"Peace Tactics and a Racial Minority"(1) The World Tomorrow, 11 (December 1928): 505-507

The World Tomorrow (2) was a liberal Protestant journal, whose pacifist and socialist orientation reflected the editorial influence of the Fellowship of Reconciliation (FOR).(3) In 1928 Thurman was asked to contribute to a series the magazine was running on the implications of pacifism for issues other than the abolition of war. Viewing pacifism broadly as opposition to a social majority's forcible subjugation of disadvantaged groups, Thurman's depiction of the racial divide in the United States is bleak. White America is characterized by the "will to dominate and control the Negro minority." This in turn engenders among blacks a spiritually crippling hatred of their would-be dominators. Thurman suggests that a way out of the impasse is to adopt a "technique of relaxation," a transcendence of the logic of mastery and resentment. Thurman sees the will to establish control of African Americans as pervasive in every institution in American society, including religion, higher education, and the popular press. Therefore educated and middle-class blacks are the most likely to be ensnared within the assumptions of white dominance, and respond either with disdain of other blacks or self-loathing. Though sketchy and hastily argued in places, this piece marks Thurman's first extended consideration of the ethical and spiritual nature of pacifism, and his call for combining "relaxation of will" with "self-respect" among social minorities anticipates important aspects of his later work, especially Jesus and the Disinherited (1949). [Document Continued Here]