Booker T Washington The Atlanta Compromise Essay

In 1895, Booker T. Washington gave a speech called “The Atlanta Compromise.” Within this speech he spoke his most famous words, “Cast down your bucket” (192). He addresses this phrase towards black people and white people, telling the blacks to cast down their buckets inorder for them to receive assistance from white people. He tells the white people to cast down their buckets and invest in the likes of hardworking black people, as to create a mutual agreement and eventually equality. Washington believes that labor will allow blacks to be equal, rather than education (192). 1895 was exactly thirty years after slavery (in the U.S.) was abolished, which, as every American should know, consisted of constant hard labor and work, with little to

This was a big deal because of the huge amount of historical turmoil going on at this time, like the Harlem Renaissance but in Atlanta. Hartshorn and Pandit describe, “A ‘new South” was rising, one that attracted both black and nonblack migrants alike to take advantage of new opportunities in telecommunications, manufacturing, and education” (qtd. in Malega and Stallings 72). Like many people know, what goes up must come down, and although it is still a booming center of black success, Atlanta cannot hold all of black America up with it. The people that black Americans are distantly related to in Western Africa are more than hesitant to invest in the African Diaspora in the United States, according to Uzoigwe (283), because of lack of confidence. They do not identify with black Americans, as black Americans do not fully identify with them, and very many African Americans do not have family in Africa to turn to for business help. Africans are very separate in identification from black Americans who are descendants of slaves. It is the job of African Americans to do their part separately until black businesses can fully