CHAPTER XLII.

EDUCATION OF THE COLORED RACE.

References to preceding reports of the United States Bureau of Education, in which this subject has been treated: In annual reports-1870, pp. 61, 337-339; 1871, pp. 6, 7, 61-70; 1872, pp. xvii, xviii; 1873, p. lxvi; 1875, p. xxiii; 1876, p. xvi; 1877, pp. xxxiii-xxxviii; 1878, pp. xxviii-xxxiv; 1879, pp. xxxix-xlv; 1880, p. lviii; 1881, p. lxxxii; 1882–83, pp. liv, xlviii-lvi, xlix, 85; 1883-84, p. liv; 1884-85, p. lxvii; 1885-86, pp. 596, 650-656: 1886-87, pp. 790, 874-881; 1887-88, pp. 20, 21, 167, 169, 988-998; 1888-89, pp. 768, 1412-1439; 1889-90, pp. 620, 621, 624, 634, 1073-1102, 1388-1392, 1395-1485; 1890–91, pp. 620, 624, 792, 808, 915, 961-980, 1469; 1891-92, pp. 8, 686, 688, 713, 861-867, 1002, 1234-1237; 1892-93, pp. 15, 442, 1551-1572, 1976; 1893-94, pp. 1019-1061; 1894-95, pp. 1331-1424; also in Circulars of Information-No. 3, 1883, p. 63; No. 2, 1886, pp. 123-133; No. 3, 1888, p. 122; No. 5, 1888, pp. 53, 54, 59, 60, 80-86; No. 1, 1892, p. 71. Special Report on District of Columbia for 1869, pp. 193, 300, 301-400. Special report, New Orleans Exposition, 1884–85, pp. 468–470, 775–781.

The estimated number of persons 5 to 18 years of age in the sixteen Southern States and the District of Columbia for the scholastic year 1895-96 was 8,562,970. Of this number 5,768,680 were white and 2,794,290 were colored. The total enrollment in the public schools of the South was 5,291,013, the enrollment in the white schools being 3,861,300, or 66.93 per cent of the white children of school age, and the enrollment in the colored schools 1,429,713, or 51.16 per cent of the colored children of school age. While the colored children constitute 32.63 per cent of the school population of the South, they make but 27 per cent of the school enrollment. In the District of Columbia and in Kentucky the per cent of colored children enrolled is higher than for the white children. În Alabama and South Carolina the per cent of attendance is higher for the colored than for white children. For the entire South the average daily attendance was 66.28 per cent of the enrollment for the white children and 62.04 per cent of the enrollment for the colored children. These statistics for each of the sixteen Southern States and the District of Columbia are given in Table 1 on the following page.

The total expenditure for public schools in the South for 1895-96 was $30,729,819. In only one or two States are separate accounts kept of the expenditure of money for the colored schools, but at a low estimation the cost of public schools for the colored race for 1895-96 was not less than $6,500,000. Table 2 shows that from 1870 to 1896 the cost of public schools in the South was $483,777,467. Between $90,000,000 and $95,000,000 of this sum must have been expended for the education of the colored children. The same table shows the enrollment in the white and colored schools for each year, and also the total expenditure for each year from 1870-71 to 1895-96.

SECONDARY AND HIGHER EDUCATION.

For the year 1895-96 this Bureau received reports from 178 schools for the secondary and higher education of the colored race. Three of these schools are in Pennsylvania, two in Ohio, two in Indiana, one in Illinois, and one in New Jersey. All the others are within the boundaries of the former slave States. Table 3 shows the number of these schools in each State and the number of teachers and students for each State. The total enrollment in these 178 schools was 40,127. The number in the elementary grades was 25,032, in the secondary 13,563, and in the collegiate grades 1.455. The number of teachers employed was 1,626. The statistics of these schools are given in detail in Tables 9 and 10.

ED 96-66

2081

TABLE 1.-Common school statistics, classified by race, 1895-96.

White. | Colored. White. Colored. White. Colored. White. Colored.

TABLE 2.—Sixteen former slave States and the District of Columbia.

Table 4 shows that in the 178 schools there were 1,494 students in classical courses, 1,345 in scientific courses, 9,139 in English courses, and 398 in business courses. Table 5 shows that 4,672 students were in normal courses. There were 826 graduates from high school courses, 966 from normal courses, and 161 from collegiate courses.

Table 6 is an exhibit of the number of students in professional courses in the colored schools. The total number in professional courses was 1,319, only 126 of these being females. There were 703 students and 76 graduates in schools and departments of theology, 124 students and 20 graduates in law, 286 students and 30 graduates in medicine, 32 students and 6 graduates in dentistry, 48 students and 13 graduates in pharmacy, and 126 students and 40 graduates in nurse training. Table 7 is a summary of the statistics of industrial training in the 178 colored schools. The number receiving industrial training was 12,341, the number of males being 4,476 and of females 7,865. The table shows that the number being trained in farm and garden work was 1,098, in carpentry 1,821, in bricklaying 254, in plastering 165, in painting 257, in tin and sheet-metal work 126, in forging 327, in machine-shop work 223, in shoemaking 165, in printing 565, in sewing 6,302, in cooking 2,455, and in other trades not named 1,677. The details of the statistics of industrial training are given in Table 10.

The financial statistics of the colored schools of secondary and higher grade are summarized in Table 8. These schools received in benefactions during the scholastic year 1895-96 the sum of $323,718. The income of these schools aggregated $1,117,569. Of this amount the sum of $289,845 was derived from public funds, $92,297 from productive funds, and $124,481 from tuition fees. The sources of the unclassified income of $610,946 are uncertain. Many schools reported only total incomes for 1895-96.

INTERVIEWS WITH LEADING EDUCATORS OF THE COLORED RACE.

Interviews with bishops of the African Methodist Church and with leading educators of the colored race were printed in the New Orleans Times-Democrat of January 24, 1897. Those who read, in the Report of the United States Commissioner of Education for 1894-95, the two chapters on the Education of the Colored Race will be interested in these interviews. The Times-Democrat made the following editorial comment:

"EDUCATION FOR THE NEGRO.

"We publish elsewhere interviews with the presidents of the several colored colleges of this city, the bishops of the African Methodist Church now in New Orleans, and others interested in the education of the colored race, upon a subject, than which there is none more important before the South and the country to-day. It is a part-and the most important part-of the great negro problem of the United States. What is better for the education of the negro-a classical edu'cation or an industrial and mechanical education? Shall we turn his ambition in the direction of the learned professions rather than toward the industries?

"When we consider that there are 8,000,000 negroes in this country, that they constitute one-ninth of its population, and in several of the Southern States are in a majority, we can form some idea of the importance of this matter of educating them and making them useful and valuable citizens.

"A great deal of work has been done already. Over $80,000,000 have been expended on colored schools and colleges since 1876 alone. Thirty-three years have passed since the emancipation proclamation-a full generation-and we ought by this time to gather some fruit from the millions expended on the education of the negro. What do the results show-that a classical education or an industrial or mechanical one is better for the present condition and needs of the negro and for the South?

The two sides of the case are well stated by Prof. Booker T. Washington, president of the Tuskegee Normal and Industrial Institute, of Alabama, on the one hand, and President Edward Cushing Mitchell, of Leland University, in this city, on the other.

"President Mitchell takes a very decided stand against simple industrial education. He calls attention to the fact that the Northern colleges, which in many cases began with manual labor schools, have abandoned this appendage to their curriculum. Ought we to insist,' he asks, 'upon putting a yoke upon the necks of our brethren in black which neither we nor our fathers were able to bear?' And he calls attention to the fact that the report of the Bureau of Education for 1889-90 shows that the graduates of 17 colored schools in which industrial instruction is

TABLE 3.-Teachers and students in institutions for the colored race in 1895–96.

Total

25 49 8 18

927 1,674 2, 601 1, 1591, 172 2,331

2,274 2,893 5,167 51 2121 160

170 291 189 480 17 1,596 1,859 3,455 235 1,715 2,194 3.909 40 948 1,301 2.249 70 1,469 1,837 3,306 0 162 241 43

178 680 9461, 626 10, 823 14, 269 25, 092 6,036, 7, 527 13,563 1,096 359 1, 455 17, 983 22, 144 40, 127

a Two schools not reporting.

TABLE 4.-Classification of colored students, by courses of study, 1895–96.

Students in classical course.

Students in sci

entific courses.

Students in

English course.

Students in business course.

40

408

230

399

36 12 48 2,056 2,059 4.115

16

Total.

Male.

Female.

Total.

Male.

Female.

Teachers.

Students.

Elementary. Secondary.

Collegiate.

Total.

given in carpentering, farming, shoemaking, etc., have generally drifted off into the professions. Out of 1,243 graduates of these schools 693 are teachers, 117 ministers, 163 physicians, 116 lawyers, while only 12 are farmers, and 5 following mechanical pursuits (2 printers, 1 carpenter, and 2 unclassified). From these facts, President Mitchell reaches the conclusion that industrial education is not what the negro needs, but the same higher or classical education provided for the whites.

"We think President Mitchell altogether wrong in his conclusions. It is the same mistake that was made when the suffrage was given the negro. Those who gave it so hastily and prematurely imagined that the fifteenth amendment would immediately make the negro a valuable citizen and endow him with all the political experience which it has taken the white race centuries-and centuries of struggle, too-to secure. There could have been no more unfortunate mistake for the negro and the South. The saturnalia that prevailed between 1868 and 1872 in consequence of conferring of the franchise on a people not yet fitted for it not only cost the South millions of dollars and thousands of lives, but did the negro race a serious injustice, setting back its civilization, arousing old prejudices, and causing even its most ardent friends to doubt its ability for the higher development and civilization.

Mr. Mitchell would have us do in education what was attempted in politics, but failed. He himself recognizes that the white race began with industrial schools, and as it advanced, steadily elevated its schools, widened its curriculum, and raised the standard of education. He would have the negro at the very start try to do what the whites have taken centuries to reach. He would begin with classical education, a policy which will cause only discontent and failure. It is not what we should offer a race only just struggling to the front, steeped in ignorance, the fruit of centuries of slavery. If it were proposed to establish a dozen great universities like Oxford and Cambridge in the heart of Africa, as a means of checking cannibalism and raising and developing the natives, and bringing them civilization and prosperity, it would cause a national protest as a pure waste of money, and yet this would be only an exaggeration of President Mitchell's proposition.

His statistics, which are the strongest point of his argument, really prove nothing. It may be true that a large proportion of the negroes educated in the colored colleges have drifted into the professions. It is equally true that a considerable proportion of them drifted into politics in 1868-1872; but we must not conclude from this that what the negro wants is a political instead of an industrial education. We see that among the college graduates there are ten ministers to every one farmer. We will not accept this as proof that what the negroes need is more theology. There are a thousand negroes engaged in farming for every one who enters the church, and if the farmers were only better taught how to cultivate their lands they would be better off materially and morally. The poverty and the ignorance of the negro race are keeping up a sick rate, a death rate, and a prison rate which are preventing that advance it would otherwise make.

It is natural that half the graduates of the colored normal and industrial schools should become teachers. In providing for a race whose education has been so long neglected, the first graduates will naturally devote themselves to teaching. President Mitchell says that in giving an industrial education to a negro you help only the individual. His own statistics disprove this, for so far a majority of these graduates have devoted themselves to scattering among the race the information which they themselves have gained. The industrial schools are teaching not a few negroes better work, but through them the entire colored race.

In marked contrast are the views of Prof. Booker T. Washington, president of the Tuskegee Normal and Industrial Institute, one of the leading representatives of his race, certainly in the field of education. Professor Washington has had the best opportunities of studying the question thoroughly and practically. The institute over which he presides has done good work for the negro, and its graduates have carried the lessons learned there throughout the South. One of its best fruits is the conference now held each year at Tuskegee of representatives of the negro race from all parts of the Union to discuss questions affecting its interests.

I am convinced,' says Professor Washington, 'that whether the negro receives much or little education, whether it be called high or low, we have reached the point in our development where a large proportion of those who are being educated should, while they are receiving their education or after they have received it, be taught to connect their education with some industrial pursuit.'

"Professor Washington thinks, as we do, that in the present condition of the negro, the first thing for him to learn is how to secure an independent position in the industrial world, how to work and to work intelligently. If the colored colleges drop industrial education and turn their attention solely to graduating theologians, lawyers, etc., he sees that the negro will very soon be crowded out of