Among the various outland elements now in the United States which threaten in different degrees our national unity, the most important is the Negro. Unlike the other alien elements the blacks were brought into the country against their will. They brought with them no persisting language, religion, or other cultural attribute, but accepted these elements from their masters.
At the time of the first census (1790) the Negroes numbered 757,208, being 19.3 per cent of the total population. They were naturally mostly in the Southern States. In 1860 the Negroes numbered 4,441,830 and constituted 14.1 per cent of the population. They were still in the South. In 1930 the Negroes numbered 11,891,143 and constituted 9.69 per cent of the population, but there had been a distinct migration from the agricultural districts of the South to the large cities of the North.
When, after the Civil War, the Negroes were granted the franchise the Negro problem was greatly complicated. This ill-advised measure was forced on the country by a wave of feeling aroused by the wanton murder of Lincoln. The North feared to entrust the government of the country to those who had lately been in armed rebellion, so they conferred the voting power on the Negroes and thereby greatly increased the electoral vote of the South. If the franchise had been confined to the Whites only, the influence of the "Solid South" after the Civil War would have been much less than it now is. The purpose of the measure was to make the South Republican, its actual effect was to enhance the power of the South in Congress and in the Electoral College and make that section definitely Democratic. In the words of the late Chancellor Von Bismarck this was worse than a crime--it was a blunder.
The Southerners understand how to treat the Negro--with firmness and with kindness--and the Negroes are liked below the Mason and Dixon line so so long as they keep to their proper relation to the Whites, but in the North the blocks of Negroes in the large cities, migrating from the South, have introduced new complications, which are certain to produce trouble in the future, especially if Communist propaganda makes headway among them.
In the Negro section of Harlem a further problem is arising from crosses between Negroes and Jews and Italians. These and other Mulattoes are showing a tendency toward Communism. During the World War a Communistic and racial movement was started there and a situation developed which was controlled with some difficulty, though without publicity.