African Americans - Key people Flashcards
Andrew Johnson 1808–75
Was elected to the U.S. Senate in 1856, where he opposed antislavery legislation. When Tennessee seceded from the union in 1862, he refused to join the Confederacy and supported Lincoln throughout the war. Chosen by Lincoln to run as his vice president in the election of 1864 because he was from the south, proslavery and yet supported the Union. However, once he became president on Lincoln’s assassination in 1865, this meant that he had no political allies. He also lacked the personal qualities to make a success of the job, especially in the area of diplomatic skills.
Abraham Lincoln 1809–65
Born in Kentucky in modest circumstances he joined the Republican party in 1856. Opposing the spread of slavery but not calling for its outright abolition he was elected as president at the end of 1860. President throughout the civil war he insisted at first that the fight was to preserve the union but changed his emphasis in 1863 when he issued the Emancipation proclamation
Thaddeus Stevens 1792–1868
Elected to the house of representatives in 1848, he was the most determined supporter of radical re-construction. He took a hard line against the southern states regarding them as conquered provinces
Radical Republicans
The Republican party was formed in 1854 as an antislavery party and supported its leader, Abraham Lincoln’s Emancipation proclamation in 1863. After the war (and Lincoln’s assassination in April 1865) Republicans differed in opinion as to how harshly the defeated south should be treated and how far the status of the African – American people should be raised. The radical Republicans were for the harsher treatment of the South and keener on giving rights the newly liberated slaves than other members of the Republican Party
Blanche K Bruce 1841–98
Born into slavery in Virginia he moved to Mississippi in 1869, becoming a landowner and local politician and obtaining the support of a number of leading white Republicans in the state government. He served on a number of important government committees and in 1888 he gained some support for his nomination to run for the vice president.
Frederick Douglass 1817 - 95
Was the leading black opponent of slavery in the years immediately before the Civil War. An escaped slave, he became active in the anti-slavery society and set up his own anti-slavery newspaper. After emancipation he refused the offer of running the Freedman’s bureau, disapproving of the policies of President Johnson. Instead he took part in many speaking tours arguing the case for black rights, actively protesting about the growing discriminatory practices.
Self-help groups
These self help groups were comprised of freedmen who joined together their meagre earnings to buy land and disused buildings in order to provide schools and to employ teachers who came mainly from the north. This compensated for the failure of the impoverished postwar southern state governments to provide education for all but especially for black, school aged children.
General Oliver Howard 1832 - 1909
Played a distinguished military role in the civil war, much of it after losing an arm. He was made head of the Freedman’s bureau in May 1865 and was noted for his lack of corruption and genuine interest in the welfare of the emancipated slaves. One of his enduring achievements was to support newly established colleges for African American education such as Fisk University in Nashville, Tennessee, as well as setting up his own University in Washington.
Ulysses S Grant
A leading northern general in the American Civil War becoming commander-in-chief of the Union forces in 1864. Turning to politics he was elected as Republican president in 1868. He broadly accepted the early reconstruction policy and when re-elected in 1872 he promised to do his best to see former slaves achieve the equal civil rights he felt they deserved but still did not possess. However, his second term in office dog by financial scandals which undermined his authority.
Theodore Roosevelt 1858 to 1919
Elected vice president in 1900, he became president the following year after the assassination of President McKinley. He supported the Progressive movement but did not really address the question of Black civil rights. Despite this, he was criticised by white supremacists holding official meetings with Booker T Washington, of whose work he clearly approved
William Howard Taft 1857 to 1930
Succeeded Roosevelt as President but his style seemed dull and he lacked Roosevelt’s political skill. Taft took little interest in Black civil rights, regarding it (like most Presidents of the time) as a question of States’ rights.
Thomas Woodrow Wilson 1856 to 1924
Was elected president in 1912 and re-elected in 1916. He held typical racist views prevalent in the South at the time. This meant he did not appoint (indeed he dismissed) African Americans or associate with their leaders. He appointed segregationist southerners to his administration, who proceeded to segregate employees by race in the growing number of government agencies.
Ida B Wells. 1862 to 1931
She was born of slave parents in Mississippi. Her Campaign against discrimination began in 1884 when she refused to give up her seat on a train to a white man. She was forcibly removed but subsequently sued the railroad Company. Her personal courage is particularly highlighted by her public opposition to lynching after some friends who owned a successful grocery store were lynched for ‘rape’, led by white owners of a rival store. She was a staunch advocate of women’s rights and of the vote for women
T Thomas Fortune 1856 to 1928
Born into slavery in Florida, from 1883 to 1907 he was editor of the New York Age, protesting against the treatment of African Americans. He formed the Afro American league at the start of 1890 to defend Black civil rights, arguing it was “time to call a halt” to accommodation. But it collapsed in 1893 through lack of funds. It was later revived as the Afro American Council in 1898 with Fortune as president. Later he became a supporter of Marcus Garvey, edited the Negro World from 1923 to 1928. He coined the term Afro-American.
Brooker T Washington 1856 to 1915
Born into slavery in Virginia and of mixed race parentage, Washington was part of the first generation of children who benefited from the new educational opportunities available after emancipation in 1865. The penniless Washington was so grateful for the opportunity which he received at Hampton that he determined to dedicate his life to ensure that as many members of his race as possible received the same chance. He ran the Tuskegee Institute from 1881 until his sudden death
William Edward Burghardt Du Bois 1868 to 1963
Born in Massachusetts, the son of a free black parents, he acquired a PhD from Harvard University, the first African-American to do so, in 1895. A prolific writer on the black condition and an early sociologist, he helped to found the Niagara movement in 1905 and National Association for the Advancement of Coloured People in 1909. He then moved away from the NAACP’s approach. In the McCarthyism era after 1945, he was persecuted as a suspected Communist: this experience actually made him into one and his views had completely changed from his younger days. He emigrated to Ghana in 1961.
William Monroe Trotter 1872 to 1934
Born in Ohio to well off black parents he achieved academic success at Harvard and planned a career in international banking only to abandon it because of the prejudice he was subject to. From 1901 he edited a weekly newspaper on race relations, the Boston Guardian. Arrested after heckling a Booker T Washington speech in 1903, he argued that more vigorous protests were required.
Leading African-American civil rights campaigners
These include to whites, Mary Ovington 1865 to 1951 Executive Director of the NAACP from 1910 to 1917.
Osward Garrison Villard 1872 to 1949 served as one of the first treasures.
Marcus Garvey 1887–1940
Born in Jamaica, originally worked as a printer leading a strike in 1908/9. He arrived in the US in March 1916 and decided to stay, founding the first American branch of his organisation UNIA in 1917 becoming quickly an important figure in the discussion over how Black civil rights could best be achieved. He was imprisoned in 1925 and deported from the US in 1927. He continued his journalistic work in exile in the 1930s.
Walter White
1893–1955
Secretary of the NAACP 1930-55. Having organisational and personal skills had good relations with many influential white political figures.
Oscar De Priest
1871–1951
Was elected as a Republican to represent Chicago’s South side from 1929 to 1935. He was criticised for not supporting many aspects of New Deal legislation which was seen as potentially helpful to blacks. However, he did win the admiration for his stand against segregation in Washington and for being prepared to accept, despite death threats, speaking engagements in the south.
