In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:

Chapter II "Be Careful and Stay out of Trouble" There wasn't much going for the Negro in the world in which I was born. The shades of darkness were falling fast upon and around him. The tides of the post-Reconstruction years were being turned deliberately and viciously against him. The ballot was being taken away. Segregation was being enacted into law. Lynching waswidespread and vigorously defended. Injustice in the courts was taken for granted whenever a Negro was involved with a white man. Discrimination and inequity in education were accepted asmorally right. Books and articles were being published, sermons preached, and anti-Negro speeches made, all saying in substance: The Negro is a different breed. He is inferior to the white man. At any cost he must be kept down. The North and the South had reached an agreement about the Negro's role in the South and in the nation. It was to be a subordinate role, with the Southern white man free from Northern interference, whatever might be his treatment of Negroes. Poor whites, former slave masters, and the warring political factions among the whites shared one determination: the "inferior" Negro was not to be allowed to become a political threat to white supremacy. At every turn the black man was being dehumanized. In fact, the Negro was being enslavedagain. In this perilous world, if a black boy wanted to live a halfway normal life and die a naturaldeath he had to learn early the art of how to get along with white folks. The Negro's economic or educational status in no way modified the problem. It was always the Negro's responsibility to find ways and means to get along with white people; never need white people concern themselves with getting along with Negroes. Were a Negro slightly above the county poverty level, with a few dollars in the bank and the ability to read, write, and figure, it was all the more necessary for him to behave well and "walk humbly" among the white folks. Strange as it may seem to most Negroes and whites today, it was literally true, when I was a boy, that it behooved Negroes to be humble, meek, and subservient in the presence of 22 "BE C A R E F U L A N D S T A Y O U T O F T R O U B L E * ' 2 3 white folks. It is even true in some backward sections of the South in 1970. When my parents admonished their children, "Be careful and stay out of trouble/' they had only one thing in mind: "Stay out of trouble with white people!" My parents were not more cautious or fearful than others; virtually all Negro parents tried in some way to protect their children from the ever-present menace of white violence. The meaning wasunmistakably clear. It was dangerous to argue with a white person. No matter how false or stupid, his word was law and gospel. It was not to be disputed even in court. "Stay out of trouble" meant that if the white man cursed you, you were not to curse him back. Even if he struck you, it was not safe to strike back. The occasional few who did strike back either ran out of town under cover of night or sought the protection of some "boss" or other influential white man. No matter how they acted, it was not always possible for Negroes to "stay out of trouble"; the many who cringed and kowtowed to white people the most were in just as much danger as the few who did not. How could a Negro avoid trouble when his "place" waswhatever any white man's whim dictated at any given time? Hundreds of innocent Negroes were insulted, cheated, beaten, even lynched for the sole reason that they had incurred the displeasureofsome white man. The situation was the same in essence throughout the South, though the degree of brutality varied from one section to another. Inevitably,some Negroes decided to fight back and suffer the consequences. One in my area, in self-defense, killed two white men and tried to escape. He took refuge in an empty house. A mob burned the house down and shot the Negro to death as he ran out. The recollections of the 118 of my contemporaries who were interviewed confirm and validate my own interracial experiences. Asked how their parents taught them to behave toward...

Share