A Cry for Justice: Daniel Rudd and His Life in Black Catholicism, Journalism, and Activism, 1854-1933

6. The Colored Catholic Congress Movemen
t, 1889–1894

CHAPTER 6 The Colored Catholic Congress Movement, 1889–1894 ‫ﱱ‬‫ﱠ‬‫ﱱ‬ The Colored man is naturally religious. He believes; but “Faith without good works will not save us,” say the doctors of the Church. Let us be up and doing. D. RUDD  SEPTEMBER  Rudd and the Roots of the Colored Catholic Congress Movement It is impossible to discuss Daniel Rudd’s vision of justice and equality for African Americans without an examination of the Colored Catholic Congress movement. In fact, this organizational initiative was an embodiment of Rudd’s campaign for justice. Moreover, the decision to organize this group of black Catholics allowed the editor to carry the work of justice forward by enlisting additional partners. For Rudd believed collective action was the key to ameliorating the injustices confronting America’s black population. Rudd strongly believed in African American agency. He was equally convinced blacks ought to take a leading role in both defending the dignity of the race as well as in protecting the group’s civil rights. In April   ‫ﱱ‬ ‫ﱠ‬ ‫ﱱ‬ Rudd urged blacks to stand up for themselves.1 On another occasion, Rudd praised the efforts of those who had agitated on behalf of blacks. At the same time, however, he also insisted that the “Colored people themselves must solve the Negro problem.”2 The Colored Catholic Congress movement, founded by visionary Daniel Rudd, held five meetings in the nineteenth century. As a result of the organizational efforts of the editor of the ACT, the first Colored Catholic Congress met in Washington, D.C., in January . With the support of Archbishop Henry Elder of Cincinnati, the congress met in Cincinnati in July . A third congress was held in Philadelphia in January . Following the third Colored Catholic Congress gathering, Rudd took a less active role in the organization he had created, focusing instead on his commission to write a book detailing the proceedings of the first three congresses.3 The fourth Colored Catholic Congress was held during the World’s Fair in Chicago in September . It is unclear as to whether or not Rudd participated in the fifth, and the nineteenth century’s final, meeting of this body, which was convened in Baltimore in October .4 The Colored Catholic Congress movement appears to have been a hybridization of two movements. The first of these was the African American convention movement, which though established in  had found its most recent manifestation in T. Thomas Fortune’s call to create the National Afro-American League (NAAL).5 The link between Rudd’s Colored Catholic Congress movement and the African American convention movement was made by the editor himself. For example, in May  Rudd discussed the historic character of the first gathering of the Colored Catholic Congress held a few months before in Washington, D.C. He said of the meeting, “It will stand as a buoy in the stream of progress, about which will cluster many pleasant profitable memories.” In this same article, Rudd made reference to the first gathering of the African American convention movement, which had assembled in Philadelphia in September . The editor of the ACT recalled with gratitude the work of the delegates to this previous assembly that had met almost sixty years earlier.6 A second source of inspiration for the Colored Catholic Congress movement was the Catholic congress movement begun in Europe and carried on by various national groups in the United States, including the German Catholics. Rudd’s exposure to an American manifestation of  THE COLORED CATHOLIC CONGRESS MOVEMENT these nationalistic congresses came by way of his encounter with the German Central Verein. Speaking before this assembly on one occasion, Rudd declared, “I have watched with intense interest the work of this great and broad-souled organization, because my race is about to engage in a work to help convert and educate those millions now in darkness.”7 In June  the ACT informed its readers that Fr. William Tappert of Covington, Kentucky, was in Chicago, “arraying for the great national Convention of German Catholics of America.” In September  Rudd traveled to Chicago in order to attend this gathering.The delegates to this meeting discussed a number of social issues, including membership in the Knights of Labor, education, and the German press. These were some of the same types of topics delegates to the Colored Catholic Congresses would subsequently address a little over a year later in Washington, D.C.8 In May  Rudd proposed the idea...