No Future in This Country by Andre E. Johnson

Author:Andre E. Johnson [Johnson, Andre E.]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: History, African American & Black
ISBN: 9781496830692
Google: N8eLzQEACAAJ
Publisher: University Press of Mississippi
Published: 2020-10-06T00:42:18+00:00

In another interview, published October 27, 1900, in the Cleveland Gazette, Turner turned up his criticism of the Republicans. He suggested that the Republicans “lied” to African Americans about their freedom. “Our freedom was a war necessity,” Turner argued, that “was dearly bought with colored arms 200,000 strong.” Therefore, Turner continued, contrary to the “emotional idea that the Republican Party has an unlimited mortgage on the suffrages of the colored man,” it is the Republicans that should be grateful to African Americans. Turner argued that for thirty-three years African Americans had delivered the vote to the Republican Party like a “poor man gives his pound of flesh to the shylock,” while African Americans received nothing in return.48

However, the more Turner said that he would not stump for Bryan, and the more he reminded his audiences that he was not a member of the Democratic Party, the more the newspapers in the country continued to say otherwise. Turner’s support for Bryan had now become an all-out endorsement for the Democratic Party and its policies—and many newspapers, especially African American ones, were not happy.

On September 28, 1900, the African American newspaper the Seattle Republican devoted a front-page editorial to Turner’s support of Bryan. Titled “Change of Heart: The Bryan Salvation,”49 the paper did not hold back its frustration with Turner’s position. The rumor was that Turner would not campaign for Bryan in the South, where the majority of African Americans lived, but in the North and the West. The Republican suggested that Turner would do this because he knew that Democrats had already disenfranchised African Americans in the South and charged Turner’s support of Bryan as aiding Democrats to disenfranchise Blacks all across the nation. The paper also charged that Democrats in the South were responsible for doing nothing about the lynching and terrorism Blacks faced and were the ones who created laws that would force a “paralyzed” Turner to ride some “300 miles” in a “Jim Crow” car after suffering a stroke.

The paper also questioned Turner’s loyalty to African Americans. When Black citizens called for a strike against streetcar discrimination in the city of Atlanta, the newspaper noted Turner was against the measure. They wrote he called the action “the height of folly,” and instead, while the “boycott’ was in effect, not only did Turner ride the cars, but some African Americans believed rumors that Turner received a “free pass.” The paper further intimated that if Turner could “succeed in his undertaking, he will no doubt be most tenderly cared for the balance of his life by the Democrats.” In framing Turner as a Democrat operative and one not loyal to the race, they issued a warning for their readers: “Always watch the white folk’s nigger.”50

The Republican continued its attacks the following month. Under its “Political Pot Pie” column published on October 5, 1900, editors questioned Turner’s motives and sanity in his support of Bryan.

Bishop Turner has either lost his mind or a mercenary greed for gain has come over him, and my intimate acquaintance with him causes me to believe that he is not a fool.

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