridge; they swept over Brooklyn; from the Battery and Morningside Heights they scanned the river. Silence, silence everywhere, and no human sign. Exhausted and disheveled, they trudged a third time slowly down Broadway, under the blazing sun, and finally stopped. He sniffed the air. A scent—a smell—and with the shifting breeze a nauseating stench filled their nostrils, carrying its dreadful warning. The girl slumped back helplessly in her seat.

"What can we do?" she exclaimed.

It was his turn to take charge now, and he did it quickly.

"The long-distance phone—the telegraph and the cable—night rockets and then—flight!"

She looked at him now with strength and confidence. He didn’t look like the men she had always imagined; but he acted like one, and that made her happy. In fifteen minutes, they arrived at the central telephone exchange. As they reached the door, he quickly stepped in front of her and gently pushed her back as he closed it. She heard him moving around and knew the small burdens he carried. When she walked in, he was alone in the room. The grim switchboard flashed its metallic face in cryptic, sphinx-like stillness. She sat on a stool and put on the bright earpiece. She looked at the mouthpiece. She had never examined one so closely before. It was wide and black, covered in bumps from use; inert; lifeless; almost sarcastic in its unfeeling curves. It looked—she pushed the thought away—but it looked,—it kept looking like—she turned her head and realized she was alone. For a moment, she was terrified; then she silently thanked him for his thoughtfulness and turned resolutely, taking a quick breath.

"Hello!" she called quietly. She was reaching out to the world. The world had to answer. Would the world answer? Was the world——

Quiet!

She had spoken too quietly.

"Hey!" she shouted, loud.

She listened. Silence! Her heart raced. She shouted in clear, distinct, loud tones: "Hello—hello—hello!"

What was that buzzing sound? Surely—no—was it the click of a receiver?

She leaned in close, moved the pegs into the holes, and called and called, until her voice nearly turned into a scream and her heart raced. It felt like she had heard the last spark of creation, and the real enemy was silence. Her voice fell to a sob. She sat there, blankly staring into the dark, mocking mouthpiece, and the thought struck her again. Hope was dead inside her. Yes, the cable and the rockets were still there; but the world—she couldn’t form the thought or say the word. It was too overwhelming—too terrifying! She turned toward the door, a new fear swelling in her chest. For the first time, she truly understood that she was alone in the world with a stranger, with something more than a stranger—someone foreign in blood and culture—unknown, maybe even unknowable. It was dreadful! She had to escape—she had to run; he must not see her again. Who knew what horrifying thoughts—

She gathered her silky skirts around her smooth, young legs—listened, and slipped into a side hall. For a moment, she hesitated: the hall was filled with dead women; then she dashed to the door and pulled at it with bloodied fingers until it swung open. She looked out. He was standing at the end of the alley—tall and dark, completely still. Was he looking at her or away? She couldn't tell—and she didn't care. She just jumped and ran—ran until she found herself alone among the dead and the tall walls of looming buildings.

She stopped. She was alone. Alone! Alone on the streets—alone in the city—maybe alone in the world! A feeling of deception crept in—like there were hidden hands behind her back—silent, moving things she couldn’t see—whispers wrapped in a fearful conspiracy. She looked behind and to the side, jumped at strange sounds, and heard even stranger ones, until every nerve in her body was tense and trembling, ready to cry out at the slightest touch. She spun around and raced back, whimpering like a child, until she found that narrow alley again and the dark, silent figure standing at the top. She paused and caught her breath; then she walked silently towards him, looked at him nervously; but he said nothing as he helped her into the car. Her voice caught as she whispered:

"Not that."

And he replied slowly, "No—not that!"

They got into the car. She leaned forward on the steering wheel and sobbed, with dry, shaking cries, as they sped toward the cable office on the east side, leaving behind a world of wealth and success for a world of poverty and hard work. Behind them was a realm of death and silence, serious and grim, almost bitter, but still respectable; here, it was horrifying. It took on every horrific form of fear, struggle, hate, and suffering. It was surrounded by crime and filth, greed and desire. Only in its terrifying and ominous silence did it resemble death everywhere.

Yet as the two, flying and alone, looked upon the horrors of the world, slowly, gradually, the feeling of all-encompassing death faded away from them. They seemed to be moving in a world that was silent and asleep—not dead. They moved with quiet reverence, so as not to wake these sleeping figures who had finally found peace. They moved in some solemn, global Friedhof, over which a powerful hand had waved its magic wand. All of nature was at rest until—until, struck by the same startling thought, they looked into each other's eyes—he, pale, and she, flushed, with unspoken feelings. For both of them, the vision of a tremendous beauty—of vast, unexpressed things, surged within their souls; but they pushed it aside.

Great, dark coils of wire rose up from the ground and reached down from the sun, entering this dim hideout of magic. The collected lightning of the world came together here, connecting the farthest corners of the earth with beams of light. The doors opened wide into the darkness inside. He paused at the entrance.

"Do you know the code?" she asked.

"I recognize the call for help—we used it before at the bank."

She barely heard. She heard the sound of the water lapping far below—the dark and restless water—the cold and enticing water, as they called it. He stepped inside. Slowly, she walked to the wall where the water called from below and stood there waiting. She waited a long time, and he did not come. Then, suddenly, she saw him, too, standing by the dark waters. He slowly took off his coat and stood there silently. She quickly walked over to him and placed her hand on his arm. He didn’t flinch or look. The water continued to lap in its tempting, deadly rhythm. He pointed down at the water and said quietly:

"The world is underwater now—can I go?"

She looked into his worn, exhausted face, and a wave of compassion filled her heart. She replied in a clear and calm voice, "No."

They looked up at life once more, and he took the wheel. The world was fading into twilight, and a great, gray blanket was gently falling over the sleeping dead. The harsh reality seemed to give way to the fantasy of some grand romance. The girl leaned back quietly as the car zipped along, half-consciously hoping to catch a glimpse of the elf-queen bringing life back to this lifeless world. She forgot to be surprised by how quickly he had learned to drive her car; it felt natural. Then, as they whirled and turned into Madison Square and stopped at the door of the Metropolitan Tower, she gasped, and her eyes widened! Maybe she had seen the elf-queen?

The man took her to the elevator of the tower, and they smoothly rode up. In her father's office, they gathered rugs and chairs. He wrote a note and placed it on the desk, then they went up to the roof where he made her comfortable. For a while, she rested and drifted into a dreamy drowsiness, watching the skies above and reflecting on her thoughts. Below, the dark shadows of the city loomed, and in the distance, the sea sparkled. She looked at him shyly as he set food in front of her, and he took a shawl and wrapped her in it, touching her with both reverence and tenderness. She gazed up at him with gratitude in her eyes, eating what he served. He focused on the city while she watched him. He seemed very human—very close now.

"Have you had to put in a lot of effort?" she asked gently.

"Always," he said.

"I've always been lazy," she said. "I was wealthy."

"I was broke," he almost repeated.

"The rich and the poor come together," she started, and he finished:

"The Lord is the creator of them all."

"Yes," she said slowly, "and how silly our human distinctions seem—now," looking down at the vast dead city spread out below, lost in shadow.

"Yeah—I wasn't—human yesterday," he said.

She looked at him. "And your people weren't my people," she said; "but today——" She paused. He was a man—nothing more; but in a bigger sense, he was a gentleman—sensitive, kind, chivalrous, everything except for his hands and—his face. Yet yesterday——

"Death levels the playing field!" he muttered.

"And the revealer," she whispered softly, standing up with wide eyes. He turned away, and after a moment of fumbling, launched a rocket into the darkening sky. It shot up, shrieking, creating a thin trail of light, and scattering its sparks, fell over the city below. She barely noticed it. A vision of the world opened up before her. Gradually, the immense vision of her destiny engulfed her. Above the dead past floated the Angel of Annunciation. She was no ordinary woman. She was neither high nor low, white nor black, rich nor poor. She was the primal woman; mighty mother of all future generations and Bride of Life. She gazed at the man beside her and forgot everything else except for his manhood, his strong, vibrant manhood—his sorrow and sacrifice. She saw him glorified. He was no longer something separate, a being below, a strange outcast of another background and heritage, but her Brother Humanity made flesh, Son of God and great All-Father of the race to come.

He didn't see the glory in her eyes; instead, he gazed out at the sea, launching rocket after rocket into the unresponsive darkness. Dark purple clouds were piled up and swirling in the west. Behind them and all around, the sky glowed with a faint, strange light that filled the darkening world and created a almost melodic sound. Suddenly, as if pulled back by some huge hand, the massive curtain of clouds parted. Low on the horizon was a long, white star—mystical and amazing! From it, a pale, wide band of flame shot up to the pole, like a gentle bridal veil, illuminating everything and washing out the stars.

In awed silence, the man stared at the sky and let his rockets drop to the ground. Memories of memories stirred in the dark corners of his mind. The chains seemed to rattle and fall away from his spirit. Rising above the crassness and oppression of his background was the lone grandeur of kings long gone. He stood up from the shadows, tall, upright, and serious, with power in his eyes and ghostly scepters floating within reach. It was as if some great Pharaoh had come back to life, or a curled Assyrian lord. He turned to look at the lady and found her staring directly at him.

Silently and without moving, they looked at each other directly—eye to eye. Their souls were exposed to the night. It wasn’t desire; it wasn’t love—it was something bigger and more powerful that didn’t require physical touch or emotional excitement. It was a divine, magnificent thought.

Slowly and quietly, they moved toward each other—the skies above, the sea surrounding them, the city below, dark and lifeless. He emerged from the deep, dark shadows. She glimmered under the stars, pearly white and slender. She extended her jeweled hands outward. He raised his strong arms, and they called out to each other, almost in unison, "The world is dead."

"Long live the——"

"Honk! Honk!" The rough, loud sound of a car broke through the quiet below. They stumbled back with a shout and looked at each other with uncertain eyes and racing hearts.

"Honk! Honk! Honk! Honk!" came the frantic shout again, and almost at their feet a rocket shot into the sky, spreading its sparks around them. She covered her eyes with her hands, her shoulders shaking. He dropped down and bowed, searching blindly on his knees around the floor. A blue flame flickered lazily after a while, and she heard the scream of a responding rocket as it soared.

Then they stood frozen, staring in opposite directions across the earth.

"Clang—crash—clang!"

The sound of fast elevators racing up from below made the tall building shake. A mix of voices filled the night air. Throughout the once-silent city, the lights blinked, flickered, and shone; then, with a loud clanging of doors, the entrance to the platform was crowded with men, and one with white, wild hair rushed to the girl and hugged her tightly. "My daughter!" he cried.

Behind him hurried a younger, better-looking guy, dressed in a stylish motor outfit, who leaned over the girl with intense concern and stared into her wide eyes until they narrowed and dropped, making her face turn deeper and deeper red.

"Julia," he whispered, "my darling, I thought I had lost you for good."

She looked up at him with unusual, searching eyes.

"Fred," she whispered, almost dreamily, "is the world—over?"

"Only New York," he replied; "it's terrible—awful! You know—but you, how did you get away—how have you dealt with this nightmare? Are you okay? Unhurt?"

"All good!" she said.

"And this guy here?" he asked, wrapping an arm around her slumped figure and turning toward the Black man. Suddenly, he tensed up and his hand shot to his hip. "What!" he snapped. "It’s—a—Black—Julia! Has he—has he dared——"

She lifted her head and looked at her late companion curiously, then sighed and dropped her eyes.

"He risked everything to save me," she said softly, "and I'm very grateful." But she didn't look at him again. As the couple walked away, the father took out a roll of cash from his pockets.

"Here you go, my friend," he said, shoving the money into the man's hands, "take this—what's your name?"

"Jim Davis," came the reply, sounding empty.

"Well, Jim, thank you. I've always liked your people. If you ever want a job, just reach out to me." And then they left.

The crowd streamed out of the elevators, chatting and murmuring.

"Who was it?"

"Are they still alive?"

"How many?"

"Two!"

"Who got saved?"

"A white girl and a black guy—there she goes."

"A black? Where is he? Let's lynch the damned——"

"Be quiet—he's okay—he saved her."

"Saved hell! He had no business——"

"Here he comes."

Into the bright glow of the electric lights, the man of color moved slowly, with the look of someone who both walks and sleeps.

"Well, what do you think about that?" shouted a bystander; "out of everyone in New York, just a white girl and a black!"

The man of color heard nothing. He stood quietly under the bright light, staring at the money in his hand and shrinking back as he looked; slowly he put his other hand into his pocket and pulled out a delicate baby cap, and looked again. A woman climbed up to the platform and scanned the area, shading her eyes. She was brown, petite, and worn from labor, and in one arm, she held the lifeless body of a dark-skinned baby. The crowd parted, and when her eyes landed on the man of color, she cried out and stumbled toward him.

"Hey, Jim!"

He spun around and, with a cry of happiness, embraced her.