Tentative Response - Booker T. Washington

Booker T. Washington suggested that the education required for training to enter the workforce already exists, and the reason blacks are oppressed is because they do not treat education with the level of importance that they should, but this is not true, according to DuBois. DuBois claims that the lack of educational resources provided to blacks is how white people keep them oppressed. 

DuBois argues that the best approach to advancing the rights of the black population is to contribute to the progress of the country. The progress that he refers to the industrialization of the South. While southerners used to be content in the simplicity of their lifestyles, industrialization created a thirst for wealth and increased the demand for a sizable and qualified workforce. The black population possessed many of the desired skills, but now needed training programs and education that they did not received during the period of slavery, needed to do their jobs. By making blacks a necessary part of the society’s success, they are forcing the white power to provide them with the education they withheld to maintain control over them.