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The colored people generally are very sensitive upon the matter of the
terms commonly employed to describe or to distinguish them from the white
race. The subject should not trouble them at all, seeing that no
particular name whatever can be applied to them which will in all
respects meet the case. The word "freedman" will not answer because all
are not freedmen. The word "colored" will not apply to them any more
than it would to the so-called white race; neither black and white being
"colors," but decidedly negative.
Taking the comprehensiveness of the term in view, the white people have
more color than the black, and if either should be called "colored" it
ought to be the former. It is a distinction, however, of which the white
people are not disposed to rob the latter.
The term "negro" cannot apply to all, while it does aply to some, as we
find it defined as "one of the black, woolly-headed, flat-nosed, and
thick-lipped race of men inhabiting Africa." We showed the other day the
word "Sambo" to mean the "offspring of the mulatto and the negro;" and
"mulatto" means the offspring of parents one of whom is white and the
other black.
"Cuffee," another common term is doubtless derived from the word Caffree,
an inhabitant of one of the countries of Southern Africa. And inasmuch
as the mixture which pervades them as a people, is in the way, they
cannot legitimately be styled
Africans. To be nice and particular in designating them, therefore we
must call each after the name which history and the dictionary have given
him. None of their names have any other than a serious actual
significance, however unpleasant they may sound on account of their
associations. If however there must be one particular appellation, what
shall it be?--Exchange |