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Niagara Movement
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==Meetings== *Scheduled for [[Buffalo, New York]] but because of threatened disruptions from partisans of the politically powerful Booker T. Washington at the last minute to rescheduled for the Erie Beach Hotel in [[Fort Erie]] in [[Ontario, Canada]] *[[Harpers Ferry, West Virginia]] (1906) *[[Boston, Massachusetts]] (1907) *[[Oberlin, Ohio]] (1908) *[[Sea Isle City, New Jersey]] (1909) After the initial meeting, delegates returned to their home territories to establish local chapters. By mid-September 1905, they had established chapters in 21 states, and the organization had 170 members by year's end.<ref name="Du Bois Papers, Special Collections and University Archives, W.E.B. Du Bois Library, University of Massachusetts Amherst">{{cite web|url=http://www.library.umass.edu/spcoll/dubois/?page_id=12|title=Du Bois Central: Resources on the life and legacy of W.E.B. Du Bois. Niagara Movement|publisher=Special Collections and University Archives, W.E.B. Du Bois Library, University of Massachusetts Amherst|access-date=September 2, 2009|url-status=dead|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20100213110340/http://www.library.umass.edu/spcoll/dubois/?page_id=12|archive-date=February 13, 2010}}</ref> Du Bois founded a magazine, ''The Moon'', in an attempt to establish an official mouthpiece for the organization. Due to lack of funding, it failed after a few months of publication.<ref>Fox, p. 101</ref> A second publication, ''The Horizon'', was started in 1907 and survived until 1910.<ref name=Rudwick190>Rudwick, p. 190.</ref><ref name=Rudwick198>Rudwick, p. 198.</ref> [[File:Niagara-leaders.jpg|left|thumb|250px|Niagara Movement leaders [[W. E. B. Du Bois]] (seated), and (left to right) [[J. R. Clifford]] (who organized the 2nd meeting), [[Lafayette M. Hershaw|L. M. Hershaw]], and [[Freeman H. M. Murray|F. H. M. Murray]] at [[Harpers Ferry]].]] The movement's second meeting, the first to be held on U.S. soil and arguably the movement's high point, took place at [[Harpers Ferry, West Virginia]], the site of abolitionist [[John Brown (abolitionist)|John Brown]]'s [[John Brown's raid on Harpers Ferry|1859 raid]]. The three-day gathering, from August 15 to 18, 1906, took place at the campus of [[Storer College]] (now part of [[Harpers Ferry National Historical Park]]). The [[Hill Top House Hotel]] hosted many of the guests. Convention attendees discussed how to secure civil rights for African Americans, and the meeting was later described by Du Bois as "one of the greatest meetings that American Negroes ever held." Attendees walked from Storer College to the nearby Murphy Family farm, relocation site of [[John Brown's Fort|the historic fort]] where John Brown's quest to end slavery reached its bloody climax. Once there, they removed their shoes and socks to honor the hallowed ground and participated in a ceremony of remembrance.<ref name="nps"/> Several of the organization's chapters made substantive contributions to the advance of civil rights in 1906. The [[Massachusetts]] chapter successfully lobbied against state legislation for the segregation of railroad cars, but was unable to stop the state from helping to fund the [[Jamestown Exposition]], a commemoration of the founding of racially motivated [[Jamestown, Virginia]], in which Virginia sought to limit black admission. The Illinois chapter convinced Chicago theater critics to ignore a production of ''[[The Clansman]]''.<ref>Rudwick, p. 187.</ref> During the early months of 1906 friction began to develop between Du Bois and Trotter over the admission of women to the organization. Du Bois supported the idea, and Trotter opposed it, but eventually relented, and the matter was smoothed over during the 1906 meeting.<ref>Fox, p. 103.</ref> Their division became more significant when Trotter split with longtime supporter and Movement member [[Clement Morgan]] over Massachusetts politics and control of the local Movement chapter, with Du Bois siding with the latter.<ref>Fox, pp. 104β106.</ref> When the Movement met in Boston in 1907 Du Bois not only admitted GrimkΓ© and Miller to the organization, he reappointed Morgan to a leading position in the organization.<ref>Fox, p. 108.</ref> Further attempts to heal the rift failed, and Trotter then resigned from the Movement.<ref>Fox, pp. 109β110.</ref> In 1906 there were several proposals floated in the black press that the Movement be merged with other organizations. None of these proposals got off the ground, with the only substance being a meeting between the Movement's [[Washington, DC]] chapter and members of the Bookerite [[National Afro-American Council]].<ref>Rudwick, pp. 187β189.</ref> [[File:Niagara Movement delegates, Boston, Mass., 1907.png|thumb|300px|right|Delegates to the Niagara Movement meeting in Boston, Massachusetts in 1907]] The Movement, in conjunction with the Constitution League (which took Du Bois on as a director), began organizing legal challenges to segregationist laws in early 1907. For an organization with a limited budget, this was an expensive proposition: the single case they mounted challenging Virginia's railroad segregation law put the organization into debt.<ref name=Rudwick190/> Du Bois had sought to return to Harpers Ferry for the 1907 annual meeting, but Storer College refused to grant them permission, claiming the group's presence in 1906 had been followed by financial and political pressure from its supporters to distance itself from them. The 1907 meeting was held in Boston, with conflicting attendance reports. Du Bois claimed 800 attendees, while the Bookerite ''[[Washington Bee]]'' claimed only about 100 in attendance.<ref>Rudwick, p. 191.</ref> The convention published an "Address to the World" in which it called on African-Americans not to vote for [[Republican Party (United States)|Republican Party]] candidates in the [[1908 United States presidential election|1908 presidential election]], citing President [[Theodore Roosevelt]]'s support for [[Jim Crow laws]].<ref>Rudwick, p. 192.</ref>
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