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Full resolution (TIFF) - On this page / på denna sida - IX. Leadership and Concerted Action - 39. Negro Improvement and Protest Organizations - 1. A General American Pattern
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CHAPTER 39
NEGRO IMPROVEMENT AND PROTEST ORGANIZATIONS
* *
I. A General American Pattern
A rich vegetation of associations and organizations for worth-while
causes is an American characteristic. Americans are great ^^joiners,” and
they enjoy ^^campaigns” and “drives” for membership or contributions.
Social clubs are plentiful, and even they are taken with a seriousness difficult
for a stranger to understand. Enthusiasm is invested in committee work of
small importance in churches, lodges, clubs and civic organizations of all
kinds.
Undoubtedly, this cultural trait is partly to be explained as an outflow
of the idealism and moralism of the American people. Americans generally
are eager to improve their society.® They also have a kindly spirit of neigh-
borliness. They like to meet each other and to feel tied together for a
common cause. For these things they are prepared to sacrifice freely of
their time and their money. It is natural for the ordinary American, when
he sees something that is wrong, to feel not only that “there should be a
law against it,”’^ but also that an organization should be founded to com-
bat it.
More fundamentally, this trait is an indication* of political frustration.
Americans are a politically minded people, and the traditions of democracy
are strong. But they do not have much of an outlet for their public interests
within their political system, as it has come to develop in practice. We have
observed in a previous chapter that the degree of participation on the part
of the common citizen in the daily duties and responsibilities of government
is low in America—that is, between the recurrent elections and except for
his part in forming the nebulous but powerful “public opinion.”® This
frustration is accentuated because the political parties are not built around
broad ideals and common interests. The lack of political goals often goes
to the extreme when parties become what the Americans call political
“machines.” Only to an unusually low degree can the ordinary American
feel the political party to be a medium for his aspirations in the field of
® See Chapter i, Section 12.
’*
Sec C\vapter Sections S and 9.
* See Chapter Section y
Bff)
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