these is in the present work very largely taken for granted. I feel
under a special debt of gratitude to the New York State Colonization
Society, which, coöperating with the American Colonization Society and
the Board of Trustees of Donations for Education in Liberia, in 1920
gave me opportunity for some study at first hand of educational and
social conditions on the West Coast of Africa; and most of all do I
remember the courtesy and helpfulness of Dr. E.C. Sage and Dr. J.H.
Dillard in this connection. In general I have worked independently
of Williams, but any student of the subject must be grateful to that
pioneer, as well as to Dr. W.E.B. DuBois, who has made contributions in
so many ways. My obligations to such scholarly dissertations as those
by Turner and Russell are manifest, while to Mary Stoughton Locke's
_Anti-Slavery in America_--a model monograph--I feel indebted more than
to any other thesis. Within the last few years, of course, the _Crisis_,
the _Journal of Negro History_, and the _Negro Year-Book_ have in their
special fields become indispensable, and to Dr. Carter G. Woodson and
Professor M.N. Work much credit is due for the faith which has prompted
their respective ventures. I take this occasion also to thank Professor
W.E. Dodd, of the University of Chicago, who from the time of my
entrance upon this field has generously placed at my disposal his
unrivaled knowledge of the history of the South; and as always I must
be grateful to my father, Rev. E.M. Brawley, for that stimulation and
criticism which all my life have been most valuable to me. Finally, the
work has been dedicated to the memory of a distinguished soldier, who,
in his youth, in the nation's darkest hour, helped to lead a struggling
people to freedom and his country to victory. It is now submitted to the
consideration of all who are interested in the nation's problems, and
indeed in any effort that tries to keep in mind the highest welfare of
the country itself.