Editing Niagara Movement (section)

==Founding==
Along with Du Bois and Trotter, [[Fredrick McGhee]] of [[St. Paul, Minnesota]], and [[Charles Edwin Bentley]] of [[Chicago]] also recognized the need for a national activist group.<ref>Fox, p. 89.</ref> The foursome organized a conference to be held July 11–13, 1905, in [[Buffalo, New York]]. 59 carefully selected anti-Bookerites were invited to attend; 29 showed up, including prominent community leaders and a notable number of lawyers. At the last minute, to avoid disruption, the meeting was moved to the Erie Beach Hotel<ref name="eriebeach">{{cite web |url=http://www.library.umass.edu/spcoll/digital/dubois/312.2.839-01-03.pdf |title=Niagara Movement First Annual Meeting |access-date=November 18, 2012 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20121218105748/http://www.library.umass.edu/spcoll/digital/dubois/312.2.839-01-03.pdf |archive-date=December 18, 2012 |url-status=dead }}</ref> in [[Fort Erie, Ontario]], Canada, across the [[Niagara River]] from [[Buffalo, New York|Buffalo]].

The organization founded at this meeting chose Du Bois as its general secretary and [[Cincinnati, Ohio|Cincinnati]] lawyer [[George H. Jackson (diplomat)|George H. Jackson]] as treasurer. It set up committees to oversee progress on the organization's goals. State chapters would advance local agendas and disseminate information about the organization and its goals.<ref name=Fox90>Fox, p. 90.</ref> Its name was chosen to reflect the site of its first meeting and to be representative of a "mighty current" of change its leaders sought to bring about.<ref>{{cite book|last=Ali|first=Omar|title=In the Balance of Power: Independent Black Politics and Third-Party Movements in the United States|publisher=Ohio University Press|year=2009|location=Athens, OH|isbn=9780821418062|oclc=756717945|page=[https://archive.org/details/inbalanceofpower0000alio/page/110 110]|url=https://archive.org/details/inbalanceofpower0000alio/page/110}}</ref> Seventeen founders were each appointed as state secretary to individually represent 17 of the states of the union:<ref>[https://books.google.com/books?id=RuEcAQAAMAAJ&pg=RA1-PA704 ''The Voice of the Negro'', Volumes 1 - 4, 1903–1907, Negro Universities Press, New York, 1949, page 704. Retrieved February 24, 2021.]</ref>
*[[Massachusetts]] – CG Morgan
*[[Georgia (U.S. state)|Georgia]] – [[John Hope (educator)|John Hope]]
*[[Arkansas]] – FB Coffin
*[[Illinois]] – CE Bentley 
*[[Kansas]] – B. S. Smith
*[[Washington, D.C.|D.C.]] – L. M. Henshaw
*[[New York (state)|New York]] – [[George Frazier Miller]]
*[[Virginia]] – [[James Robert Lincoln Diggs]]
*[[Colorado]] – C. A. Franklin
*[[Pennsylvania]] – G. W. Mitchell
*[[Rhode Island]] – [[Byron Gunner]]
*[[New Jersey]] – [[T. A. Spraggins]]
*[[Maryland]] – G.R. Waller
*[[Iowa]] – [[G. H. Woodson]]
*[[Tennessee]] – Richard Hill
*[[Minnesota]] – [[Fredrick McGhee|F. L. McGhee]]
*[[West Virginia]] – [[J. R. Clifford]]

===Founders===
The 29 founders who traveled to the inaugural meeting of the Niagara Movement came from 14 states, and became known as "The Original Twenty-nine":<ref>{{Cite web |url=http://credo.library.umass.edu/view/full/mums312-i0404 |title="Niagara Movement, 'The Original Twenty-Nine', 1905", W. E. B. Du Bois Papers (Series 17. Photographs &#91;IMAGE depicts 27 of 29 founders&#93;), Special Collections and University Archives, University of Massachusetts Amherst. Retrieved October 12, 2019. |access-date=October 12, 2019 |archive-date=October 12, 2019 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20191012201843/http://credo.library.umass.edu/view/full/mums312-i0404 |url-status=live }}</ref><ref name=Jones/> 
# [[James Robert Lincoln Diggs]] – College president; pastor; ninth African American to receive a doctorate in the United States
# Dr. Henry Lewis "H. L." Bailey (January 17, 1866 – July 16, 1933) – Teacher and medical doctor.<ref>{{Cite book |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=Wko6P5M3QbAC&pg=PA15 |title=''Biographical Dictionary of American Physicians of African Ancestry, 1800-1920'', by Geraldine Rhoades Beckford, Africana Homestead Legacy, 2013, page 15. Retrieved February 11, 2020. |isbn=9781937622183 |access-date=February 11, 2020 |archive-date=August 6, 2020 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20200806180847/https://books.google.com/books?id=Wko6P5M3QbAC&pg=PA15 |url-status=live |last1=Beckford |first1=Geraldine Rhoades |date=March 2013 |publisher=Africana Homestead Legacy Pb }}</ref>
# William Justin "W. Justin" Carter, Sr. (May 28, 1866 – March 23, 1947)<ref>{{Cite web |url=http://www.geocities.ws/pchittams/CARTER.html |title=Evening News'' obituary, March 26, 1947 via Geocities.'' |access-date=February 11, 2020 |archive-date=August 4, 2020 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20200804111209/http://www.geocities.ws/pchittams/CARTER.html |url-status=live }}</ref> – Pennsylvania lawyer; civil right activist; scholar; early NAACP member<ref>{{Cite book |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=wIJ8se7mTMUC&pg=PA17 |title=Race, Social Science and the Crisis of Manhood, 1890-1970: We are the Supermen |publisher=Routledge |isbn=9780415517430 |access-date=October 12, 2019 |archive-date=August 6, 2020 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20200806171227/https://books.google.com/books?id=wIJ8se7mTMUC&pg=PA17 |url-status=live |last1=Lindquist |first1=Malinda A. |year=2012 }}</ref>
# William Henry "W. H." Scott (June 15, 1848 – June 27, 1910)<ref>{{Cite web |url=https://findingaids.library.emory.edu/documents/scott1082/printable/ |title=SCOTT, WILLIAM H. (WILLIAM HENRY), 1848-1910. William H. Scott family papers, 1848-1982, Emory University Stuart A. Rose Manuscript, Archives, and Rare Book Library, archived 2012, page 2. Retrieved February 11, 2020. |access-date=February 11, 2020 |archive-date=October 2, 2015 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20151002022905/http://findingaids.library.emory.edu/documents/scott1082/printable/ |url-status=live }}</ref> – Born to slavery, soldier, teacher, bookseller, Baptist pastor, activist, founder of Massachusetts Racial Protective League and the [[National Independent Political League]]<ref name=Jones>{{Cite book |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=mxCKaX-SUJMC&pg=PA229 |title=''African American Civil Rights: Early Activism and the Niagara Movement'', by Angela Jones, Praeger, ABC-CLIO, 2011, page 229. Retrieved February 11, 2020. |isbn=9780313393600 |access-date=February 11, 2020 |archive-date=June 13, 2020 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20200613152352/https://books.google.com/books?id=mxCKaX-SUJMC&pg=PA229 |url-status=live |last1=Jones |first1=Angela |date=31 August 2011 |publisher=Abc-Clio }}</ref>
# Isaac F. "I.F." Bradley, Sr. (1862 – 1938) – Assistant county attorney, [[Wyandotte County]]; [[justice of the peace]]; judge; publisher and editor of ''[[The Wyandotte Echo]]'' (1930 – 1938);<ref>{{Cite web |url=http://blog.law.ku.edu/student-life/early-black-graduates-exemplify-how-diversity-makes-us-better/ |title="Early black graduates exemplify how diversity makes us better", by Aaron Holmes, "KU Law Blog", University of Kansas School of Law, March 3, 2017. Retrieved February 19, 2020. |date=3 March 2017 |access-date=February 19, 2020 |archive-date=February 19, 2020 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20200219202015/http://blog.law.ku.edu/student-life/early-black-graduates-exemplify-how-diversity-makes-us-better/ |url-status=live }}</ref> father of Isaac F. Bradley, Jr., who was assistant [[attorney general]] for [[Kansas]] (1937-39)<ref name=Emancipation>[https://books.google.com/books?id=1lOIjQUG4aoC&pg=PA519 ''Emancipation: The Making of the Black Lawyer''] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20200806071314/https://books.google.com/books?id=1lOIjQUG4aoC&pg=PA519&lpg=PA519 |date=2020-08-06 }}, 1844-1944, by J. Clay Smith, Jr. (1885 – 1975), [[University of Pennsylvania]] Press, 1999, page 519.</ref>
# [[Alonzo Herndon|Alonzo F. Herndon]] – Born to slavery; entrepreneur; one of the first African-American millionaires in the United States
# William Henry "W. H." Richards (January 15, 1856 – 1941) – Lawyer and law professor; secured funding from [[United States Congress|Congress]], with [[William Henry Harrison Hart]], for first law school building at [[Howard University]]; activist; alderman; mayor;<ref name=Jones/>''William H. Richards: A remarkable life of a remarkable man'', was a biography by [[Julia B. Nelson]], published about 1900<ref>{{Cite book |url=https://www.worldcat.org/oclc/9534691 |title=''William H. Richards : a remarkable life of a remarkable man'', by Julia B. Nelson, Murray Bros. Press. |oclc=9534691 |access-date=2020-02-26 |archive-date=2020-02-26 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20200226170521/https://www.worldcat.org/title/william-h-richards-a-remarkable-life-of-a-remarkable-man/oclc/9534691 |url-status=live }}</ref>
# Brown Sylvester "B. S." Smith – Kansas City lawyer and City Councillor,<ref>[https://books.google.com/books?id=U_EZDAAAQBAJ&pg=PA336 ''The Battle for the Souls of Black Folk: W.E.B. Du Bois, Booker T. Washington, and the Debate That Shaped the Course of Civil Rights''] Thomas Aiello, ABC-CLIO, 2016, page 336. Retrieved February 25, 2022.</ref> activist. Born to parents who were born into slavery; orphaned young.<ref name=Jones/>
# [[Fredrick McGhee|Frederick L. McGhee]][[Image:W.E. Burghardt DuBois.JPG|thumb|right|upright|[[W. E. B. Du Bois]], 1903 portrait]]
# [[William Monroe Trotter]]
# Garnett Russell "G.R." Waller (February 17, 1857 – March 7, 1941) – Shoemaker; pastor<ref name=Jones/> 
# Harvey A. Thompson — H. A. Thompson (July 24, 1863 – ), [[Columbus, Ohio]] native; [[Fisk University]], [[LeMoyne–Owen College|Le Moyne College]] and [[Meharry Medical College]] alumni; Ninth United States Cavalry (1883 – 1888); adjutant and first lieutenant of the [[370th Infantry Regiment (United States)|Eighth Illinois]] (1894); Chicago political and business figure; clerkship at the central police station; married Frances Gowins<ref>{{Cite book|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=mXgtAAAAYAAJ&pg=PA77 |title=The "Eighth Illinois" |publisher=Blakely Printing |page=77 |access-date=2021-02-07 |archive-date=2021-02-14 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210214093334/https://books.google.ca/books?id=mXgtAAAAYAAJ&pg=PA77&lpg=PA77 |url-status=live |last1=Goode |first1=W. T. |year=1899 }}</ref><ref name=Jones/> 
# [[William Henry Harrison Hart]] — Born to a white slave trader; jailed activist; secured funding from [[United States Congress|Congress]], with W. H. Richards, for first law school building at [[Howard University]]; law professor; worked for [[United States Treasury]], [[United States Department of Agriculture]]; assistant [[librarian of Congress]]; first black lawyer appointed as special [[U.S. District Attorney]] for the [[District of Columbia]]
# [[Lafayette M. Hershaw]]
# [[W. E. B. Du Bois]] – Co-founder of the [[NAACP]]
# [[Charles Edwin Bentley|Charles E. Bentley]]
# [[Clement G. Morgan]]
# [[Freeman H. M. Murray]]
# [[Jesse Max Barber|J. Max Barber]][[File:HC Smith.png|thumb|right|[[Harry Clay Smith|H. C. Smith]], ''[[Men of Mark]]'' sketch.]]<ref name="Men of Mark">[https://archive.org/stream/menmarkeminentp00turngoog#page/n214/mode/2up ''Men of mark; eminent, progressive and rising''] by Rev. [[William J. Simmons (teacher)|Wm. J. Simmons]], Geo. R. Rewell & Co., Ohio, 1887, page 194.</ref>
# [[George Frazier Miller]] (November 28, 1864 – May 9, 1943) — rector of St. Augustine's Episcopal Church, Brooklyn; socialist; civil rights activist<ref name=Jones/>
# George Henry "G. H." Woodson (December 15, 1865 – July 7, 1933)<ref>{{Cite web |url=http://uipress.lib.uiowa.edu/bdi/DetailsPage.aspx?id=417 |title="Woodson, George Henry ", ''THE BIOGRAPHICAL DICTIONARY OF IOWA'', University of Iowa Press Digital Editions. Retrieved February 3, 2021. |access-date=February 3, 2021 |archive-date=September 21, 2020 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20200921154315/http://uipress.lib.uiowa.edu/bdi/DetailsPage.aspx?id=417 |url-status=live }}</ref> — Criminal trial attorney, born to newly [[Slavery in the United States|emancipated slaves]]; founder and president of both the Iowa Negro Bar Association in 1901 and — subsequent to being denied membership in the [[American Bar Association]] (along with [[Gertrude Rush]], S. Joe Brown, James B. Morris, and Charles P. Howard, Sr.) — the National Negro Bar Association, in 1925, which became the [[National Bar Association]] (NBA), of which he also served as president ''emeritus''; [[Calvin Coolidge|President Coolidge]] appointed Woodson chairman of the first all-Negro commission ever sent overseas, with a mandate to investigate the economic conditions of the Virgin Islands (illustrated report available from the U. S. department of labor archives)<ref>{{Cite web |url=https://ir.uiowa.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=7097&context=annals-of-iowa |title="The Des Moines Negro and His Contribution to American Life", by Lawrence C. Howard, ''The Annals of Iowa'', Volume 30, Number 3 (Winter 1950), pages 211-221, State Historical Society of Iowa. Retrieved February 3, 2021. |access-date=February 3, 2021 |archive-date=August 22, 2021 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210822185005/https://ir.uiowa.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=7097&context=annals-of-iowa |url-status=dead }}</ref>
# James S. Madden — Bookkeeper; activist; desegregationist; worked to establish the Chicago branch of the Niagara Movement with [[Charles Edwin Bentley|Charles E. Bentley]]; [[Provident Hospital (Chicago)|Provident Hospital]] trustee; assisted in the founding of the Equal Opportunity League<ref name=Jones/> 
# [[Harry Clay Smith|Henry C. Smith]] – Musician, composer; civil rights activist; Ohio deputy oil inspector; co-founder and editor of ''[[The Cleveland Gazette]]''<ref name="Men of Mark"/>
# Emery T. "E.T." Morris (1849 - 1924)<ref name=CambridgeUSA>{{Cite web |url=https://www.cambridgeusa.org/listing/emery-t.-morris |title="Emery T. Morris", ''Cambridge.usa'', The Cambridge Office for Tourism. Retrieved February 17, 2021 |access-date=February 17, 2021 |archive-date=January 26, 2021 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210126183933/https://www.cambridgeusa.org/listing/emery-t.-morris |url-status=live }}</ref> — Massachusetts deputy sealer of weights and measures;<ref name=Jones/> druggist; rail porter; stationary steam engineer; lay teacher who created extensive antislavery libraries in New England;<ref name=CambridgeUSA/> founder of the [[Boston, Massachusetts|Boston]] branch of the Movement<ref>{{Cite web |url=https://www.wbur.org/artery/2017/10/16/tufts-boston-black-history-trail |title="Tufts Project Maps The Landmarks Of Black Boston", by Alexa Vazquez, ''The Artery'', Tufts University, October 16, 2017. Retrieved February 17, 2021 |date=16 October 2017 |access-date=February 22, 2021 |archive-date=December 12, 2019 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20191212110050/https://www.wbur.org/artery/2017/10/16/tufts-boston-black-history-trail |url-status=live }}</ref>
# Richard Hill (October 12, 1864 – ) – Native of [[Nashville, Tennessee]]; teacher and city schools supervisor; insurance and real estate entrepreneur; served as NM Secretary for Tennessee; father of civil rights activist and lawyer Richard Hill, Jr.<ref name=Jones/> 
# [[Robert H. Bonner]] – [[Beverly, Massachusetts]] artist; [[Yale University]] alumni; Colored Yale Quartette singer; lawyer;<ref name=Jones/> long associated the [[James Monroe Trotter|Trotter]] family<ref>{{Cite book |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=SwOLDwAAQBAJ&pg=PG118 |title=''Black Radical: The Life and Times of William Monroe Trotter'', by Kerri K. Greenidge, Liveright Publishing, 2019, page 118. Retrieved February 25, 2021. |isbn=9781631495359 |access-date=February 25, 2021 |archive-date=December 3, 2021 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20211203192340/https://books.google.ca/books?id=SwOLDwAAQBAJ&pg=PG118 |url-status=live |last1=Greenidge |first1=Kerri K. |date=19 November 2019 |publisher=Liveright }}</ref>
# [[Byron Gunner]] (July 4, 1857 – February 9, 1922)<ref name=Jones/> – Congregational minister; president of the [[National Equal Rights League]]; later a strong ally of William Monroe Trotter; Rhode Island Niagara Movement secretary; father of playwright [[Mary Frances Gunner]] 
# Edwin Bush "E.B." Jourdain — Boston lawyer; hosted "the [[New Bedford, Massachusetts|New Bedford]] Annex for Boston Radicals";<ref name=Jones/><ref>[https://www.baystatebanner.com/2013/02/13/boston-radicals-found-a-home-in-new-bedford-2/ "Boston radicals found a home in New Bedford", by Ted Langston Chase, February 13, 2013. Retrieved March 2, 2021.]</ref> father of journalist, activist and first black alderman of [[Evanston, Illinois]] Edwin B. Jourdain, Jr.<ref>[https://dailynorthwestern.com/2020/07/19/city/house-of-edwin-b-jourdain-jr-citys-first-black-alderman-designated-new-african-american-heritage-site/ "House of Edwin B. Jourdain Jr., city’s first black alderman, designated new African American heritage site", by Jacob Fulton] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20200721203418/https://dailynorthwestern.com/2020/07/19/city/house-of-edwin-b-jourdain-jr-citys-first-black-alderman-designated-new-african-american-heritage-site/ |date=2020-07-21 }}, ''[[The Daily Northwestern]]'', July 19, 2020. Retrieved March 2, 2021.</ref>
# George W. Mitchell – [[Washington, DC]] attorney; [[Howard University]] Latin and Greek professor; Pennsylvania NM secretary;<ref name=Jones/> father of lawyer and real estate investor George Henry Mitchell<ref>{{Cite web |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=tzoTAAAAYAAJ&q=281 |title="History of the American Negro and His Institutions", Arthur Bunyan Caldwell, Editor, A. B. Caldwell Publishing Company, 1921, page 281. |access-date=2021-03-02 |archive-date=2021-12-03 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20211203192341/https://books.google.com/books?newbks=1&newbks_redir=0&id=tzoTAAAAYAAJ&q=Mitchell#v=snippet&q=281&f=false |url-status=live |last1=Caldwell |first1=Arthur Bunyan |year=1921 }}</ref>

===Inaugural meeting location===
{{also|Niagara Falls Conference}}
[[File:Erie Beach Hotel.jpg|thumb|Erie Beach Hotel, Fort Erie, Ontario, Canada. Destroyed by fire in 1975. Not to be confused with current Erie Beach Hotel in [[Port Dover, Ontario]].]]
The First Niagara Conference was originally scheduled for [[Buffalo, New York]], but because of threatened disruptions from partisans of the politically powerful [[Booker T. Washington]] fled at the last minute to the [[Erie Beach Hotel]] in [[Fort Erie, Ontario]], Canada. Du Bois described the meeting as "secret".<ref>{{cite book
|page=249
|url=https://archive.org/details/autobiographyofw0000dubo/page/248/mode/2up
|title=The autobiography of W.E.B. DuBois : a soliloquy on viewing my life from the last decade of its first century
|last=Du Bois
|first= W. E. B.
|date=1991
|orig-date=1968
|authorlink=W.E.B. Du Bois
|lccn=68-14103
|location=New York
|publisher=[[International Publishers]]|isbn=9780717802340
}}</ref> One Bookerite, Clifford Plummer, traveled to Buffalo to check up on the proceedings, looked around, and "happily" reported back that there was no conference.<ref name=Fox>{{cite book
|page=90
|title=The Guardian of Boston: William Monroe Trotter
|last=Fox
|first=Stephen R.
|date=1970
|location=New York
|publisher=[[Charles Scribner's Sons|Atheneum]]
|url=https://archive.org/details/guardianofboston00foxs/page/90/mode/2up?q=Buffalo}}</ref>{{rp|106}}<ref name=Forth>{{cite journal
|title=Booker T. Washington and the 1905 Niagara Movement Conference
|first=Christopher E.
|last=Forth
|journal=[[Journal of Negro History]]
|date=Summer–Autumn 1987
|volume=72
|number=3/4
|pages=45–56
|doi=10.2307/3031507
|url=https://www.jstor.org/stable/3031507
|jstor=3031507|s2cid=150352156
|url-access=subscription
}}</ref>

To disguise this, it was said that they were refused accommodation in Buffalo.<ref name="pbs">{{cite web 
|url=https://www.pbs.org/wnet/jimcrow/stories/events_niagara.html
|title=Niagara Movement 1905-10 
|publisher=[[Public Broadcasting Service|PBS]] 
|access-date=October 9, 2007 
|work=The Rise and Fall of Jim Crow 
|first=Richard 
|last=Wormser 
}}{{Dead link|date=September 2023 |bot=InternetArchiveBot |fix-attempted=yes }}</ref><ref name="nps">{{cite web 
|url=http://www.nps.gov/archive/hafe/niagara/history.htm 
|title=The Niagara Movement at Harpers Ferry 
|publisher=[[National Park Service]] 
|date=August 11, 2006 
|access-date=October 9, 2007 
|first=David T. 
|last=Gilbert 
|archive-date=October 27, 2007 
|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20071027053344/http://www.nps.gov/archive/hafe/niagara/history.htm 
|url-status=live 
}}</ref><ref>{{cite book
|title=The Making of Harpers Ferry National Historical Park: A Devil, Two Rivers, and a Dream
|year=2008
|publisher=[[Altamira Press]]
|isbn=978-0759110656
|first1=Teresa S.
|last1=Moyer
|page=19
|first2=Paul A.
|last2=Shackel|oclc=1058473018
}}</ref> However, no evidence supports this.<ref name=Forth/>{{rp|49}}{{rp|49 n. 28}} According to contemporary reports, Buffalo hotels complied with a statewide anti-discrimination law passed in 1895, and in a recent article it is called an "unlikely...legend".<ref>{{cite web|url=http://wings.buffalo.edu/uncrownedqueens/C/history/niag_mov/mystery_solved.html |title=NIAGARA MOVEMENT - A Mystery Solved! |publisher=[[University at Buffalo]] |access-date=October 9, 2007 |year=2005 |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20080829140429/http://wings.buffalo.edu/uncrownedqueens/C/history/niag_mov/mystery_solved.html |archive-date=August 29, 2008 }}</ref><ref>{{cite journal |url=http://www.buffaloresearch.com/essays/BuffaloHotels.pdf |title=Buffalo Hotels and the Niagara Movement: New Evidence Refutes an Old Legend. |first=Cynthia 
|last=Van Ness 
|journal=Western New York Heritage Magazine |volume=13 |issue=4 |date=Winter 2011 |pages=18–23 |archive-date=March 4, 2016 |access-date=June 10, 2020 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160304030121/http://www.buffaloresearch.com/essays/BuffaloHotels.pdf |url-status=dead
|quote=Van Ness says that the "Malby Law" (1895) prohibited discrimination in hotels on the basis of color, and ''The New York Times'' reported on a successful test of that state law in Buffalo, thus making the hotel legend unlikely.}}</ref>

===Declaration of Principles===
The attendees of the inaugural meeting drafted a "Declaration of Principles," primarily the work of Du Bois and Trotter.<ref name=DecPrin>{{cite journal|title=The Niagara Movement's "Declaration of Principals"|journal=Black History Bulletin|date=March 2005|volume=68|issue=1|pages=21–23}}</ref> The group's philosophy contrasted with the conciliatory approach by Booker T. Washington, who proposed patience over militancy.<ref>{{cite book | last1 = Brinkley | first1 = Alan | title = The Unfinished Nation | chapter = Chapter 20 - The Progressives | publisher = McGraw Hill | year = 2010 | isbn = 978-0-07-338552-5}}</ref> The declaration defined the group's philosophy and demands: politically, socially and economically. It described the progress made by "Negro-Americans", 
<blockquote>"particularly the increase of intelligence, the buy-in of property, the checking of crime, the uplift in home life, the advance in literature and art, and the demonstration of constructive and executive ability in the conduct of great religious, economic and educational institutions."<ref name=DecPrin/></blockquote>  

It called for blacks to be granted manhood suffrage, for equal treatment for all American citizens alike. Very specifically, it demanded equal economic opportunities, in the rural districts of the South, where many blacks were trapped by [[sharecropping]] in a kind of [[indentured servitude]] to whites. This resulted in "virtual slavery". The Niagara Movement wanted all African Americans in the South to have the ability to "earn a decent living".

[[File:Niagara-women.jpg|thumb|left|Women at the 1906 Niagara Movement Conference at Harpers Ferry: [[Gertrude Wright Morgan|Mrs. Gertrude Wright Morgan]] (seated) and (left to right) Mrs. O.M. Waller, Mrs. H.F.M. Murray, Mrs. Mollie Lewis Kelan, Mrs. [[Ida D. Bailey]], Miss Sadie Shorter, and Mrs. Charlotte Hershaw.]]
On the subject of education, the authors declared that not only should it be free, but it should also be made compulsory. Higher education, they declared, should be governed independently of class or race, and they demanded action to be taken to improve "high school facilities." This they emphasized: "either the United States will destroy ignorance, or ignorance will destroy the United States."<ref>{{cite web|last=Du Bois|first=W. E. B.|title=Address to the Nation|url=http://www.wfu.edu/~zulick/341/niagara.html|location=Harper's Ferry, West Virginia|date=August 16, 1900|publisher=Second annual meeting of the Niagara Movement|access-date=December 3, 2012|archive-date=July 8, 2012|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20120708031329/http://www.wfu.edu/%7Ezulick/341/niagara.html|url-status=live}}</ref> They demanded for judges to be selected independently of their race, and for convicted criminals, white or black, to be given equal punishments for their respective crimes.  

In his address to the nation, W. E. B. Du Bois stated, "We are not more lawless than the white race; we [are] more often arrested, convicted and mobbed. We want justice, even for criminals and outlaws." He called for the abolition of the [[convict lease]] system. Established after the Civil War before southern states built prisons, convicts were leased out to work as cheap laborers for "railway contractors, mining companies and those who farm large plantations." Southern states had passed laws targeting blacks and leasing them out to pay off fines or fees they could not manage. The system continued, earning money for local jurisdictions and the state from leasing out prisoners. There was little oversight, and many prisoners were abused and worked to death.<ref>{{cite book|last=Wells|first=Ida B|title=The Reason Why the Colored American Is Not in the World's Columbian Exposition: The Afro-American's Contribution to Columbian Literature.|year=1999|publisher=University of Illinois Press|location=Illinois|page=23|author2=Frederick Douglass |author3-link=Irvine Garland Penn|author3=Irvine Garland Penn |author4=Ferdinand L. Barnett |chapter=Chapter 3: The Convict Lease System}}</ref><ref>Douglas Blackmon, ''Slavery by Another Name''</ref> Urging a return to the faith of "our fathers," the declaration appealed for every person to be considered equal and free.

The declaration also targeted the treatment blacks received from labor unions, often oppressed and not fully protected by their employers nor granted permanent employment. It validated the already announced affirmation that such protest against outright injustice would not cease until such discrimination did. Secondly, Du Bois and Trotter stated the irrationality of discriminating based on one's "physical peculiarities", whether it be place of birth or color of skin. Perhaps one's ignorance, or immorality, poverty or diseases are legitimate excuses, but not the matters over which individuals have no control. Near its end, the document condemns the [[Jim Crow]] laws, the rejection of blacks for enlistment in the Navy and by the military academies, the non-enforcement of the 13th, 14th and 15th Amendments protecting the rights of blacks, and the "unchristian" behaviors of churches that segregate and show prejudice to their black brothers. The Declaration thanked those who "stand for equality" and the advancement of this cause.<ref name=DecPrin/><ref>{{cite web|last=Williams|first=Scott|title=The Niagara Movement|publisher=Department of Mathematics, University at Buffalo|url=http://www.math.buffalo.edu/~sww/0history/hwny-niagara-movement.html|access-date=December 3, 2012|archive-date=October 30, 2012|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20121030170441/http://www.math.buffalo.edu/~sww/0history/hwny-niagara-movement.html|url-status=live}}</ref>

===Opposition===
[[Image:BookerTWashington-Cheynes.LOC.jpg|thumb|right|[[Booker T. Washington]], 1903 portrait]]
Booker T. Washington and his supporters tried to discourage growth of this rival movement. Washington, [[Timothy Thomas Fortune|Thomas Fortune]], and Charles Anderson met after learning of the Movement's formation, and agreed to suppress news of it in the black press.<ref>Fox, p. 92.</ref> They acquired supporters in [[Archibald Grimké]] and Kelly Miller, two moderates who had been friendly with Trotter, but had not been invited by Du Bois to the convention (Grimké was hired by Fortune's ''[[New York Age]]''). The ''Age'' editorialized that the Movement was little more than an attempt to tear down the house that Washington had labored to set up.<ref>Fox, p. 95.</ref> A Boston supporter of Washington convinced the printer of Trotter's ''Guardian'' to withdraw his services, but Trotter managed to continue printing anyway.<ref>Fox, p. 97.</ref> Prominent white activists, including Francis Jackson Garrison and [[Oswald Garrison Villard]] (family of abolitionist [[William Lloyd Garrison]], a hero of Trotter), refused to attend Trotter-organized commemorations of their father's birth centennial.<ref>Fox, p. 99.</ref> They chose a celebration organized by Bookerites.<ref>Fox, p. 100.</ref>

Despite Washington's attempts at suppression, Du Bois reported at the end of 1905 that a number of black publications had published accounts of the Movement's activities, and it received further publicity as a consequence of Bookerite press attacks against it.<ref>Rudwick, pp. 180–181.</ref> Washington also attacked the [[Constitution League]], a multi-racial civil rights group that was also opposed to his accommodationist policies. The Niagara Movement made common cause with this organization.<ref>Rudwick, pp. 183–185.</ref>