I wrote this book because in my view leading American historians have committed the anachronistic fallacy of removing Washington from the context of his life. They have done so out of protest against racial injustice--an understandable motive, but one that casts the Tuskegeean as a foil to African-American protest leaders of the 1960s. In the process, a fair understanding of Washington's career and purpose has been sacrificed. The mainstream view of Washington originated largely with W.E.B. Du Bois, the Tuskegeean's longstanding rival for black leadership. Du Bois survived Washington by nearly a half century and shaped the memory of his avowed enemy. Du Bois insisted that Washington's emphasis on material advancement over political involvement, and on industrial schooling over purely academic education, gave black consent to segregation and discrimination.

What I found was something different: Washington did protest against discrimination by railroads and labor unions. He also spoke our repeatedly against lynching, unfair voting qualifications, and segregated-housing legislation. Washington also constantly raised money for black educational institutions in the South, both industrial schools like his own and more-traditional academic colleges like Fisk University. He led Northern philanthropists to build hundreds of primary schools for black children. He arranged and helped finance lawsuits challenging disfranchisement, jury discrimination, and peonage--though he did it all secretly because such open civil-rights activism would have invited violence against him and his school. And he campaigned openly and constantly against the pernicious images projected in the news media and popular culture about black people, including protesting in 1915 the racist movie The Birth of a Nation.

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I wrote this book because in my view leading American historians have committed the anachronistic fallacy of removing Washington from the context of his life. They have done so out of protest against racial injustice--an understandable motive, but one that casts the Tuskegeean as a foil to African-American protest leaders of the 1960s. In the process, a fair understanding of Washington's career and purpose has been sacrificed. The mainstream view of Washington originated largely with W.E.B. Du Bois, the Tuskegeean's longstanding rival for black leadership. Du Bois survived Washington by nearly a half century and shaped the memory of his avowed enemy. Du Bois insisted that Washington's emphasis on material advancement over political involvement, and on industrial schooling over purely academic education, gave black consent to segregation and discrimination.

What I found was something different: Washington did protest against discrimination by railroads and labor unions. He also spoke our repeatedly against lynching, unfair voting qualifications, and segregated-housing legislation. Washington also constantly raised money for black educational institutions in the South, both industrial schools like his own and more-traditional academic colleges like Fisk University. He led Northern philanthropists to build hundreds of primary schools for black children. He arranged and helped finance lawsuits challenging disfranchisement, jury discrimination, and peonage--though he did it all secretly because such open civil-rights activism would have invited violence against him and his school. And he campaigned openly and constantly against the pernicious images projected in the news media and popular culture about black people, including protesting in 1915 the racist movie The Birth of a Nation.

Read more »