We must not forget that most Americans
answer all queries regarding the Negro a priori, and that the
least that human courtesy can do is to listen to evidence.
The advocates of the higher education of the Negro would
be the last to deny the incompleteness and glaring defects of
the present system: too many institutions have attempted to
do college work, the work in some cases has not been thor-
oughly done, and quantity rather than quality has sometimes
been sought. But all this can be said of higher education
throughout the land; it is the almost inevitable incident of
educational growth, and leaves the deeper question of the
legitimate demand for the higher training of Negroes un-
touched. And this latter question can be settled in but one
way,--by a first-hand study of the facts. If we leave out of
view all institutions which have not actually graduated stu-
dents from a course higher than that of a New England high
school, even though they be called colleges; if then we take
the thirty-four remaining institutions, we may clear up many
misapprehensions by asking searchingly, What kind of insti-
tutions are they? what do they teach? and what sort of men do
they graduate?
And first we may say that this type of college, including
Atlanta, Fisk, and Howard, Wilberforce and Claflin, Shaw,
and the rest, is peculiar, almost unique.
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