A Brief Sketch of the African American Population from 1800 to 2000

In the United States, African American history has been observed annually since 1926, initially as “Negro History Week” and later as “African American History Month”. The African American historian Carter G. Woodson (1875-1950), who founded the Association for the Study of African-American Life and History in 1915 and the Journal of African American History in 1916, spearheaded the establishment of “Negro History Week.” The second week of February was selected; the month of February was chosen out of recognition of Frederick Douglass and Abraham Lincoln’s birthdays. Woodson was interested in having Negro History Week bring national attention to the contributions of African Americans throughout American history. In 1976, Black History Week evolved into Black History Month (now often referred to as African American History Month).

In our attention here, we want to take what is an obviously limited view of statistical profiles of the African American population over the last 200 years by focusing on the years of 1800, 1900, and 2000. The portraits here are not comprehensive, but we may get some numerical feel of a few aspects of situations of African Americans.

1800

According to the 1800 U.S. census, there were 1,002,037 African Americans in the U.S., representing 18.9% of the total U.S. population of 5,309,000. The Northern states (primarily New York and New Jersey) still had 36,505 people in slavery. Most Northern states by this time had abolished slavery or provided for gradual emancipation.

• Phillis Wheatley, captured as a child in Africa, became literate quickly while a slave in Boston, and became a heralded poet
• Olaudah Equiano (Gustavus Vassa), who produced an influential narrative of his life, and who migrated to England and became an active abolitionist there
• Benjamin Banneker who published almanacs---was an astronomer, mathematician, engineer, and scientist---and served on the commission to define the boundary line and lay out the streets of the District of Columbia
• the physician James Derham
• Richard Allen, a founder of the African Methodist Episcopal Church (AME)
• Prince Hall who led the establishment of the first chapter of African American masons in the U.S.

African Americans, struggling under slavery in general, also sought ways, as both slave and nominally free, to forge paths of advancement in the general society.

1900

In 1900 the census showed 8,833,994 African Americans in the U.S., representing 11.6% of the total U.S. population of 76,094,000. Nearly 90% of the African Americans lived in the South and represented one-third of the total Southern population. This era saw tremendous increase of migration to urban areas and to the North. There were nine cities with over 30,000 African Americans. African Americans outnumbered whites in Charleston, SC; Savannah, GA; Jacksonville, FL; Montgomery, AL; Shreveport, LA; Baton Rouge, LA; and Vicksburg, MS.

In 1900 the life expectancy of African Americans averaged approximately 34 years, while the white life expectancy was approximately 48 years. Thirty-five years removed from slavery, 55.5% of African Americans were literate. By the end of 1900, more than 2,000 African Americans had college degrees. Between 1900 and 1910, four PhD's were
awarded, two from African American colleges and two from integrated colleges.

Along with advances in education, there were also crucial disappointments facing the people. Occasions of violence, such as lynching and white riots, had devastating results. Disenfranchisement continued, preventing people from exercising voting rights. Segregation practices increased (notably in the 1896 Supreme Court decision in Plessy v. Ferguson which affirmed the “separate but equal” doctrine); economic exploitation continued; democratic participation was still alien in too many places. African American leadership responded in strategies to combat problems menacing the people. In the shadow of Frederick Douglass’ demise appeared figures such as Booker T. Washington (1856-1915), W.E.B. DuBois (1868-1963), and other contributors. With the establishment of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) and other organizations supported by African Americans and whites, problems began to be addressed in varying degrees. Some seeds of liberty were sown but it would take many years for them to come to fuller fruition in the Civil Rights Movement in the mid-century, and in continued efforts.

2000

The 2000 U.S. census noted 36,400,000 African Americans, representing 12.9% of the total U.S. population of 281,422,000. The ten states with the largest numbers of African Americans were New York, California, Texas, Florida, Georgia, Illinois, North Carolina, Maryland, Michigan, and Louisiana. Thirty-four cities had African American populations of more than 100,000. Sixteen cities, with over 180,000 total population, had African American mayors.

In 1965, there were 218,000 full-time African American college students; in 2002, that category had risen to 1,468,000 (with an additional 800,000 part-time students).

According to a Joint Center for Political and Economic Studies report in December 2000, the number of African Americans elected to federal, state, and local offices nationwide amounted to 8,936. That figure represented 1.7% among all elected officials, still quite a low percentage. Among the year 2005 elected officials are included 42 members of the U.S. House of Representatives and one member of the U.S. Senate. There is concern about this nationwide low representation in the political scheme of things.

These numbers merely reflect shadows of other advances made, realities experienced, and some haunting problems which still face the society. Many challenges in areas such as health care, employment opportunities, other economic concerns, the justice system, education, and additional matters remain.

As John Hope Franklin and Alfred A. Moss note in From Slavery to Freedom, the experience that African Americans have undergone has been a rich one. They have become an integral part of Western culture and civilization, sometimes spiced with their valuable contributive seasonings, and their fate is inextricably connected with this society. The rejections they have suffered have wounded them considerably, but they have endured and gained a perspective and an objectivity that others have had greater difficulty in achieving. They can counsel their country, if it cares to listen, concerning its own position in the current and coming world. If America’s role is to lead the world toward peace and understanding, African Americans have a special function to perform in carrying forward the struggle for freedom at home, for the sake of America’s role, and abroad, for the sake of the survival of the world.

Sources include John Hope Franklin and Alfred A. Moss, Jr., From Slavery to Freedom: A History of African Americans, Eighth Edition, 2002; Peter M. Bergman and Mort N. Bergman, The Chronological History of the Negro in America, 1969; “Black History Month: the History of Black History,” www.infoplease.com/spot/bhmintro1.html; “Carter G. Woodson: Origins of Black History Month,” www.swagga.com/woodson.htm; U.S. Population, 1790-2000, www.u-s-history.com; U.S. Census Reports.