We are more used, perhaps. to the Communist perspective and history of radical work in Harlem. Crosswaith, a leading Black Socialist and organizer of A. Philip Randolph’s Brotherhood of Sleeping Car Porters, looks at life and politics in the neighborhood during the mid-1920s.

‘Harlem: The Black Man’s Burden’ by Frank Crosswaith from The New Leader. Vol. 2 No. 15. April 11, 1925.

To the enterprising young hunter of literary laurels and the profit propelled publishers of modern journalism, Negro Harlem has suddenly loomed upon the journalistic horizon as the Klondike appeared to the gold seekers a generation or so ago.

From near and far they come, pen in hand, to uncover before a gasping and gullible world the hidden secrets of black Harlem. They assume–these scribes–the pose of a Howard Carter or a Lord Carnarvon about to unearth Tutankhamen’s buried treasures and tickle the flickering fancy of their readers. Most of what they write about Harlem is misleading and much is false. Many of them approach Harlem with a sympathetic attitude. They mean well, but they come expecting to find countless curios of cave-dwelling days; they hope to discover that long-looked-for, but never-found “thing” which makes the Negro in one instance the victim of savage hostility and again the object of sympathy and benevolence; in other words, they enter this “city in itself” to prove the old claim that the Negro is “different”; that he reacts differently, lives differently, worships differently, and that there is a great “difference” and “distance” between life in Negro Harlem and life in the rest of New York City, all of which is not true.

Negro Harlem Typically American

Negro Harlem is a typical American industrial community containing all of the evidences of such a community. In Harlem one finds–as one finds in other working-class centers–a plethora of churches; some of them are attractive and compelling, others are repelling and grotesque. One is tempted to say that every known religious faith has its faithful followers in Harlem. Here, as elsewhere, religion is a lucrative profession for the leaders. Many who fail in other callings finally claim the Bible is a means to secure an easy and profitable existence; these are usually without the necessary training to fit them as competent expounders of that much expounded book. There are some cultured and educated preachers in Harlem.

Harlem is superstitious and patriotic; Babbittry is rampant here. On national holidays, Harlem, like any other working-class section, celebrates with its unfurled flags, its parades, dances and picnics. In war-time, Harlem, too, hates the “enemy” and subscribes willingly to war loans. It supports the Red Cross, it furnishes its quota of volunteers; it has its “uplift organizations,” its Y.M.C.A. and Y.W.C.A. There is a local Chamber of Commerce and a home for fallen girls. Harlem is honeycombed with secret societies–not of a subversive nature–which hold tightly to “long ago” and are dedicated to “yesterday”; any intelligent consideration of “today” and “tomorrow” is firmly opposed by them.

“Intense and Pathetic” Gullibility–Babbittry Rampant

Not unlike the average working-class community, Harlem’s gullibility is intense and pathetic. Proof of this is plainly evidenced by the response to movements such as the Garvey movement and Sister Harrell’s spectacular campaign of “healing.”

Garvey holds, in common with the Knights of the Ku Klux Klan, that this is a white man’s country; he opposes the election of Negroes to high political office and accepts as true the assertion that Negroes are inferior to white men; he justifies Jim Crowism on the railroads on the grounds that Negroes never built any roads and do not own any. Nevertheless, Garvey is reported to have collected over $2,000,000 from Negroes for the purpose of building an Empire in Africa, with himself as Emperor, President or Potentate–whichever title suits his particular fancy at the time he is speaking–and transporting all Negroes thereto.

Sister Harrell (white), with a Negro spokesman, came to Harlem. Of course, she came at the command of God to “heal” the crippled, the halt and the blind–the three dominant types found today in every industrial center at one dollar or more per “heal.” Business was exceptionally good. She “healed” them going and coming, right and left (departed). Of course, all who desired could not be “healed.” Some did not have the price, which was of prime importance in one’s being “healed,” and besides, her mandate from God was to “heal” only Jews and Negroes. Having witnessed the remarkable (financially) of these two movements, one confidently awaits the day when Harlem will be honored by a “raiser up,” i.e., one who will raise up the dead; what, a fortune awaits such a thrifty genius!

Main Street Papers

There are published in Harlem four weekly newspapers. These are truly Main Street; the news that they see “fit to print” mainly considers murders, divorces, fights, court decisions, scandals, etc. Naturally, they are all successful and some of them even exercise political influence. There are four or five monthly magazines which are concerned, in the main, with chronicling Negro achievements in the field of literature and business.

Negro Harlem differs from any other industrial center in two aspects only. Firstly, it is a veritable human rainbow; every possible shade of color between the extremes of white and black is represented; thereby giving the concrete negative answer to the late President Harding’s assertion that there is “a fundamental, eternal and inescapable difference between the races.” There are some Negroes here who can pass the Nordic’s rigid inspection and qualify for the Ku Klux Klan. One only regards these as Negroes because they themselves insist upon being so classified, at least, while they are in Harlem. And the second difference is, the degree of exploitation to which Harlem is subjected.

The Economic Lever

The overwhelming majority of Negroes in Harlem are workers, and during the period of industrial activity Harlem reflects this fact in a large number of weddings, gorgeous social functions, theater parties, elaborate and costly funerals and the spontaneous ride of petty business, etc. When the industrial pace slackens, bringing with it inevitable unemployment, poverty and hard times, Harlem again registers this change by contributing its share of holdup men, beggars, schemers, bootleggers, business failures, employment agencies and installment peddlers.

When unemployment sets in, Negro workers suffer longest and severest; it is unfortunately too true that they are the last to be hired and the first to be fired. This is due partly to the race prejudice evidenced in every walk of life in the United States, whether it be in the church, the school or in the factory; and partly to the fact that Negro workers are largely unorganized. Contrary to common belief, the absence of any large number of Negroes in the unions of the industries in which they work is due not to the Negro’s failure, to grasp the significance and, importance of Unionism in the life of the modern worker, but to the failure of organized labor generally to realize that the Negro is simply a worker whose skin is black.

Unions and Race Prejudice

Most of the trade unions are saturated through and through with race prejudice; many of them covertly bar the Negro from their ranks, others openly deny him entrance; all of them how practically no desire to unionize the Negro worker except during the period of a strike when he is used by the employers against the union. Wherever he has been able to force his way into the trade union movement, we find that he is not accorded all of the rights and privileges exercised by other union men; in some cases, the union is fearful of the Negro. They dread the thought that if permitted in the union in large numbers he will dominate the organization and perhaps monopolize the jobs. As a result of this attitude, there is a growing conviction among, Negroes to believe that, while they deplore the necessity for such action, the only way of escape is for Negro workers to form a colored Federation of Labor. Some Negroes oppose this idea and hope that organized Labor will soon see the folly of its ways and change its attitude before the Negro worker is driven to this extreme, perhaps to the mutual hurt of both black and white labor in the United States.

The lot of the Negro worker in New York City is a harder one, perhaps, than it is in any other industrial and financial center. New York boasts of no basic industry) like the packing industry in Chicago or the automobile industry in Detroit, consequently, the great bulk of Negro labor is unskilled, and we find him employed here today, there tomorrow, and God knows where the next day.

“The Profiteer’s Paradise”

Negro Harlem is the profiteer’s paradise. Due to segregation, the Negro worker is the victim of a savage and double-edged exploitation. Like all workers, he is exploited generally by the white industrial masters, and in addition to these, he is gouged by the capitalist-minded Negro, who makes his appeal on the basis of race. In the kingdom of the profiteers, a Harlem landlord is king. The shortage of homes in Negro Harlem is an ever present and serious matter; owing to the restrictions placed, upon the Negro tenant, and being unable to move where he can find a vacancy, he is compelled to remain within the pale. The landlords of Harlem take advantage of this condition to bleed him most mercilessly. The practice usually is to replace white tenants with colored ones and in the process increase the rent of the latter anywhere from 50 to 100 per cent.

The supreme tragedy of this is better grasped when we bear in mind the fact that the Negro worker receives far less in wages than his white brother. There are any number of Negroes whose rent far exceeds their wages. Having to choose between paying the high rent or be without a home, they decide to pay; to do so they resort to the  established custom of taking in “lodgers”; in most cases these “lodgers” are total strangers to the family with whom they lodge; a lodger’s character may be shady and low and his habits loose, vulgar and harmful to the morals of the children in the home. This matters not, however. All that counts is to get the big rent for the landlord.

“The Vicious Circle”

But while the morals of the children in the home may be corrupted, while the home itself may be broken up through clandestine love affairs, in the final analysis it is the lodgers who pay most of the rent; for whenever the landlord increases the rent of a tenant, say, $10 per month, said tenant in turn distributes this increase on the weekly rental of the lodgers–lodgers pay rent not monthly like tenants, but weekly and by so doing realizes in most instances much more than the additional $10 per month. One may find a family today occupying the status of a tenant, tomorrow that same tenant becomes a lodger, and so the vicious circle goes on and on.

There is an old tradition which still survives, to the effect that whenever Negroes move into a community the property value decreases; like many another fable, this one is not true. Negroes maintain that where the assured and steady income from ownership in a certain piece of property is greatest it is then that the value should be high. But, say those who hold the former opinion, “while we are receiving more income from the property when occupied by Negro tenants, we find, when compelled to secure loans, that the lenders of money demand a higher percentage of interest and more security than when the property is occupied by white tenants, because the former do not take as good care of property, as do the latter.”

To which Negroes make this reply: “Granting as true what is said about loans, the question thereupon A comes down to a class basis. Negro worker has as much or as little appreciation of property as his white brother in the same class. The reverse is also true; a white person of leisure, culture and refinement will treat property in the same manner as does the colored brother with similar culture and refinement.”

Merciless Exploitation

Nevertheless, the Negro tenant is the victim of a brutal and merciless exploitation by both black and white landlords, and the tragedy of the situation lies in the fact that there is no escape for him. White tenants may move unhampered from one end of the city to the other. Not so the colored tenant; while segregation continues, Negro tenants will continue to be offered up on the altar of greed and profit, to the glory of gold and the benefit of real estate sharks.

Politically, Negro Harlem is reactionary. Until very recently Harlem “en masse” went to the polls and voted as “my grand-daddy did.” The old tradition of the Negro in politics as voiced by Frederick Douglass, viz., that “the Republican party is the ship and all else the sea,” was for a long time accepted by Negroes here and elsewhere as “Gospel truth.” Of late, however, a decided change has taken place in the political life of Negro Harlem. Negroes no longer blindly follow the Republican party, but have gone over to Tammany Hall. Last year Harlem was represented both in the State Legislature and in the Board of Aldermen by Negro Democrats.

Radicals Make Progress

The Negro radicals in Harlem have done splendid work, which can hardly be realized and appreciated by those out of touch with conditions within the black belt. From the day the Negro radical began his agitation in Harlem he was made to realize that between the great mass of white workers and the bulk of Negro workers, in so far as understanding and serving their own interest was concerned, there was absolutely no difference. The two groups are alike in their opposition to anything new; they glorify the past and are fearful of any departure therefrom.

Encouraged by a reactionary leadership, they have set their faces stubbornly against radicalism and change; whether it be in religion, politics, economics or in any other field. The general attitude of Negro Harlem towards a change in our economic system was tersely voiced by a recognized leader of the race who said: “The Negro, just out of slavery, cannot afford to agitate for the abolition of capitalism; he must protect and prolong capitalism until he has had a chance to taste the sweets of private property.”

Meetings Broken Up

The street meetings of Negro Socialists have on numerous occasions been interrupted and broken up; their speakers assaulted, just as white Socialist meetings have been broken up, and their speakers assaulted in other sections of the city and country. Nevertheless, it is safe to say that the amicable relationship observed between the races in Harlem is due largely to the influence of the persistent propaganda of Negro Socialists. Of all the groups propagandizing in Harlem, none have done as much to remove suspicion and hatred and to foster the spirit of tolerance and mutual good-will among the two races as have the Socialists; even their most bitter enemies pay them this tribute.

In spite of many obstacles, however, and with a firm determination that is at once admirable and commendable, the Negro radicals have kept up the fight, until today one can say with pride that Harlem has more Negro Socialists, organized and unorganized, than anywhere else in the United States, and one is even tempted to predict that the first Negro Socialist to be elected in the United States will come from black Harlem.

New Leader was the most important Socialist Party-aligned paper from much of the 1920s and 1930s. Begun in 1924 after the S.P. created the Conference for Progressive Political Action, it was edited by James Oneal. With Oneal, and William M. Feigenbaum as manager, the paper hosted such historic Party figures as Debs, Abraham Cahan, Lena Morrow Lewis, Isaac Hourwich, John Work, Algernon Lee, Morris Hillquit, and new-comers like Norman Thomas. Published weekly in New York City, the paper followed Oneal’s constructivist Marxism and political anti-Communism. The paper would move to the right in the mid 30s and become the voice of the ‘Old Guard’ of the S.P. After Oneal retired in 1940, the paper became a liberal anti-communist paper under editor Sol Levitas. However, in the 1920s and for much of the 1930s the paper contained a gold mine of information about the Party, its activities, and most importantly for labor historians, its insiders coverage of the union movement in a crucial period.

PDF of full issue: https://www.marxists.org/history/usa/pubs/new-leader/1925/v02n15-apr-11-1925-NL.pdf