James McCune Smith's The Destiny of the People of Color

James McCune Smith (1813-1865) was an African-American physician, abolitionist, educator, and writer. He was the first African-American to earn a medical degree and become a physician. He was born in New York City, where he attended the African Free School, a public school for the children of slaves and free people of color, which had been founded by the New York Manumission Society, an organization dedicated to the abolition of slavery. Other students at the school who went on to have distinguished careers included Henry Highland Garnet (1815-1882, African-American abolitionist, minister, and educator), Ira Aldridge (1807-1868, African-American actor), Alexander Crummell (1819-1898, African-American minister, missionary, and educator), and Samuel Ringgold Ward (1817-1866, African-American minister, abolitionist, and newspaper editor).

      After graduating from the African Free School, McCune Smith applied to Columbia College in New York City and Geneva Medical College, in Geneva, New York, but was unable to gain admission, due to racial discrimination.¹ However, with financial assistance from the New York City community, he was able to travel to Scotland to attend the University of Glasgow, where he was awarded a bachelor’s degree in 1835, a master’s degree in 1836, and a medical degree in 1837.² He returned to New York City in 1837 to start the first general medical and surgical practice by a university-trained African-American physician, and he opened the first pharmacy operated by an African-American.³ He was active in the abolitionist movement, and he worked with Frederick Douglass to establish the National Council of Colored People in 1853. He wrote the introduction to Douglass’ second volume of autobiography, My Bondage and My Freedom (1855). He also published articles in medical journals, and was a founding member of the New York Statistics Society, as well as a member of the American Geographic Society.² He was appointed a professor of anthropology at Wilberforce College, Ohio in 1863, but died two years later on Long Island, New York in 1865.

      The Destiny of the People of Color is a lecture that McCune Smith delivered to The Philomathean Society and The Hamilton Lyceum in 1841. It was published in 1843. (The Philomathean Society is a collegiate literary society that was started at the University of Pennsylvania in 1813. The Hamilton Lyceum was a literary society that was based in New York City.⁴)

      McCune Smith explains that in order for people of color to investigate their destiny, they must have some understanding of their present position in society. The basic truths of this position in society, and thus the basic premises for investigating the destiny of people of color, are: “First. We are a minority held in servitude by a majority. Secondly. That majority simulate a Republican form of Government. Thirdly. We, the minority held in servitude, are distinguished by a different complexion from the majority who hold us in thrall.”⁵

      The social position of people of color in America is unusual, says McCune Smith, insofar as they are held in servitude and yet live in a country that aspires to, or pretends to have, democratic principles of government. However, the proper destiny for people of color is not for them simply to leave the country and flee from oppression, but rather to remain and struggle against injustice by working to make sure that the American system of government lives up to its democratic principles.

      In order to overcome slavery and oppression, people of color must refute the principle that “might makes right,” by showing that “right makes right.”⁶ The power of the social majority to hold a minority in servitude does not make that majority morally right. The basis of a democratic system of government is that all citizens are recognized as having equal rights.

      In order to fulfill their destiny, people of color must think not only of the present, but also of the future. They must consider the welfare of future generations whose rights will be affected by their actions. They must show the moral wrongness of returning evil for evil, by showing the rightness of returning good for evil. Acts of injustice cannot rightfully be answered by further acts of injustice; they must be answered by acts of justice.

      McCune Smith quotes the words of the Roman playwright Terence (c. 190 – 159 BCE), “Homo sum humani nil a me alienum puto” (“I am human, and nothing human is alien to me”), which express a sentiment that McCune Smith finds particularly noteworthy, given that Terence was a slave who gained his freedom. McCune Smith regards Terence’s words as an affirmation of the common brotherhood and sisterhood of all humankind. The destinies of all human beings are inextricably intertwined. Thus the destiny of people of color, given their being held in servitude by a social majority that pretends to be democratic in its system of government but deprives them of their rights of citizenship, is to save that system of government from perishing as a result of its own contradictions, and to convert it into a system that is truly democratic.

      McCune Smith makes clear that people of color cannot overcome their oppression merely by overthrowing or becoming like their oppressors. Only by affirming the common brotherhood and sisterhood of all humankind can liberty and justice truly be achieved.

      The destiny of people of color is a subject also explored by other nineteenth-century abolitionists, including Frederick Douglass (1818-1895), Martin Robison Delany (1812-1885), and Henry Highland Garnet (1815-1882).

      Douglass (1849) says that the destiny of people of color and the destiny of white people are tied to each other, and that in order for society as a whole to flourish, both people of color and white people must flourish. White people and people of color can flourish only if they do so together.⁷

      Delany (1854) argues that people of color must be in control of their own political destiny if they are to secure the right to full citizenship. People of color will never secure the right to full citizenship unless everyone has an equal opportunity to participate in government. However, Delany considers it unlikely that there will ever be equality of opportunity in American society, and he therefore advises people of color to consider emigration and the pursuit of nationhood abroad.

      Garnet (1848) explains that the destiny of white people and the destiny of people of color are inseparable, insofar as distinctions between white people and people of color will eventually be erased by the advent of a society in which “mixed race” will be the norm. An increasing number of people will be “mixed race,” making it more difficult to separate people into distinct racial groups. Prejudice against people of color, or “colorphobia,” may therefore one day become an anachronism.

     

FOOTNOTES

¹John Stauffer, “Introduction,” in The Works of James McCune Smith: Black Intellectual and Abolitionist, edited by John Stauffer (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2007), p. xxi.

²Ibid, p. xxi.

³Thomas M. Morgan, “The Education and Medical Practice of Dr. James McCune Smith (1813-1865), First Black American to Hold a Medical Degree,” in Journal of the National Medical Association, Vol. 95, No. 7, July 2003, pp. 603-614.

⁴William Henry Ferris, The African Abroad: Or, His Evolution in Western Civilization, Volume 2 (New Haven: Tuttle, Morehouse & Taylor Press, 1913) p. 866.

⁵James McCune Smith “The Destiny of the People of Color (1843)” in The Works of James McCune Smith: Black Intellectual and Abolitionist, edited by John Stauffer (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2007), p. 50.

⁶Ibid., p. 52.

⁷Frederick Douglass, “The Destiny of Colored Americans,” in The North Star, November 16, 1849.

ADDITIONAL REFERENCES

Delany, Martin Robison. “Political Destiny of the Colored Race on the American Continent” (1854), in Martin R. Delany: A Documentary Reader, edited by Robert S. Levine (Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 2003), pp. 245-279.

Garnet, Henry Highland. “The Past and the Present Condition, and the Destiny, of the Colored Race” (Troy, NY: J.C. Kneeland, 1848).

Being Invisible

“I am an invisible man.” –Ralph Ellison, Invisible Man (1952)

What kind of being belongs to the invisible? Perhaps the being of the invisible is a non-being of the visible, and the being of the visible is a non-being of the invisible. Perhaps we can only say that the invisible “is,” in some respect, if we also say that the visible “is not,” in that same respect. The being of the visible and the being of the invisible may be contradictory to each other.

      Perhaps the being of the invisible is also a nothingness of the visible, an emptiness or void in the realm of the visible. The invisible is that which we know is there, but which we cannot see. 

      Invisibility is the negation of visibility. It is a blank space or hidden territory into which being vanishes or disappears.

      The difference between the visible and the invisible may be analogous to the difference between the seen and the unseen, the discernible and the indiscernible, the apparent and the inapparent, the disclosed and the undisclosed.

      How many degrees of visibility are there? The spectrum may extend from the completely invisible, the virtually invisible, the barely visible, and the slightly visible, to the partially visible, the mostly visible, the completely visible, the obviously visible, and the unavoidably visible.

      If visibility may signify a kind of presence, then invisibility may signify a kind of absence. However, visibility as presence may depend on, and may perpetuate, invisibility as absence.

      The being of the spoken may be invisible insofar as spoken words cannot literally be “seen” by listeners, but it may be visible insofar as spoken words can have visible effects on listeners and speakers. Conversely, the being of the written may be visible insofar as written words are actually seen on a page, screen, wall, or other background, but it may be invisible insofar as written words are unseen unless they are actually being read.

      Of course, when we see the world around us we (usually) assume that we are seeing it as it actually is, and that what we are seeing is real and not imaginary. We (usually) assume that for something to be visible is for it also to be real. On the other hand, we may have no grounds for assuming that for something to be real is for it also to be visible. The visibility of (all of) the real may not follow from the reality of (all or some of) the visible.  The real may often be invisible to us (at least insofar as we are able to see it with the naked eye).

     On the other hand, the hypervisible or all too visible may be that from which we must avert our gaze in order to avoid becoming consciously aware of it. Thus, the fact that something is hypervisible does not always mean that we consciously see and recognize it. We may have various motives for trying to ignore things that are hypervisible. We may also in some cases be less aware of things that are hypervisible than we are of things that are much less visible.

      Visibility and invisibility may be examined in terms of their metaphysics, ethics, aesthetics, and politics. The metaphysics of visibility and invisibility may be concerned with the ultimate nature, being, and reality of the visible and invisible. The ethics of visibility and invisibility may be concerned with the obligations that we incur when we make or do not make things visible, and with the responsibilities that we assume when we make or do not make visible those things that should or should not be made visible. The aesthetics of visibility may be concerned with the manner in which (or the degree to which) the visible conforms to such ideals as beauty, elegance, harmony, symmetry, and unity. The politics of visibility and invisibility may be concerned with the manner in which (or the degree to which) the visible and the invisible are produced, recognized, and authorized by law, public policy, and government.

      Being in society (social being) may enable, encourage, or require each of us to have some degree of social visibility. Being socially visible may mean being included among those who are noticed and recognized. Being socially invisible, on the other hand, may mean being excluded from notice or recognition by society.

      Being seen may or may not lead to the awareness of being seen. It may or may not also lead to the awareness of being a visual object. Being seen as a person and being seen as a visual object may to some extent be compatible, insofar as being a person makes possible the experience of being seen as a visual object. On the other hand, being seen as a person and being seen as a visual object may be incompatible, insofar as a person is not merely an object, but a whole person, and for them to be seen merely as an object is for them to have the wholeness of their personhood ignored and unrecognized by whoever sees them in that way.

      To be visible is also to be situated in a field or terrain of visibility. The field or terrain may include other objects that (or persons who) have varying degrees of visibility. The visibility of any particular object (or person) may depend on prevailing environmental conditions as well as on the visual capabilities of the viewer.

      To be visible is also at times to cast a shadow over some other person or object in the viewer’s visual field. The shadow cast by some person or object may obscure the presence of some other person or object, and the relations between those persons or objects may thereby also be obscured. Being invisible may therefore in some cases mean remaining hidden within the shadows. It may also mean being perceived as having only a shadowy, vague, and indeterminate kind of existence.

      We may be compelled by whatever (social, cultural, or historical) situation we find ourselves in to ask ourselves, “How visible are we, and to whom?” To whom must we be visible? To whom do we want to make our presence known? By whom would we rather not be noticed or recognized? From what (or from whose) standpoint do we want or not want to be visible, seen, and recognized? What kind of visibility to others and what kind of recognition by others do we aspire to achieve?

      Minority groups that have been described as invisible in one way or another to the majority of American society include blacks, Hispanics, Asian Americans, Native Americans, minority women, gays, lesbians, bisexuals, transgender people, elderly people, people with disabilities, children of undocumented immigrants, and other minority groups.

      Being a member of an invisible social minority may mean being faceless and nameless to the social majority, by virtue of being unseen and unrecognized. It may also mean being voiceless, by virtue of having no say in matters that pertain to one’s own destiny. It may also mean having to overcome the social disadvantages suffered by minority group members as a result of the prejudices of majority group members. It may also mean being falsely assumed to enjoy the same social advantages as majority group members. It may also mean being ignored by majority group members, and being discriminated against by them.

      People may be made to feel invisible by not being noticed, by being disregarded, by being forgotten, by not having their presence acknowledged by others, by being talked about as if they were not there, by not being able to get the attention of others, by being interrupted when they are speaking, by not being listened to, by being refused acceptance or recognition by others, by being denied rights that are enjoyed by others, and by not being granted privileges that have under similar conditions been granted to others.

     

Black being/Being black

If a fundamental question of philosophy is “What is being as being?” then perhaps an equally fundamental question (at least for black people) is “What is being black as being black?”

      From a so-called “black” perspective, to be is to be black. Being is inseparable from being black. Insofar as one sees oneself as black, one cannot see oneself simply as “being” in some way without also “being black.” But to be black is “to be,” as well as “to be black.” Being black may therefore be ontologically as well as existentially investigated. It may be examined purely from the standpoint of being, as well as from the standpoint of a particular way of being.

      The investigation of black being/being black may also be metaphysical or empirical, phenomenological or psychological.

      Black being is a mode of being of black people, but not their only mode of being.

      There may be more than one kind of black being, just as there may be more than one way of being black.

      Black being as manifestation or representation is being black. There may be a plurality of representations, and each may have its own degree of subjective or objective validity, as well as personal or social validity. Some representations may be more valid than others, as determined by their fulfillment of such criteria as truthfulness, consistency, coherence, and intelligibility.

      In the being of black being/being black, there is external appearance as well as internal reality. The external appearance (of skin color and other racially ascribed characteristics) may be separable from the internal reality (the cognitive faculties, moral character traits, and other personality traits that have nothing to do with an individual’s supposed racial identity). On the other hand, the external reality (of being seen by others as black) may become an internal reality (of seeing oneself as black). The internal reality may be not only personal and psychological, but also moral and existential.

      There is no definable essence of black being/being black. Black being/being black is too diverse to be essentialized. There are no essential qualities or criteria that a person must have or fulfill in order to be described as black. Exceptions may be found to any qualities or criteria that might be proposed as essential to the being of black being/being black.

      To be black is to be a human being among other human beings (black, white, brown, and other colors) within a broader society. It is also to share with those human beings a common humanity that transcends all racial and ethnic categories. It is also in some way to share with them a common language, and a common social, cultural, or world history.

       Interestingly, Frantz Fanon (1952) rejects ontology as a means of understanding the being of black people, on the grounds that in a colonial or post-colonial society the being of black people is judged by white society as not a being through self, but a being through others (a being that only comes into play through white society). The being of black people is viewed by white society as a subordinate and dependent kind of being. Fanon explains that in order for black people to understand their social situation, they must have a “third person consciousness” and be able to see themselves as they are seen by white society. A “first-person consciousness” is insufficient. Black people must be able to see themselves in such a way that they are able to overcome their being seen as mere objects or black bodies by a white society that attempts to deprive them of their personhood.¹

      What then is the meaning of being black? This is a key philosophical question that may be approached in a variety of ways. One way of approaching it may be to make the following observations:

      Being black means having a social identity determined not only by race or ethnicity, but also by such factors as age, gender, family background, social class background, educational background, employment background, religion, and nationality.

      Being black means feeling a sense of kinship, of common ancestry, and of shared history with other black people.

      Being black means being able to recognize and appreciate the cultural contributions of black people to the modern world.

      Being black means being able to take pride in one's own blackness, and in one's own being black.

      Being black means recognizing the capacity of black people to resist servitude and to triumph over oppression.

      Being black means being told by white people, at some point in one’s life, that one is inferior to them or is less than they are, simply because one is black.

      Being black means being more likely to be viewed by white people as unreliable, untrustworthy, suspect, threatening, violent, or criminal.

      Being black means being more likely to be a victim of discrimination with regard to housing, employment, education, health care, and public accommodations.

      Being black means “driving while black,” “shopping while black,” and “walking while black,” that is to say, being viewed with mistrust and suspicion while performing routine daily activities, and being subjected to racial harassment or intimidation.   

      Being black means being more likely to be unemployed, undereducated, living in poverty, or incarcerated.

      It means being more likely to be denied service by a taxi driver, sales clerk, retail store, restaurant, entertainment venue, public lodging establishment, recreational facility, or financial institution.

      It means being more likely to be a victim of racial slurs or hate speech.

      It means being more likely to be stopped by police for a minor traffic violation.       

      It means being more likely to be suspected of stealing, shoplifting, burglary, assault, or other crimes.

      It means being more likely to be imprisoned and to be sentenced to a longer sentence than a white defendant accused of the same crime.

      It means, in some cases, being denied basic human rights (such as the right to equal protection under the law, the right to protection against discrimination, the right to personal security, and the right to participate in government).                                      

      Steve Biko (1971) explains, “Being black is not a matter of pigmentation—being black is a reflection of a mental attitude.”¹ It is thus a matter of self-definition or self-conception. It involves seeing oneself as black. It is a state of mind as much as a social construct or sociocultural phenomenon.

      According to Biko, being black is also a matter of realizing the necessity of struggle against injustice and oppression. It is a matter of realizing the need for black people to free themselves from the shackles that white racism attempts to place on them.³

FOOTNOTES

¹Frantz Fanon, Black Skin, White Masks [Peau Noire, Masques Blancs, 1952], translated by Charles Lam Markmann (New York: Grove Press, 1967), pp. 109-115.

²Steve Biko, I Write What I Like: Selected Writings, edited by Aelred Stubbs (Chicago: The University of Chicago Press, 2002) p. 48.

³Ibid., p. 49.

Language and Being

There are things that have their being in (or through) language, and that have no other being than their being in (or through) language. There are also things that have a being in language (or a being in a language), leaving open the question of whether they have a being not in language (or a being not in a language).

      Questions therefore to be considered include: Do all things have their being in language? Does language in and of itself constitute the being of things? Can the being of things always be reduced to being in language? Is being in language the only possible mode of being? Is there a mode of being interior to language, as well as a mode of being exterior to language? Is there a mode of being that transcends language?

      Language may be instrumental to the being of things. Indeed, the meaning of the term “being” may only be definable in terms of, or by means of, language.

      Can it rightly be said that to be is to be in language? If so, then the answer to Hamlet’s question, “to be, or not to be?” may depend on whether language is or is not.

      Language may be a ground of being of things. Some things simply are because they are in language, i.e. because we can think linguistically, write, or speak about them.
      Beings may communicate through many kinds of natural and artificial languages, including word languages, sign languages, sound languages, symbolic languages, and numerical languages.
      To translate something from one language into another may be to transform its being in language.

      Walter Benjamin (1916) says that the linguistic being of things is their being in language, and that language is a medium by which the mental being of things can be communicated. (His definition of language does not explicitly include language as a medium by which the physical or spiritual being of things can be communicated.) He argues that mental being is identical with linguistic being only insofar as it communicates, or is capable of communicating, itself.¹ Mental being is linguistic only insofar as it is in language or is capable of linguistically expressing itself.    

      If being is always in language, then our understanding of being may depend on our understanding of language (and its syntactic, semantic, pragmatic, and sociocultural dimensions). Our understanding of being may also depend on our familiarity with, and our knowledge of, the rules of language. Our understanding of things may be our understanding of them in or through language. Indeed, language may be necessary in order for us to think, speak, or communicate about them.

      Martin Heidegger (1927) describes discourse as constitutive of the existence of Dasein (being-there), and as the articulation of the intelligibility of being-in-the–world. He says, “The attuned intelligibility of being-in-the-world is expressed as discourse,” and “The way in which discourse gets expressed is language.”²

      Heidegger also raises the interesting question, “What kind of being does language have if there are “dead” languages?”³

      Is language prior to being or is being prior to language? Is the being of things a condition of the possibility of language, or is the being of language a condition of the possibility of the being of things?

      If language is the being of things, then a philosophy of being may require a philosophy of language.

      To formulate a theory of being may be to formulate a theory of language, and to formulate a theory of language may be to formulate a theory of being.

      If language is the being of things, then the embodiment of language may also be the embodiment of the being of things. If language is grounded in bodily experience, then so may be the being of things.

      If the being of things is always a “being thus” or a "being so" or a "being here" or a "being there" or a “being now” or a “being then," then so may be the being of language.

      Hans-Georg Gadamer (1960) describes language as a medium of hermeneutical experience, and as the medium of our understanding of the world. Everything we experience is conditioned by the linguistic nature of interpretation. Language is therefore a horizon of hermeneutic ontology. The horizons of language are also the horizons of our interpretation of the world. The world has its being for us in language, and language has its being for us in its representation of the world.⁴

      Jacques Derrida (1974) explains that the play of difference between written being and being written is also the play of difference between absence and presence, insofar as the metaphysics of presence conceptualizes written being as a kind of absence (of the writer for the reader), and being written as a kind of presence. To privilege presence over absence, and thus to ignore their interdependence, may be to try to evade a basic question of philosophy, the question of being (“what is, or is not?”).⁵

FOOTNOTES

¹Walter Benjamin, “On Language as Such and on the Language of Man,” in Selected Writings, Volume 1, 1913-1926, edited by Marcus Bullock and Michael W. Jennings (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1996) p. 63.

²Martin Heidegger, Being and Time, translated by Joan Stambaugh (Albany: State University of New York Press, 1996), p. 151.

³Ibid., p 155.

⁴Hans-Georg Gadamer, Truth and Method (New York: The Seabury Press, 1975), p. 401.

⁵Jacques Derrida, Of Grammatology, translated by Gayatri Charkravorty Spivak (Baltimore: The Johns Hopkins University Press, 1974), pp. 18-19.

Presuppositions

When we ask such questions as "What is time?" or “What is being?” or “What is the relation between mind and matter?” what kinds of presuppositions are we making?

      Are we already presupposing the answers we hope to provide to such questions? Are we presupposing that there are indeed answers to such questions? Are we presupposing that such questions can be explored metaphysically, analytically, empirically, or scientifically?

      When we ask such questions as “Is lying always wrong?” or "Is there life after death?" or “Is there such a thing as a ‘good war’?” are we presupposing, first of all, that it is indeed possible to ask such questions? That is to say, are we presupposing that such questions make sense or have meaning? Are we presupposing our own ability to articulate and meaningfully investigate such questions? Are we presupposing that such questions have not already been answered?

      When we ask such questions as "What is fairness?" or “What is justice?” or "How can fairness and justice best be achieved in society?" are we also presupposing the existence of counter-questions to such questions? Are we presupposing the existence of counter-answers to whatever answers we might try to provide?

       And when we ask such questions as “What is the relation between language and thought?” or "Is there a language of thought?" or ”Are the limits of language the same as the limits of thought?” what might be our motives for asking such questions? Do we suppose that we may actually be able to answer such questions? Do we actually want answers or are we more concerned with the questioning itself? Are the questions themselves more important to us than being able to find the answers?

     Are we also presupposing that the questions we are asking are the right ones or are better than other questions we might ask?

      When we ask such questions as “Is predestination compatible with free will?” or “Why does God allow evil to exist?” or “Is faith compatible with reason?” are we already presupposing that such questions are relevant to our own situation at this particular time or moment in history? Are we presupposing that such questions have not already been asked by other individuals or have not already been examined by individuals better qualified than ourselves to fully evaluate them?

      And what kinds of presuppositions are we making by describing such questions as "philosophical questions"? What is it precisely that makes such questions "philosophical"? Are we perhaps unfairly presupposing what philosophy is and what kinds of questions it should be concerned with?

      Are we also presupposing that there is someone other than ourselves to whom our questions may be addressed? Are we presupposing that there is someone other than ourselves to whom, or for whom, our questions may have some relevance or meaning? Someone willing to listen to the answers we are trying to provide? Someone who has not already fully explored and investigated the questions we are asking? Someone who may in fact be able to provide their own answers to those questions?