The Renaissance
IN JULY, 1918, in what he later called
"one of my periods of exhaltation,"
editor W. E. B. Du Bois published
his famed editorial, "Close Ranks."
In the pages of The Crisis, official
voice of the NAACP, he said, in part,
"That which the German power
represents today spells death to the
aspirations of Negroes and all darker
races for equality, freedom and democracy.
Let us not hesitate. Let us, while
this war lasts, forget our special
grievances and close our ranks shoulder
to shoulder with our own white fellow
citizens and the allied nations that
are fighting for democracy. We make
no ordinary sacrifice, but we make
it gladly and willingly with our eyes
lifted to the hills."
The editorial came at a time when
black soldiers were proving their
valor overseas and President Wilson
had finally spoken out against lynching.
Still, it provoked a
great deal of criticism from other
blacks,
which Du Bois felt that he had to
answer.
First [he said, in the August Crisis],
this is Our Country—we have worked
for it, we have suffered for it, we
have fought for it; we have made its
music, we have tinged its ideals,
its poetry, its religion, its dreams;
we have reached in this land our highest
modern development and nothing, humanly
speaking, can prevent us from eventually
reaching here the full stature of
our manhood. Our country is at war.
The war is critical, dangerous and
world-wide. If this is our country,
then this is our war. We must fight
it with every ounce of blood and treasure
.... But what of our wrongs, cry a
million voices with strained faces
and bitter eyes. Our wrongs are still
wrong. War does not excuse disfranchisement,
"Jim Crow" cars and social
injustices, but it does make our first
duty clear. It does say deep to the
heart of every Negro American—we
will not bargain with our loyalty.
We will not profiteer with our country's
blood. . . .
Judging from the loyalty displayed
by black Americans during the war,
Du Bois seems to have spoken for the
masses. Less
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