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CHAPTER 3
FACETS OF THE NEGRO PROBLEM
I. American Minority Problems
For some decades there has been a tendency to incorporate the American
Negro problem into the broader American minority problem.^ In the
United States, the term ‘^minority people” has a connotation different from
that in other parts of the world and especially in Central and Eastern
Europe, where minority problems have existed. This difference in problem
is due to a difference in situation. The minority peoples of the United
States are fighting for status in the larger society j
the minorities of Europe
are mainly fighting for independence from it. In the United States the
so-called minority groups as they exist today—except the Indians and the
Negroes—^are mostly the result of a relatively recent immigration, which
it was for a long time the established policy to welcome as a nationally
advantageous means of populating and cultivating the country. The new-
comers themselves were bent upon giving up their language and other
cultural heritages and acquiring the ways and attitudes of the new nation.
There have been degrees of friction and delay in this assimilation process,
and even a partial conscious resistance by certain immigrant groups. But
these elements of friction and resistance are really only of a character and
magnitude to bring into relief the fundamental difference between the typi-
cal American minority problems and those in, say, the old Austrian Empire.
Of greatest importance, finally, is the fact that the official political creed of
America denounced, in general but vigorous terms, all forms of suppression
and discrimination, and affirmed human equality.
In addition to a cultural difference between the native-born and the
foreign-born in the United States, there was always a class difference. At
every point of time many of those who were already established in the
new country had acquired wealth and power, and were thus in a position
to lay down the rules to late<omers. The immigrants, who left their native
lands mainly because they had little wealth, had to fit themselves as best
they could into the new situation. Their lack of familiarity with the English
language and ways of life also made them an easy prey of economic
exploitation. But as long as the West was open to expansion, immigrant
groups could avoid becoming a subordinate class by going to a place
so
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