Booker T Washington Atlanta Exposition Address Analysis

Carrie Missey
History 122 Section 1
Blog #2
As Booker T. Washington said in his Atlanta Compromise Speech of 1895, cast down your bucket. He stated not only to his people but to the white southerners as well. The way that we can learn to be as one is to learn to rely on each other. In stating that he made a great point in the fact that his people were the ones who lived to make the southern man’s land what it was. I think in the speech he made it very clear that there was not one society but a nation of groups. He mentioned how his people tilled their lands and helped the southern white man keep them in working condition under such awful conditions of slavery but now we all had the opportunity to live next to each other and develop relationships

He states to cast their bucket down as well and make friends in every manly way of the people of all races, by whom you are surrounded. In that I took it to mean that he was talking to them as well to let down their guards and try to work together as one and not separate groups of people. To me as well it was interesting to see him say that at the beginning of their new life it started at the top and not at the bottom. If I am understanding what he is saying clearly they were seeking and trying to maintain control of their places in the communities and the way they saw to do that was to seek things like seats in congress as opposed to land. They were going after the big guns then as to go in a direction of the things that maybe they had a little more knowledge in. He also states in the beginning that the opportunities here afforded will awaken among us a new era of industrial progress. I think in that statement he is conveying the knowledge that we know the population exists and that we can use it to the benefits that we once had but in a way of appreciation and not of slavery and that we can all benefit from it. Really to me it seemed as though Booker T. Washington and his speech was an eye opening way of looking at every possible angle and realizing

He was by that speech making all races understand the possibilities with jobs, political affiliation, and class standings could soar and be prosperous for all if we would all would southern whites and negroes simply cast down our buckets and learn to learn and benefit from each other. When reading what W. E. B. DuBois says about the Atlanta Compromise seems to be a little different. He critiques it in saying that men accept the Atlanta Compromise in only its broadest interpretation. Almost making it sound more like yeah I like the way that sounds but really? They state this which I find to be a little insulting to the speech that he gave…But, nevertheless, they insist that the way to truth and right lies in straightforward honesty, not in indiscriminate flattery. I don’t think anywhere in that speech did I get the hint of lies. I got the idea of a good new start for the southern man and the Negros. The ideas that they could live together and benefit from each other. I don’t know to each his own opinion but I think that Booker T. had the ideas that we have now and are still trying to get ahold of and unfortunately have yet to master as a society of so many different races. Maybe he was just understanding of what equality and the way we should treat each