Black Protest: Issues and Tactics, and: Allies for Freedom: Blacks and John Brown (review)

BOOK REVIEWS91 Black Protest: Issues and Tactics. By Robert C. Dick, (Westport, Conn.: Greenwood Press, 1974. Pp. xiii, 338. ) Allies for Freedom: Blacks and John Brown. By Benjamin Quarles, (New York: Oxford University Press, 1974. Pp. xiv, 244. $7.95.) The above books are in a sense two approaches to a general theme: how blacks relate to white America. Dick, a professor of speech and communication, treats the issues debated by the black protest movement , 1827-1861. Quarles, a veteran black historian, assesses the impact on the blacks of a man whose life and legend has encompassed a number of the issues confronting blacks. Professor Dick delineates such issues as colonization, a question argued by the blacks largely after it had been abandoned by the whites; and the nature of the Constitution, whether it could be best judged by the soaring visions of the founders or by their earth-bound deeds. Certain black leaders suspected that the actual practices of the founders were the best proof of their intentions, but at the same time they noticed that there was enough elasticity in revolutionary rhetoric for the growth of a broader concept of justice. There was also the debate about whether it was better to educate or to participate, whether it was better to tell the whole truth to almost nobody, or, in exchange for some political allies, to remain silent about some important issues. The Liberty, Free Soil, and Republican parties were successively broader alliances whereby blacks could speak out to more and more people about fewer and fewer of their grievances. These debates are well presented though I would have liked to have seen more stress on the historical context in which they occurred. There was too the debate about the role of violence, an issue closely related to black attitudes toward John Brown, the subject of Professor Quarles' book. Quarles holds that in general blacks have been more favorable than whites toward John Brown. They have viewed somewhat differently even that most damning indictment of Brown, his needless killing of five pro-slavery men at Pottawatomie, Kansas Territory, in 1856. They did not condone the killings, he says, but rather "viewed the incident from a wider perspective of aberrant behavior in their country, from a greater familiarity with the climate of violence, both legitimate and extra-legal. . . ." If blacks were indeed more open to the methods of Brown, how was it that he was able to survive several years in lily-white "bleeding Kansas ", but failed instantly at Harper's Ferry, where success depended on black response? To some degree Brown may have been guilty of what Lenin called the most dangerous mistake that a revolutionist can make, confusing his own desires with objective reality. He judged the reality of slavery by the rumors of slave revolts reported in the Abolitionist press. He judged slaves by a rare breed of ex-slaves who had often risked their lives for freedom. 92CIVIL WAR HISTORY And yet, Quarles thinks, Brown may not have misjudged the militancy of slaves as much as some historians suppose. Because of bad timing the revolt was suppressed too quickly to really test black militancy. Certainly northern blacks were not unresponsive as the aftermath of Harper 's Ferry shows. And, despite a lavish display by the southern press of loyal slaves professing hatred for Brown, these same journals report a wave of arson attempts, suggesting a different response than the one being featured on their front pages. Of course the chief impact of Brown has been the legend rather than the man. For blacks his image has proved more enduring than that of other whites whose noble words are often belied by self-serving deeds. Even for those frustrated black nationalists of the 1960s, the division of the world along the lines of color was never complete. Because they remembered that there had been one white man who cared enough to become a martyr to their cause. John Brown was evidence that mankind is one. W. McKee Evans California Polytechnic University Roosevelt's Image Brokers: Poets, Playwrights, and the Use of the Lincoln Symbol. By Alfred Haworth Jones. (Port Washington, N.Y.: Kennikat Press, 1974. Pp...