The Philadelphia Negro. W. E. B. Du Bois

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СКАЧАТЬ it is said, here they are free; they have the same chance as the Irishman, the Italian, or the Swede ; at other times it is said, the environment is such that it is really more oppressive than the situation in Southern cities. The student must ignore both of these extreme statements and seek to extract from a complicated mass of facts the tangible evidence of a social atmosphere surrounding Negroes, which differs from that surrounding most whites ; of a different mental attitude, moral standard, and economic judgment shown toward Negroes than toward most other folk. That such a difference exists and can now and then plainly be seen, few deny ; but just how far it goes and how large a factor it is in the Negro problems, nothing but careful study and measurement can reveal.

      Such then are the phenomena of social condition and environment which this study proposes to describe, analyze, and, so far as possible, interpret.

5. Plan of Presentment.—The study as taken up here divides itself roughly into four parts : the history of the Negro people in the city, their present condition considered as individuals, their condition as an organized social group, and their physical and social environment. To the history of the Negro but two chapters are devoted—a brief sketch —although the subject is worthy of more extended study than the character of this essay permitted.

      Six chapters consider the general condition of the Negroes: their number, age and sex, conjugal condition, and birthplace; what degree of education they have obtained, and how they earn a living. All these subjects are treated usually for the Seventh Ward somewhat minutely, then more generally for the city, and finally such historical material is adduced as is available for comparison.

      Three chapters are devoted to the group life of the Negro ; this includes a study of the family, of property, and of organizations of all sorts. It also takes up such phenomena of social maladjustment and individual depravity as crime, pauperism and alcoholism.

      One chapter is devoted to the difficult question of environment, both physical and social, one to certain results of the contact of the white and black races, one to Negro suffrage, and a word of general advice in the line of social reform is added.

CHAPTER III.

      THE NEGRO IN PHILADELPHIA, 1638–182O.

6. General Survey.—Few States present better opportunities for the continuous study of a group of Negroes than Pennsylvania. The Negroes were brought here early, were held as slaves along with many white serfs. They became the subjects of a protracted abolition controversy, and were finally emancipated by gradual process. Although, for the most part, in a low and degraded condition, and thrown upon their own resources in competition with white labor, they were nevertheless so inspired by their new freedom and so guided by able leaders that for something like forty years they made commendable progress. Meantime, however, the immigration of foreign laborers began, the new economic era of manufacturing was manifest in the land, and a national movement for the abolition of slavery had its inception. The lack of skilled Negro laborers for the factories, the continual stream of Southern fugitives and rural freedmen into the city, the intense race antipathy of the Irish and others, together with intensified prejudice of whites who did not approve of agitation against slavery—all this served to check the development of the Negro, to increase crime and pauperism, and at one period resulted in riot, violence, and bloodshed, which drove many Negroes from the city.

      Economic adjustment and the enforcement of law finally allayed this excitement, and another period of material prosperity and advance among the Negroes followed. Then came the inpouring of the nedy emancipated blacks from the South and the economic struggle of the artisars to maintain wages, which brought on a crisis in the city, manifested again by idleness, crime and pauperism.

      Thus we see that twice the Philadelphia Negro has, with a fair measure of success, begun an interesting social development, and twice through the migration of barbarians a dark age has settled on his age of revival. These same phenomena would have marked the advance of many other elements of our population if they had been as definitely isolated into one indivisible group. No differences of social condition allowed any Negro to escape from the group, although such escape was continually the rule among Irish, Germans, and other whites.

7. The Transplanting of the Negro, 1638-1760.—The Dutch, and possibly the Swedes, had already planted slavery on the Delaware when Penn and the Quakers arrived in 1682.¹ One of Penn's first acts was tacitly to recognize the serfdom of Negroes by a provision of the Free Society of Traders that they should serve fourteen years and then become serfs—a provision which he himself and all the others soon violated.²

      Certain German settlers who came soon after Penn, and who may or may not have been active members of the Society of Friends, protested sturdily against slavery in 1688, but the Quakers found the matter too “weighty.”³ Five years later the radical seceders under Kieth made the existence of slavery a part of their attack on the society. Nevertheless the institution of slavery in the colony continued to grow, and the number of blacks in Philadelphia so increased that as early as 1693 we find an order of the Council against the “tumultuous gatherings of the negroes of the towne of Philadelphia, on the first dayes of the weeke.” ⁴

      In 1696 the Friends began a cautious dealing with the subject, which in the course of a century led to the abolition of slavery. This growth of moral sentiment was slow but unwaveringly progressive, and far in advance of contemporary thought in civilized lands. At first the Friends sought merely to regulate slavery in a general way and prevent its undue growth. They therefore suggested in the Yearly Meeting of 1696, and for some time thereafter, that since traders “have flocked in amongst us and…increased and multiplied negroes amongst us,” members ought not to encourage the further importation of slaves, as there were enough for all purposes. In 1711 a more active discouragement of the slave trade was suggested, and in 1716 the Yearly Meeting intimated that even the buying of imported slaves might not be the best policy, although the Meeting hastened to call this “caution, not censure.”

      By 1719 the Meeting was certain that their members ought not to engage in the slave trade, and in 1730 they declared the buying of slaves imported by others to be “disagreeable.” At this milestone they lingered thirty years for breath and courage, for the Meeting had evidently distanced many of its more conservative members. In 1743 the question of importing slaves, or buying imported slaves, was made a disciplinary query, and in 1754, spurred by the crusade of Say, Woolman and Benezet, offending members were disciplined. In the important gathering of 1758 the same golden rule was laid down as that with which the Germans, seventy years previous, had taunted them, and the institution of slavery was categorically condemned.⁵ Here they rested until 1775, when, after a struggle of eighty-seven years, they decreed the exclusion of slaveholders from fellowship in the Society.

      While in the councils of the State Church the freedom of Negroes was thus evolving, the legal status of Negroes of Pennsylvania was being laid. Four bills were introduced in 1700: one regulating slave marriages was lost; the other three were passed, but the Act for the Trial of Negroes—a harsh measure providing death, castration and whipping for punishments, and forbidding the meeting together of more than four Negroes—was afterward disallowed by the Queen in Council. The remaining acts became laws, and provided for a small duty on imported slaves and the regulation of trade with slaves and servants.⁶

      In 1706 another act for the trial of Negroes was passed and allowed. It differed but slightly from the Act of 1700 ; it provided that Negroes should be tried for crimes by two justices of the peace and a jury of six freeholders ; robbery and rape were punished by branding and exportation, homicide by death, and stealing by whipping ;⁷ the meeting of Negroes without permission was prohibited. Between this time and 1760 statutes were passed regulating the sale of liquor to slaves and the use of firearms by them ; and also the general regulative Act of 1726, “for the Better Regulation of Negroes in this Province.” This act was especially for the punishment of crime, the suppression of pauperism, the prevention СКАЧАТЬ