Booker T Washington Atlanta Address
"To those of my race who depend on bettering their condition in a foreign land or who underestimate the importance of cultivating friendly relations with the Southern white man, who is their next-door neighbour, I would say: "Cast down your bucket where you are"-cast it down in making friends in every manly way of the people of all races by whom we are surrounded. Cast it down in agriculture, mechanics, in commerce, in domestic service, and in the professions." This powerful statement that Booker T. Washington made was both enlightened and quite possible harmful to the black race. At the time the speech was given, Jim Crow laws in the south were in full affect, and the black population as a whole, in the South was striving to improve their socio-economic status. Washington wanted to help his people and thought the best way to do so was in an
Washington gave at Atlanta shows us that he must have spent a great deal of time in preparing his speech to make sure what he had said was perfect and could not be misunderstood by the people who would be willing to stop his cause. However, I believe that Washington failed to realize that without political power, economic gains were short-lived and vulnerable. He was by far a great man and should be looked at with hero's eyes. The KKK was gaining popularity and Black people really had little or no say in Congress, much less local courts, or even police protection. Washington was doing what he thought was best; but I also wonder if he would have used his influence, to persuade his northern philanthropists to help out even more with the obvious struggle that blacks faced at this time. "No race can prosper till it learns that there is as much dignity in tilling a field as in writing a poem. " By teaching people how to become better members of society through hard work, and prudence, one could achieve empowerment. It is clear that Washington gave himself to his cause and instead of fighting a losing cause that would have no merit he did actually help a great many of his people by giving them a chance to achieve where his race was never able to so before, in the work force. Without financial backing there would be no Tuskegee school, and therefore no improvement of the future, which could pave the way for true civil equality. Washington was a realist, and if he wanted to achieve a decent socio-economic status for his people he had to accommodate to the people who had money. This is very difficult point to understand in order to get a little one has to give a little but at the time, hangings were happening at an outrageous rate. "In all things that are purely social we can be as separate as the fingers, yet one as the hand in all things essential to mutual progress. To accommodate Jim Crow he was in fact doing more harm then good.
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