White philanthropists recognized only Black leaders could move Black communities

Evidence

In 1898 George Sale, a white man and the president of Atlanta Baptist College, bluntly told a white teachers’ association in Georgia: “A white man, northern or southern, may go to their gatherings; they will treat him with all respect and will listen to all he has to say, but they will follow the lead of their own men, and if we will do anything for or with the Negro we must do it through Negro men and women.” — Evelyn Brooks Higginbotham, Righteous Discontent, 144

Categorization

• SEED: Angle: the Talented Tenth strategy rested on a white admission that segregation made Black-led uplift the only viable route — white influence could only be indirect.
• XREF: connects to: Black social reform rested on poor people’s pooled efforts, not wealthy philanthropy — Evelyn Brooks Higginbotham, Righteous Discontent: The Women’s…, 802; White elites supported only image-serving racial moderation to protect their business interests — Kevin M. Kruse, White Flight: Atlanta and the Making of…, 89; Reading white missionary efforts only as racist paternalism erases Black leaders’ agency — Evelyn Brooks Higginbotham, Righteous Discontent: The Women’s…, 436 (+1 more)

Broader Connections

• Reading white missionary efforts only as racist paternalism erases Black leaders’ agency #expands (0.78) — Evelyn Brooks Higginbotham, Righteous Discontent, 436
• Marginalized black communities can and should lead their own liberation #expands (0.76)
• White elites supported only image-serving racial moderation to protect their business interests #complicates (0.74) — Kevin M. Kruse, White Flight, 89