A "Black" State - Page 3 - Historum

**tjadams** · June 23rd, 2012, 07:40 AM

I'm reminded of Marcus Garvey and his "Back to Africa" movement.

**Patito de Hule** · June 23rd, 2012, 03:00 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by tjadams

I'm reminded of Marcus Garvey and his "Back to Africa" movement.

I thought of him too when I mentioned Griggs influence on the Black Nationalism movement, but:

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Originally Posted by VM1138

I'm talking about within the boundaries of the United States. Radical Republicans needed black votes, it gave them their political power. So why was there no attempt to concentrate them in a state or two to generate more electoral votes? Or were they tipping the scales on close elections in existing states that they couldn't risk losing votes in those locations?

Other than Griggs' utopian novel, I don't know of any Black separatists who had a significant influence. Louisiana did have a Black majority in 1865, and many of them were well educated and well-to-do. These suffered from the South's retrenchment or "Redemption."

laketahoejwb · June 23rd, 2012, 03:03 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Patito de Hule

I thought of him too when I mentioned Griggs influence on the Black Nationalism movement, but:

Other than Griggs' utopian novel, I don't know of any Black separatists who had a significant influence. Louisiana did have a Black majority in 1865, and many of them were well educated and well-to-do. These suffered from the South's retrenchment or "Redemption."

Patito: What woke you up ?????

.......Lake

Punos_Rey · June 23rd, 2012, 05:44 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by tjadams

I'm reminded of Marcus Garvey and his "Back to Africa" movement.

Didn't Lincoln also have his own repatriation scheme? Iirc, there was a book "Lincoln the Man" which went into detail on that and other less known sides of Lincoln's character, but I had too much of a heavy load at the time to finish reading it.

**Rongo** · June 24th, 2012, 11:34 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Punos_Rey

Didn't Lincoln also have his own repatriation scheme? Iirc, there was a book "Lincoln the Man" which went into detail on that and other less known sides of Lincoln's character, but I had too much of a heavy load at the time to finish reading it.

Lincoln didn't have "his own" repatriation scheme, but like his mentor, Henry Clay, and other leading Americans of the day, he was a member of the American Colonization Society, that believed in recolonizing freed slaves to Africa on a voluntary basis:

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The American Colonization Society was established in 1816 by Robert Finley as an attempt to satisfy two groups in America. Ironically, these groups were on opposite ends of the spectrum involving slavery in the early 1800's. One group consisted of philanthropists, clergy and abolitionist who wanted to free African slaves and their descendants and provide them with the opportunity to return to Africa. The other group was the slave owners who feared free people of color and wanted to expel them from America.
Both the these groups felt that free blacks would be unable to assimilate into the white society of this country. John Randolph, one famous slave owner called free blacks "promoters of mischief." At this time, about 2 million Negroes live in America of which 200,000 were free persons of color. Henry Clay, a southern congressman and sympathizer of the plight of free blacks, believed that because of "unconquerable prejudice resulting from their color, they never could amalgamate with the free whites of this country."

Source: American Colonization Society

are6729 · June 24th, 2012, 03:06 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by VM1138

The Great Migration occurred in the 1920s and '30s if I'm not mistaken, and had many blacks settle in northern industrial towns like Detroit. That's actually what got me thinking about this "black state" idea. Around the turn of the 20th Century blacks were actually prohibited from relocating because the exodus was picking up steam. But during Reconstruction I'm not aware of any similar prohibitions on such a large scale.

An economic historian could probably correct me here, but I don't think agrarianism was that big in the South after the war. I don't think it ever reached pre-war levels again and the South struggled economically for almost one hundred years. Naturally Southerners wouldn't want blacks to leave (cheap labor) but Northern Radical Republicans it seems would want to "solve" the racial issue, foster reunion under those terms, potentially solve some unemployment issues in the north, and settle the West all in one blow.

It's probably a stretch, though. I bet a lot of immigrants wouldn't be willing to do work that slaves had done for centuries. But I guess I'm just surprised no one tried it.

Hmm, very interesting..