ABSTRACT

This perception of Washington and Du Bois as personifying competing opposites in an ideological struggle within black American society is one that was generally endorsed by contemporary commentators within the United States and by later historians. Samuel R. Spencer, a biographer of Washington in the 1950s, reflected that the Tuskegeean "was a practical realist, interested primarily in attaining tangible goals." In contrast, Du Bois "was a romantic, willing and eager to fight for principle even if the battle cost him his life." Du Bois as an academic and intellectual "liked to deal with ideas, while Washington preferred men and things."2