Book Review on Southern Horrors and Other Writings Paper Example

The book Southern Horrors and Other Writings is an excellent reflection of the dreadful horrors of the lynching activities that were exposed to the African American in the period around the late 1800's. Ida B. Wells used various viewpoints of the black race to help show the rest of the world what was going on. The whites lynched hundreds of black men for reasons that were deemed necessary at that times but Wells, being a seasoned and competent writer and journalist, looked into these reasons for lynching the black race and came up with actual reasons in a quite daring and courageous attempt to stand up against the whites (Wells, p 55). In her writing, Ida argues that the underlying reasons for the lynching of the blacks by the whites was, for example, to reduce or eliminate business competition, the rape of white women to conceal the fact that white men were having sex with black women. Finally, they did this to concentrate and keep power in the hands of the white rule. During this time, it should be understood that there was an extreme scarcity of money and the majority were lived in poverty. Few people during the lynching period were wealthy, so it should be understood that money was significant. This is the reason as to why those who owned large stores had no problem with competition especially if it came from African American which was believed to be poor and hence could not pose a measurable competition. Ida also argues that other factors in which African Americans were accused lack entirely ground and merit and therefore she believed they were or witch hunting schemes to diminish the up surging black race and to maintain the white superiority. Wells is an African American civil rights advocate, as well as women's advocate during her time; she became active in the Woman Suffrage Movement (Wells, p 61). As a result of her courage and advocacy activities, she wrote the book Southern Horrors and Other Writings purposely to bring to light atrocities that were meted on the black race in the form of lynching by the white majority. This is because it is understood from the book that Wells herself had been a victim of racial segregation in a train and that is the reason as to why she organized an anti-racial campaign in 1884 in a local railway.

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Born in July 1862, Ida B Wells became a great African American investigative journalist, a leader, as well as educator in the various civil rights movement. Being an investigative journalist offered her with courage and strength to dig into issues and condone things that she felt were done wrongly especially for the black race. She developed intentions to author this book, Southern Horrors and Other Writings, having observed how the black race was treated and racially segregated in almost all aspects of life. She became one of the founders of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People which was purposely formed to fight for the rights and freedoms of the black race (Wells, p 58). This enabled Wells to be one of the most known black woman in America at a time when many people were engaged in fighting for the rights and freedoms of blacks when there was a lot of hatred, violence, and hatred.

As a result of courage and determination to liberate the black race, Wells, in the 1890's, sort to document lynching in America. Intentioned to pass the message about lynching to the whole world and its consequences in the lives of black people, she claimed this in the book. She argued that this practice was carried in the South as a means to punish and fully control the blacks who tried to compete with the whites and not as actually based on the criminal acts that blacks did as claimed by the whites. By bringing this to light, Wells achieved her intention of informing the world that blacks were exposed into lynching practices to avoid competition with the whites and not based on the grounds of criminal activities that they did. As a result of her report, it is understood that the mob of white men destroyed her newspaper presses. This confirms her earlier reports.

It is important to note that having observed several incidences of lynching, including the death of her friend, Wells decided to publish some works in a bid to investigate lynching. She did this in the Memphis Paper, which was known as, The Free Speech. Following the destruction of her paper by the mob whites, Wells decided to give a detailed account of lynching in the black newspaper that was in New York. But by 1892, she decided to publish her research work in a more detailed manner and titled the pamphlet as The Southern Horrors: Lynch Law in All its Phases (Wells, p 59).

To further reveal her intentions for researching the lynching practices on the African Americans, Wells concluded that the people of the South lamented over rape as a way to hide and completely conceal the real reasons for lynching. Wells gave out her reasoning that it was because of the up surging economic progress of the blacks that threatened to pose some competition to the whites. Another fact was that the whites always wanted blacks to be seen and maintain their longstanding status of being rated as second class citizens in the society. It cannot be ignored that black economic progress was a major issue of concern in the South. For this reason, to shy away from the competition, the white workers had come up with such damaging reputations against the blacks (Wells, p 56). This is why they worked to suppress the progress that could be made by the black. It was during this period that most of the Southern states came up with new laws and recommendations in the constitution that served to demean and alienate the black race and other poor whites by introducing things that were unfriendly to the low-class citizens like literacy tests, poll taxes among other hostile devices to the poor. The blacks were grouped in this category. In her controversial recommendations, she proposed that the black race should use arms of any kind to defend themselves against lynching.

Other adversely mentioned work in the collection is The Red Record which she produced in 1895, where she describes a detailed lynching in America as from the onset of Emancipation Proclamation of 1863. It also shows how black people had suffered and struggled in the Southern states since the outbreak of the American Civil War (Wells, p 64). This book explores the high lynching rates in the United States. To conclude on the summary of the book, it should be admitted that Wells purposely talks about significant problems that were brought about by lynching on the blacks. She also states that lynching was performed against African Americans only because of the economic fear of competition that the blacks were already posing on the whites. She made the world realize that it was not as alleged that blacks raped the whites.

While going through the whole book, it is evident that Ida B. Well talks about the atrocities and problems of lynching in the south up to almost the very last section of the book. She clearly articulates her argument in the whole book from the first statement to the last talking about lynching. The book lacks a proper conclusion simply because Wells gave room for the ongoing details about lynching (Wells, p 63). This is evident in other of her work called The Red Record which further talks about lynching in the South, the book tends to be entirely redundant and lacks an insightful conclusion as a result of the reason I have stated above.

Conclusion

It is worth mentioning that this book is quite relevant in the study of the African American History. This is because by looking at the events as detailed by Ida B. Wells, African Americans get to appreciate the efforts that were put by their earlier fellows to ensure that they enjoy a better life that they are currently experiencing in America. The book makes people know the importance of living in peace to help foster economic prosperity of a country too because, without the efforts that were put by Wells, the level of development observed in America right now would not be there. It should be further appreciated that it was during this period that first African American, Henry Ossian, became the first cadet to graduate from the United States military. This is a significant portion of history that must be appreciated as a result of the earlier efforts by people like wells to preach for the liberation of the black race.

Work Cited

Wells, Ida B. Southern horrors: Lynch law in all its phases. The Floating Press, 2014.