W.E.B. Du Bois: “The truth is, Congress cannot prohibit the importation of slaves during that period; but the laws against the…”

Many of the worst characteristics of the Negro masses of to-day had their seed in this period of the slave’s ethical growth.

So the Cotton Kingdom still lives; the world still bows beneath her sceptre.

The ballot, which before he had looked upon as a visible sign of freedom, he now regarded as the chief means of gaining and perfecting the liberty with which war had partially endowed him.

He simply wishes to make it possible for a man to be both a Negro and an American, without being cursed and spit upon by his fellows, without having the doors of Opportunity closed roughly in his face.