A Defamer of His Race
By CHARLES W. CHESNUTT
[Mr. Charles W. Chesnutt, the writer of this review, speaks freely and forcibly of the man who has
defamed his race. Mr. Chesnutt, who is himself allied by blood to the negro race, is also a writer of wide
reputation. He knows his subject thoroughly and speaks not only with feeling, but with the facts at his
finger-ends.— Eus. CRITIC.]
THE first thought that strikes the
reader of this atrocious book* is, how
did a reputable publishing house ever
permit itself to become parties to its
publication ? The answer probably is
that the readers of the publishing house
knew nothing about the colored race
beyond what they read in the news
papers, and therefore took it for granted
that a colored man, who claimed to be
a lawyer and ex-member of a legisla
ture, would know all about his own peo
ple. It seems never to have occurred
to them that a man might be all that,
and yet be unworthy of credit, nor do
they seem to have inquired into the an
tecedents of the author of a book the
value of which must rest almost solely
upon the writer's character, for the
book is almost wholly an expression of
opinion, with no statistics to support
it, but based entirely upon the claimed
knowledge and experience of the
writer. That a reputable publishing
house should have issued such a book
against any other considerable class of
people without such preliminary inves
tigation is incredible.
The present reviewer during a recent
extended tour of the Southern States,
under circumstances which threw him
mainly among the better class of the
colored people, has taken pains to as
certain as far as possible the past record
of Mr. Thomas, and is obliged to say
that he has not heard anywhere one
good word concerning him. The
writer has conversed with colored
bishops, college professors, and others,
men of substance and character, who
have known this man during his varie
gated career, and they are all unani
mous in the statement that the book
faithfully represents the man. The
only parallel example to this book was
one written some years ago by a rene-
* " The American Negro." By
The Macmillan Company.
William Hannibal Thomas.
$2.00.
35°
gade Jew, in which all the worst slan
ders against this oppressed people were
gathered from the obscure and musty
folios of ancient libraries, and dished
up in a paper-covered volume for the
delectation of the nineteenth century.
It must have been a satisfaction to the
chosen people to note that within a
year the author of the book was sent
to the penitentiary for forgery, and
that a year or two later the publishing
house failed disastrously. This may
have been a logical non sequitur, but it
was poetic justice. Mr. Thomas may
continue to escape this fate, but if it
be any satisfaction to him to know
that he has not a single friend or well-
wisher among the whole eight or ten
millions of his own people, he may rest
content that such is emphatically the
case.
So much for the man, if it be pos
sible to separate the man from the
book. The present reviewer once
wrote a story in which a negro was
transformed into a tree, and the tree
sawed up into lumber, and built into a
house, which was ever afterwards
haunted by the spirit of the unfortu
nate victim of an untoward fate. The
parallel between Thomas and this tree-
man is obvious. He has transformed
himself into white paper and black ink
— he is a mulatto by blood — and has
bound himself into a book. Neverthe
less, it may be possible, by an effort,
to consider the book as a separate
thing.
In the first place, it is not a well-
written book. That it has a certain
amount of ability is beyond question ;
but it lacks consecutiveness. It would
seem to have been compiled from a
scrap-book, into which the author had
pasted for twenty years or more every
newspaper clipping that he had seen
anywhere to the discredit of the colored
race. A peculiarity of the book which
 A Defamer of His Race
bears out this view is his employment
of the word
" freedman," a term which
is not now in common use as descrip
tive of the colored people, as it was
twenty years ago. A full average
generation has elapsed since the aboli
tion of slavery, and fully three fourths
of the colored people of the present
day are free born, as a comparison of
their numbers now and at the close of
the civil war will demonstrate. Mr.
Thomas has great fluency of language
— a fondness for big words is supposed
to be a trait of his race. A good com
mand of a large vocabulary is a valu
able accomplishment, and, if it be a
race trait, one which may be judiciously
cultivated to the enrichment of litera
ture; but it is painfully apparent here
and there that Mr. Thomas's thought
has been swept away by the current
of his own eloquence. One must some
times fish long in this turbid pool to
catch a minnow.
The negro has suffered a great deal,
in the public estimation, from loose
and hasty generalizations with refer
ence to his intelligence, his morals, his
physical characteristics, and his social
efficiency. But not the worst things
said about him by his most radical de
tainers, all put together, could surpass
in untruthfulness and malignity the
screed which this alleged reformer has
put forth under his publisher's imprint.
The slanders against the womanhood
of his race are so vile as to confute
themselves by their mere statement.
There are several passages in the book,
reflecting on the morals of colored
youth, which ought to bar the volume
from circulation in the United States
mails. They are false on the face of
them. No individual could possibly
know that they were true, and they
are utterly abhorrent to human nature
and human experience. To believe
them, one must read the negro out of
the human family. If they are the
fruit of this author's observation, one
shudders to contemplate the depths
of vice which he has fathomed.
His characterization of colored
preachers is also unjust. That there
are many such preachers who might be
otherwise employed with more profit
351
to society may well be admitted ; but
that there are among them many good
men, faithful to their trust, earnestly
striving to uplift their people, and with
encouraging results, is apparent to any
one who will take the trouble to inquire.
The greatest preacher of America did
not escape calumny, if he avoided sin.
Human character is a compound of
good and evil. For aught we know,
Judas Iscariot was a very good apostle
before he betrayed his Master; we
know that Benedict Arnold was a gal
lant soldier who had served his country
well before he betrayed her. But here
the parallel between these men and
this author fails, for what good thing
Thomas had ever done for his people
before he dealt them this traitorous
blow is not of record among the tradi
tions of his people, nor in the archives
of the South Carolina Legislature of
which he claims to have been a valu
able member. That membership in
that body should be set forward by a
writer and accepted by a publisher as
a certificate of moral character, is the
most curious feature of this whole re
markable performance.
Among the glimmerings of reason
which here and there may be found in
this book, is the statement that the
colored people are deprived of social
stimulus because the white people will
not associate or intermarry with them.
Granted. But with what face could
any one ask a race with any self-respect,
any pride of its past, any hope for its
future, to consort with such moral and
mental degenerates as Thomas has
sought in this book to make of his
own people ?
The strongest argument against the
negro suggested by this book is the
existence of the book itself. As one
of a race which has but just begun to
win a hearing in the forum of letters,
the author might have found a different
theme. If the book were truthful, it
would be without excuse as coming
from such a source. But being false,
as the book essentially is, it is all the
more worthy of condemnation. That
a man of color should write such a book
is almost enough to make out his case
against the negro.