"Democracy and Education"
December 5, 1896
Summary
The highlights of Booker T. Washington’s famous “Democracy and Education” speech are transcribed.
Transcription
Prof. Booker T Washington lectured before Twentieth Century Club of Boston, Nov. 25th and during his remarkable address on "Democracy and Education” gave voice to expressions, which will give him rank among the foremost economic thinker of his day.
Among other things, he said:
“The central idea which I wish you to help me consider this evening is the reaching and lifting up of the lowest, most unfortunate, negative element that occupies so larges proportion of our territory and composes so large a percentage of our population. It seems to me that there never was a time in the history of our country when those interested in education should more earnestly consider to what extent the mere acquiring of the ability to read and write, of a knowledge of literature and science, makes men producers, lovers of labor, independent, honest, unselfish and, above all, supreme good. Call education by what name you please, and if it fails to bring about these results among the masses, it falls short of its highest end. The science, the art, the literature, that fails to reach down and bring the humblest up to the enjoyment of the fullest blessings of our government is weak, no matter how costly the buildings or apparatus used, or how modern the methods of instruction employed.”
Who can truthfully gain-say or deny those assertions? And again:
"I know that wherever our life touches yours, we help or we hinder; that wherever your life touches ours, you make us stronger or weaker. I know that with all the conflicting opinions and with a full knowledge of all our weaknesses, only a few centuries ago we went into slavery in this country pagans, we came out Christians; we went into slavery a piece of property, we came out American citizens; we went into slavery with chains clanking about our wrists, we came out with the American ballot in our hands. My friends, I submit it to your candid and sober judgement if a race that is capable of such a test, such a transformation, is not worth saving and making a part in reality, as well as in name, of our democratic government.”
The above are truisms. He said:
"Few, I fear, realize what is to be done before the 7,000,000 of my people in the South can be made a safe, helpful, progressive part of our institutions The South, in proportion to its ability, has done well, but this does not change facts. In spite of all that has been done, in one county in Alabama, that contains 30,000 colored people and about 7,000 whites, not a single public school for Negroes has been opened this year longer than three months, not a single colored teacher has been paid more than $15 a month for teaching. In this county, the state or public authorities do not own a single dollar's worth of school property. Each colored child has had spent on him this year for his education about 50 cents while each one of your children has had spent on him about $20 And yet each citizen of that county is expected to share the burdens and privileges of our democratic form of government equally with the people of Boston. Did you know that a single schoolhouse built this year in a town near Boston to shelter 300 students has cost more for building alone than will be spent this year for the education of the whole colored school population of Alabama?”
No stronger comparison could have been made; no greater contrast presented. But he makes a powerful plea for the poor whites of the South.
The following was bound to have telling effect upon those who listened to his argument:
"The educators, the statesmen, the philanthropists, have never comprehended their duty towards the millions of poor whites in the South who were buffeted for 200 years between slaver and freedom, between, civilization and degradation, who were disregarded b both master and slav. It needs no prophet to tell the character of our future civilization when the poor white boy in the country districts of the South receives $1 worth of education and your boy $20 worth; when one never enters a reading room or library and the other has reading rooms and libraries in every ward or town; when one hears lectures and sermons once in two months, and the other can have a lecture or a sermon almost every day in the year.”
He concluded as follows:
"When you help the South you help yourselves. Abuse will not bring the remedy. The time has come, it seems to me when in this matter we should rise above party or race or sectionalism into the region duty of men to man, citizen to citizen, Christian to Christian. And if the negro, who has been oppressed and denied rights in a Christian land, can help the North and South to rise, can be the medium of your rising into this atmosphere of Christian Brotherhood and self-forgetfulness, he will see in it a recompenses for all that he has suffered in the past.”
Is there a man of us who would take issue with Prof. Washington upon this point? Are not all his utterances made in the same spirit as were those which thrilled Wendell Phillips and caused William Lloyd Garrison brave the fury of the mobs in enunciated the hoary doctrine of the fatherhood of God and the brotherhood of man.
Prof. Washington may be misunderstood and misrepresented now; but if success attends his efforts and his hopes for the future realized generations as yet unborn will accord him that praise which many now refuse to tender.
Race interests are paramount with us, and in this distinguished son we see the hope of the dawn of a brighter day.
Among other things, he said:
“The central idea which I wish you to help me consider this evening is the reaching and lifting up of the lowest, most unfortunate, negative element that occupies so larges proportion of our territory and composes so large a percentage of our population. It seems to me that there never was a time in the history of our country when those interested in education should more earnestly consider to what extent the mere acquiring of the ability to read and write, of a knowledge of literature and science, makes men producers, lovers of labor, independent, honest, unselfish and, above all, supreme good. Call education by what name you please, and if it fails to bring about these results among the masses, it falls short of its highest end. The science, the art, the literature, that fails to reach down and bring the humblest up to the enjoyment of the fullest blessings of our government is weak, no matter how costly the buildings or apparatus used, or how modern the methods of instruction employed.”
Who can truthfully gain-say or deny those assertions? And again:
"I know that wherever our life touches yours, we help or we hinder; that wherever your life touches ours, you make us stronger or weaker. I know that with all the conflicting opinions and with a full knowledge of all our weaknesses, only a few centuries ago we went into slavery in this country pagans, we came out Christians; we went into slavery a piece of property, we came out American citizens; we went into slavery with chains clanking about our wrists, we came out with the American ballot in our hands. My friends, I submit it to your candid and sober judgement if a race that is capable of such a test, such a transformation, is not worth saving and making a part in reality, as well as in name, of our democratic government.”
The above are truisms. He said:
"Few, I fear, realize what is to be done before the 7,000,000 of my people in the South can be made a safe, helpful, progressive part of our institutions The South, in proportion to its ability, has done well, but this does not change facts. In spite of all that has been done, in one county in Alabama, that contains 30,000 colored people and about 7,000 whites, not a single public school for Negroes has been opened this year longer than three months, not a single colored teacher has been paid more than $15 a month for teaching. In this county, the state or public authorities do not own a single dollar's worth of school property. Each colored child has had spent on him this year for his education about 50 cents while each one of your children has had spent on him about $20 And yet each citizen of that county is expected to share the burdens and privileges of our democratic form of government equally with the people of Boston. Did you know that a single schoolhouse built this year in a town near Boston to shelter 300 students has cost more for building alone than will be spent this year for the education of the whole colored school population of Alabama?”
No stronger comparison could have been made; no greater contrast presented. But he makes a powerful plea for the poor whites of the South.
The following was bound to have telling effect upon those who listened to his argument:
"The educators, the statesmen, the philanthropists, have never comprehended their duty towards the millions of poor whites in the South who were buffeted for 200 years between slaver and freedom, between, civilization and degradation, who were disregarded b both master and slav. It needs no prophet to tell the character of our future civilization when the poor white boy in the country districts of the South receives $1 worth of education and your boy $20 worth; when one never enters a reading room or library and the other has reading rooms and libraries in every ward or town; when one hears lectures and sermons once in two months, and the other can have a lecture or a sermon almost every day in the year.”
He concluded as follows:
"When you help the South you help yourselves. Abuse will not bring the remedy. The time has come, it seems to me when in this matter we should rise above party or race or sectionalism into the region duty of men to man, citizen to citizen, Christian to Christian. And if the negro, who has been oppressed and denied rights in a Christian land, can help the North and South to rise, can be the medium of your rising into this atmosphere of Christian Brotherhood and self-forgetfulness, he will see in it a recompenses for all that he has suffered in the past.”
Is there a man of us who would take issue with Prof. Washington upon this point? Are not all his utterances made in the same spirit as were those which thrilled Wendell Phillips and caused William Lloyd Garrison brave the fury of the mobs in enunciated the hoary doctrine of the fatherhood of God and the brotherhood of man.
Prof. Washington may be misunderstood and misrepresented now; but if success attends his efforts and his hopes for the future realized generations as yet unborn will accord him that praise which many now refuse to tender.
Race interests are paramount with us, and in this distinguished son we see the hope of the dawn of a brighter day.
About this article
Source
Location on Page
Upper Left Quadrant
Topic
Contributed By
Liam Eynan
Citation
“"Democracy and Education",” Black Virginia: The Richmond Planet, 1894-1909, accessed April 24, 2025, https://blackvirginia.richmond.edu/items/show/1573.