Litwack - North of Slavery The Negro in the Free States

North of Slavery

To My Father and Mother

JULIUS AND MINNIE LITWACK

The same popular pressures that forced political parties to embrace the doctrine of white supremacy demanded and sanctioned the social and economic repression of the Negro population. Racial segregation or exclusion thus haunted the northern Negro in his attempts to use public conveyances, to attend schools, or to sit in theaters, churches, and lecture halls. But even the more subtle forms of twentieth-century racial discrimination had their antecedents in the ante bellum North: residential restrictions, exclusion from resorts and certain restaurants, confinement to menial employments, and restricted cemeteries. The justification for such discrimination in the North differed little from that used to defend slavery in the South: Negroes, it was held, constituted a depraved and inferior race which must be kept in its proper place in a white man's society.

The position of the Negro in the ante bellum North invites obvious comparison with that of the slave in the South. Indeed, many publicists and politicians in both sections repeatedly made and exploited that comparison, claiming that slaves and free Negroes shared an identical existence. Such a position, however, is as gross an oversimplification as is the traditional contrast between northern racial benevolence and southern intolerance. For, as this study suggests, important distinctions did exist between northern free Negroes and southern slaves, just as there were fundamental differences between the condition of northern white industrial workers and southern bondsmen. Above all, the northern Negro was a free man; he was not subject to the whims and dictates of the master or overseer; he could not be bought and sold; he could not be arbitrarily separated from his family. Although a victim of racial proscription, he could and on several occasions did advance his political and economic position in the ante bellum period; he could and did organize and petition, publish newspapers and tracts, even join with white sympathizers to advance his cause; in sum, he was able to carry on a variety of activities directed toward an improvement of his position. Although subjected to angry white mobs, ridicule, and censure, he made substantial progress in some sections of the North and, at the very least, began to plague the northern conscience with the inconsistency of its antislavery pronouncements and prevailing racial practices. And although confined largely to menial employments, some Negroes did manage to accumulate property and establish thriving businesses; by 1860, northern Negroes shared with white workers the vision of rising into the middle class. Finally, on the eve of the Civil War, an increasing number of Negroes were availing themselves of educational opportunities, either in the small number of integrated schools or in the exclusive and usually inferior Negro schools.

The northern Negro, then, proved to be neither as passive nor as meek and subservient as the conventional stereotype portrayed him; nor, for that matter, did the southern slave. But the free society of the North and the slave society of the South dictated different forms of Negro protest. While the pre-eminent Negro of the ante bellum North was undoubtedly Frederick Douglass, an active abolitionist organizer, speaker, and editor, the most symbolic product of the ante bellum South was Nat Turner, the unsuccessful slave insurrectionist. Therein lies the difference.

During its various stages of development, this book has benefited from the suggestions and criticisms of many friends. My indebtedness to Kenneth M. Stampp is considerable. Since the inception of this study, he has given it direction, encouragement, and searching criticism. I am also grateful to Vernon Carstensen and Leslie H. Fishel, Jr., for their careful reading of the entire manuscript and their helpful comments and corrections. Early in the study I profited from the suggestions of Richard Drinnon, John Hope Franklin, Seymour M. Lipset, and William R. Stanton. In the final stages Gaspare Saladino and Rupert Loucks rendered some valuable assistance. Finally, to my good friends James Kindregan and Arthur Zilversmit I would like to express my special gratitude for the interest, time, energy, and insights which they so generously bestowed upon this work. Bowing to one of the traditions of acknowledgments, and to protect the innocent, I assume full responsibility for any stylistic errors or misinterpretations of facts.

The Sigmund Martin Heller Traveling Fellowship, awarded by the University of California, enabled me to conduct my research in various parts of the United States. A summer grant from the University of Wisconsin Graduate School permitted me to prepare the manuscript for publication. I am also appreciative of the co-operation and courtesies extended to me by the staffs of the University of California Library, Berkeley; the University of California, Santa Barbara Library, Goleta; the Henry E. Huntington Library, San Marino; the Library of Congress and Howard University Library (Moorland Foundation), Washington, D.C.; the 135th Street Branch of the New York Public Library (Schomburg Collection) and the Columbia University Library, New York City; the Boston Public Library; the Harvard University Library, Cambridge; the Cornell University Library, Ithaca; the University of Michigan Library and the William L. Clements Library, Ann Arbor; the Historical Society of Pennsylvania Library, Philadelphia; the Friends Historical Library of Swarthmore College, Swarthmore; and the State Historical Society of Wisconsin Library, Madison. For permission to reprint materials that have appeared in their publications, I am grateful to the editors of the Journal of Negro History and the New England Quarterly.