All too predictably, the left has been busy at work trying to convince Americans that opposition to President Obama is motivated by the \u201cracist\u201d machinations of his Republican opponents.<\/p>\n
Last Thursday, for example, while addressing the Democratic National Convention, Congressman John Lewis informed audiences that a victory for Mitt Romney promised to turn back the hands of time to the Jim Crow era of his youth.<\/p>\n
Recalling his days as a civil rights activist, Lewis proclaimed that \u201cwe have come to far together to ever turn back.\u201d<\/p>\n
We have indeed come too far. We have come so far that we have forgotten\u2014or have been made to forget\u2014that there was a time when the Republican Party was the home of American\u2019s blacks.<\/p>\n
And we have forgotten\u2014or have been made to forget\u2014such staunch black conservatives as George S. Schuyler.<\/p>\n
Born in 1895 in upstate New York, Schuyler was still a young man when he became one of the most insightful\u2014and prolific\u2014essayists that twentieth century America had ever produced.\u00a0 This, at any rate, was the judgment of many, including his one-time mentor, the iconoclastic H.L. Mencken.\u00a0 Schuyler was part of \u201cthe Harlem Renaissance,\u201d and from the 1920\u2019s through the 1960\u2019s, he wrote and edited The Pittsburgh Courier, <\/em>one of the largest black newspaper publications in the country.<\/p>\n Besides being an ardent anti-communist, Schuyler also had little good to say about those of his contemporaries who lead the civil rights movement of the 1950\u2019s and 1960\u2019s. Although he had been a tireless champion of racial equality for all of his life, he regarded the plans of the civil rights activists as inimical to liberty.<\/p>\n For instance, while it was still a bill in Congress, Schuyler argued powerfully against what would become the Civil Rights Act of 1964.<\/p>\n Schuyler readily concedes that the white majority\u2019s attitude toward the black minority is \u201cmorally wrong, nonsensical, unfair, un-Christian and cruelly unjust.\u201d Still, because \u201cit remains <\/em>the majority attitude,\u201d the federal Civil Rights law would be but \u201canother typically American attempt to use the force of law to compel the public to drastically change [.]\u201d<\/p>\n Although race relations weren\u2019t where Schuyler wanted for them to be at this time, he was quick to point out that they had improved markedly since slavery had ended.\u00a0 He was equally quick to observe that \u201ccivil rights laws, state or federal, have had little to do with\u201d such changes.<\/p>\n Speaking as a true conservative, Schuyler declared that it is \u201ccustom\u201d that \u201chas dictated the pace of compliance\u201d with those civil rights laws that otherwise remained \u201cdormant in the law books.\u201d<\/p>\n The \u201cprincipal case\u201d that Schuyler makes against this proposed legislation pertains to \u201cthe dangerous purpose it may serve.\u201d\u00a0 Such a law \u201cis still another encroachment by the central government on the federalized structure of our society.\u201d<\/p>\n Schuyler is blunt:<\/p>\n \u201cArmed with this law enacted to improve the lot of a tenth of the population, the way will be opened to enslave the rest of the populace.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n In short, a federal civil rights law of the sort that was passed in 1964 strikes \u201ca blow at the very basis of American society which is founded on state sovereignty and individual liberty and preference.\u201d<\/p>\n Schuyler was critical of both Martin Luther King, Jr. and, especially, Malcolm X.\u00a0<\/p>\n He lauded King\u2019s objectives but deplored his motives.\u00a0 When King was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 1964, Schuyler was outraged. He wrote that King deserved, not this prize, but \u201cthe Lenin Prize,\u201d for \u201cit is no mean feat for one so young to acquire sixty Communist-front citations [.]\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n Furthermore, King\u2019s \u201cincitement packed jails with Negroes and some whites, getting them beaten, bitten and firehosed, thereby bankrupting communities, raising bail and fines, to the vast enrichment of Southern Law and order.\u201d<\/p>\n Schuyler debated Malcolm X on more than one occasion.\u00a0 He had little regard for Malcolm, who he referred to as \u201cone of the high priests of Black Power [.]\u201d\u00a0 Schuyler says of Malcolm that he \u201cwas a bold, outspoken, ignorant man of no occupation,\u201d just one of the many \u201cmediocrities, criminals, plotters, and poseurs\u201d that had come to fill the ranks of this \u201cpast generation\u201d of \u201cblack \u2018leaders [.]\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n Some years after his death the movement to memorialize Malcolm was well under way.\u00a0 Schuyler said that \u201cwe might as well call out the school children to celebrate the birthday of Benedict Arnold.\u201d\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n Schuyler added: \u201cIt is not hard to imagine the ultimate fate of a society in which a pixilated criminal like Malcolm X is almost universally praised, and has hospitals, schools, and highways named in his memory!\u201d<\/p>\n There is much more that George Schuyler has said, and much more that can be said about him.\u00a0 But knowing just this little bit that this distinguished black conservative of yesteryear did say, it is hard not to suspect that, sadly, we have indeed been made to forget the existence of this conservative champion of constitutional government and genuine equality.\u00a0 \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n <\/p>\n <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" All too predictably, the left has been busy at work trying to convince Americans that opposition to President Obama is motivated by the \u201cracist\u201d machinations of his Republican opponents. Last Thursday, for example, while addressing the Democratic National Convention, Congressman John Lewis informed audiences that a victory for Mitt Romney promised to turn back the…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":399,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-573","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"yoast_head":"\n