The Northwest enterprise. [volume] (Seattle, Wash.) 1931-1952, 1931-03-19
"The Fall OF a
Fair Confederate"


to New York and for the first time
met one. y was a writer. one Of the
New" Negroes. Only X denied
there was such a thing as the New
Negro, contendng that the World
War had merely upset American ira
ditions and given the Younger col
ored generation a chance to assert
few ideas-ideas which he said had
been voiced lust rs well back in
Frederick Douglass's generation.
Y was a Northern Negro with
Yankee temperament And had
not known how Southern | was till
! met him. for talked more like
a "nigger" and had more niger
isms so-caled than he had. Yet he
was a full-hlooded Negro and almost
as dark as they come. He had new
er sung a Spiritual and did not great
ly admire them. He had not heard
Blues song till he was in his teens,
and he disliked proerastination, emo
tionalism and loud talking-qualties
of which he said |, along with all
other Southerners. black and white,
had n weakness.
Neither did he believe there was
such thing as Negro Art" Any
difference in the artistic production
of the Aframerican was due, he de
olared, to the Negroes economic sto
tus here and not to his racial strain.
The Blues and Spirituals resemhled
the music of oppressed groups the
world over. This disappointed me.
F.. 1 e IN
was essentially different. A n
neither did X believe that the South
ern Negro was ready for Commu-
nism. So we quarreled upon all these
points aud became fast friends.
Finds Harlem Cosmopolitan
| was living in the Village, and
once Or twice a week he would come
down to see me and as often | would
run up to Harlem to 30 with him
to the theatres, cabarets and dance
halls of the Black Belt. My senti-
mental views of the Negro greatly
arnused him. and he undertook to
emancipate me from my first eman-
eipation.
Everything about Harlem thrilled
me, but | concealed my enthusiasm.
for he seemed politely bored by what
seemed to me astonishing and novel.
The octoroon choruses at the Lafay-
cite, the black sheiks at SmalPs.
the expert amateur dancing to be
seen at the Savoy, the Curb Market
along the Sth Avenue az, with its
strange West Indian roots and flare
of tropical fruits which bloomed even
when snow had whtened the face of
Harlem, the displays of gatherings
and pig-snouts in the restaurant win
dows; Strivers Row, where the col
ored aristocracy lived in stately
houses behind stately trees, and
three blocks away the dirty tene-
ments of 142nd Street with their
shricking swarms of black. brown,
yellow, and pale ivory children; and
the foreign Negroes speak French.
Spanish, and Dutch, and strangely
enough, looking their nationalities; ;
the British West Indians with the
Africanized Cocknev and thoroughly
British temperament; the rural
Southern Negroes so entirely differ
ent from the urban Southern Negro
and yet more like him than like
their Northern rural cousins.
was finding that "All Coons
Look Alike" only to the inexperi-
enced eye.
Thoughts of Marriage Arise
One night over a midnight supner
at Tabb's. x casually remarked that
he would like to marry me. | had
never considered such thing and
was secretly shocked by his presump-
ton (although ! had been dallying
with the idea of an affair" with
HIM. Not that X was asking me
to marry him, it was simply a casual
aside; but the idea that such n thing
was possible, for the first time oc-
cured to me. And though he did
not refer to it again, it stuck in
my mind. | had day dreams about
IL and wrote myself long lectures in
my dairy upon how inadvisable such
step would be.
The glance and touch Of X thrilled
me as no other mans ever had. |
had no objection to being embraced
by him. believe that Southerners
who are used to Negroid character
istics Of hair and skin have far less
aversion to colored person as
mate than a Northern. Mote our
overwhelming mulatto population in
the South / felt that what was
good enough for my forefathers was
good enough for me. But marriage
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