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Who is George
Edwin Taylor?
Taylor was born in Little Rock,
Arkansas, in August
1857, to Amanda Hines, a free black woman. Taylor later reported that his father was
Nathan Taylor, a slave. Hines was forced to
leave Arkansas in 1859 as a consequence of a new
law which required all free blacks to leave
the state by 1 January 1860 or be sold as
slaves. Hines died in
Alton, Illinois, in 1861 or 1862, and young George was forced to
live in “dry goods boxes” and fend for
himself until 1865 when he arrived in La Crosse, Wisconsin,
onboard the “Hawkeye State,” a side-paddle vessel then operating on the
upper Mississippi River.
Taylor
lived in La Crosse
only one or two years, after which he was
“bound out” to Nathan Smith of rural
West Salem where he lived until
he reached the age of 20 years. He attended
Wayland
University
in Beaver Dam from 1877 to 1879, after which
he settled in La Crosse and in the employ of Marcus “Brick”
Pomeroy, editor of Pomeroy’s Democrat.
From 1880 to 1885, Taylor wrote for several local papers and contributed
articles to the
Chicago
Inter
Ocean. In
1885, he was the editor of a newspaper
supported financially by Frank “White
Beaver” Powell, and eventually became an
important player in Powell’s first two terms
as mayor of
La Crosse. In 1886
and 1887, Taylor
became a crucial figure and office holder in
Wisconsin’s People’s
Party and then its Union Labor Party. His
Wisconsin Labor Advocate was the voice
of
Wisconsin’s labor
party in 1886-1887. From 1891 to 1910,
Taylor
lived in Oskaloosa and
Ottumwa,
Iowa, where he published a
national magazine called the Negro
Solicitor. During this period he rose to
prominence in national black politics,
acting as president of the National Colored
Men’s Protective Association and the
National Negro Democratic League and served
high office in various other black
organizations. In 1904, Taylor was selected to lead the ticket of the National
Negro Liberty Party for the office of
president of the United States.
From 1910 to 1925,
Taylor retreated from the
national stage and lived an active life in Jacksonville, Florida.
Resources on
George Edwin Taylor:
Wisconsin Labor Advocate -
One of the first items digitized with the
help of UW-La Crosse Murphy Library
Endowment Fund in 2002 was the only known
original copy of the Wisconsin Labor
Advocate, a newspaper published in
La Crosse in 1886 and
1887. This newspaper had been given to the
La Crosse Library Association and was
considered by that association so liberal
and incendiary that it was never removed
from its original wrappers. That collection
of papers was found in a store room of the
library only in 1986. Murphy Library at the
University of Wisconsin-La Crosse has the
original issues, and the full run is
available online.
Haas, Charles. “George
Edwin Taylor: The black presidential
candidate with the
La Crosse
connection.” Past, Present and Future.
La Crosse
County Historical Society
vol. 30, no. 4 (October-December 2008): 1-3.
Included is a nice full-length portrait from
the Univ. of North Florida library.
There are some nice
materials about Taylor and blacks in La
Crosse on
La Crosse History Unbound including
images of the paper Taylor published here in
La Crosse from 1886-1887 Wisconsin Labor
Advocate.
Black La Crosse, Wisconsin,
1850-1906: Settlers, Entrepreneurs &
Exodusers.
Mouser, Bruce L.
La Crosse:
La Crosse County Historical Society, 2002.
This monograph consists of eight chapters
covering the history of Black settlement
between 1850 and 1906. Chapters 1 through 5
include biographical sketches of all persons
listed in official records,
personal/residential/occupational data for
each person, residential districts and
barbershop addresses, a chronology of Black
settlement for the period of study, and a
narrative analysis of data. Chapters 6
through 8 consist of reprints of eight
articles printed earlier in Past,
Present, & Future.
La Crosse
County Historical Society between 1998 and
2001. Of particular are chapters regarding
George Coleman Poage (Olympian in 1904) and
George Edwin Taylor (newspaper publisher,
politician, and unsuccessful candidate for
President of the United States
in 1904).
For Labor, Race, and Liberty: George Edwin
Taylor and the Making of Black Politics.
Bruce L Mouser. University of Wisconsin Press, 2010. Available for
purchase online at ///.
There are several
hundred published and original materials
written about La Crosse and La Crosse County
in
La Crosse History Unbound,
including theses, dissertations, seminar
papers, pictures, maps, charts, and so
forth. This site also provides access to
various government documents and local
sources.
Documents relating directly to George Edwin
Taylor:
Many of these were not appended in Mouser’s
2010 biography of
Taylor
but are included here. Readers are asked to
suggest items for inclusion: such items
should be sent to
mouser.bruce@charter.net.
Defense of
Voting Requirements – 1898
This is an essay written by an unidentified
person at the Negro Solicitor, likely
in late 1897 or early 1898, and republished
in the Broad Ax, which was then being
published in Salt Lake
City, Utah. The original issue of the
Negro Solicitor from which this essay
was taken no longer exists. Source: The
Broad Ax, Salt Lake City, Utah, 30 April
1898, p.4
Cincinnati
Platform – 1887
The
Cincinnati
Platform of the Union Labor Party.
Conference of Industrial Labor, Cincinnati, Ohio,
22 to 24 February 1887. Source: Wisconsin
Labor Advocate, La Crosse,
Wisconsin, 4 March
1887
Colored
Democrat – 1900
“A
Colored Democrat: Oskaloosa’s Black Boom for Bryan.” This article is the first sketch of Taylor and was written by
him at the request of the press. It was
written following Taylor’s election as president of the National
Negro Democratic League in 1900. This is the
first appearance of information about his
early life. Much information from this
sketch appears later in
Taylor’s campaign
literature in 1904. Source: Times
Picayune, 12 August 1900, p22.
Cora Taylor
Editorial – 1896
Editorial written by Cora E. Taylor,
Oskaloosa, Iowa, and co-editor of The
Negro Solicitor, on about 30 May 1896
Letter of
Acceptance – 1904
Letter of acceptance
made public today by Hon. George E. Taylor.
Source:
Ottumwa
Weekly Democrat, 15 September 1904, p1.
Letters of acceptance were generally
published in full for all nominees of
political parties. This is the only known
segment from
Taylor’s letter of
acceptance.
La Crosse
Convention Platform – 1886
Platform of the La Crosse Convention, 16 July 1886. Source:
La Crosse News,
La Crosse,
Wisconsin, 17 July
1886, p2.
National
Appeal – 1892
A National Appeal of 1892: Address
to the American Negro and the Friends of
Human
Liberty. Issued
following the
Minneapolis
Convention of the National Republican Party.
Source:
Daniel Murray Pamphlet Collection (Library of Congress)
National
Appeal – 1896
National Appeal to the American
Negro of 1896: Why we should favor the
Chicago platform : by Geo. E. Taylor,
Oskaloosa, Iowa.
Source:
African American Perspectives: Pamphlets
from the Daniel A.P.Murray Collection,
1818-1907, Library of Congress
Neenah
Convention Platform – 1886
The Labor Platform Adopted At The
Neenah
Convention. Source:
Wisconsin Labor Advocate,
24 September 1886, p2
Negroes
for Bryan – 1900
This was a message to the nation given by
the National Negro Democratic League at the
conclusion of its biennial convention held
in Kansas, City, Missouri in 1900. That
convention was marked by a vigorous campaign
for president of the League. George Taylor
was selected as the League’s president, but
his challenger, Fredrick McGhee, asked
League to produce a letter to the American
public. McGhee became the chairman of a
Committee on Addresses chosen to draft such
a letter. It is likely that this
announcement was largely the creation of
Fredrick McGhee. Source:
Broad Ax
(Chicago,
Illinois), 21 July 1900
National
Liberty Party Appeal – 1904
“The National Liberty
Party’s Appeal, by George Edwin Taylor,
Candidate of the National Liberty Party for President of the United States.”
A slightly different version was printed by
The Independent,
Houston, Texas, 57(13 October 1904), 844-6. Source:
Voice of the Negro, October 1904, 844-46
National
Liberty Party Platform – 1904
National Negro Liberty Party Platform
adopted at convention at Douglass Hotel, St.
Louis, MO.,
on 7 July 1904. Source: Everit Brown
and Albert Strauss, A Dictionary of
American Politics (New York: A. L. Burt, c.1907), 585-87. For a
summary of the platform, see East St.
Louis Daily Journal, East St. Louis,
Illinois, 8 July
1904. The platform also is printed in Edward
Stanwood, A History of the Presidency
vol. 2 (New York: Houghton Mifflin, 1916),
127-29. The Landmark,
Statesville,
North Carolina, 22 July 1904,
p2, listed the “non-interference” in the
affairs of the Far East
as one of the five most important issues of
the campaign
Ross to
Taylor
- 1904
Letter, James Ross to George Taylor, 9
August 1904. Source:
Ottumwa Courier, Ottumwa, Iowa,
16 August 1904, p.2
Sun interview with Taylor –
1904
Taylor interview with
The Sun,
conducted c. 9 or 10 November 1904. A
portion of this interview was published by
the
Washington
Bee, 26 November 1904. Source:
The Sun,
New York City, New York, 20 November 1904,
Section 3, p.7
Tillinghast Editorial – 2008
Article by Muriel Tillinghast written for
“The Ladner Report – 25 May 2008.
“What the Party
is.”
This is the only copy of this article and
synopsis. Source: The
Ottumwa
Courier,
Ottumwa, Iowa, 3 August 1904.
“A
Man or a Monkey.”
This is a clipping from the
Negro Solicitor and was found in a
scrapbook of clippings kept by George
Woodson of
Buxton,
Iowa. It was among a group of
clippings dated by someone in the July to
August period of 1898.
“Ex-Slave Bounty and Pension
Association,”
Senate Bill S.1176 -
1899
This page from the Congressional Record
contains the exact language of the bill
introduced "by request" by Senator Pettus.
According to the debate found on this page,
it was identical to other bills offered in
both the House and the Senate over the
years. Source: U.S. Senate, Cong. Rec.,
56th Cong., 1st sess., 1899–1900, 11
December 1899 (Mr. Pettus), 33:183.
Pictures of George Edwin Taylor or of his
particular world. Readers are asked to
suggest pictures for inclusion: such items
should be sent to
mouser.bruce@charter.net.
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