Mixing Protest and Accommodation: The Response of Oklahoma's Black Town Newspaper Editors to Race Relations, 1891–1918

Abstract

Oklahoma's African-American frontier editors combined vigorous editorial protest and aspects of accommodationist policies when responding to civil rights issues. The editors' mixture of the two philosophies was based on the unique circumstances of African-American life in rural Oklahoma during the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. The state held out initial promise—which was quickly denied—that the region would be a safe haven and model of tolerance and civil liberties. Instead, editors had to struggle to overcome their political and social marginalization by a white-dominated reactionary state legislature. The editors' vigorous protest and judicious use of accommodation says volumes about their struggles to achieve middle-class status and town stability, while tacitly acknowledging their overall racial vulnerability