The daily worker. [volume] (Chicago, Ill.) 1924-1958, 1929-06-07
By RICHARD B. MOORE.
III. Race Prejudice the Ideology of
Capitalist Imperialism.
(Continued)

In order to maintain the system
of exploitation of the black masses,
the imperialists following in the
wake of the chattel slave holders
have developed an theology and pre-
JUDGE against the Negroes. They
hold that the Caucasian race is a
superior race and that all other
races are inferior, the Negroes
being the most inferior of all. All
sorts of arguments are put forward
to support this prejudice. The old
biblical myth of the curse pro-
nounced by Noah upon Canaan be-
cause Ham laughed at the drunken
state of the old patriarch is brought
forward as proof of the divine en-
dowment of the white race with SUI
perior qualities and the lack of
them in the supposed black descend
ants of Ham. "Science" is supposed
to prove that the germ-plasm of the
superior Nordic is endowed with
mysterious and excellent properties
which are responsible for the pres
ent superior status of the white i'm
perialist nations. History also is
brought under contribution to show
that the Negro race has contributed
nothing to civilization whereas it is
to the white race that we owe what
ever civilization exists. So-called
intelligence tests are also said to
prove innate deficiencies of Negroes
and other non-whites. But truly
scientific analysis of this race
theology of imperialism proves the
utter falsity of all these assump-
| lions.
/. No intelligent person can for
moment countenance the biblical
argument. The twaddle of drunk
en- man cannot be taken as uni
versal cosmic law.
2. In respect to racial contribu-
lions to civilization, the truth of his
tory attests that all races have made
great contributions thereto. Not the
least among these the Negro race.
AS we must be brief, we quote only
this small paragraph from Buchar-
ms Historical Materialism": GIN
the first place, the race theory is in
contradiction with the facts. The
lowest race, that which is said to
be incapable, by nature, of any de-
velopment, is the black race, the Ne
groes. Yet it has been shown that
the ancient representative of this
black race, the so-called Kushites,
created a very high civilization in
India before the days of the Hin
doos) and Egypt; the yellow race,
which now enjoys but slight favor,
also created very high civilization
in China, far superior in its day to
the then-existing civilization of the
white men; the white men were then
children as compared with the yellow
men. We now know how much the
ancient Greeks borrowed from the
Assyro-B abylonians and Egyptians.
These few facts are sufficient to
show that the "racial" explanation
is no explanation at ALL" Up. 1919
3. Inferiority based upon present
social traits. Even the most en-
lightened of the bourgeois scientists
are compelled to refute this ideol-
ogy. Professor Franz Boas in "The
Mind of Primitive Man" deals with
this at length. We have space only
for the following quotation: "An
unbiased estimate Of the anthropol-
ogical evidence so far brought for
ward does not permit us to coun-
tenance the belief in racial in
feriority which would unfit an in
dividual of the Negro race to take
his part in modern civilization. We
do not know Of any demand made
on the human body or mind in mod
ern life that anatomical or ethno-
logical evidence woold prove to be
! beyond the powers of the Negro.
"The traits Of the American Ne