Our Business Relationship

In a speech delivered before the American Banker Association, Mitchell speaks of the forming of a “better class of white and colored people [who] are endeavoring to form an alliance for the stamping out and the obliteration of these evils.”

In our speech in New York, before the American Banker Association, we spoke as a banker to bankers, as a businessman. That the facts stated are true admits of no question on the part of intelligent, business men, be they white or be they colored. The obnoxious color-line is not discernible in our business relationship with the white businessmen of the South.
A colored man who makes a point to keep his credit above par, by meeting his obligations promptly and caring for his outstanding paper is always accorded a hearty support by white men of the business type, who haven’t the time to indulge in race prejudice or to consider whether the person giving them trade belongs to the much abused race of the Southland.
But when you come to the lower strata of the white humanity, you find the anarchistic tendencies that breed lynching, stake-burnings and other barbarous practices. The better class of white and colored people are endeavoring to form an alliance for the stamping out and the obliteration of these evils.
The loafing, insulting, good for nothing Negro elements are an abomination. They constantly handicap the better class of colored people, who are endeavoring to improve their condition.
It is partially at least to relieve ourselves of “the body of this death” and to disclaim our responsibility for their foibles and follies that we at times join in a denunciation of them.

“Our Business Relationship,” Black Virginia: The Richmond Planet, 1894-1909, accessed September 14, 2026, https://blackvirginia.richmond.edu/items/show/673.