It had long been the more or less definitely expressed theory of the North that all the chief problems of Emancipation might be settled by establishing the slaves on the forfeited lands of their masters,—a sort of poetic justice, said some.
Du Bois discusses the Northern belief that land redistribution could resolve the issues of emancipation, reflecting on its implications.
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Away with the black man’s ballot, by force or fraud,—and behold the suicide of a race!
By 1830 slavery seemed hopelessly fastened on the South, and the slaves thoroughly cowed into submission.
They approach me in a half-hesitant sort of way, eye me curiously or compassionately, and then, instead of saying directly, How does it feel to be a problem? they say, I know an excellent colored man in my town; or, I fought at…
After the Egyptian and Indian, the Greek and Roman, the Teuton and Mongolian, the Negro is a sort of seventh son, born with a veil, and gifted with second-sight in this American world,—a world which yields him no true self-consciousness…