What do you think?
Rate this book
The Betrayal of the Negro: From Rutherford B. Hayes to Woodrow Wilson
Between the end of Reconstruction in 1877 and the end of World War I in 1918, African Americans experienced their nadir. The Betrayal of the Negro (originally published as The Negro in American Life and Thought: The Nadir, 1877-1901 and subsequently expanded) is the only full-scale account to document with encyclopedic research this neglected phase in American history. The author examines every aspect of our country's post-Reconstruction retreat from equality: the economic factors, the Supreme Court decisions, Booker T. Washington and his "Era of Compromise," and, in a unique and disturbing survey, the racist caricatures that dominated the most liberal newspapers and magazines of the day. Dispassionate and insightful, Logan unfolds a narrative of national betrayal as harrowing as it is heartbreaking.
480 pages, Paperback
First published March 21, 1954
6 people are currently reading
615 people want to read
About the author
Rayford W. Logan
18 books7 followersRayford Whittingham Logan was an African-American historian and Pan-African activist. He was best known for his study of post-Reconstruction America, a period he termed "the nadir of American race relations". In the late 1940s he was the chief advisor to the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) on international affairs. He was professor emeritus of history at Howard University.
Ratings & Reviews
Friends & Following
Create a free account to discover what your friends think of this book!
Community Reviews
Displaying 1 - 5 of 5 reviews
March 30, 2021
I first heard about this book when I read Stony the Road: Reconstruction, White Supremacy, and the Rise of Jim Crow by Henry Louis Gates Jr. Gates mentioned that The Betrayal of the Negro and Du Bois’s Black Reconstruction in America 1860-1880 were the two books that shaped his views on the Reconstruction and post-Reconstruction periods. I bought both books last year and read Du Bois’s first. Rayford Logan’s book is a good follow-up to Du Bois because it picks up with the end of Reconstruction and covers the period of time from 1877 to 1920.
Rayford Logan was a Black historian/activist who taught at Howard University and was considered one of the many members of the Black Cabinet during FDR’s administration. He was once described, by the Chicago Defender, as a “Bad Negro with a PhD”. Logan’s book begins by covering the policies of the presidents from Rutherford B. Hayes to William McKinley, specifically their policies (or lack thereof) to help Black people. Republicans, who Black people aligned themselves with during this time, called out the encroachments on Black civil rights, but ultimately they did not do anything about it; mostly all words and little action. Democrats did not speak on the issues at all and as a result did not do anything. Both political parties failed Black people during this time.
“It made little difference whether a Republican or a Democrat- at least a Northern Democrat-was President. Party platforms were frankly hypocritical on the constitutional rights of Negroes. Presidents of both parties uttered pious platitudes but said nothing and did nothing except to give a few jobs to professional Negro officeholders.” -Rayford Logan
Logan calls this period of time (1877–1901) the “nadir of the Negro’s status in American society”. Civil and voting rights were attacked and taken away. Lynchings of Black people continued to occur. You would think this would prompt a response, but there was more of an appetite for anti-lynching bills to protect foreign nationals such as Italians rather than Blacks.
The federal courts had a mixed record when it came to Black rights. They tended to rule in favor of Blacks to serve on juries but were reluctant to overturn racial segregation laws most notably in the landmark Supreme Court case Plessy v. Ferguson which established the principle of “separate but equal”.
Logan did not solely focus on politics in this book, he also examined how the Northern and Southern press covered Black people. In short, major papers at this time contained alot of racist rhetoric about Blacks and other racial minorities, and anti-Semitic rhetoric about Jews.
The book contains an extensive chapter on Booker T. Washington’s famous 1895 Atlanta Compromise speech. I learned that the content/ideology of Washington’s speech was not novel. Many white speakers had been saying the same thing years prior, that Blacks should focus on industry jobs and practical educational rather than social equality. Washington was just a major Black figure who was saying it too. In this chapter, Logan also shows how favorably the Southern press covered Washington’s speech. I was unaware that Washington was also in favor of educational or property tests in order to vote as long as it was applied equally and fairly to Blacks and Whites, history shows that these policies were not fair.
This book does cover some of the positive achievements of Blacks during this time such as the rise of the Black literacy rate, various social societies and organizations (Niagara Movement, NAACP), and the rise of more progressive leaders such as Du Bois, Ida B. Wells, and Mary Church Terrell.
The book ends similarly to how it began, by showing how presidents of both political parties failed Blacks from Theodore Roosevelt to Woodrow Wilson. Lynchings continued to be on the rise and the two major parties never addressed it in either of their party platforms at the time. As of this writing, an antilynching law still has not been enacted in the United States. Many Blacks at the time believed that Woodrow Wilson was going to be a disaster for Black Americans, his administration according to Logan did less harm than anticipated, but it was harm nonetheless. Wilson mostly continued to build off of Taft’s segregation policies. Unsurprisingly, Congress during Wilson’s tenure did not pass any legislation that would protect Black civil rights; however they surprisingly did not pass any anti-Black bills. In other words the racist status quo kept chugging along.
Overall, Logan’s book is a powerful introduction to this period of time that is seldom taught or written about. It was hard to read alot of the racist rhetoric during this period but Logan does a good job with his use of primary sources to show the racist rhetorical roots of Black inferiority that was prevalent at the time. As with most American history books of this vein, I can definitely see parallels to today. While not the exact same form of oppression, the throughlines are still with us today when you think of the never-ending struggle for voting rights and the constant fight for the lives of Black people against extrajudicial killings.
Review first published here: https://medium.com/ballasts-for-the-m...
Rayford Logan was a Black historian/activist who taught at Howard University and was considered one of the many members of the Black Cabinet during FDR’s administration. He was once described, by the Chicago Defender, as a “Bad Negro with a PhD”. Logan’s book begins by covering the policies of the presidents from Rutherford B. Hayes to William McKinley, specifically their policies (or lack thereof) to help Black people. Republicans, who Black people aligned themselves with during this time, called out the encroachments on Black civil rights, but ultimately they did not do anything about it; mostly all words and little action. Democrats did not speak on the issues at all and as a result did not do anything. Both political parties failed Black people during this time.
“It made little difference whether a Republican or a Democrat- at least a Northern Democrat-was President. Party platforms were frankly hypocritical on the constitutional rights of Negroes. Presidents of both parties uttered pious platitudes but said nothing and did nothing except to give a few jobs to professional Negro officeholders.” -Rayford Logan
Logan calls this period of time (1877–1901) the “nadir of the Negro’s status in American society”. Civil and voting rights were attacked and taken away. Lynchings of Black people continued to occur. You would think this would prompt a response, but there was more of an appetite for anti-lynching bills to protect foreign nationals such as Italians rather than Blacks.
The federal courts had a mixed record when it came to Black rights. They tended to rule in favor of Blacks to serve on juries but were reluctant to overturn racial segregation laws most notably in the landmark Supreme Court case Plessy v. Ferguson which established the principle of “separate but equal”.
Logan did not solely focus on politics in this book, he also examined how the Northern and Southern press covered Black people. In short, major papers at this time contained alot of racist rhetoric about Blacks and other racial minorities, and anti-Semitic rhetoric about Jews.
The book contains an extensive chapter on Booker T. Washington’s famous 1895 Atlanta Compromise speech. I learned that the content/ideology of Washington’s speech was not novel. Many white speakers had been saying the same thing years prior, that Blacks should focus on industry jobs and practical educational rather than social equality. Washington was just a major Black figure who was saying it too. In this chapter, Logan also shows how favorably the Southern press covered Washington’s speech. I was unaware that Washington was also in favor of educational or property tests in order to vote as long as it was applied equally and fairly to Blacks and Whites, history shows that these policies were not fair.
This book does cover some of the positive achievements of Blacks during this time such as the rise of the Black literacy rate, various social societies and organizations (Niagara Movement, NAACP), and the rise of more progressive leaders such as Du Bois, Ida B. Wells, and Mary Church Terrell.
The book ends similarly to how it began, by showing how presidents of both political parties failed Blacks from Theodore Roosevelt to Woodrow Wilson. Lynchings continued to be on the rise and the two major parties never addressed it in either of their party platforms at the time. As of this writing, an antilynching law still has not been enacted in the United States. Many Blacks at the time believed that Woodrow Wilson was going to be a disaster for Black Americans, his administration according to Logan did less harm than anticipated, but it was harm nonetheless. Wilson mostly continued to build off of Taft’s segregation policies. Unsurprisingly, Congress during Wilson’s tenure did not pass any legislation that would protect Black civil rights; however they surprisingly did not pass any anti-Black bills. In other words the racist status quo kept chugging along.
Overall, Logan’s book is a powerful introduction to this period of time that is seldom taught or written about. It was hard to read alot of the racist rhetoric during this period but Logan does a good job with his use of primary sources to show the racist rhetorical roots of Black inferiority that was prevalent at the time. As with most American history books of this vein, I can definitely see parallels to today. While not the exact same form of oppression, the throughlines are still with us today when you think of the never-ending struggle for voting rights and the constant fight for the lives of Black people against extrajudicial killings.
Review first published here: https://medium.com/ballasts-for-the-m...
October 3, 2022
This book represents an excellent literature study, which backs the author's thesis to a T. The literature proves how racist our country was, especially in the South, leading all the way up until 1964. The book also points out progress made in race relations in said years, often forgotten by most people. With this work, Dr. Logan put together a timeless work, and an excellent reference, which, no doubt, will continue to last into future generations.
September 20, 2024
Such an amazing book, but also a real slog at times. This feels to me as important more as a reference work than a historical monograph. It is wide ranging and written in a particularly dryI/literary style of leading historians of the 50s. Logan could hardly be described as a consensus historian, but there is something of that flair to the words on the page. The book expects a lot of its reader. Very few notes and voluminous reference to other historians noted with the attribution of a last name, a Dr. is added if Logan thinks highly of them or their work. If you are not versed in the history of the period, this will send you to look things up every other page.
The book also feels like two books, with the first section chronicling the descent of African Americans into the depth of "second class citizenship" in the decades following the failure of Reconstruction. This is Logan defining of the Nadir of Race Relation and the historiographical contribution of the book that was the only thing I really knew about it, but the second half o the book is really fascinating. It focuses on the image of Black Americans as presented in the Northern press during the same period and makes a compelling argument that it was these northern and often liberal publications that cemented the racist stereotypes of Black people in the American mind and American culture that allowed the nadir to happen. It's a monumental feat of scholarship, but it is not always entertaining and follows lots of leads piling evidence upon evidence. Extended discussions of Congressional Bills and newspaper headlines, that are real and necessary historical work, but make for slow going. I'm proud of having read this, but will recommend folks dip in and read chapters here and there. A classic that should be more talk about.
The book also feels like two books, with the first section chronicling the descent of African Americans into the depth of "second class citizenship" in the decades following the failure of Reconstruction. This is Logan defining of the Nadir of Race Relation and the historiographical contribution of the book that was the only thing I really knew about it, but the second half o the book is really fascinating. It focuses on the image of Black Americans as presented in the Northern press during the same period and makes a compelling argument that it was these northern and often liberal publications that cemented the racist stereotypes of Black people in the American mind and American culture that allowed the nadir to happen. It's a monumental feat of scholarship, but it is not always entertaining and follows lots of leads piling evidence upon evidence. Extended discussions of Congressional Bills and newspaper headlines, that are real and necessary historical work, but make for slow going. I'm proud of having read this, but will recommend folks dip in and read chapters here and there. A classic that should be more talk about.
January 15, 2017
Valuable chapters on Northern newspapers and magazines during the post-Reconstruction era.
March 20, 2012
This is a 1965 reprint of the 1954 edition, published by Collier Books.
Displaying 1 - 5 of 5 reviews