From The
Souls of Black Folk, 1903,
W.E.B. DuBois
Strange to relate! For this is certain, no secure civilization
can be built in the South with the Negro as an ignorant, turbulent
proletariat. Suppose we seek to remedy this by making them
laborers and nothing more: they are not fools, they have tasted
of the Tree of Life, and they will not cease to think, will
not cease attempting to read the riddle of the world. By taking
away their best equipped teachers and leaders, by slamming
the door of opportunity in the faces of their bolder and brighter
minds, will you make them satisfied with their lot? Or will
you not rather transfer their leading from the hands of men
taught to think to the hands of untrained demagogues? We ought
not to forget that despite the pressure of poverty, and despite
the active discouragement and even ridicule of friends, the
demand for higher training steadily increases among Negro youth:
there were, in the years from 1895-1900, nearly 100 graduates.
From Southern Negro colleges there were, in the same three
periods, 143, 413, and over 500 graduates. Here, then, is the
plain thirst for training; by refusing to give this Talented
Tenth the key to knowledge, can any sane man imagine that they
will lightly lay aside their yearning and contentedly become
hewers of wood and drawers of water?
