Tue, November 9, 2010 6:54:31 PM

dubois
From: santana francisco <sjfrancisco2010@gmail.com>  
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To: santana_da_balla2010@yahoo.com

What are the steps Dubois felt should be taken to life the race from its position as he saw it in
1903?

                W.E.B Du bois was a great man who, in light of all his accomplishments, only wished to
propel his African American people in this racially injust American country.  With
Reconstruction ending and becoming what some would call a failure under President Andrew
Johnson’s leadership, the African American race needed a strong leader that would point them
in the right direction. Racial prejudices and segregation made being black a struggle in itself,
and to go along with the many struggles a person has to go through in life just by living, being
an African American in the early twentieth century could be seen as a stressful, and most
enduring way of life. African Americans needed a powerful leader DuBois rose to the occasion
and became that leader the people needed. In order to lift the race from its position as he saw
it in 1903, Dubois felt that the African American community needed to become more defiant
towards the things they wanted instead of being submissive, fight for the right to vote, and of
course become a much more educated people.

                What made W.E.B DuBois a great leader was his blunt and “to-the-point” attitude that
he had towards getting the things he wanted. This was the same attitude that DuBois felt the
African American race needed to have If they wanted to rise above the poor standards that the
Caucasian race had set for them. During times of slavery, the submissive attitude was the
attitude most African Americans carried; this was the attitude that the new leader of this time,
Booker T. Washington also carried. In being submissive, DuBois stated that Washington asks the
race to give up three things: political power, insistence on civil rights, and the higher education
of Negro youth (pg. 67). In return, Dubois said that African Americans have seen, “the
disfranchisement of the Negro, legal creation of a distinct status of civil inferiority for the
Negro, and the stead withdrawal of aid from institutions for the higher training of the Negro (pg
68).” This old submissive attitude doesn’t help one to gain the rights that they ultimately feel
they deserve; instead, they either remain in the same place in which they started or they see
see their situation deteriorate. DuBois believes that, “the way to truth and right lies in the
straightforward honesty,”and this type of attutude is what the race needed if it wished to see
its situation improved (pg 69). If a person doesn’t allow for their opinion or stance on a
situation to be heard, then how can they expect for their situation to get better? This was the
logic that DuBois used to tear down Washington’s approach and show that defiance and
becoming outspoken is the way to let others know that you don’t accept the current conditions
that your being subject to.

                Another aspect that DuBois felt was essential in the lifting of the African American race
was the right to vote. DuBois states that, “Negros must insist continually, in season and out of
season, that voting is necessary to modern manhood… (pg 70).” How can a person expect their
situation to change if they are unable to let their concerns known to the very people that
govern their existence?  Demanding the right to vote was another assertive attitude that DuBois
carried and spread to the African American community. How can a man be a man if their voice
cannot be heard? DuBois knew that if the African American could win the right to vote, then a
lot of the newly established Jim Crow law that kept the race down would ultimately be shunned
and dismissed. Of course he wasn’t the only one to recognize this face; Caucasian Americans
knew of this secret too. Keeping African Americans out of the government gave White America
all of the power to do whatever it wanted. Not only did voting keep African Americans out of
the government and politics, but mostly it prevented members of the African American
community to be fully recognized as citizens. Sure the government counted them as citizens of
the United States, but in actuality, they weren’t any more distinguished than an immigrant in
the fact that they couldn’t vote. This had an emotional effect of the African American
community more than anything and falls in line with DuBois statement that voting is necessary
to modern manhood. If a man can’t let his voice be heard through his vote, then what is the
point of saying that you live in a democratic country that supposedly has all these unalienable
rights promised to citizens of the United States?

                Lastly, DuBois felt that education was one of the most essential parts to propelling the
African American race in early twentieth century America. In a land where slaves were thought
of as incapable of learning, educating the African American race would prove that African
Americans were just as capable of learning as whites and eliminate ignorance in the African
American population. Being unable to read shouldn’t be a factor as to why the white man
blindsided you in a business venture or other common situations that arose on plenty occasions
during this time. DuBois stated that, “…such human training (educating) as will best use the
labor of all men without enslaving or brutalizing; such training as will give us poise to encourage
the prejudices that bulwark society, and to stamp out those that in sheer barbarity deafen us to
the wail of prisoned souls within the Veil, and the mounting fury of shackled men (pg 92).”
DuBois recognized that education would open up a whole new world for the African American
race and make them able to compete with their Caucasian counterpart whenever they are
given the opportunity to present themselves to the workforce or just to the general public. A
more knowledgeable African American race will do just as Dubois said and free itself from the
“Veil” and see what all American and life has to offer outside of what Jim Crow and the South
presents to them.  This will unlock the minds of many of the African Americans and make things
that they didn’t think they could achieve come to life. Education is a win-win situation for the
African American society as it also allows for more leaders like DuBois to come out of the
darkness and into the light and propel the African American community in the same way that
he did. Only good can arise from being educated and DuBois knew this through his own
education. No one, no matter what race he or she was, could tell DuBois something false and
make him believe because when education allows for you to discover the truth for yourself.
This is what education could do to make the African American rise to the occasion and pave a
way to a better life in the midst of everything that was going on around them.

                Overall, DuBois felt that in order to propel the race from its position as he saw it in
1903, the African American race would have to become more defiant and vocal in trying to get
what they want, fight for their right to vote, and become educated. If the African American race
could become these three things, then change would have to come about eventually. Dubois
felt that the way for a people to gain their reasonable rights is not by, “voluntarily throwing
them away and insisting that they do not want them; that the way for a people to gain respect
is not by continually belittling and ridiculing themselves; that on the contrary, Negroes must
insist continually, in season and out of season that voting is necessary to modern manhood, the
color discrimination is barbarism and that black boys need education as well as white boys (pg
70).” This way of thinking paved the way for future leaders like Malcolm X and Martin Luther
King that actually witnessed some of the changes that came about based on the ideas that
Dubois felt would actually propel the African American race.