Coming Soon - In the Ring With Jack Johnson Part II: The Reign

The Los Angeles Times was concerned that as a result of Johnson’s victory, blacks might become too uppity, confident, and demanding of more rights. It sought to disabuse blacks of such notions, and to diminish the fight’s significance. It told whites that the fight meant nothing, and to take the loss in a more honorable fashion.

It was a fight between a white man and a black man, but it is well at the outset not to pin too much racial importance on the fact. The conflict was a personal one, not race with race. … Even if it were a matter of great racial import, the whites can afford the reflection that it is at best only a triumph of brawn over brain, not of brain over brawn. …
Pugilism and civilization bear no direct connection, but are in inverse ratio. …
The white man’s mental supremacy is fully established, and for the present cannot be taken from him. … His superiority does not rest on any huge bulk of muscle, but on brain development. …
The members of the white race who are not a disgrace to it will bear no resentment toward the black race because of this single victory in the prize ring. That would be to manifest lamentable weakness, not strength; stupid foolishness, not wisdom; a cowardly disposition, not manliness.
Let the white man who is worthy of the great inheritance won from him by his race and handed down to him by his ancestors “take his medicine” like a man. If he put his hope and the hope of his race in the white man who went into the ring, let him recognize his foolishness, and in his disappointed hope let him take up this new “white man’s burden” and bear it like a man, not collapse under it like a weakling.
And now a Word to the Black Man.
Do not point your nose too high. Do not swell your chest too much. Do not boast too loudly. Do not be puffed up. … Remember you have done nothing at all. You are just the same member of society today you were last week. Your place in the world is just what it was. You are on no higher plane, deserve no new consideration, and will get none. … No man will think a bit higher of you because your complexion is the same as that of the victor at Reno.

The Times further said that the fight did not mean that the black man was on top. “You are no nearer that mark than you were before the fight took place.” It said brains mattered more than muscle. But it also said, “White men who are men worthy of the name will not join in any fresh crusade against your race, already too long and too cruelly persecuted.”

 

Spoken like a man who has a perspective on race relations at the turn of the century. Anyone who reads my books knows that blacks were subject to tremendous inequality and indignities under the law and via social custom. It is a no brainer. Whites openly admitted it.

 

Sympathizing with American whites, many newspapers in London, England were excusing the white violence that followed in the wake of the fight result, feeling that it was understandable, and perhaps even necessary. A Freeman correspondent said the ***** thing about the reaction in London, England, was that the English, who usually took delight in anything that reflected adversely upon Americans, suddenly reverted to support for black suppression. Race appeared to trump nationality. “The London Afternoon Star is practically the only afternoon paper that has criticized the outbreak of anti-Negro violence.” The London Globe, which usually was anti-American, was not so in this instance. It said,

Our sympathy runs more to the man with the rope than to the blatant blacks. It is against human nature to expect white men to accept the negroes’ insolent assertion that Johnson’s victory established the superiority of the black without instant protest. The Reno contest was the most injudicious one ever permitted and the racial effects will continue for years.
The Americans are the trustees of the predominance of whites over blacks and we believe they will prove true to their trust.

The London Daily Telegraph wrote in support of white-upon-black violence,

It is useless to hold up the hand of reprobation here. These things are brutal and vile, but behind them lies the absolute necessity to keep the negro race a little in check, for if it once gets out of hand there will be worse scenes under the stars and stripes than have yet been witnessed there.

The London Times said the fight proved nothing, for a thousand American whites probably would beat a thousand negroes in any conflict or form of physical endurance. It commented on the fact that Americans disliked seeing a white man beaten by a Negro, and remarked,

The American feeling must frankly be recognized. The feeling, we think, is not confined to America. It is very easy for us in England, where we have no color problem, to talk with indignation and abhorrence of the lynchings and the outrages which occur so frequently in the Southern States of America. We have yet to see how the English would act if confronted with entirely similar conditions. There is much reason to fear that our attitude would be no more tolerant.

...

England’s Boxing said the big fight was over, “and now we are being told that the racial war is going to commence. Was there ever a more lamentable confession of panic?” The “prophets of evil” were inciting “the more truculent white men in America to ensure that bloodshed shall follow the defeat of Jeffries.”

That some bloodshed was bound to follow, everybody who knew anything about the racial trouble in the States was aware. The black man is, and will be for many generations, very like a child. … But the negroes could no more help strutting round and gloating over their champion’s triumph than they could help breathing. Their boastings may not have been in the best possible taste perhaps, but one might have expected that the whites would have been sufficiently strong-minded to recognize that the blacks were only children showing off in somewhat noisy fashion. If the white men hadn’t been so sore about the matter!
Because there is no use in disguising the fact that the whole white race is feeling a bit sore over this Reno battle.
Everybody has been telling everybody all about the yellow streak which every Negro conceals in his make-up, and which Johnson was certain to reveal in the ring. Well, every negro may conceal a yellow streak somewhere, as quite a number of white men do (although we never acknowledge the fact); but its existence has still to be discovered in Jack Johnson’s composition.
Had Jeffries emerged victorious from the struggle should we not have heard of bonfires, feastings, and general jubilation? Here and there a negro would probably have been killed, but these murders would only have been isolated cases, for the simple reason that the negroes would have accepted their hero’s defeat with more equanimity than the whites have done; while, on the other hand, the white men’s jubilation would have been more restrained and less personally offensive. The white’s superiority to all the races, which is his cardinal faith, would merely have been confirmed, and he would consequently have been far less excited.
As matters turned out, however, the black’s growing hopes of equality, as well as his peculiar vanity, the vanity of a subject race, were all appealed to, and no power on earth could have prevented him manifesting his joy over the event.

 

You are acting like I don't mention Johnson's bad behavior - I do, plenty, and more than anyone else ever has. You just chose to ignore what I wrote, or haven't yet read the entire book.

You are acting like I don't mention bad behavior of blacks in the post-Jeffries riots - I do. It is in there. But it was generally conceded, even by white-owned newspapers, that the majority of the rioting was caused by whites, unless you want to say black celebration caused whites to attack them. But that is not a proportional response. Why don't you mention all of the quotes I have in the book about all of these points?

A lynching is never proper, even when the person did something wrong, because under the American justice system, a person is presumed innocent until proven guilty by a jury of his peers, with a fair trial and advice of counsel. You can never countenance a lynching because its very nature is lawless, and was used as a method to deny blacks what few constitutional rights they had.

I would not have criticized the judge had the bail been set high from the start. BUT, once he has been indicted by the grand jury, and released on bail, there is no reason to increase it once he has shown that he will show up to trial, as he did. All these incidents you mention were AFTER that trial, or before it such that the judge would have known about them such that it could have been considered in the initial setting of his bail. But to increase the bail after he's already shown up, when the prosecution isn't prepared, is vindictive and smacks of lack of neutrality.

Why in the heck are you focusing on such small portions of my book? It is well over 800 pages. This is what you select to nitpick about? That blacks were bad too, and I didn't cite enough instances of bad black behavior to your liking!? You are missing the bigger picture of what was the real cause of the national rioting - which is that whites in general were angry and attacked celebrating blacks. That is what the majority of the reports say, and even the white newsmen agreed with that. You don't find a bunch of articles saying blacks were the cause of the riots - even back then. Most of the articles say the whites took out their revenge on the blacks who were celebrating. Some imply that blacks would not have been attacked had they not been disorderly and been more reserved, but that is more of an explanation than an excuse - blaming the victim really. Again, I do mention instances of blacks behaving badly, but it seems that you want me to just focus on that to the exclusion of the bigger picture which is that most of the rioting was the result of indignant whites not being able to handle black celebrations, and yes, at times, taunts. But what can you expect blacks to do when white newspapers for months have been telling the world that Jeffries was the savior of the white race and was going to bring out the yellow in Johnson that every black man has in his makeup and would show the world that the white man is superior in every way? What do you think the psychological effect on both races was when that did not happen?

 

Why is it that folks (many of whom have not even read my Johnson books, or have not read them in their entirety), say I don't criticize his bad behavior enough (even though I do mention as many as or more of his bad acts than anyone else), yet don't lodge the same criticism when it comes to my other books? Why are folks so hell-bent and desirous of a book that lays into Johnson hard, but not any of the other champions? No one writes lengthy posts about how I didn't talk enough about the assaults, batteries, and drunken excesses of the other champions. Why are folks so fixated on Johnson? Why are folks so fixated on me not attacking blacks enough for their role in the riots, (even though I do mention their roles in the riots), when it was a time that blacks were living in a world in which they had almost no civil rights, were subject to legalized discrimination (Jim Crow laws), social discrimination, workplace discrimination, lynchings, ****s, a biased judicial system, inferior schools, and a biased press that incited riots and lynchings and told blacks that they need to know their place, that they were inferior beings, and that Jeffries was the white man's representative and would knock out the black man's representative as a result of the natural order? And you don't think blacks were going to celebrate and challenge whites' preachings of inferiority on that night, when their lives were what they were? And you don't think whites living in and benefiting from that world weren't going to lay into blacks for challenging that dominant ideology? Come on. I think I did a good job of conveying the fact that it was a powder keg of racial tension that exploded.

It is patently obvious why folks have a hard-on for Johnson, even to this day. The sad thing is that folks still have it out for him, even to this day. Stop acting like he and blacks lived in a world with a level playing field, with a fair and unbiased press and judicial system. That is a fantasy. You cannot simply ignore that when you criticize him. How many times was Johnson actually convicted of a crime? And what crimes? What was the evidence against him? It is all there in the book. What the Johnson haters don't realize is that the ammunition is there for them if they read carefully. But there also is plenty for his defense as well.

 

I call bull****. You obviously did not read my book because your statement above indicates that you think I gave Johnson a pass on his bad behavior. I call attention to his bad behavior throughout the book. Johnson himself admitted that he was going to speed no matter what. I have several quotes throughout the book from people saying that Johnson was a known jumper of contracts, meaning that he had no problem breaching them. And I give the most detailed and accurate account of the Mann act issues ever, using the trial transcript (proving that Schreiber, McLay, and Cameron were prostitutes), and I also include his cheating on his wife Etta, and the criticisms of him from both white and black owned newspapers. Even some black newspapers said he was no civil rights leader; other than the fact that his victories in the ring showed what a black man could do if given a fair chance. But that said, back then, given that blacks had almost no fair opportunity, that was a very powerful thing. He also debunked myths of white racial superiority; which also was very powerful, symbolic, and uplifting for black folk. What more do you want? Write your own anti-Jack Johnson book hit piece and see if you can do a better job than I did. Heck I'll even publish it for you if you want.

 

William Pickens, a Talladega College professor, gave his ****ysis of the fight and the race issues it revealed. He noted that Johnson had said before the fight that if he whipped the white man, Jeff would never forget it, but if the white man whipped him, he would forget it in fifteen minutes.

These words pretty accurately express the difference in the feelings of the two races. The average Negro wished to look at the fight as only a pugilistic contest between individuals, while certain clamorous newspapers of the white race, north and south, insisted and kept insisting that it was to be “a great race battle.” …

If Jeffries had won the fight, it would have aroused no resentment in the Negro race against the white race.

However, blacks knew that if Jeff won, whites and their newspapers were ready to preach lies about black inferiority. Many editors already had composed such editorials before the fight. Therefore, blacks could not conceal their satisfaction at Johnson’s big fist figuratively knocking such homilies and editorials into the waste basket. “In this he did missionary work.”

Contrary to what they said before the fight, whites ex post facto tried to spin the fight as just being about brute force, but really it was about more.

We are not sorry that Johnson showed other points of superiority besides mere physical superiority. Most of us had already conceded the latter. But during all the months of preparation and clear through the battle he has carried the sunshine and good-nature of his race. His good-nature was impregnable against insult and unshaken by the battle itself. …

Even the insulting words of Corbett, the “bully,” could not shake him. The jeers of the audience fell on him like rain upon the testudinate back of a turtle. … The black man was merry all through the game. …

And not only in physical and temperamental qualities, but in magnanimity the black man was superior. His race has noted with pride that he has never tried to bully his enemies or to detract from the worth of his opponent. … [H]e gave them choice of corners without “tossing.” …

White editors who so nobly fought Jeffries’ battles before the fight, have found one consoling reflection since the fight, viz; that the victory of the black man “will do the Negro race harm.” How, I ask, in the name of heaven can it harm a race to show itself excellent? … These results have simply impressed the Negro with an undue sense of its importance. It was poor tact again on the part of white people.

But, sincerely now, it was a good deal better for Johnson to win and a few Negroes be killed in body for it, than for Johnson to have lost and all Negroes to have been killed in spirit by the preachments of inferiority from the combined white press. It is better for us to succeed, though some die, than for us to fall, though all live. The fact of this fight will outdo a mountain peak of theory about the Negro as a physical man – and as a man of self-control and courage. …

It will do Johnson’s race good and no one knows this better than the white men who are responsible for the overestimation of the event – before the event. After the event, however, it is called a pure contest of brutality, and Johnson is represented as simply the “best brute.”

 

The Freeman said Johnson’s victory revealed a great deal about society.

Johnson, by defeating Jeffries, has brought about the true color of the average American white man. … This fight has drawn them out from Governor on down. Their actions after Johnson had won proves beyond the slightest doubt the brain and blood of this fair country, which is advertised the world over “the land of the free and liberty.” Ministers laid down their Bibles, lawmakers set aside their duties to meddle with the much-called low, degraded pastime of prize-fighting. All these choice picked public servants, whom the public has selected from among the thousands of men to help lead the nation to peace and prosperity, turned and advocated race riots on the whole-sale order. …

Their reason for objecting to the pictures being shown is that it would ruin the morals of the young American. Because Jack Johnson, black-born American, defeated James J. Jeffries, white-born American, the child must not see this horror; yet they have seen “The Clansman,” heard the great Tillman lecture, read for years what Vardaman had to say and know the art of burning Negroes at the stake by heart. All this they claim as pastime, but a picture that would show them what a Negro can do if he is given a fair chance would ruin their little pure hearts. … If Jeffries had won…these same persons would have advocated that these pictures be shown in the public schools every Friday in order to show the little tender buds of morals the superiority of the white man over the black man. … They would claim that the pictures and books would give them courage. …

[A]ny Representative from the South can shoot a defenseless Negro while lying helpless on the ground and should be awarded a Carnegie brave medal. Yet it is a state’s prison offense to show a picture where a Negro defeated a white fair and square.