Paternalistic racism distorted the Freedmen’s Bureau into boasting about not assisting people

Evidence

The New England native believed that emancipated Blacks wished to be dependent on government because they were used to being dependent on their masters. When the bureau was dissolved in 1869, General Howard bragged that his agency had not been a “pauperizing agency,” since so “few” had been assisted. Officials of an assisting agency bragging about not assisting people? It only made sense in the context of racist ideas. — Ibram X. Kendi, Stamped from the Beginning, 622

Categorization

• XREF: Shows racist ideas (Black dependency) preceding and shaping a real policy outcome (the Bureau under-serving its charge) — useful counterpoint data as the reader tests Kendi’s policy-before-ideas inversion against cases like this.