And yet, by the irony of fate, nothing has more effectually made this programme seem hopeless than the recent course of the United States toward weaker and darker peoples in the West Indies, Hawaii, and the Philippines,—for where in the world may we go and be safe from lying and brute force?
This passage from "Of Mr. Booker T. Washington and Others" connects the challenges faced by Black Americans to the broader context of American imperialism and global racial injustice.
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More from W.E.B. Du Bois
One ever feels his twoness,—an American, a Negro; two souls, two thoughts, two unreconciled strivings; two warring ideals in one dark body, whose dogged strength alone keeps it from being torn asunder.
All this segregation by color is largely independent of that natural clustering by social grades common to all communities.
The form and disposition of the laborers’ cabins throughout the Black Belt is to-day the same as in slavery days.