A supreme effort…
Racism has been one of the great banes of this world, and while it is a worldwide phenomenon touching every society internally as well as externally the particulars of its history in the United States of America have been of particular note. To get a grasp of both the world-wide phenomena and the place of these States in the view of the world I recommend reading `Abdu'l-Bahá's 1912 Howard University Speech: A Civil War Myth for interracial Emancipation by Dr. Christopher Buck, part of the commemorative volume, ‘Abdu’l-Bahá’s Journey West - The Course of Human Solidarity, edited by Negar Mottahedeh, available variously.
One angle explored by Dr. Buck in reviewing `Abdu’l-Bahá’s speech calls up the fact, and its image in our hopes and ideals of the function of deeds, that ultimately whites rose up in war to end slavery. As Dr. Buck notes, the Civil War was about slavery but people’s approach to the war evolved, had sides of course, and was driven by slavery’s ubiquitous place in society at the time, and the end of the war marked a major shift in humanity - not the first and not the last in matters of slavery, but an effect of the first order around the world. To the extent the Bahá’í Faith has had something to say about slavery and racism it may be edifying and illuminating to note Bahá’ís in relation to the Civil War and the general American arena of the 19th century and the follow-up and progress of such ideas and practices in the religion. While other situations were presenting themselves on other parts of the 19th century, here is a particular effort to see what comes to light.
The Civil War
Being that the presence of Bahá’í activity in America dates from near 1895 onward, and not a thousand of Bahá’ís until 1899*it is more than remarkable that the one pointed to as the first occidental Bahá’í, and thus not just the first Bahá’í of the United States, or all of America, but of the entire Western Hemisphere, was a veteran of the Civil War. Even more, he was not just a veteran, or one who fought on the Union side, but one who, in the context of the social realities of the day, chose to be a leader of a Colored Troop infantry unit. According to the research of Dr. Robert H. Stockman, James Brown Thornton Chase, or Thornton Chase as he was later universally called, went to Philadelphia to attend a school for officers for black infantry units just before his seventeenth birthday. By May, 1864, Chase was second in charge of one hundred men: Company K of the Twenty sixth United States Colored Troops (USCT). And in July the unit fought two battles south of Charleston, S.C. where Chase was wounded by an exploding cannon and suffered hearing loss in his left ear the rest of his life. In 1865 he was promoted to captain and commanded Company D of the 104th USCT. In time Chase wandered the Colorado mountains looking for silver and eventually got a job in life insurance and then in the summer of 1895 learned of the Bahá’í Faith. He died in 1912 after having traveled far east and west in the country, steadily serving the new religion, and `Abdu’l-Bahá offered a prayer for him, saying in part “Verily he held the chalice of guidance in his right hand and gave unto those athirst to drink of the cup of favor.”
While we know the most about Chase’ Civil War service among all Bahá’ís, he is not the only veteran who came to the Faith. Another we know some about was Nathan Ward Fitzgerald. While Chase had his own complicated history, Fitzgerald and others of his family served in Indiana-based infantries, and after the war became involved in the government’s pensions system, fell to the political intrigues of the day, and eventually was despondent of all things until he was galvanized by the Bahá’í Faith. It dug deep into his roots recalling his mother’s fervor as a Millerite. Despite being somewhat untutored in the teachings of the religion his enthusiasm and skills as an orator lead to the establishment of the Faith in America’s north west.
John Wilson Gift, the first Bahá’í of Peoria, ended the Civil War as a Captain of Company F of the 13th Regiment of the Iowa Volunteer Infantry* that was captured along with many others during the surprise attack of the Confederates Apr 6, 1862. Gift survived and worked the rest of his life in bigger and bigger mill companies and moved between Iowa, Missouri, and ended up in Peoria Illinois from 1880* and became the first Baha'i there in 1915.* Albert Vail was beginning to make waves promoting the Bahá’í Faith and came to Peoria and meet Gift. Gift married Maye Harvey - more about her below - in 1918 and they received a brief tablet from `Abdu’l-Bahá in 1919 saying in part “Ye strive for the guidance of souls and become the cause of the illumination of hearts… From among these is the establishment of one’s remembrance and the attainment unto the supreme bounty in the Abha Kingdom.”* He died in 1927.
But we know of a few more Civil War veterans who found the Bahá’í Faith. John C. Ruddiman was also among the first wave of Bahá’ís in the United States going through the same kind of classes on the religion Thornton Chase went through and, also like Chase, served in the Civil War out of New York though when he come to the religion he and his wife were living in Kansas. Oscar S. Hinckley was a Civil War veteran who had also been injured in the war. He was disabled and living on a government pension and served on the precursor to the local Spiritual Assembly in Chicago from January 1902 until September 1906. Another who founded the Bahá’í community of Buffalo, NY, was John Harrison Mills who attracted `Abdu’l-Bahá to Buffalo. There was also Archie C. Fisk (about whom research is presently ongoing but he served with the lieutenant of companies K & E of the Ohio 23rd Regiment Infantry and rose to being an adjunct officer of several Union Generals and retiring as a colonel and was a Bahá'í by 1899.) According to the research of O.Z. Whitehead in Some Baha'is to Remember, p. 1, another early Bahá’í, Arthur Pillsbury Dodge, served in the Civil War as a drummer boy in the regiment from New Hampshire under the command of his father, Colonel Simon Dodge.
So more than one Civil War veteran founded Bahá'í communities. Thornton Chase served with a particular distinction. Archie Fisk may have been the highest ranking Civil War veteran to join the religion because he served on the staff of several generals. If we find more veterans we will be pushing the average of veterans that joined the religion. Around 1900 there were some 76 million Americans. That means Bahá’ís were around 0.001% of the American population. About 1 million veterans of the Civil War were living in 1900.* That means roughly 10 veterans would randomly would have found the Faith - and we know of most of them perhaps. A rough estimate of whites who served in black units is about 5-600. Only some of them served in two units and only some of them would have been alive circa 1900. The fact that Chase was one of them and was the first Bahá’í in the West seems out of proportion with chance.
Beyond those who were themselves were in the Civil War and joined the religion, there are those who had family directly related to the issues and realities of the Civil War. Perhaps earliest is Sarah Farmer who found the Faith in 1900. According to the research of Anne Gordon Perry in her Green Acre on the Piscataqua, Farmer’s mother, Hannah Tobey Shapleigh Farmer, (1823-1991), was an abolitionist. Farmer saw to it that Green Acre hosted a meeting of Civil War vets in 1906.* We also have the case of We also have the case of Julius deLagnel, whose second wife Josephine Conkin Cowles deLagnel was an early Bahá’í and had arranged for `Abdu'l-Bahá to visit Julius’ grave during 1912. A decade earlier Josephine hosted Ali Kuli Khan when he first came to the States.* Eva Webster Russell was an early Bahá’í close to Frederick Douglass. Agnes Parsons' father was a Civil War general whose gravesite `Abdu’l-Bahá also visited, in Arlington Cemetery.* Claudia Coles' father was a Civil War vet; see Portraits of Some Baha'i Women by OZ Whitehead, p. 37. Elizabeth Carpenter's father served in the Civil War, see Why they became Baha'is, by Annamarie Honnold, p. 305. Florence Mayberry's father served in the Civil War - she tells an anecdote in her autobiography: "…the whole family moved to Waverly Missouri. The family became friends several African-Americans: Ollie, a neighboring African-American, and insisted an African-American family eat with them at their kitchen table. There was a "visit" from the social ladies of the town who communicated to them that the norm in the area was in favor of maintaining segregated eating - and her grandfather quipped back, as Mayberry recalled, 'Tell your menfolks this. As a boy I fought in the Civil War for Abe Lincoln. The idea was to fix things so black folks are free to be like God wanted 'em to be. Free and equal. A colored man or woman is as good as Becky'n me. In my house they eat at my table, because I eat at my table. And tell your menfolks this, too. I keep a loaded shotgun under my bed. And the first man, or men, steps on my land I bought and paid for to force me or my woman to change how we treat folks on our property will get its full blast. And I reload fast. I thank you, Ladies, and good afternoon.' "
Beyond war
But just as peace is not defined or created by the absence of war, so too unity is not well characterized by a war that eventually promulgated the end of slavery. While there are various reviews of early connections of the Faith with Africans and African Americans, this is primarily a review of what “white” American Bahá’ís have done on matters of racial healing. I hope you have already seen several links to materials to read - more to come! Beyond those of individual efforts to follow, below, there is the case of the series of conferences Bahá’ís organized called "Race Amity Convention"s. These have been commented on in various places, (1, 2, 3, 4, 5) but there has yet to be a collective review. While Louis Gregory and Agnes Parsons were key founding participants, many others contributed in leading events or participating in talks. Most especially this was true of Albert Vail, (though some of this remains to be documented - some further links after 1921 are known *,*,*.) A moving speaker by Gregory’s own testimony, he participated in most Race Amity Conventions. Across some 15 years from 1921 to 1936, with sometimes more than one conference per year, usually held across more than one day in more than one venue, perhaps dozens of speakers and panelists ultimately took part. And these ran well into the Great Depression. The conventions were succeeded with more locally presented Race Unity conferences.) A moving speaker by Gregory’s own testimony, he participated in most Race Amity Conventions. Across some 15 years from 1921 to 1936, with sometimes more than one conference per year, usually held across more than one day in more than one venue, perhaps dozens of speakers and panelists ultimately took part. And these ran well into the Great Depression. The conventions were succeeded with more locally presented Race Unity conferences, and then Race Unity Day which is still observed. Even so, integration was a process repeated which is still observed. Even so, integration was a process repeated over and over, rising to become the national norm.* Bahá’ís were also involved in the NAACP and other race-conscious organizations.*
The religion itself is organized primarily around elected institutions such that no one runs for office and, instead, everyone votes only as their conscience dictates, respecting only the qualities of the spirit each sees through their own eyes among their fellow believers. As a result, the Faith abides no quotas perse, though tie votes are yielded to the minority in the society in question. It is in this situation where the Bahá’ís of the United States have, since 1922, almost always elected at least one African American to the national assembly, and usually two, sometimes 3 or 4. An average of 17% African American have been elected any particular year. Of the 78 Bahá’ís who have been elected to the National Spiritual Assembly annually since 1922, 15 (19%) have been African-American* whereas the average in the US Congress is approaching 10% although not actually reaching it.* Nevertheless, in 1939, Shoghi Effendi, then head of the religion, said: “Let the white make a supreme effort in their resolve to contribute their share to the solution of this problem, to abandon once for all their usually inherent and at times subconscious sense of superiority, to correct their tendency towards revealing a patronizing attitude towards the members of the other race, to persuade them through their intimate, spontaneous and informal association with them of the genuineness of their friendship and the sincerity of their intentions, and to master their impatience of any lack of responsiveness on the part of a people who have received, for so long a period, such grievous and slow-healing wounds.” (See also this.)
Stories
So, a testimony continues though it may be drowned out by the narrative of suffering in the United States most of the time. Some stories have been gathered, some less so. Pauline Hannen’s story less so, so far, (but see here though she and her husband taught the religion to Louis Gregory, a very well-known Bahá’í.) In the 1920s Bahá’í engagement in New York city,* a location of hundreds of Bahá’ís but without a Center of their own, became distinguished both among those recognizing the evil of racism and among those who supported it. The favorable comment was “…resulting in the formation of important Bahá'í centres in New York, Chicago, San Francisco and other cities. One of the most notable practical results of the Bahá'í ethical teaching in the United States has been, according to the recent testimony of an impartial and qualified observer, the establishment in Bahá'í circles in New York of a real fraternity between black and white, and an unprecedented lifting of the "colour bar", described by the said observer as ‘almost miraculous’.” But from a recognized newspaper associated with the KKK we have: “In several cities meetings are regularly held by Bahaists (sic) and Babist (sic) … in New York.” Though an Austrian and fleeing WWI, Ludmila O. B. Van Sombeek was visible in black newspapers for decades in America because of her personal and energetic participation in matters of African-Americans and interracial harmony at first alittle since the late 1920s but then much more in the 1950s and 60s. Robert B. Powers was a kind of state-wide police chief in California in 1945 and in 1946 was brought to a process to develop an early police training program geared to overcome assumptions of racism rampant among police and society and simultaneously began to read books on the Faith. Later his son joined a police force but when he witnessed undue violence this son testified against the police. Dorothy Beecher Baker helped develop a speaker’s bureau for race matters. More stories await documenting. Workers in the field of unity walked the paths of bringing people together.* Our predilection for inter-racial meetings has gotten us in trouble even in more recent days.*
While `Abdu’l-Bahá often spoke to the issue of race, and Bahá’u’lláh had freed the slaves inherited from his wealthy father, a noble in a society that also practiced slavery acquiring African slaves from its east coast compared the Europeans and US doing so in the west coast, Bahá’ís had not collected a compilation of the guidance presented in various circumstances until circa 1935. Two white women - Maye Harvey Gift and Alice Simmons Cox - did this. They both joined the religion in the Urbana-Champaign, Illinois, community. Gift had graduated from the University of Illinois there, took up the early days of philanthropy work, and got professional training and on return to Urbana she worked through several organizations ultimately becoming the director of the Pekin Social Service League in a neighboring town. She encountered the Bahá’í Faith about 1915 as did her soon husband and Civil War veteran John Wilson Gift and among their first acts as a couple was supporting soldiers in WWI through a university support system for veterans. Cox was from a small town in Illinois and attended Lombard College where she graduated summa cum laude and had David Starr Jordan as a faculty member. She married Levi Cox on graduating and the couple moved to Peoria. Cox encountered the Faith by 1934. Gift had attended the earliest meetings of the new Louhelen Bahá’í School in Michigan and began her service there with three presentations on race issues to eager adult learners of the religion. Cox learned of the work and together they decided to produce a compilation the first version of which came out in 1935. Cox worked as a writer and editor of World Order magazine. In anticipation of the Centenary of the Declaration of the Báb in 1844 the Bahá’í community choose race issues as one of the lead projects to be promulgated and Gift and Cox returned to their compilation, revising and extending it - a list of references was published in World Order in 1942 as “Bahá'í Lessons” and the revised text Race and Man was published in 1943 - a year fraught with race riots in the US. During that period from November 1942 to April 1943 Cox wrote articles for the New York Age and Pittsburg Courier - two of the most prominent African American newspapers in the country - outlining the Bahá’í view on matters of race and social justice. The compilation was republished in 1946 and again in 1956. That edition eventually made it into the library of Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Gift died in 1961 and Cox near 1985.
However, in that period from mid-1930s the attention of many Bahá’ís was directed overseas. In the face of being purged from southern Russia under the Soviet Union, the religion, and significantly the body of the Bahá’ís of the United States, were directed to promote the religion in South America, and then Europe, and then Africa by individuals choosing to live in foreign lands.* This was initiated in the latter days of the colonial period around the world and America was engaging on the world stage itself and promoting a hegemony. However, the Bahá’ís were directed and guided in specific ways and with specific goals to avoid any tendency of cultural colonialism and its baggage of racism. Multiplying institutional capacity across Latin America was specifically minded in such a way as to facilitate a shift in the balance of roles from Americans giving leadership guidance and Latino cooperation to Latinos leading and giving guidance and Americans cooperating.* When Americans went to Africa, care was minded repeatedly that the goal was to empower African adoption of the religion and leadership in locally implementing the religion among those that wanted to join it.* When the religion was brought to the attention of Native Americans, the lack of colonialization mindsets was observed by non-Bahá’í native scholars.* When the religion arrived in New Guinea, indigenous converts became known as the ones who preserved and advanced traditional knowledge.* When the Bahá’ís sought to promote village radio programs across Latin America it was in a context of developing locally sustainable skills as well as a distinction in promoting indigenous languages.* Indeed, following the founding and advancing of the community by white American Bahá’ís,*,*,* in 1997 Bahá’ís contributed to the South African Truth and Reconciliation Commission as follows: “…both individual Bahá'ís and our administrative institutions were continually watched by the security police.... Our activities did not include opposition to the previous Government for involvement in partisan politics and opposition to government are explicitly prohibited by the sacred Texts of our Faith.... During the time when the previous Government prohibited integration within our communities, rather than divide into separate administrative structures for each population group, we opted to limit membership of the Bahá'í Administration to the black adherents who were and remain in the majority of our membership and thereby placed the entire Bahá'í community under the stewardship of its black membership.... The pursuit of our objectives of unity and equality has not been without costs. The 'white' Bahá'ís were often ostracized by their white neighbours for their association with 'non-whites'. The Black Bahá'ís were subjected to scorn by their black compatriots for their lack of political action and their complete integration with their white Bahá'í brethren.…”
Though phases of activity were overseas there was some activity back in the States. In December 1947 Bahá’ís participated in a protest at the University of Chicago and echoes of the student protestors were published around the United States,*,*,*,*,*. This was over how black students were being treated in medical institutions on campus.* The question of participation in the protest was addressed to the leader of the religion after `Abdu’l-Bahá - Shoghi Effendi - by a leading black Bahá’í. He got a reply in January 1948 in support of the general and specific protest by Bahá’ís because of the general outrage in the society on campus and an awareness in that society of the Bahá’í views on race and justice.*
Having finished the 10 Year Crusade around the world, back in the US in 1964 Bahá’ís took part in an initiative similar to the Freedom Summer campaign with connections at the Louhelen Bahá'í School, and the burgeoning Bahá'í community of Greenville, South Carolina, which was integrating its schools that Fall. Training sessions for a project were noted in the Bahá'í News in August.* Some 80 youth attended the training in mid-June with faculty like Firuz Kazemzadeh. After the classes in various subjects, 27 individuals went to 8 locations including Greenville, SC.* Six youth including some white students went to Greenville under the sponsorship of the local assembly there for a 6 week program. Local youth joined in. The group worked on tutoring some 55 black students about to attend newly integrating schools, held informational meetings on the religion, and supported petitioning for the public swimming pool being integrated. The work was capped with a parent-teacher banquet reception at a church and a picnic for the students conducted by the Bahá'í teachers.* The group visited many churches, restaurants, parks, stores, and a community center to demonstrate solidarity with the black community. Side ventures included the Bahá'í Summer School near Asheville, NC, going to Greensboro, NC, and the Southern Christian Leadership Conference training camp near Savannah, GA.
In the mid-later 1960s a particular hotspot in American society was the situation in Montgomery, Alabama. A startup newspaper dedicated to coverage of events was the Southern Courier and it covered some Bahá’í mentions as well.* Before it started printing in July it should be noted Bahá'ís participated in the (probably third) March on Montgomery and arranged for telegrams according to the June issue of Baha'i News.* The National Assembly telegrammed the US President and the Southern Christian Leadership Conference. Bahá'ís that marched include Henry Miller, Diane Schable, Daniel Connor, Charles Carter, Mary Jane Austin, Joseph Mydell, Joan Bronson (the last two from Montgomery.) Though Bahá’ís had lived there in the 1930s, however, as of 1954 there were no known Bahá'ís in Montgomery.
By the 1980s it was clear that the Bahá'í Faith had progressed around the nation and it was possible to look at relatively how it had done over the previous decades.* Certainly there were intensional programs to spread the religion as well as to keep spreading it rather than form concentrations. But interestingly it seems that to a first approximation one region stood out as relatively underperforming in the spread of the religion - the South, where over and over again the teachings of the religion had to be applied against a context of the Jim Crow laws and white supremacy culture of the region, only recently pushed back to a degree by the Civil Rights Movement. And to a second degree of approximation, the most progress of the religion in the South was among the black populations mostly along the coasts of the South.
There are probably other instances - this is what has been gathered so far.
So, there are diverse measures of white Bahá’ís making an effort to live in distinctive ways as they adopted the religion and promoted standards of integration and respect for diversity. And Bahá’ís have succeeded in demonstrable ways decades before the contests general American culture went through for civil rights and, despite changes in law and society, have yet to achieve. This isn’t to say that cultural norms among white Bahá’ís are done evolving and there is comment of a need for a sustained and ubiquitous progression in the face of the pernicious effects of racism. As membership in the religion is within a racist society in America, there are affects inward as well as outward. We’re not done.
