From Slavery to Freedom: John Edward Bruce's Childhood and Adolescence
2002; Volume: 26; Issue: 1 Linguagem: Inglês
ISSN
0364-2437
Autores Tópico(s)Race, History, and American Society
ResumoIn March 1897, Charles W. Anderson requested that Levi P. Morton, New York's Republican Governor, appoint John Edward Bruce a minor political post. Anderson, a respected Black Republican stalwart, had been a member of New York Republican State Committee for sixteen years and was a primary dispenser of Black political patronage in New York City. If Anderson gave his seal of approval a Black nominee, white politicians usually fell in line. This appointment, however, was somewhat different, and Morton's aides encouraged him be cautious.(2)Bruce was an ambitious forty-one-year-old man, of dark brown complexion, just under six foot tall, with a prominent mustache, penetrating eyes, a confident persona that intimidated his peers, and had a preference for Havana cigars. An established journalist, Bruce was by one author be the prince of Afro-American correspondents. His articles, well-known in Black community, caught attention of white readers as well. In addition, he was active in Prince Hall Masons, Afro-American League, and African Methodist Episcopal Zion Church and he was a charter member of American Negro Academy, a newly formed organization led by Rev. Alexander Crummell of Washington, D.C. These were notable accomplishments for a former slave with a third-grade education. Bruce had developed his intellectual, political, and social talents through reading, travel, personal contacts, and on-the-job experience.(3)While Morton's advisors Bruce a valuable addition New York's Black practitioners of Republican politics, they questioned his party loyalty. Would his ambition, independence, and staunch commitment racial advancement interfere with Governor's agenda? Bruce had campaigned against accommodation for several years, and he was a member of a small but vocal contingent of articulate Blacks who challenged leadership of Booker T. Washington. His pen name, Grit, was a nineteenth-century term that denoted unyielding courage in face of hardship or danger. Bruce's ideas, according historian Alfred A. Moss, were considered trenchant and even blunt in their analyses of people and issues, delighting some and outraging others.(4)Governor Morton eventually appointed Bruce to represent interests of colored citizens of New York a general exposition held in Nashville, Tennessee. The historian Lawrence Reddick contended that Bruce aroused people of Empire State and organized a splendid exhibit....(5) The Nashville Exposition was nationally recognized celebration of America's one hundred years of constitutional government. Organizational difficulties delayed event until late 1870s. Similar Colored People's Day staged at 1893 Chicago World's Columbian Exposition, Nashville event solicited state authorities sponsor Black delegations. Bruce and his colleagues believed such events could be used document African American accomplishments and challenge racial stereotypes that underpinned Black inferiority. Nashville's middle-class Black community also had a rich tradition of supporting a diverse collection of Black conventions throughout post-Reconstruction Era and into early twentieth century.(6)Bruce's success with Nashville Exposition was only one of his accomplishments in 1897. His journalistic career and community activities punctuated an avid interest in African American history. This passion, inspired by Pan-African advocates whom had he met during his youth, dominated Bruce's intellectual life from 1876 his death.(7) Through these contacts he developed an international network of political and intellectual resources. This association stimulated a thriving discourse among Black thinkers in Africa, Caribbean, and United States, and, on occasion, Black residents in Europe. George Shepperson, Scottish scholar, identified collaboration between Bruce and his colleagues as a commerce of ideas and politics between descendants of. …
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