Atlanta Compromise

Nadir of American race relations
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A French news illustration of the 1906 Atlanta race massacre
Historical background Reconstruction era Voter suppression Disfranchisement Redeemers Compromise of 1877 Jim Crow laws Segregation Anti-miscegenation laws Convict leasing
Practices Common actions Expulsions of African Americans Lynchings Lynching postcards Sundown town Whitecapping Vigilante groups Black Legion Indiana White Caps Ku Klux Klan Red Shirts
Lynchings Andrew Richards Michael Green Nevlin Porter and Johnson Spencer Eliza Woods Amos Miller George Meadows Joe Vermillion Jim Taylor Joe Coe People's Grocery Ephraim Grizzard Alfred Blount Samuel J. Bush Stephen Williams Frazier B. Baker and Julia Baker John Henry James Sam Hose George Ward David Wyatt Marie Thompson Watkinsville Ed Johnson William Burns Walker family Laura and L. D. Nelson King Johnson John Evans Jesse Washington Newberry Six Anthony Crawford Ell Persons Jim McIlherron George Taylor John Hartfield 1920 Duluth James Harvey and Joe Jordan Joe Pullen
Massacres and riots Opelousas massacre Rock Springs massacre Thibodaux massacre Spring Valley Race Riot of 1895 Phoenix election riot Wilmington insurrection of 1898 Pana riot Robert Charles riots Evansville race riot Atlanta Massacre of 1906 Springfield race riot of 1908 Johnson–Jeffries riots 1912 racial conflict in Forsyth County 1917 Chester race riot East St. Louis riots Elaine massacre Red Summer Chicago race riot of 1919 Washington race riot of 1919 Ocoee massacre Tulsa race massacre Perry race riot Rosewood massacre
Reactions Anti-lynching movement Atlanta Compromise Back to Africa movement Exodusters movement Great Migration Niagara Movement NAACP Silent Parade
Related topics Black genocide Civil rights movement (1865–1896) Civil rights movement (1896–1954) Mass racial violence in the United States

The Atlanta Compromise was a proposal put forth in 1895 by prominent African American leader Booker T. Washington. His proposal called for Southern blacks to accept segregation and to temporarily refrain from campaigning for equal rights, including the right to vote. In return, he advocated that blacks would receive basic legal protections, access to property ownership, employment opportunities, and vocational and industrial education.

The proposal was met with opposition from other black leaders, most notably W. E. B. Du Bois, who rejected the compromise’s emphasis on accommodation and limited political ambition. Du Bois and others instead advocated for full civil rights and the immediate end of segregation. From 1903 until Washington’s death in 1915, the two figures engaged in an extended public debate over the direction of African American advancement.

The Compromise was the dominant policy pursued by black leaders in the South from 1895 to 1915. However, it did not end segregation, nor produce equal rights for Southern blacks. Those goals were not significantly advanced until the civil rights movement of the 1960s.