W. W. Tate to Frederick Douglass, June 2, 1862
W. W. TATE1Biographical information on this correspondent is limited. W. W. Tate (c. 1840—?) appears to be an Ohio-born African American restaurateur residing in the western territories. A W. W. Tate wrote to the Liberator on 12 August 1865 from Santa Fe, New Mexico, expressing regrets that William Lloyd Garrison had announced the suspension of that newspaper. Earlier that year, he had been part of a public meeting at which Santa Fe African Americans expressed their mourning at Lincoln’s assassination. Lib., 8 September 1865; The Assassination of Abraham Lincoln, Late President of the United States of America, and the Attempted Assassination of William H. Seward, Secretary of State, and Frederick W. Seward, Assistant Secretary, on the Evening of the 14th of April, 1865 (Washington, D.C. 1867); 1880 U.S. Census, New Mexico, Santa Fe County, 38. TO FREDERICK DOUGLASS
Montgomery City, C[olorado] t[erritory].2Probably the recently established settlement in the Montgomery Mining District located in Colorado Territory. In 1862 it had over one hundred cabins, mainly for workers in the areas silver mines. Today it is a ghost town located in Park County, southwest of Denver. Robert L. Brown, Ghost Towns of the Colorado Rockies (Caldwell, Idaho, 1968), 224-27. 2 June [18]62.
FRED’K DOUGLASS ESQ:—
Although an entire stranger to you, and claiming no right either to your
time or attention, neither as a philanthropist nor as a writer; yet I espe-
cially solicit your attention at this time, most respectfully on the score of
Humanity and Justice to our oppressed and shamefully degraded race.
I have been forced to this unpleasant duty from the reading of an
article in the May number of your Monthly, which I have just received, en-
titled “Colored Men Petitioning to be Colonized,”3Following the passing of the District of Columbia Compensated Emancipation Bill, Douglass published an article in the May 1862 issue of Douglass’ Monthly in which he discussed a group of Washington blacks who put forth a petition requesting the federal government to set aside a parcel of land, either in the United States or in Central America, where they could immigrate and enjoy their freedom. Douglass wrote, “[E]xperience has demonstrated the folly and the evil of this separation, as they will demonstrate the same of this asking the Government to kick us out of the country.” Douglass published Tate’s letter in the July 1862 issue of Douglass’ Monthly. DM, 4:2 (May 1862), 5:4 (July 1862). and from the reading
of which, I am left in a labyrinth to know your true meaning. But by way
of explanation, dear friend, allow me to give you the fullest assurance that
I am not a Colonizationists that is according to the American construction
of the word.
So far as you oppose the scheme of the Washington petitioners, peti-
tioning Congress to colonize them either in some part of this country, or
in Central America, I certainly have not a word of dissent to offer. And
most heartily and religiously agree with you when you say, "We regret this
movement on the part of the colored men at Washington.” “But, when a
little farther along in the same thread of argument you say that it is now
too late in the day for us to think of colonizing in any quarter of the globe
freed from the presence of the white race even if that were desirable.” To
which you add, “But the Washington petitioners do not wish to be free
from the protection of the white race, for they would prefer to remain
in some part of the United States. Whether they go to Central America
or to some part of this country set apart for them, they still wish to be
under the protection of the United States and in this feature of their plan
and in this only are they wise.” Well, where under the canopy of heaven
did these Washington petitioners derive the phrase “under the protection
of the United States Government," from. Now sir, it is from the above
quoted paragraph that I must conscientiously dissent; or at least call upon
you for further exemplification. Why is it so exclusively profoundly wise
that the emancipated slave of this country should still hold to the coat tails
of the sworn and inexorable enemies of their race, who declares by their
every word and action, throughout the length and breadth of the land, in
New York as in Louisiana, and in Ohio as in Texas, that the “Negro has
no rights that the white man is bound to respect?"4Tate slightly misquotes an infamous portion of Chief Justice Roger B. Taney’s majority opinion in the Dred Scott decision. v. , 19 Howard 393 (1857), 407. []Is there no living
example to prove that, both the emancipated slave and the nominally free
colored man might improve their conditions far more, both socially and
politically, as well as Nationally, by emigrating to some country beyond
the influence of the barbarous inclinations of the dominant class in these
United States? And where too, the climate is congenial, the soil rich, and
the ruling class a people of their own kind, of their own stock and lineage
I need scarcely refer you to the elevated positions of the colored people
throughout Central America and the West Indies, or even to Canada, for
there the colored man is equal before the law, nor in fact to their superior
condition in any other country as compared with this slavery damned and
thoroughly corrupted country, wholly destitute of the essential elements
necessary to the dissemination and maintenance of Justice, Freedom and
Equality. For my part, individually, I look not for common justice even in
a country where the ruling class is so far in advance of my race, in num-
bers, wealth, and intelligence; and where too they now are, and always
have been our bitterest enemies, for the space of two hundred and forty
years.
The people of the United States have robbed us of our birthright. The
right of schools, the right to read the sacred Bible, handed down to us by
God himself; the right of elective franchise, without which no people can
be free; also the right to call our own bodies, and those of our dear wives
and children our own. These things have they done and are yet doing
to-day. A nation sir, that is capable of committing these heinous, and un-
called for deeds against my people for two centuries and a half, is wholly
incapable of my esteem and confidence.
But from the following I am constrained to believe that you are averse
to the colored man emigrating to any country beyond the confines of the
United States; whether it be to Canada, Central America, Hayti, Liberia,
or anywhere else. For you say, that “The great argument for emigration,
is that we must go where we shall be respected.” And further: “The best
answer to this view of the case was made recently by Mr. Powers5Tate is referring to Jeremiah Powers (c. 1819—?), a prominent black abolitionist from New York City. Powers served on the city’s Committee of Thirteen, formed by black abolitionists in response to the Fugitive Slave Act of 1850. Powers also stood against efforts to colonize blacks in Africa. During a public meeting in 1852 in New York, Powers declared that the American Colonization Society “is organized upon a system of plunder, and they are all robbers and murders.” He also appealed to blacks to resist the colonization movement and to “vote for no man that will not vote for us, and the cause of humanity.” In 1862, following the abolition of slavery in Washington, D.C., Powers criticized blacks who favored emigration. In his monthly newspaper, Douglass wrote that the best answer to the question of emigration came from Powers during a meeting of black abolitionists at the home of Thomas Downing in New York City. During this meeting, Powers apparently made the argument that blacks could not hope to be respected anywhere until they were respected in the United States. NASS, quoted in FDP, 5 February 1852; DM, 4:642-43 (May 1862); 1850 U.S. Census, New York, New York County, 10; Leslie M. Alexander, African or American? Black Identity and Political Activism in New York City, 1784-1861 (Urbana, IIl., 2008), 123-24; Foner and Walker, Black State Conventions, 1:36, 87.
in New
York, who took the ground that the colored race can never be respected
anywhere till they are respected in America.” And by the term “America,”
you evidently mean the United States, exclusively, for you further ahead
adopt these words: “We thoroughly agree with Mr. Powers that the ques-
tion as to the estimate which shall be formed of the negro, and the place
he shall hold in the world’s esteem, is to be decided here &c."—I ask
sir, that, if it was good for the Pilgrim Fathers6William Bradford, governor and historian of Plymouth Colony, first labeled as Pilgrims a group of Separatist Puritans originating in Scrooby, England. The term, however, is usually applied to all passengers of the Mayflower and anyone settling in Plymouth Colony before 1631. These Separatists believed that the Church of England could not be reformed, and they therefore challenged the church’s claim to exclusive legitimacy. This view differed from those of many Puritans as well as the king, which led to their persecution. Though hundreds of them first fled to the Netherlands for religious liberty, in 1620 nearly one-third of these Separatists sailed to America. After initially landing at Cape Cod, the Pilgrims established their permanent colony at Plymouth and enjoyed religious freedom in the New World. Godfrey Hodgson, A Great and Godly Adventure: The Pilgrims and the Myth of the First Thanksgiving (New York, 2006), 1-21; Charles L. Cohen, “Pilgrims,” in Paul S. Boyer, ed., The Oxford Companion to United States History (Oxford, 2004), 121. to emigrate in the Seven-
teenth Century to free themselves from Religious tyranny, why then may
it not be good for the descendants of Africa, in the Nineteenth Century,
to quit their unhomely homes, the place of their nativity, on account of
oppression both social and political, as well as religious. Oppression sir
for barbarity would put to shame the wicked absurdities of the Antide-
luvians,7The term “antediluvian,” meaning “before the deluge,” refers to the period before the great flood described in the first six chapters of the book of Genesis. Tate’s use of the term extends the definition to describe the people of that period. Gen. 1-6; E. D. Rendell, The Antediluvian History, and Narrative of the Flood, (Boston, 1851), 15. and bring to naught the atrocities of those who were the modus
operandi8This postclassical Latin expression translates into “mode of operation.” of the superstitions and crimes of those who lived in the Middle
and Dark Ages of the world—And while the inhabitants of the Old World
are continually fleeing from oppression at home and the civilized world
cries, “Amen, so mote it be!"9The phrase “So mote it be” is the proper Masonic way to end a prayer. It is similar to the term “amen,” signaling agreement with the prayer that was made. The term first appeared in the Regius Manuscript, one of the earliest documents containing information on the early Masonic Lodges in Britain. S. Brent Morris, The Complete Idiot’s Guide to Freemasonry, 2d ed. (New York, 2013), 7. Where is the potent unanswerable argument
that says “The true policy of the colored American is to make himself
in every way open to him an American citizen, bearing with proscrip-
tion and insult, till these evils disappear." How long, O, Lord, how long10Ps. 94:3. must we suffer to be kicked and proscribed, and then only to be kicked
and proscribed again, simply because we were born on the sacred soil of
America?
From what I have said do not deem me your enemy. And if I have
committed an error, be assured that it has been of the head and not of the heart.
Accept, then, my dear sir, my highest regards and believe me to be your abiding friend for the elevation of our despised race.
W. W. TATE.
PLSr: DM, 5:676-77 (July 1862).