Transcripts For CSPAN3 American Artifacts 20161025 : vimarsa

Of artifacts and a lot of history to cover and the last African American to be elected in the 19th century leaves in 1901 and then its a long time before another African American comes into the house and we have a couple of really rare artifacts from the 1920s and 30s but before i launch into them tell us about how he got into congress. Theres a long period. Almost three decades after he leaves congress where theres no African Americans either in the house or the senate and that has everything to do with the books and the way that that changes over time is theres a critical thing going on in the south where African Americans leave the south and move northward as part of a multidecade movement that would be called the great migration and that begins depending on which historian you talk to 1890s and runs through world war ii. It picks up momentum around world war i as theres a need in the north to fill industrial jobs and jobs occupied by men that have gone off to fight in the war and you see tens of thousands of African Americans moving northward for the first timeout of the south to industrial jobs in chicago and st. Louis, cleveland, pittsburgh, new york and overtime the African American population and cities increases and the african meshes in those cities are gradually recruited by the political parties. He is born in the south. He and his family are part of a group that moved to the midwest to kansas and he actually goes to grade school but he finds his way in the 1890s and moves up into in the political system and his career has peaks and valleys but by the 1920s hes part of the republican political machine and in 1928 when the sitting congressman from chicago very powerful republican named Martin Madden who is on the Appropriations Committee passes away mid congress in the fall elections. He runs for the seat and he wins and in 1929 he comes to the house of representative. This little tiny button that we have in the collection is from his career. It was really small and it has a picture of him and one of the things i loved most about him is they arent rare and there rbt many of them around him initially and very few survive. Only seen one or two others in existence but if you think about this tiny button worn on someones lapel looking for all the world like any other button, this actually represents a revolution. The attempt to elect an African American congress for the first time in decades. So just this presence of this little inch and a quarter tiameter of piece of metal would have been a statement on the part of whoever was wearing it and i love that it has survived and came back to the place where they wanted de priest to end up which was the u. S. Congress and when he got here he then found a lot of a lot he didnt ask for in the issues he handled and he does end up being sort of the surrogate representative for African Americans in general, right . Absolutely. It must have been an interesting shift for him because he come up through the chicago political machine and while he had advocated for his constituent sy you didnt get the sense that he embraced this role as a he preventatives of African Americans generally until he comes to congress and a couple of things happened right off the bat almost immediately that really force him to take a very public role for African American political rights. He is the first African American to serve in a long time but when he comes to congress theres a bit of a fire storm in the press. It was tradition for the first lady in this case lou hoover, to have a tea for all the congressional wives, spouses, nowadays we would say but wives in the late 1920s and there were several Southern States that rejected the fact that wooifs that are members of Congress Might have to have tea in the white house with an African American woman. There were even Southern States that had their legislatures pass resolutions asking hoover to make sure this didnt happen. And what hoover did was to divide the tea party into a couple sessions and it was a very carefully preselected group of congresswomen she wouldnt object. And just the Southern State legislatures that had spoken up and this is the first kind of road block that he returns into. Another one happens here in the house right . About where his office is located. Right. Yes, you know, people dont want their offices to be. They want their office to be next to him i dont want to be serving with an African American and were doing research recently on the history of who had what office in the different House Office Buildings in the Cannon House Office building it turned out that the place that oscar de priest was assigned was a bathroom and they ripped out the plumbing and just turned it into an office for himful one has to wonder did they choose that particular space to rip out and change for him because it could happen at the last minute and perhaps it would side step people objecting in advance because they wouldnt think that anybody was going to be next to them . They thought just the bathroom was next door . But its definitely these things that bubble up from lots of pie mary Source Research that our offices do when we learn the stories behind the stories. One other episode happens late in te priests career when a staffer is essentially his chief of staff and Family Member are asked to leave the house restaurant and move to a segregated room where African Americans could get lunch in an adjoining space and depriest objected to this unsurprisingly and defended his secretary as chief of staff and then the accounts committee in the house, that dictated the restaurant needs to be segregated. He comes on to the house floor and the press pays a lot of attention to this and his line is if we cant have freedom, if we cant have equality under the dome of the capitol then where in gods name are we going to get it . And the house creates a special committee to investigate segregation in the restaurant but the issue dies with that committee and the restaurant remains segregated well into the 20th century. Thats interesting because it brings up for me thinking about not just the experience of African American members in the 19th century and the early part of the century but the experience of african mesh staff there and the job of running the house restaurant was given as a concession. Somebody could have almost like the franchise i guess of running that and in the 1960s after the civil war is over that is awarded to a famous African American restaurantuer and his experience is as someone thats a business man operating in that space and in the reconstruction period there is some examples of African Americans being sort of the pioneers of being on staff and theyre very few in number but they manage to sort of be in positions that have not been created for them but the positions that do have some weight and purpose in the house. And some symbolic and importance to the fact that these individuals were put in those positions. One of them was William Smith who was appointed the house librarian in the 1880s. And he is at that point one of the highest ranking African Americans in the federal government and he had been brought along slowly. He first came to the house and worked in the library during the civil war and he had opinion promoted by radical republicans like senator sumner helped push him along in his career and another would be who is appointed during reconstruction is the first African American page to serve in the house. Of manchester virginia, just south across james from richmond and he is a carpet 3bagger from the north. A former Union Officer and he serves in a district that represents richmond and he is appointed in 1871. He serves a year and a half in the house and hes also the other connection there is that he is the great grand nephew of John Mercer Langston there at that point. He was the dean of Howard University at the time and is going to be in congress too. Theres an interesting network of people that know other people and are able to move pieces around and make things happen and then we get from George Downing in the 1860s running the house restaurant right up to the chief of staff for Oscar Depriest being refused service in the house and oscar de priest later in his career he takes on and champions these issues that need championing and arent necessarily related to his constituent constituentcy and hes a National Figure and another object that relates to that is a program from a speech he is giving in dayton ohio, very far from chicago. It doesnt say what hes going to talk about. Hes just speaking and it happened at the local junior high school. You know theres a band and around the whole thing and he is presented as a statesman important to the community in dayton and thats part of the whole notion of surrogate representation. The fact that youre representing people beyond the borders of your district or your state your a National Figure. We dont really think of him that much as a National Figure. But we do. And many people dont and the late 1940s do become National Figures. He is defeated for reelection. Another African American from chicago. And hes the first African American from congress. And what you begin to see in that decade from the 1930s into the 1940s and you see it very clearly in this chicago district is that theres a shift in African American allegiance away from the republican party. The party of lincoln and the party of reconstruction to the Democratic Party for the new deal and it has to do with the fact that African Americans are recruited by democratic city leaders and theres the promise of greater political participation which is that promise that pulled African Americans out of the south during the great my fwrags to begin with. And they have a slightly greater voice in that new Deal Coalition that Franklin Roosevelt puts together and they begin to be drawn toward the Democratic Party. And he down plays the fact that hes an African American in congress. He doesnt want to push black issues per se as he told the press on numerous occasions. He served for a couple of terms and he is replaced by another member named William Dawson thats one of the longest serving African Americans in house history. Started off as a republican and moved to the Democratic Party in chicago and he chairs the committee that will become oversite in government reform. And he chairs that for the rest of his career. For two decades and hes another member that comes into the institution and and fitting into the institution and trying to effect change from his position of power as a Committee Chairman. And in addition to being Committee Chair and part of that institutional approach to everything and he has a portrait of himself as any Committee Chairman did, created and its one of the first portraits of an African American in the u. S. Congress. Which really raises it to a very elevated place. William dawsons portrait, its the first African American Committee Chairman portrait in the house and hes the First Standing Committee of the house and its a wonderful portrait in that it really represents him as the embodiment of a Committee Chair. Its not one where theres lots of elements in there to give you clues to where he is. Its about the stature of the man. Hes standing alone. Hes standing in a very conservative blue suit and he looks like a member of congress. Thats something thats really important. Part of this is part of his approach and many peoples approach to working in congress as members is to be part of the institution and he uses that and becomes an incredibly long serving chair. So William Dawson was a member that had a legislative style that was very much a workhorse style. She was behind the scenes and he didnt want to be in the media. Very quite. Determined but very low key. His style contracts with these. This is by adam clayton powell. This was published marching blacks. Its published right after he is elected in 1944 and begins to serve in 1945 and he was definitely a man ready for a progress and he was the pastor in harlem district and he serves a very long time in congress. This is from the beginning of his congressional career. This is later moving from the paper form to wax. A recording he made. Keep the faith baby. Its a series of speaking meditations and these bookend his career. He has a very different approach to how to do things. All human beings black and white, rich and poor, equal in the sight of god. Keep your faith in the life of your fellow man even though he abuses you. When he abuses you, he makes himself a lesser man. A great man once said love your enemies. Bless them that curse you. Do good to them that hate you and pray, pray, pray, pray, pray for them which despitefully use you. Keep your faith. Up through the 1970s powell was the person who kind of emotions bodied civil rights in the house, right . Civil rights in congress. He is elected in 1944. He and dawson are the only two members of congress for a number of congresses until the early 1950s and swo very contrasting styles where as powell is out front talking to the media. Pushing against segregation practices in the house restaurant. In the press galleries in terms of accreditation of African American reporters. Hes constantly pushing the envelope. Theres a great story that he we covered in our book black americans in congress where sam ray burn the revered long time speaker of the house has a conversation when he first comes in and the gist of it is fresh men listen quitely and learn and dont go causing a ruckus. Well, you can imagine, powell this new yorker from harlem listening to this texan explain to him the ways of the house and powell looked at him and said mr. Speaker i have a bomb in both hands and im ready to hurl them but he had a great relationship with ray burn according to the account afterwards but he is constantly pressing the envelope in the house particularly by the 1960s when we go through a reform period during the kennedy and johnson associations and at the part of the Great Society with johnson. He is chairman of the committee and it pushes through 50 different measures related to education reforms so a very substantive legislator in addition to being, having a show horse kind of style. Very flamboyant. One of the things thats interesting is the two aspects. Theres the part where hes known as plfmr. Civil rights an hes very willing to champion civil rights on all levels. Both legislatively and the live of the house. I remember you telling me once even something as seemingly minor as sitting in the House Chamber and where you sit in the House Chamber, that will came up for him. Theres another story one of his biographers tell. Seating is open slox you respect the party block tradition and when powell came in there was a very prominent southern member that told the press this man was a chairman of a committee. He said i refuse to sit next to a black man on the house floor and what powell did is follow him around for a day on the floor and take a seat next to him any time he sat down and force this very Senior Member to move around the chamber and afterwards powell told the reporter im a baptist minister by training and i dont know whether to baptist that man or drown him. You have to remember when he came into congress in the mid 1940s there was no large Civil Rights Movement happening outside of congress. There was nothing happening and that doesnt come along until the 1950s with Martin Luther king and the Southern Christian Leadership Congress so powell is very much the face of civil rights in the u. S. For more than a decade and once that movement begins happening outside of congress as one of his biographers told us and he is no longer the face of many civil rights and overtime his attendance, his behavior becomes a little bit more erratic. The house in the late 1960s refuses to seat him. Th