For Frederick Douglass' Paper.

NEW YORK AND BROOKLYN NEWS.

BROOKLYN, Jan. 20th, 1855.

The difficulties between the white and colored laborers bid fair to become serious.—It grew out of the whites refusing to work at what is called " 'Longshore" work, for less than fourteen shillings per day, which they yet persist in—while not only colored, but thousands of whites are idle, and would be glad to get work at even half that price. The price offered, and at which the colored laborers are at work, is twelve shillings. Of course, colored men can feel under no obligations to hold out in a "strike" with the whites, as the latter have never recognized them. Their expectation and determination were not to allow them to work at all. But in this they have been disappointed. The inconsisten[c]y is too palpable to be winked at in the days of Know Nothing and Wide Awake societies. The sympathies of the employers, the public, and the law, are on the side of the blacks; consequently, the white laborers have been restrained from any overt acts, though, at times, very threatening. But the approach of a possee of police has tended to allay all fears of an outbreak.

The enclosed slip is from the New York Tribune of this morning:

THE 'LONGSHOREMEN—THE MERCHANTS REJECT A COMPROMISE.—The Committee appointed by the 'Longshoremen at their meeting Thursday night, together with the President of the Society, Mr. J. H. Williams, waited upon the merchants on 'Change yesterday and submitted their proposition for a compromise. The committee were courteously received by the Chairman, who laid the matter before the merchants, but they refused to take any action and expressed a determination to adhere to their previous resolution to pay but $1.50 per day. Mr. Williams informs us that the merchants admit the superiority and skill of the 'Longshoremen over green hands in their business, and further that they are better worth $1.75 per day than green hands are four or six shillings less, but they contend the men should accept the wages tendered to them. The result will, undoubtedly be a general strike, which will be not only disastrous to the strikers, but to the merchants to a great extent. Another mass meeting of the 'Longshoremen's

Society will be held at Tammany Hall on Sunday evening, (that evening having been selected in consequence of the hall being engaged on other nights,) when the report of the committee will be made and action thereupon will be taken.

Mr. W. F. Johnson (known as blind Johnon) has been here during the past week exhibiting the magic lantern and lecturing on phrenology, examining heads, &c. Some of them he found, as in other places, very hard, and some very soft. Among the number examined was Ethiop'sWilson, William Joseph ("Ethiop")

William Joseph Wilson (1818–?), a free black man from New Jersey, operated a bootmaking shop in New York City as early as the 1830s. In the 1840s he became a secondary school teacher and later a principal of a black school in Brooklyn. He was an activist on behalf of black education, encouraging access and attendance, and even opened his own library. Wilson also campaigned to secure the franchise for New York African Americans. He served as a member of the Committee of Thirteen, organized by New York black leaders to stop enforcement of the Fugitive Slave Act. In the early 1850s Wilson’s letters appeared frequently in Frederick Douglass’ Paper, and Douglass referred to him as the newspaper’s “Brooklyn correspondent.” Wilson’s letters to the newspaper, published under the pseudonym “Ethiop,” were often part of an ongoing debate about the condition of blacks in New York and the United States. Wilson’s most frequent sparring partner in the war of letters was “Communipaw,” actually James McCune Smith, a prominent black physician in New York City. Carleton Mabee, Black Education in New York State: From Colonial to Modern Times (Syracuse, N.Y., 1979), 54, 63-67, 123, 129, 155, 158; Foner and Walker, Black State Conventions, 1:79-88; Quarles, Black Abolitionists, 87, 212, 229; Ripley, Black Abolitionist Papers, 4:144-45n. . I suppose we shall soon have some account of that extraordinary head before long. But he has not set for his daguerreotype yet, which he promised us so long ago. I can only say that it is anxiously looked for by your readers.

How strange the workings and nature of prejudice! We are credibly informed that a colored pupil in the Blind Institute, after its being found out, after some months, that she was colored, has been turned out of the Institute. Having no friends convenient, she solicited, through one of the young Christian lady pupils, a near and dear friend of hers, the counsel and advice of the Rev. James Williams and Robert Jackson, Esq., of Brooklyn, by whose aid it is hoped, on a reconsideration of the matter, she may be again restored to the privileges that legitimately belong to her as a pupil. Mr. Johnson (and to his honor be it said) was the first that broke the way for colored pupils since which, and during his stay, several have been admitted.

Dr. T. J. White lectures before the Brooklyn Library Association on next Friday evening; and Mr. —— on next Tuesday evening before the Anti-Slavery Society at the Tabernacle.

OBSERVER.