8 The Black Man’s Burden (1899)

H. T. Johnson

The Black Man’s Burden

by H. T. Johnson[1]

from Christian Recorder, March 1899

Pile on the Black Man’s Burden.
      ‘Tis nearest at your door;
Why heed long-bleeding Cuba, [2]
      or dark Hawaii’s[3]shore?
5
Hail ye your fearless armies,
      Which menace feeble folks
Who fight with clubs and arrows
      and brook your rifle’s smoke.
Pile on the Black Man’s Burden
10
      His wail with laughter drown,
You’ve sealed the Red Man’s problem,
      And will take up the Brown,[4]
In vain ye seek to end it,
      With bullets, blood or death
15
Better by far defend it
      With honor’s holy breath.
Pile on the Black Man’s burden,
      His back is broad though sore;
What though the weight oppress him,
20
      He’s borne the like before.
Your Jim-Crow laws[5] and customs,
      And fiendish midnight deed,
Though, winked at by the nation,
      Will some day trouble breed.
25
Pile on the Black Man’s burden,
      At length ’twill Heaven pierce;
Then on you or your children
      Will reign God’s judgments fierce.
Your battleships and armies
30
      May weaker ones appall.
But God Almighty’s justice
      They’ll not disturb at all.
  1. A photograph from the Library of Congress https://www.loc.gov/resource/bellcm.10974/ and a note in History Matters refers to him as "African-American clergyman and editor H. T. Johnson" ("'The Black Man's Burden'"). From 1892 to 1909, Johnson was the editor of The Christian Recorder, the official publication of the African Methodist Episcopal Church ("History"). Citations: 1. "History," The Christian Recorder, 2016. https://www.thechristianrecorder.com/our-leadership/history/. 2. "'The Black Man’s Burden': A Response to Kipling," History Matters, American Social History Productions, Inc.,2018. http://historymatters.gmu.edu/d/5476/. ↵
  2. In the nineteenth century, Cuba, a sugar-rich Spanish colony farmed by African slaves until emancipation in 1884, was thoroughly economically intertwined with the United States: "In 1894 nearly 90 percent of Cuba's exports went to the United States, which in turn provided Cuba with 38 percent of its imports" (Hernandez). Cuba had long been battling Spain for Independence, led by a multiracial army, and when a US ship was sunk in the battles between Cuba and Spain, Americans intervened, sparking the American-Spanish War (of which the Phillipines Kipling was writing about was a part). Citation: Hernandez, José M. "Cuba in 1898," The World of 1898: The Spanish-American War, Hispanic Division, Library of Congress, 2011. https://www.loc.gov/rr/hispanic/1898/hernandez.html ↵
  3. As with Cuba, Americans had an increasing economic interest in Hawaii, a "key provisioning spot for American whaling ships, fertile ground for American protestant missionaries, and a new source of sugar cane production" (U.S. Department of State). In 1893, Americans deposed Hawaii's monarchy under Queen Liliuokalani and by 1898, during the Spanish-American War, annexed Hawaii. Citation: U.S. Department of State, "Annexation of Hawaii, 1898," Timeline of US Diplomatic History, https://2001-2009.state.gov/r/pa/ho/time/gp/17661.htm ↵
  4. He is referring to Filipinos here. ↵
  5. David Pilgrim explains, "Jim Crow was the name of the racial caste system which operated primarily, but not exclusively in southern and border states, between 1877 and the mid-1960s." Citation: Pilgrim, David. "What was Jim Crow?" Jim Crow Museum of Racist Memorabilia, Ferris State University, 201https://www.ferris.edu/jimcrow/what.htm ↵

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