George
Schuyler was born in Providence, Rhode Island, in 1895. He enlisted
with the United States Army in 1912 and
worked his way to the rank of lieutenant.
After the First World War Schuyler moved to
New York City where he worked as a labourer
before Philip Randolph and Chandler
Owen employed him as a journalist on The
Messenger in 1923. A member of the Socialist
Party, Schuyler contributed to a wide variety of radical journals
including Opportunity, Crisis
and Nation.
Schuyler eventually become associate editor of the
Pittsburgh Courier. He supplied the weekly paper with
a regular column and was one of its chief editorial writers. On one
assignment he took the Jim Crow tour
of the southern states. Books written by Schuyler include
The Negro Art Hokum (1926), Slaves
Today: A Story of Liberia (1930) and Black
No More (1931).
In the Second World War Schuyler criticised
President Franklin
D. Roosevelt
for arguing that the United States was fighting
for freedom and democracy. He pointed out that Adolf
Hitler and the Nazi Party had been deeply
influenced by the racial policies of the Deep South. In one article
he argued that "until now the United States has yielded 100 per
cent to the same racial theories trumpeted by Herr Hitler."
Although
he was quick to point out individual cases of racism in the armed
forces, Schuyler believed that African American should do all they
could to defeat the Axis powers. He even attacked former comrades
such as Philip Randolph when they attempted
to bring an end to racial discrimination by actions such as the proposed
March on Washington.
In
1943 Schuyler wrote an article on the war for the African American
magazine, The Crisis entitled A
Long War Will Aid the Negro. Schuyler argued that the war
was taxing America's white human resources to the limit and that the
armed forces "would have to rely increasingly on blacks to meet
its needs and, in the process, would open up to them yet further opportunities
for advancement."
During the McCarthy
Era Schuyler moved sharply to the right and contributed to American
Opinion, the journal of the John Birch Society.
In 1947 he published The Communist
Conspiracy against the Negroes. His autobiography, Black
and Conservative, was published in 1966. George Schuyler
died in 1977.
(1)
George Schuyler, wrote about
his time working for Philip
Randolph and The
Messenger
in his autobiography, Black and Conservative.
Philip Randolph was one of the finest, most engaging
men I had ever met. Undemanding and easy to get along with, leisurely
and undisturbed, remaining affable under all circumstance, whether
the rent was due and he did not have it, or whether an expected donation
failed to materialize, or whether the long-suffering printer in Brooklyn
was demanding money. He had a keen sense of humor and laughed easily,
even in adversity.
(2)
George
Schuyler, Pittsburgh
Courier (10th January, 1942)
With sadness and weary resignation I note that many supposedly intelligent
Negroes are swallowing hook, line and sinker the same bush-wah at
which their fathers snapped during World War One, to wit; that once
victory is achieved, the colored brethren as a reward for their patriotic
efforts and sacrifices will be promptly invested with all rights and
privileges of citizenship now denied them wherever Homo Nordicus
rules.
Of course it may be that the black
masses's scepticism is unwarranted and that the phonograph Negroes
are correct. Maybe peace will see an end to the discrimination and
insults Negroes suffer under the Stars and Stripes, Union Jack, Tr-color,
the banner of Savoy, etc. I hope so. But when I see a great nation
like the United States engaged in a struggle for life and still determined
to continue and even expand the racial distinction forced upon the
whole nation by the fanatically Negrophobic South, I am doubtful,
to put it mildly. And unless some changes are made pretty soon in
the direction of real improvement, the disinterest of the black masses
in the outcome of the current fight for democracy is going to become
tremendous.
(3) During
the Second World War George Schuyler attacked
the political activities of Philip
Randolph
in the Pittsburgh Courier (1st August, 1942)
Mr.
Randolph knows how to appeal to the emotions of the people and to
get a great following together, but there his leadership ends because
he has nowhere to lead them and would not know if he had. He has the
messianic complex, considerable oratorical ability and some understanding
of the plight of the masses, but the leadership capacity and executive
ability required for the business at hand is simply not there. The
original March on Washington move is now admitted to have been a failure
else the current agitation would not be necessary.
(4)
Thomas Sancton,
New
Republic (26th April, 1943)
George S. Schuyler is about the best. He is a clear and vivid writer.
Sometimes he writes with a mordant sarcasm, but he does not let it
unbalance the order of his ideas.
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