SOURCE: “Emigrate!” in Martin R. Delany: The Beginnings of Black Nationalism, Beacon Press, 1971, pp. 141‐71.

In the following excerpt, Ullman traces the growth of Delany's theory of Black separatism, emphasizing his role in the National Emigration Convention of 1854.

Condition and Elevation has always been a neglected source of information in the study of the American Negro. The reason may be because it violates the American illusion of democratic equality. It sets forth quite clearly and in detail the genesis of one of today's unmentionables—that the American brand of apartheid differs little in white attitudes from those of South Africa and Rhodesia.

Delany can be accused—and was—of poor writing in portions of Condition and Elevation but never of superficial thinking or compromise with his innate honesty. He declared in his preface that his “sole object has been to place before the public in general, and the colored...