Atlanta Compromise

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The Atlanta Compromise was an address by African-American leader Booker T. Washington on September 18, 1895. Given to a predominantly white audience at the Cotton States and International Exposition in Atlanta, Georgia, the speech has been recognized as one of the most important and influential speeches in American history, because it forever changed hiring practices.

Washington began with a call to the African-American race, which comprised one third of the Southern population, to join the world of work. He declared that the South was where an African-American was given his or her chance, as opposed to the North, and especially in the worlds of commerce and industry. He then addressed the White audience, telling them rather than rely on the immigrant population arriving at the rate of a million souls a year, they should hire some of the eight million African-Americans. He praised their loyalty, fidelity, and love in service to the white population, but warned that they could be a great burden on society if oppression continued, stating outright that the progress of the south was inherently tied to the treatment of African-Americans and their liberties.

He addressed the inequality between commercial legality and social acceptance, proclaiming that "The opportunity to earn a dollar in a factory just now is worth infinitely more than the opportunity to spend a dollar in an opera house."