Christopher Buck
Alain Locke and Cultural Pluralism
ALAIN LEROY LOCKE, 1918
the year he earned a Ph.D. from Harvard University,
and the year he formally embraced the Bahá’í Faith.
(Alain Locke Papers, Moorland-Spingarn Research Center,
Howard University.
94
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Alain Locke and Cultural Pluralism
By Christopher Buck
Book chapter, published in: Search for Values: Ethics in Baha’i
Thought. Edited by Seena Fazel and John Danesh. Los
Angeles: Kalimat Press, 2004. Pp. 94–158.
African American philosopher Alain Locke is arguably the most profound
and important Western Bahá’í philosopher to date. Except for one 1979
article in a Bahá’í periodical, scholarship on Locke has neither seriously
taken into account his Bahá’í identity nor the Faith’s influence on his
work. The present study, based largely on archival sources, contributes to
research on this “missing” dimension of Locke’s complex life and
thought. It examines Locke’s worldview as a Bahá’í, his secular
perspective as a philosopher, and the synergy between his confessional
and professional essays. This study also argues that Locke had a fluid
hierarchy of values—of loyalty, tolerance, reciprocity, cultural relativism
and pluralism (the philosophical equivalent of “unity in diversity”)—and
that this hierarchy represents a progression and application of
quintessentially Bahá’í ideals. Locke’s distinction as a “Bahá’í
philosopher” may therefore be justified on ideological as well as historical
grounds. Locke “translated” Bahá’í ideals “into more secular terms” so
that “a greater practical range will be opened up for the application and
final vindication of the Bahá’í principles” in order to achieve “a positive
multiplication of spiritual power.” 1
One can appreciate the deep–seated desire and the ever–recurrent but
Utopian dream of the idealist that somehow a single faith, a common culture,
an all–embracing institutional life and its confraternity should some day
unite man by merging all his loyalties and culture values. But even with
almost complete intercommunication within practical [96] grasp, that day
seems distant, especially since we have as great need for cultural pluralism in
a single unit of society as in a nation as large and as composite as our own.
[…] The pluralist way to unity seems by far the most practicable.
– Alain Locke,
“Pluralism and Ideological Peace” (1947).2
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Bahá’í philosopher?
Recent scholarship on the African American philosopher and aesthete,
Alain LeRoy Locke (d. 1954), has brought his work “back to influential
life.”3 Locke is arguably the most profound and important Western Bahá’í
philosopher to date. Gayle Morrison rightly calls him “the outstanding
black intellectual” 4 among the early Bahá’ís. He embraced the Bahá’í Faith
in 1918, the year he received his doctorate in philosophy from Harvard
University. In what sense, then, is Locke a “Bahá’í philosopher”?
Although there is no formal discipline of Bahá’í philosophy as such,
Bahá’í philosophy is expected to evolve over time. A close comparison of
Locke’s Bahá’í essays with his philosophical ones discloses some striking
resonances between the two, from shared vocabulary to parallel concepts.
The present study will attempt to fill a lacuna in the literature on Locke,
in which his worldview as a Bahá’í is given passing mention at best, or, at
worst, is ignored altogether. By further developing Ernest Mason’s initial
work on Locke’s Bahá’í identity and its presumed interaction with his
thinking as a philosopher,5 this study hopes to fill in this “missing”
dimension of Locke that has all too often been glossed over in the
literature. While we will never know if Locke himself would have been
comfortable with that label, certainly he would have acknowledged the
impact of his Bahá’í experience on his life in general and probably on his
philosophy in particular. As will be shown, the converse holds true as
well, in that much of Locke’s formal philosophical thinking informed his
Bahá’í perspective.
In a popular publication, The Black 100, Alain Locke ranks as the 36th
most influential African American ever, past or pre- [97] sent. 6
Distinguished as the first African American Rhodes Scholar, Locke was
the philosophical architect—indeed, the “Dean”7 —of the Harlem
Renaissance, a period of cultural efflorescence connected with the “New
Negro” movement of the mid-1920s to mid-1930s (not to be confused
with the “American Renaissance” just preceding the Civil War). This was
a watershed period in African American history for psychological
revalorisation and race vindication. “Arguably Locke was the first black
American,” writes Winston Napier, “seeking to challenge European
cultural imperialism through the formal articulation of a black
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aesthetics.”8 Among his other roles, Locke was the first African American
president of the American Association for Adult Education, a
predominantly white, national education association.9 He helped found
the prestigious Conference on Science, Philosophy and Religion, which he
chaired in 1945. Locke served on the editorial board of the American
Scholar and was a regular contributor to national journals and
magazines.10 By universal acclamation, Locke has achieved immortality as
a great African American. Yet by comparison his identity and
contributions as a Bahá’í remain relatively obscure.
Augmented by his fame and prestige in wider American society, his role
as a contributor to the first five volumes of the Bahá’í World invites a
closer examination of Locke’s significance as a Bahá’í writer during the
early years of the American Bahá’í community. Except for Ernest Mason’s
article,11 which exists in splendid isolation, there is a dearth of literature
on the topic. As interest in Locke intensifies and new documents come to
light, this essay will complement prior scholarship by taking a closer look
at the Bahá’í dimension of Locke’s life and thought, and exploring how
the synergy between Locke’s Bahá’í essays and philosophical essays
permit one to speak of an inchoate “Bahá’í philosophy” in embryonic
form.
The present study is based, in part, on Locke’s autobiographical note that
prefaced his first formal philosophical essay, “Values and Imperatives,”12
published when he was fifty years old (1935). Locke refers to this self–
narrative as his “psychograph.” In it, Locke does not directly mention the
fact that he was a Bahá’í. But he does allude to it, calling himself a
“universalist in religion.”13 As a [98] methodological control and anchor
of authenticity, periodic references to Locke’s psychograph will be made
throughout this essay.
Locke begins his psychograph so: “I should like to claim as life-motto the
good Greek principle,—‘Nothing in excess,’ but I have probably worn
instead as the badge of circumstance,—‘All things with a reservation.’”14
While a Bahá’í for most of his adult life, Locke had some reservations
about ways in which the Bahá’í Faith was understood and applied by
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some of his fellow Bahá’ís. His reservations may contribute to a richer
understanding of Bahá’í principles as he interpreted them through his
unique perspective as both a race leader (“perforce an advocate of cultural
racialism”) as well as a “cultural cosmopolitan” steeped in the
“philosophy of value,” allied with “cultural pluralism and value
relativism.”15 This study will thus situate Locke within the context of
those intellectual formations—value theory, pragmatism, Boasian
anthropology, and cultural pluralism, as well as Bahá’í principles—that
deeply influenced him.
Early life
An African American (“Negro”) child of Northern Reconstruction with an
enlightened upbringing, Locke was the only son of Pliny Locke and Mary
(Hawkins) Locke, who had been engaged for sixteen years before they
married.16 Alain LeRoy Locke was born on 13 September 1885 in
Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, not in 1886, as is commonly thought.17 For
reasons that have eluded historians, Locke always represented the year of
his birth as 1886—not 1885.18 At birth, although his name was recorded
as “Arthur,” his parents may have actually named him “Alan.” From the
age of sixteen, Locke later adopted the French spelling, “Alain” (close to
the American pronunciation of “Allen”) and added the middle name
“LeRoy” (probably because he was called “Roy” as a child).19
In his psychograph, Locke reflects on his childhood: “Philadelphia, with
her birthright of provincialism flavoured by urbanity and her petty
bourgeois psyche with the Tory slant, at the start set the key of paradox;
circumstance compounded it by decreeing me as a [99] Negro, a dubious
and doubting sort of American and by reason of racial inheritance making
me more of a pagan than a Puritan, more of a humanist than a
pragmatist.”20 While Locke himself did not explain what he meant by the
“key of paradox,” “paradox” appears to be a reference to twists of fate and
to tensions as well as the harmony between his cultural nationalism and
integrationist universalism—perhaps never fully resolving the ideological
paradox. In Philadelphia, Locke led a sheltered and somewhat privileged
life (relative to the lives of the vast majority of other black Americans at
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the turn of the last century).21 A biographer notes that Locke was a “child
of privilege in a black household whose ancestors on both sides had been
free before 1865.”22
Locke’s family background shows how nature and nurture combined to
provide him with rare educational advantages. Locke’s paternal
grandfather, Ishmael Locke (1820–1852), attended University of
Cambridge with support from the Society of Friends. Ishmael was
employed as a teacher in Salem, New Jersey, and, over four years,
established schools in Liberia, where he met and married Alain Locke’s
paternal grandmother, Sarah Shorter Hawkins, who was from Kentucky.
Ishmael Locke later served as principal of the Institute for Colored Youth
in Philadelphia, following his tenure as headmaster of a school in
Providence, Rhode Island.23
Locke’s father, Pliny Locke, graduated from the Institute in 1867, and
taught mathematics there for two years, after which he taught freedmen
in North Carolina during the early years of Reconstruction. He also held a
position as an accountant in the Freedman’s Bureau and the Freedman’s
Bank, and was private secretary to General O. O. Howard. He was
accepted to the Howard University Law Department (later called the
School of Law), and graduated in 1874. That year, Pliny returned to
Philadelphia as a clerk in the US Post Office. He died in 1891.24
Locke’s mother, Mary (Hawkins) Locke, was from a family of free blacks,
among whom were soldiers who had fought with valor during the Civil
War and missionaries to Africa under the Society of Friends. Mary
Hawkins was a descendant of Charles Shorter, a free Negro who had
fought in the War of 1812.25 She was educated at the [100] Institute for
Colored Youth in Philadelphia. Mary Locke supported herself and her
family as a teacher in Camden and Camden County. She was a disciple of
the humanist and rabbi, Felix Adler (d. 1933), who believed that all
religions had a common ethical basis, and who proposed the First
Universal Races Congress held in 1911, to the American section of which
he and W. E. B. Du Bois were elected co–secretaries.26 She joined the
Society for Ethical Culture, which Adler founded in 1876. It was liberal
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on racial matters. Adler invited Booker T. Washington and W. E. B. Du
Bois to lecture at the Society, and encouraged black students to enrol in
his own school.27 His mother’s role as both a teacher and a humanist
probably left its imprint on Locke, who, in his psychograph, described
himself as “more of a humanist than a pragmatist.”28
Locke had an Episcopal upbringing. During his youth, he was enamoured
of Greek philosophy.29 Later he found, as Leonard Harris puts it, a
“spiritual home” in the Bahá’í Faith.30 Mary Locke died on 23 April
1922.31 In a letter dated 28 June 1922 to Agnes Parsons, Locke disclosed
that his mother had been favourably disposed to the Bahá’í Faith:
“Mother’s feeling toward the cause [the Bahá’í Faith], and the friends
[Bahá’ís] who exemplify it, was unusually receptive and cordial for one
who had reached conservative years,—it was her wish that I identify
myself more closely with it.” At the end of the letter, Locke speaks of the
Bahá’í Faith as “this movement for human brotherhood.”32 Given the
extraordinary demands placed upon him as an academic, lecturer, cultural
critic, and educator, Locke lived up fairly well to his mother’s wish over
the next two decades.
University education
Locke had a black middle class upbringing, but with an unusual
education. In his infancy, Locke was stricken with rheumatic fever, which
permanently damaged his heart (an inhibitive factor in Locke’s later
activities as a Bahá’í). After the episode of rheumatic fever, Locke dealt
with his “rheumatic heart” by seeking “compensatory satisfactions” in
books, piano, and violin.33 Only six years old [101] when his father died,
Locke was sent by his mother to one of the Ethical Culture schools,
which was a pioneer, experimental program of Froebelian pedagogy (after
Friedrich Froebel [d. 1852], who opened the first kindergarten). By the
time he enrolled in Central High School of Philadelphia (1898–1902),
Locke was already an accomplished pianist and violinist. From 1902 to
1904, Locke attended the Philadelphia School of Pedagogy.34 Locke
graduated second in his class in 1904. That year, Locke entered Harvard
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College as an honor student, where he was one of only a few African
American undergraduates.
As a philosophy major, Locke studied under George Herbert Palmer, Josiah Royce, Hugo Münsterberg, and Ralph Barton Perry.35 Remarkably,
Locke completed his four–year program in only three years. During this
time, he was elected to Phi Beta Kappa. In 1907, Locke won the Bowdoin
Prize—Harvard’s most prestigious academic award—for an essay that he
wrote. Locke also passed a qualifying examination in Latin, Greek, and
mathematics for the Rhodes scholarship, which had just been established
in 1904. 36 Locke made history and headlines in May 1907 as America’s
first—and astonishingly, until 1960, the only—African American Rhodes
scholar. He graduated magna cum laude with his bachelor’s degree in
philosophy that same year.37 On his Rhodes Scholarship, Locke studied at
the University of Oxford from 1907 to 1910. “At Oxford,” Locke found
himself “once more intrigued by the twilight of aestheticism.”38 An
account of Locke’s experiences at Oxford is given by Jeffrey Stewart.39
Rejected by five Oxford colleges, Locke was finally admitted to Hertford
College.
As a Harvard senior in 1905, Locke had met Horace Kallen, a German–
born Jew who was a graduate teaching assistant in a course on Greek
philosophy—taught by George Santayana—in which Locke had enrolled.40
This was the beginning of an association that lasted for many years.
Kallen recorded some personal observations about Locke as a young man.
Locke was “very sensitive, very easily hurt.” Recalling a conversation at
Harvard, Kallen writes that Locke would strenuously insist that, “I am a
human being,” that, “We are all alike Americans,” and that his “color
ought not to make [102] any difference.”41 This is corroborated by a
letter Locke wrote to his mother, Mary Locke, shortly after having been
awarded his Rhodes scholarship, in which he insists: “I am not a race
problem. I am Alain LeRoy Locke.”42 Unfortunately, in that era, colour
made all the difference. Two years later, on a Sheldon traveling fellowship,
Kallen ended up at Oxford at the same time as Locke.
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At Oxford, recommencing their earlier conversation at Harvard, Locke
asked Kallen, “[W]hat difference does the difference [of race] make?” “In
arguing out those questions,” Kallen recounts, “the phrase ‘cultural
pluralism’ was born.”43 While the term itself was thus coined by Kallen in
this historic conversation with Locke,44 it was really Locke who developed
the concept into a full–blown philosophical framework for the
melioration of African Americans. Although distancing himself from
Kallen’s purist and separatist conception of it, Locke was part of the
cultural pluralist movement that flourished between the 1920s and the
1940s.
Kallen describes a racial incident over a Thanksgiving Day dinner hosted
at the American Club at Oxford. Locke was not invited, because of
“gentlemen from Dixie who could not possibly associate with Negroes.”45
Elsewhere, Kallen is more blunt: “[W]e had a race problem because the
Rhodes scholars from the South were bastards. So they had a
Thanksgiving dinner which I refused to attend because they refused to
have Locke.”46 In fact, even before they left for Oxford, these Southern
Rhodes scholars had “formally appealed to the Rhodes trustees to
overturn Locke’s award”47—but to no avail. “What got Kallen particularly
upset, however,” according to Louis Menand, “was the insult to
Harvard.”48
In support of this, Menand cites a letter to Harvard English professor
Barrett Wendell, in which Kallen speaks of overcoming his admitted
aversion to blacks through his loyalty to Harvard and by virtue of his
personal respect for Locke. After having invited Locke, as his guest, to tea
in lieu of the Thanksgiving dinner, Kallen writes that, “tho’ it is
personally repugnant to me to eat with him [...] but then, Locke is a
Harvard man and as such he has a definite claim on me.” 49 The irony is
that Kallen harbored some of the very same prejudices as the Southern
Rhodes scholars who shunned Locke, but not [103] to the same degree.
“As you know, I have neither respect nor liking for his race,” Kallen
writes, “—but individually they have to be taken, each on his own merits
and value, and if ever a Negro was worthy, this boy is.”50 Locke was
deeply wounded: “Now, the impact of that kind of experience left scars,”
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remarks Kallen.51 And it wasn’t just the prejudice of his fellow American
peers that so disaffected Locke, for he was almost as critical of British
condescension as he was of American racism. In 1909, Locke published a
critique of Oxford (“Oxford Contrasts”),52 particularly of its aristocratic
pretensions. 53
He found social acceptance elsewhere. He belonged to the “Oxford
Cosmopolitan Club,” which attracted a number of international students
(“colonials”). According to Posnock, “This group soon became Locke’s
intimate circle.” 54 For years to come, Locke nurtured these contacts
through extensive correspondence. While “socially Anglophile” as he says
in his psychograph, Locke found himself increasingly drawn to his sense
of “race loyalty.”55 As evidence of this, Locke helped establish the African
Union Society, and served as its secretary. Its constitution stated the
society’s purpose was to cultivate “thought and social intercourse
between its members as prospective leaders of the African Race.”56
Indeed, it was at Oxford that a crucial transformation took place: At
entrance, Locke saw himself as a cultural cosmopolitan; on exit, Locke
resolved to be a race leader.57 Hence, in his psychograph, Locke describes
himself as “a cultural cosmopolitan, but perforce an advocate of cultural
racialism as a defensive countermove for the American Negro.”58 In a
letter to his mother while he was at Oxford, Locke reflected: “Oxford is a
training–school for the governing classes, and has taught your son its
lesson.” 59 The Oxford experience steeled Locke’s sense of destiny as a
non-chauvinistic “advocate of cultural racialism.”60
So acutely did the Thanksgiving Day dinner incident traumatize Locke
that he left Oxford without taking a degree, and spent the next two years
studying Kant at the University of Berlin and touring Eastern Europe.61
Locke mentions in his psychograph that, while at Oxford, he became “but
dimly aware of the new realism of the Austrian philosophy of value.”62
During his study at the University of Berlin in 1910–1911, where he
earned a B.Litt., Locke became conversant with the “Aus- [104] trian
school” of anthropology, known as philosophical anthropology, under the
tutelage of Franz Brentano, Alexius von Meinong, Christian Freiherr von
Ehrenfels, Paul Natorp and others. In Paris, he studied under Bergson and
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others. Locke preferred Europe to America. There were moments when
Locke resolved never to return to the United States. Reluctantly, he did so
in 1911. In 1912, with the help of Booker T. Washington, Locke joined the
faculty of Howard University as a professor of English.63
In 1916–1917, Locke took a sabbatical as an Austin Teaching Fellow for
one year at Harvard. During his graduate year there, Locke explored the
ideas of such great thinkers as Hugo Münsterberg and von Ehrenfels, as
well as Kant and Hegel.64 In his psychograph, Locke writes: “Verily
paradox has followed me the rest of my days: at Harvard [as an
undergraduate], clinging to the genteel tradition of Palmer, Royce and
Münsterberg, yet attracted by the disillusion of Santayana and the radical
protest of James: again I returned [as a graduate student] to work under
Royce but was destined to take my doctorate in value theory under
Perry.”65 Here, Locke discloses important links in his intellectual
pedigree, which included the value theorists of Europe and the
pragmatists of America.66
Locke’s dissertation, “The Problem of Classification in Theory of Value,”
was an extension of a lengthy essay he had written at Oxford. It was
Harvard mentor Josiah Royce who inspired Locke’s interest in the
philosophy of value.67 Indeed, the underlying basis for Locke’s philosophy
was values theory. Values theory constituted the “pivot of Locke’s
thinking,” which was “his belief that human values are central in
determining the course of social life.”68 For Locke, there are five value–
types, each with corresponding “feeling–modes” which are, respectively:
[105]
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Alain Locke and Cultural Pluralism
Modal
Value
Value
Value
Value
Quality
Type
Predicates
Polarity
Polarity
Positive
Negative
Holiness
Salvation
Sin
Damnation
EXALTATION
(Awe–Worship)
Religious
Holy–Unholy
Good–Evil
TENSION
(Conflict–
Choice)
Ethical/
Moral
Good–Bad
Right–Wrong
Conscience
Right
Temptation
Crime
ACCEPTANCE
Logical
Correct–
Incorrect
Consistency
Contradiction
AGREEMENT
Scientific
True–False
Certainty
Error
Aesthetic/
Artistic
Beautiful–Ugly
Fine–
Satisfaction
Unsatisfactory Joy
REPOSE/
EQUILIBRIUM
Disgust
Distress
These value genres constitute Locke’s typology of values. The five “value
provinces”69 are the battlefields of cultural conflicts and the common
ground of mutual respect through value transposition. Values are “rooted
in attitudes, not in reality and pertain to ourselves, not to the world.”70
Moreover, Locke favored a “historical–comparative approach” as “the only
proper […] way of understanding values, including particularly those of
one’s own culture and way of life.” 71
In 1918, Locke was awarded his PhD in philosophy from Harvard. That
same year, Locke became a Bahá’í. Locke was “perhaps the most deeply
and exquisitely educated African American of his generation.” 72 This
assessment is brought into even sharper relief in the sobering knowledge
that, as late as 1935—a full generation after Locke—three–fourths of all
blacks had not gone beyond a fourth–grade education.73 His “exquisite”
education had prepared Locke for his historic role, which was—to cite his
psychograph—to become “a philosophical mid–wife to a generation of
younger Negro poets, writers, artists.”74
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Academic career
As previously mentioned, in 1912 Locke joined the faculty of the Teachers
College at Howard University as Assistant Professor of the [106]
Teaching of English and Instructor in Philosophy and Education. There
Locke taught literature, English, education, and ethics and, following
president Lewis B. Moore’s retirement in 1912, ethics and logic at
Howard University itself. In the spring of 1915, Locke proposed a course
on the scientific study of race and race relations. But the white ministers
on Howard University’s Board of Trustees rejected his petition. They
opposed him because they felt that controversial subjects such as race had
no place at a school whose mission was to educate black professionals.
However, the Howard chapter of the National Association for the
Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) and the Social Science Club
sponsored a two–year extension course of public lectures, which Locke
called, “Race Contacts and Inter-Racial Relations: A Study in the Theory
and Practice of Race.”75 As the focus of his lectures, Locke’s social
conception of race represented a further development of the thought of
cultural anthropologist Franz Boas. Locke viewed Boas as a “major
prophet of democracy.”76
Boas, who had significant contacts with Bahá’ís, effectively deconstructed
the so–called “scientific racism” so prevalent at that time. He was widely
regarded by intellectual historians as one who “did more to combat race
prejudice than any other person in history.”77 Boas convincingly exploded
the myth that race had any real basis in scientific fact. Racism was
biological nonsense. Cultural anthropology sought to establish “culture”
—as opposed to pseudo–scientific fictions of race—as a “central social
science paradigm.”78 Locke began his lectures by asserting Boas’s
distinction between racial difference and racial inequality. Racial difference is biological; racial inequality is social.79
Locke himself had a three–tiered conception of race: (1) theoretical; (2)
practical; (3) social.80 Like Boas, Locke held that race has no biological
significance. At best, it is a social construct that can serve to enhance
group identity. At worst, race can be used as a tool of oppression. Indeed,
Locke foresaw the “ultimate biological destiny of the human stock” as
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mulatto, or mixed, “like rum in the punch.”81 Sadly, Locke’s lectures had
no influence on his philosophical contemporaries.82
[107] In June 1925, Locke was fired from Howard University by its white
president, J. Stanley Durkee, for Locke’s support of an equitable faculty
pay scale and for student demands to end mandatory chapel and ROTC.
Following his dismissal, since he was no longer gainfully employed, Locke
needed to find a patron for support of his intellectual work. He found his
patron in Charlotte Mason, a wealthy white woman, with whom Locke
faithfully corresponded until her death in 1940. He did not return to
Howard University until 1928, when its first black president, Mordecai
Johnson, reinstated him.83 Locke was subsequently promoted to the chair
of the philosophy department. He is credited with having first introduced
the study of anthropology, along with philosophy and aesthetics, into the
curriculum at Howard. 84
In 1943, Locke was on leave as Inter–American exchange Professor to
Haiti under the joint auspices of the American Committee for Inter–
American Artistic and Intellectual Relations and the Haitian Ministry of
Education. Towards the end of his stay there, Haitian President Lescot
personally decorated Locke with the National Order of Honor and Merit,
grade of Commandeur. 85 During the 1945–1946 academic year, Locke was
Visiting Professor at the University of Wisconsin and in 1947 as Visiting
Professor at the New School for Social Research. One of Locke’s former
students at Wisconsin, Beth Singer, described her professor as follows:
“Locke was a quiet, extremely scholarly, and well organized lecturer; I do
not recall his speaking from notes.”86 After mentioning the fact that
Locke was a Bahá’í, Singer recalls that “Dr. Locke seemed somehow aloof,
and my friends and I were pretty much in awe of him.”87
On 28 May 1946, Locke gave a commencement address at University of
Wisconsin High School. Beth Singer notes the subsequent newspaper
story, “Dr. Locke Pleads for World Culture,” having quoted Locke as
saying: “[W]e are fast approaching a stage in which culture will have to
be international. This culture must have courtesy and reciprocity and
must be aided by religious tolerance. […] And in order to have tolerance,
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we must have every person intelligently aware of the common
denominators of basic ideas and basic moral issues. That is necessary for
basic unity.” 88 Interpreted through a [108] journalist’s ear, this report of
Locke’s lecture is a way to understand Locke in more practical, mundane
terms.89
From 1948–1952, Locke taught at City College of New York as well as
continuing to teach at Howard University. In June 1953, Locke retired,
and was awarded an Honorary Degree of Doctor of Humane Letters. He
moved to New York in July.
The Harlem Renaissance
As “philosophical mid–wife to a generation of younger Negro poets,
writers, [and] artists,”90 Alain Locke was the ideological mastermind
behind the Harlem Renaissance, “an artistic explosion in the decade
following World War I.”91 In its mythic and utopian sense, Harlem was
the “race capital” and the largest “Negro American” community in the
world. The Harlem Renaissance, consequently, presented itself as a
microcosm or “self-portraiture” of black culture to America and to the
world. The movement was an effusion of art borne of the experience of
“even ordinary living” that has “epic depth and lyric intensity.”92 As
editor of the anthology known as The New Negro, published in December
1925,93 Locke contributed the title essay, which served as a manifesto. In
the new Preface to the reissue of The New Negro anthology in 1968,
Robert Hayden (a well known Bahá’í and America’s first black poet–
laureate) echoes Locke’s vision of the Harlem Renaissance as rooted in
the transracial experience of America: “The Negro Renaissance was
clearly an expression of the Zeitgeist, and its writers and artists were
open to the same influences that their white counterparts were. What
differentiated the New Negroes from other American intellectuals was
their race consciousness, their group awareness, their sense of sharing a
common purpose.” For Locke, art ought to contribute to the
improvement of life—a pragmatist aesthetic principle Richard
Shusterman calls “meliorism.”94
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The Harlem Renaissance—known also as the “New Negro Movement”—
sought to advance freedom and equality for blacks through art. It was
“not just a great creative outburst in the stimulating atmosphere of the
1920s,” it was “actually a highly self–con- [109] scious modern artistic
movement.”95 Locke himself spoke of a “race pride,” “race genius” and
the “race–gift.”96 This “race pride” was to be cultivated through
developing a distinctive culture, a hybrid of African and African American
elements. 97 Locke had hoped the Harlem Renaissance would provide “an
emancipating vision to America” and would advance “a new democracy in
American culture.”98 But the Harlem Renaissance was more of an
“aristocratic” than democratic approach to culture. 99 In principle, Locke
was an avowed supporter of W. E. B. Du Bois’ idea of a cultural elite (the
“Talented Tenth”100), but differed from Du Bois’s insistence that art serve
as propaganda.101
Much criticized by other African Americans, Locke himself came to regret
the Harlem Renaissance’s excesses of exhibitionism, after it had dissolved
just a few years later.102 While the dazzling success of the movement was
short–lived, it is said to have had a more subtle, yet enduring influence.
According to Johnny Washington, the civil rights movement actually had
its roots, in a subterranean way, in the Harlem Renaissance: “Locke was
to the Harlem Renaissance what Martin Luther King, Jr., was to the civil
rights movement of the 1960s.”103 In the end, however, the efflorescence
of black culture failed to lead to civil and political rights for African
Americans. It would take a Martin Luther King, Jr. to spearhead a
movement that would achieve that goal.104
Eventually, as Posnock points out, “Locke enunciated his theory of
cosmopolitanism post facto, after the Harlem Renaissance, his principal
site of engagement, had largely run its course.”105 As Locke matured in
his philosophical thinking, he favoured open identities over closed social
ones.
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Locke as a Bahá’í
Prior to the Harlem Renaissance, Locke had become a Bahá’í. As stated
earlier, Locke embraced the Bahá’í Faith in 1918, the same year that he
received his doctorate from Harvard. There is thus a certain synchronicity
between Locke’s religion and his philosophy and, as I shall argue, a
synergy between the two acted as a dynamic intensifier. Indeed, around
the same time as he launched [110] the Harlem Renaissance, Locke made
a pilgrimage to the Bahá’í world centre in Haifa, Israel (then Palestine),
and travelled throughout the American South on a Bahá’í-sponsored
lecture tour.
In his psychograph, Locke described himself as a “universalist in
religion.”106 In a private communication, one leading authority on Locke
recently expressed doubts as to his formal affiliation with the Bahá’í
Faith. So, the question has to be asked: What direct proof, beyond
circumstantial evidence, establishes Locke’s actual status as a Bahá’í?
While he certainly associated with Bahá’ís and participated in Bahá’í
events—over a number of years, in fact—was Locke ever formally on
record as a declared Bahá’í? Moreover, did Locke’s involvement in the
Bahá’í Faith influence his vocation as a philosopher? To address these
questions, I will discuss Locke’s involvement in the Bahá’í Faith on the
basis of archival as well as published documents.
[111] Since formal enrollment procedures did not exist at that time, no
archival record of the exact date of Locke’s conversion has yet been found.
The academic and religious literature on Locke could, at best, speculate as
to the date of his conversion, which had, in itself, been the source of
some doubt (outside of Bahá’í circles). In the course of my research and
at my request, archivist Roger Dahl, searching the National Bahá’í
Archives for documents relating to Locke, discovered the evidence
scholars had been looking for: Dahl found a “Bahá’í Historical Record”107
card that Locke had filled out in 1935, at the request of the National
Spiritual Assembly, which, in conducting its Bahá’í census, had mailed
the forms in triplicate to all Bahá’ís through their local spiritual
assemblies and other channels.108 Locke was one of seven black
respondents from the Washington, DC, Bahá’í community to complete
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the card.109 In “Place of acceptance of Bahá’í Faith” is entered
“Washington, DC.” Locke personally completed and signed the card,
“Alain Leroy Locke” (in the space designated, “19. Signature”). Under
item #13, “Date of acceptance of the Bahá’í Faith,” Locke entered the year
“1918.”110 This date is significant in that it predates previous estimates
that placed Locke’s conversion in the early 1920s.111
The discovery of Locke’s Bahá’í Historical Record card confirms what was
already evident from a host of other sources. (Those sources, however,
failed to pinpoint the date of Locke’s conversion.) The card does not,
however, shed any light on the precise circumstances surrounding his
conversion. It is quite possible that Locke came into contact with the
Faith through W. E. B. Du Bois, who had personally met ‘Abdu’l-Bahá and
had lectured at Green Acre (a Bahá’í school in southern Maine). It is just
as likely that Locke encountered the Faith through Louis Gregory, or
through one of the other Bahá’ís or friends of the Faith from among the
circle of educated African Americans in Washington, DC. After all, 1918
was just six years after ‘Abdu’l-Bahá had lectured at Howard University
and at the NAACP convention in Chicago. In short, the Faith was widely
known among the black intelligentsia, and Locke could have been
introduced to it by any number of people.112
[112] Curiously, Locke’s name does not appear on an October 1920 list
of the Washington, DC, Bahá’ís. But his name does appear in at least
twenty subsequent lists,113 from March 1922 to 1951, showing a Bahá’í
affiliation of at least thirty consecutive years, or thirty–four years dating
back to 1918, and probably thirty–seven years, assuming Locke
maintained his affiliation until his death in 1954. But the nature of his
relationship to the Bahá’í Faith at the end of his life is also unknown,
since in July 1953 Locke moved to New York, where there is no record of
his contact with the Bahá’í community there. Locke died on 9 June 1954,
in Washington, DC. On June 11th at Benta’s Chapel, Brooklyn, Locke’s
memorial was presided over by Dr. Channing Tobias, with cremation
following at Fresh Pond Crematory in Little Village, Long Island.114 The
brief notice that appeared in the Bahá’í News in 1954 (No. 282, p. 11)
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states that: “Quotations from the Bahá’í Writings and Bahá’í Prayers were
read at Dr. Locke’s funeral.”
To date, no systematic effort has been undertaken to reconstruct Locke’s
life as a Bahá’í. A provisional chronology of Alain Locke’s Bahá’í activities
may be outlined as follows:
1915 Locke attends his first Bahá’í fireside (Washington, DC). 115
1918 Locke accepts the Bahá’í Faith (Washington, DC).116
1921 Session Chair on Friday evening, 20 May 1921 (Washington, DC).
Convention for Amity Between the Colored and White Races. 117
1922 Visits Bahá’ís of England.118
1923 Pilgrimage to Haifa (Israel), 119 late Nov./early Dec. Service to
youth (Washington, DC).120
1924 Speaker at Third Racial Amity Convention, 28–30 March 1924
(New York), along with Franz Boas, James Weldon Johnson, and
Jane Addams, among others.121 Appointment by NSA to
Interracial Amity Committee, 19 May 1924.122 Speaker at Fourth
Racial Amity Convention, 22–23 October 1924. Second session,
Locke presented, “Negro Art and Culture” (Philadelphia).123
1925 Reappointment by NSA to Interracial Amity Committee. 124 [113]
Speaker, “Universal Peace,” 5 July 1925, Bahá’í Congress, Green
Acre (New York).125
1925–1926
Lecture tour throughout the American South.126 “Impressions of
Haifa” published in the Bahá’í Year Book. 127 Special consultation
with NSA on race relations (November, Chicago).128
1927 Speaker, “Cultural Reciprocity,” World Unity Conference, 27
March 1927 (New Haven). 129 Lends name as contributing editor,
World Unity: A Monthly Magazine Interpreting the Spirit of the New Age
(New York). 130 Appointed to first National Inter-Racial Amity
Committee (8 January 1927).131
Progress report on interracial work (December).132
1927–1928
Appointed to second National Inter-Racial Amity Committee.133
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1928–1929
Appointed to third National Inter-Racial Amity Committee.
1929 “Impressions of Haifa” reprinted in the Bahá’í World 1926–
1928.134
1929–1930
Appointed to fourth National Inter-Racial Amity Committee.135
1930 “Impressions of Haifa” reprinted in the Bahá’í World 1928–
1930.136
Annual progress report on interracial work, 1929–1930.137 Invited
by Shoghi Effendi to comment on working translation of Kitáb-i–
Íqán. 138
1931–1932
Accepts appointment by NSA to fifth National Inter-Racial Amity
Committee.139
1932 Speaker, Racial Amity Convention, 10 December 1932 (New
York). Planned in cooperation with the National Urban League.140
1933 “Unity through Diversity: A Bahá’í Principle” published in Bahá’í
World 1930–1932.141
1935 Appointed to Teaching Committee (Washington, DC).142 Reports
on “stagnation” in the racial amity work (18 April 1935).143
Speaker, “Abdul–Baha on World Peace,” 26 November 1935
(Washington, DC).144 Resigns from Teaching Committee, 10
December 1935 (Washington, DC).145
1936 “The Orientation of Hope” published in Bahá’í World 1932–
1934.146 [114]
1943 Speaker, 24 October 1943, Bahá’í Center/Youth Rally
(Washington, DC). 147
1944 Speaker, Thirty–Sixth Racial Amity Convention (New York).148
Sends message to 20th anniversary of the passing of Woodrow
Wilson (New York).149
1945 “Lessons in World Crisis” published in Bahá’í World 1940–1944.150
1946 Speaker, “Democracy in Human Relations,” Rhode Island School
of Design. (Jointly sponsored by Negro College Club and
Providence, Rhode Island Bahá’ís.)151
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1949 Name appears on list of Bahá’í eligible voters, 6 April 1949.152
1949 Louis Gregory appeals to Locke to identify more fully with
Faith.153
1951 Louis Gregory again appeals to Locke to identify more fully with
Faith.154
1952 Locke invited to submit ideas for the “Centenary of Universal
Religion.”155 Picture appears in article on the Bahá’í Faith in
October 1952 issue of Ebony.
1954 Bahá’í writings and prayers read at his funeral.
From various indications in his unpublished correspondence, it seems
that Locke’s Bahá’í activities were intense but sporadic. This is not to say
that Locke’s engagement with the Faith was in any way superficial. His
most profound experience as a Bahá’í was probably the event of his
pilgrimage. Locke undertook two pilgrimages to Haifa. The Research
Department at the Bahá’í World Centre has written that they occurred in
1923 and then again in 1934:
Dr. Locke visited the Bahá’í World Centre on at least two
occasions. We have not, however, been able to find a record of the
exact dates of his pilgrimages. Dr. Locke’s first visit appears to
have taken place in November or early December 1923. As to the
duration of his stay, we note that Dr. Locke, in a letter dated 5
December 1923 written from Egypt, informs Shoghi Effendi of his
arrival in Cairo. The letter also refers to “the memory of the past
week at Haifa [which] is one of the happiest things I have to
cherish—the experience itself being one of the most significant and
beneficial experiences of my life.”156
[115] In a subsequent reference to the contents of Locke’s letter of 5
December 1923, the Research Department relates:
As stated in the earlier summary, he shares his view that the best
way for him to thank Shoghi Effendi is “to devote my best efforts
to the Cause.” He also asks to be remembered with thanks to the
friends until he has had a chance to write them individually.157
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Locke’s second pilgrimage was incomplete, lasting just one day. For
reasons not yet clear, Shoghi Effendi was unavailable at that time. In
determining the date of his second pilgrimage to Haifa, key evidence
comes from a letter Locke wrote to Shoghi Effendi on 1 August 1934,
who received it on 18 August 1934. From the Research Department’s
summary of it, we are told:
The letter is written on board the ship “Roma”, following Dr.
Locke’s brief visit to Haifa and the Bahá’í Shrines. He spent “a
beautiful day” and visited “all three shrines” in the company of
Ruhi Afnan, and as was the case on his first visit some 10 years
ago, he was “deeply inspired, and spiritually refreshed.” Dr. Locke
expresses pleasure at seeing the beauty and care with which
Shoghi Effendi has developed the Bahá’í properties on Mount
Carmel and in ‘Akká, and he comments that the Guardian’s
“nurture of the principles in concrete symbols is a great
contribution.” He states that he plans to share his impressions
with the friends.158
Those impressions, if written, were never published. But his
“Impressions of Haifa” (1924, 1926, 1929, 1930), approved by Shoghi
Effendi as “very good and sufficient”159 and first published in Star of the
West 15.1 (1924): 13–14, immortalized his first pilgrimage. Locke
continues his letter, expressing his regrets over having missed the
opportunity to see Shoghi Effendi:
Dr. Locke laments not having had the opportunity of seeing Shoghi
Effendi. However, the “deciding factor” was “the chance of another
visit, even though a glimpse.” He hopes to return for a lengthier
visit “as soon as practically possible.”160
[116] Obviously, his contemplated return for a lengthier visit never
materialized. The next part of Locke’s letter clearly indicates what was on
his mind:
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He indicates that he would have welcomed the chance to talk to
Shoghi Effendi about some of the difficulties under which he had
been working during the last several years. He mentions the
impact on him of the “factionalism of race.” He explains that as a
teacher, he has tried to be “a modifying influence to radical
sectionalism and to increasing materialistic trends—and in this
indirect way to serve the Cause and help forward the universal
principles,” which he supports without reservation. He
foreshadows seeking guidance from the Guardian on this matter in
the future.161
In his reminiscences of that experience, published as “Impressions of
Haifa” (1926, 1929, 1930),162 Locke stressed the importance of being able
to see a religion in its human incarnation, “without the mediation of
symbols.”163 In Locke’s eyes, Shoghi Effendi was the living embodiment
of all Bahá’í virtues: “For after all the only enlightened symbol of a
religious or moral principle is the figure of a personality endowed to
perfection with its qualities and necessary attributes.”164 Describing
Shoghi Effendi as a “gifted personality,” Locke was privileged to see his
“[r]efreshingly human”165 side as well. The two enjoyed a long walk and
conversation in the Bahá’í gardens. For Locke, his “Impressions of Haifa”
were deep and lasting.
Interracial unity activities
Locke’s universalism included social demonstrations of interracial unity,
as exemplified by his participation in a “Convention for Amity Between
the Colored and White Races” which took place in Washington, DC, 19–
21 May 1921. This gathering was organized by Agnes S. Parsons (a white
woman prominent in Washington high society) at the instruction of
‘Abdu’l-Bahá who, during her second pilgrimage to Haifa (1920), said to
her: “I want you to arrange in Washington a convention for unity between
the [117] white and colored people.”166 ‘Abdul–Bahá considered this
meeting to have had paramount symbolic and social importance.167
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The conference was a spectacular success. As Leonard Harris notes: “The
Bahá’í belief in the unity of humanity was expressed in practical terms by
inter-racial meetings (then a fairly unusual situation in Christian
America).” 168 Retrospectively, in its 1929–1930 annual report, the nine–
member Interracial Amity Committee, of which Locke was an active
participant, assessed the significance of the first Amity Convention in
1921, Washington, DC: “The convention of the colored and white was in
reality a great work, because if the question of the colored and white
should not be resolved[,] it will be productive of great dangers in [the]
future for America. Therefore the Confirmations [sic] of the Kingdom of
Abha shall continually reach any person who strives after the conciliation
of the colored and the white.” 169 ‘Abdu’l-Bahá subsequently praised Agnes
Parsons as “the first person to raise the banner of the unity of the white
and the colored.”170
Locke saw considerable value in these race amity conferences. Despite his
delicate heart and the considerable demands on him as a lecturer, the
committee work and participation in these gatherings was worth his time
and effort. According to archivist Roger Dahl, “Locke was a member of
the national Race amity committee for at least five years between 1925
and 1932.”171 In 1931, Locke expressed his “hope next year to be called
upon to participate more actively in the Amity conferences and
consultations” and registered confidence that “the work is gradually
reaching wider and wider circles.”172
On a sombre note, it appears that Locke became somewhat pessimistic
about the future prospects of interracial unity in the Washington, DC,
Bahá’í community. In a letter dated 18 April 1935 to Horace Holley,
secretary–general of the National Spiritual Assembly of the Bahá’ís of the
United States and Canada, Locke wrote:
Since I last saw you, I have had two occasions to meet with the
local friends, and have very effectively renewed my contacts with
them. This has also given me occasion to make some comparisons
between [118] the work as I knew it rather intimately before and
as it seems to be going now. I regret to have to call your attention
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to what seems to me to be something approaching stagnation in
the inter-racial work at Washington. This but confirms a feeling
that I have had all along for several years that unfortunate
personality influences have crept into the situation and decidedly
hampered the development of this very important practical phase
of the Cause. For a considerable while I thought this was my own
personal bias concerning Mrs. Haney and Mrs. Cook who have
pioneered so much in this field and have now for a long while
exerted a control in it which threatens to become a monopolistic
and hampering one.173
Mariam Haney (Mary Ida Haney [Parkhurst]) was mother of future Hand
of the Cause Paul Haney. She adopted “Mariam” as her name when
‘Abdu’l-Bahá addressed her so in a tablet. Active for many years in the
Washington, DC, Bahá’í community, she served on various national
committees and was an editor of The Bahá’í World.174 There are indications
that Locke’s estimate of Mariam Haney was initially positive. In a letter to
Agnes Parsons, Locke writes: “I learned with great satisfaction from Mrs.
Haney of the plans for the Amity Conference in New York. I shall most
certainly attend, and if I can in any way be of further assistance, please
feel free to call upon me.”175 Assuming that Haney was centrally involved
in planning the event, Locke’s enthusiasm may be construed as an
oblique endorsement of her role. Coralie F. Cook was an African–
American Washingtonian Bahá’í who was a professor at Howard
University like her husband.176 In November 1926, the National Spiritual
Assembly invited a group of black and white Bahá’ís for a special
consultation on race. Mariam Haney and Coralie F. Cook and were both in
that group, as was Alain Locke himself. How and why Locke became
disaffected with these two mainstays of the race amity movement is not
clear.
Locke was critical of other leading Washingtonian Bahá’í figures as well.
By 1931, Locke had complained of “the deceptive platitudes of some of
our friends, including even Dr. Leslie P. Hill.”177 This is a particularly
stunning statement, as “Professor” Leslie Pickney Hill, who was the black
principal of the Cheyney Institute (a teacher training school) had spoken
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at the Philadelphia convention of 22–23 October 1924 and was among
those invited by the National Spiritual Assembly in November 1926 to a
special consultation on race.178
[119] Another dismaying development for Locke may have been the
appointment of a predominantly white amity committee for the 1933–
1934 Bahá’í year—an appointment that, evidently, excluded Locke
himself.179 It was around this time that the race amity initiatives went
into decline, as chronicled by Gayle Morrison.180 The last race amity
committee was appointed in 1935–1936. In July 1936, the committee, in
the words of Morrison, “unknowingly wrote its own epitaph” in stating:
“The National Assembly has appointed no race amity committee this
year. Its view is that race unity activities have sometimes resulted in
emphasizing race differences rather than their unity and reconciliation
within the Cause.”181 With the demise of the race amity committees, it
would seem that Locke’s special services were no longer needed. Finally,
in 1941, Locke requested that the local spiritual assembly should
henceforth regard him as an “isolated believer,” explaining:
I naturally am reluctant to sever a spiritual bond with the Bahai
[sic] community, for I still hold to a firm belief in the truth of the
Bahai principles. However, I am not in a position, and haven[‘]t
been for years, to participate very practically or even with the
fullest enthusiasm, in the collective activities of the local friends.
One of my reservations is, of course, the seeming impossibility of
any really crusading attack on the practises of racial prejudice in
spite of the good will and fair principles of the local believers. They
are not to blame perhaps for their ineffectualness any more than
we, who are in more practical movements[,] are for our absorption
of time and energy in what we regard as more immediately
important.182
Further contributions to the Bahá’í community
The brightest moments in Alain Locke’s public Bahá’í life were three: (1)
the first Race Amity Conference, in which Locke presided [120] as a
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session chair on 20 May 1921; (2) his presentation at the Racial Amity
Convention in Harlem, 10 December 1932; and (3) his lecture,
“Democracy in Human Relations” at the Rhode Island School of Design
in 1946. In his 1933 report on behalf of the National Bahá’í Committee
for Racial Amity, Louis Gregory was delighted with Locke’s public
declaration of his Bahá’í identity and his open endorsement of its
principles:
For a number of years, in fact since the first amity convention in
Washington, Dr. Alain Locke has during the years been a
contributor to the work of the Cause, without formally identifying
himself with it. Perhaps the most significant feature of this
conference was his strong, eloquent and beautiful address, in
which he took a decided and definite stand within the ranks of the
Cause. This attitude we believe will increasingly with the years
influence people of capacity to investigate the mines of spiritual
wealth to be found in the Revelation of Bahá’u’lláh. It will also
make what has long been a grandly useful life more glorious,
serviceable and influential than ever before. It is to be hoped that
the friends both locally and nationally, will largely make use of the
great powers of Dr. Locke both in the teaching and administrative
fields of the Cause. He has made the pilgrimage to Haifa. The
Master in a Tablet praised him highly and it is known that the
Guardian shares his love for our able brother.183
Louis Gregory’s disclosure that the illustrious philosopher had received a
“tablet” (letter) from ‘Abdu’l-Bahá—presumably in response to a letter
that Locke had sent—is yet another important piece of the puzzle in
reconstructing this lesser known dimension of Locke’s life. During the
ministry of ‘Abdu’l-Bahá, it was customary for new converts to write
directly to “the Master” as a testimony of faith. This was more of a
precedent than a protocol, yet the practice was widespread enough to
warrant the probability that Locke wrote to ‘Abdu’l-Bahá in 1918, the year
Locke indicated that he had become a Bahá’í. Another bright moment in
Locke’s public life as a Bahá’í took place in 1946 during a visit to Rhode
Island, reported in Bahá’í news:
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When Dr. Alain Locke was scheduled as a speaker for the Rhode
Island School of Design’s exhibition of Negro art, the Negro
College [121] Club and the Providence Bahá’ís held a joint
meeting for which Dr. Locke talked on “Democracy in Human
Relations” and spoke of being a Bahá’í. There were twenty non–
Bahá’ís present in spite of bad weather. His talk was reported and
the next Sunday’s program was announced in both the Urban
League Bulletin and the Providence Chronicle.184
Of Locke’s travel teaching tour in the southern USA, we know relatively
little. This lecture tour took place at some point between October 1925
and spring 1926. This can be inferred from a statement that appeared in
the Bahá’í News Letter: “Dr. Alain Locke of Washington, DC, who delivered
one of the notable addresses at the 1925 Convention in Green Acre, is
now making an extensive teaching journey into the Southern States
which will bring him in touch with the most influential audiences and
individuals. Reports of this journey will be published from time to
time.”185 The description of Locke’s address at the seventeenth annual
convention and Bahá’í Congress deserves notice:
Dr. Alain LeRoy Locke of Washington, DC, delivered a polished
address, portraying the great part which America can play in the
establishment of world peace, if alive to its opportunity. The
working out of social democracy can be accomplished here. To this
end we should not think in little arcs of experience, but in the big,
comprehensive way. Let our country reform its own heart and life.
Needed reforms cannot be worked out by the action of any one
group, but a fine sense of cooperation must secure universal
fellowship. He praised Green Acre, which he declared to be an
oasis in the desert of materiality. He urged all who were favored by
this glorious experience to carry forth its glorious message and
thus awaken humanity. In final analysis, peace cannot exist
anywhere without existing everywhere.186
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Whether due to Locke’s disinclination to have such publicity or for some
other reason, only one other report of Locke’s trip appear to have been
published in the Bahá’í News Letter. After referring to the publication of
The New Negro “by Dr. Alain Locke, our brilliant Bahá’í brother of
Washington, DC and New York City,” the article simply states:
“Altogether inadequate has been the mention in previous issues of the
News Letter of the remarkable work carried on [122] throughout the
South during the winter by Mr. Louis Gregory, Mr. Howard MacNutt, Dr.
Locke and Mrs. Louise Boyle. These teachers, in cooperation with the
Spiritual Assembly of Miami and many Bahá’í groups and isolated
believers, held an astounding number of meetings from autumn to spring,
in churches, schools clubs [sic] and private homes, with the result that a
powerful concentration of spiritual forces was focussed on this great and
important territory.” 187
According to Gayle Morrison, this travel teaching trip began in October
1925. There were seven Bahá’í groups in Florida at that time. Morrison
notes that “successful meetings” were held in Miami, Jacksonville and St.
Augustine. Evidently, a new spiritual assembly was formed in Miami as
one of the signal outcomes of this teaching trip, through the combined
efforts of white Bahá’í “homefront pioneers” and the itinerant teachers.
While it is possible that Alain Locke may have been instrumental in
helping to establish the Miami Bahá’í council, which may have well been
the first spiritual assembly in the South, fresh evidence suggests that the
Miami assembly formed in November 1925.188 How far into the spring of
1926 the trip lasted is not certain. The published accounts of this
teaching trip are too general. These leave us with very little idea as to
what actually happened.
However, in the transcript for the 1926 Convention, in a report from El
Fleda Spaulding, chairperson of the National Teaching Committee, on
recent Bahá’í efforts in the South, there is reference to Locke that
indicates what his primary role may well have been: “[T]he delicate
problems here are being ably handled by Mrs. Boyle, Mr. Gregory and Mr.
MacNutt. Dr. Locke also expects to speak before a number of the
Universities.”189 Some other details on Locke appear in the Southern
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Regional Teaching Committee Report, which was read into the
transcript.190 These details, which have recently been brought to light, are
as follows:
An important contribution to the teaching service has been
rendered during the past few months by Dr. Alain Locke of
Washington, who is regarded by many as the outstanding scholar
of the Negro race in America. Having been invited to address many
universities and col- [123] leges in various parts of the country[,]
Dr. Locke consented to present the Bahai Message to educators and
student groups, and has been able to touch the best Negro
institutions in the Middle South and Northern Florida. Before
proceeding South he was called to the middle West and was thus
enabled to give the message at the Dunbar Forum of Oberlin, at
Wilberforce University and at Indianapolis, Cleveland and
Cincinnati.
Dr. Locke has been everywhere received with marked distinction.
He writes of the deep spiritual refreshment experienced through
his labours for the Blessed Cause. Through special arrangement
with the President, Mrs. Mary Bethune[,] he will make a return
visit to the Daytona Industrial Institute in May, and at that time
will visit Mr. Dorsey of Miami as his guest to confer on educational
plans for the new city. He will also visit the Hungerford School
near Orlando in which Mr. Irving Bachellor and other distinguished
people are actively interested. 191
Reference here to “Mr. Dorsey” deserves comment. According to the
report, D. A. Dorsey was the owner of the Dorsey Hotel, where weekly
Bahá’í meetings were held. The report states:
Its owner, Mr. D. A. Dorsey, is a colored financier, highly regarded
by all the promoters of Greater Miami. Having accumulated more
than five million dollars, he is now actively engaged in founding a
Model Negro City near Miami, in which he has donated a site for a
Mashrak el Askar [Bahá’í House of Worship].
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It is the desire of Mr. Dorsey to use his wealth for the advancement
of his race and he will build schools, a university for the arts and
sciences, a hospital, modern administration buildings and other
institutions for the practical and cultural progress of his people. He
is a man of the highest moral character, simple and unassuming,
and respected by all—a noble-hearted[,] God-directed man.192
The report also confirms that Dorsey enrolled as a Bahá’í, having
“accepted the teachings whole–heartedly through the labors of Mr. Louis
Gregory and Mr. [Howard] MacNutt and are constantly bringing people of
all races to hear the Glad Tidings.” 193 The fate of this model city, and the
status of the land he endowed for a Bahá’í temple, as well as solid
information on Dorsey himself, require further investigation.
[124] One of the most surprising and rewarding outcomes of my archival
research was the discovery of yet another contribution Locke had made to
the Faith—one that, in fact, had no connection with race relations
whatever. Among the Alain Locke Papers, preserved in the Moorland–
Spingarn Research Center at Howard University, were found two letters
to Locke, written on behalf of Shoghi Effendi by his secretary at that time,
Ruhi Afnan. These letters are dated 15 February and 5 July 1930. The first
begins: “Dear Dr. Locke: Shoghi Effendi has been lately spending his
leisure hours translating the Book of Iqan for he considers it to be the key
to a true understanding of the Holy Scriptures, and can easily rank as one
of the most, if not the most, important thing that Bahá’u’lláh revealed
explaining the basic beliefs of the Cause. He who fully grasps the purport
of that Book can claim to have understood the Cause.”
The “Book of Iqan” is better known in English as the Book of Certitude
(Kitáb-i Íqán), and has achieved distinction as Bahá’u’lláh’s preeminent
doctrinal text.194 In efforts to perfect his working translation of the Íqán
from Persian to English, the Guardian called upon Locke as the person
“best fitted to render him [Shoghi Effendi] an assistance” in giving
critical feedback on the translation itself. Shoghi Effendi requested that
Locke “go over it [the translation] carefully, studying every sentence—its
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structure as well as choice of words—and giving him your [Locke’s]
criticism as well as constructive suggestions that would make it more
lucid, English [sic] and forceful.” He adds, “Shoghi Effendi is fully aware
of the many duties you have and how pressing your time is, and had he
known of an equally fitting person he would surely have saved you the
trouble. Yet he finds himself to be compelled.” The first letter
accompanied the first half of the translation which Shoghi Effendi decided
to send to Locke. The second half was mailed later.
Locke did as Shoghi Effendi requested. The second letter (5 July 1930)
was sent to Locke to acknowledge his editorial assistance: “Though they
were not so many, he [Shoghi Effendi] found the suggestions you gave
most helpful.” Moreover, Ruhi Afnan reported that: “Shoghi Effendi has
already incorporated your suggestions and sent his manuscript to the
National Spiritual Assembly [of the [125] United States and Canada] for
publication.” A most interesting comment follows: “It naturally depends
upon that body and the reviewing and publishing committees to decide
whether it should come out immediately or not.” The potential value of
reaching the Western intelligentsia was noted as well: “The most
important service that can now be rendered to the Cause is to put the
writings of Bahá’u’lláh in a form that would be presentable to the
intellectual minds of the West. Shoghi Effendi’s hope in this work has
been to encourage others along this line.” At the end of the letter, Shoghi
Effendi wrote, in his own hand, the following:
My dear co–worker:
I wish to add a few words expressing my deep appreciation of your
valued suggestions in connexion with the translation of the Iqan. I
wish also to express the hope that you may be able to lend
increasing assistance to the work of the Cause, as I have always
greatly admired your exceptional abilities and capacity to render
distinguished services to the Faith. I grieve to hear of the weakness
of your heart which I trust may through treatment be completely
restored. I often remember you in my prayers and ever cherish the
hope of welcoming you again in the Master’s home.
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Your true brother,
Shoghi.
Locke wrote four essays published in six volumes of The Bahá’í World,
which was not only a record of the development of the Faith
internationally, but was its official international voice as well (prior to the
establishment of the Bahá’í International Community). Leonard Harris is
currently the world’s leading authority on Alain Locke. In his collection of
Locke’s philosophical writings, two of Locke’s Bahá’í World essays are
anthologized: “The Orientation of Hope” (1936)195 and “Unity through
Diversity: A Bahá’í Principle” (1933).196 “‘The Orientation of Hope’,”
according to Harris, “is a definitive expression of Locke’s belief in the
Bahá’í Faith and its focus on the universal principles definitive of spiritual
faiths.”197 Locke’s other two Bahá’í World essays were: “Impressions
[126] of Haifa” (1926, 1929, 1930) and “Lessons in World
Crisis” (1945).
These essays profile Locke’s perspective as a Bahá’í, even though we have
such sketchy details about his Bahá’í activities. How he came to write
these essays, which evidently were invited, is an important consideration.
Although Shoghi Effendi certainly supervised its publication and
approved its contents, normally the editors of The Bahá’í World issued
invitations to write articles. However, Shoghi Effendi personally contacted
Locke by cable, inviting him to contribute his final Bahá’í World essay:
“WOULD GREATLY APPRECIATE ARTICLE FROM YOUR PEN ON
ANY ASPECT FAITH FOR CENTENARY ISSUE BAHÁ’Í WORLD
VOLUME NINE LOVING GREETINGS SHOGHI RABBANI.”198
In his essay, “The Orientation of Hope,” Locke gives some fraternal advice
to Bahá’ís. This statement serves as eloquent testimony to the strength of
his own convictions as a Bahá’í:
Must we not as true Bahá’í believers in these times embrace our
principles more positively, more realistically, and point everywhere
possible our assertion of the teachings with a direct challenge?
[…] Especially does it seem to me to be the opportunity to bring
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the Bahá’í principles again forcefully to the attention of statesmen
and men of practical affairs […]. Is it not reasonably clear to us
that now is the time for a world–wide, confident and determined
offensive of peaceful propaganda for the basic principles of the
Cause of brotherhood, peace and social justice? […] And to do that
powerfully, effectively, the Bahá’í teaching needs an inspired
extension of the potent realism of ‘Abdu’l-Bahá by which he
crowned and fulfilled the basic idealism of Bahá’u’lláh. 199
A proper understanding of Locke’s Bahá’í World essays—especially “The
Orientation of Hope” and “Unity through Diversity: A Bahá’í Principle”—
requires a background in Locke’s philosophical thought, which is outlined
briefly in the next section.
Locke as philosopher
While his formal training in philosophy was followed by a long and
distinguished teaching career as an academic, with numerous publi[127] cations to his credit, Locke did not publish a single article on
philosophy until he was fifty years old, 200 seventeen years after he had
become a Bahá’í. This significant fact accords with Locke’s psychograph in
which he disclaims having ever been “a professional philosopher.”201
Notwithstanding, his work during this later period articulates his mature
thinking as both a professor of philosophy as well as a philosopher by
training. Locke’s first formal philosophical essay, “Values and
Imperatives,” appeared in 1935. This marked the year that saw his
“reentry into the doing of philosophy directly”202 and thus back into the
world of grand theory.
What role did philosophy play in Locke’s life? What was its purpose?
What had Locke hoped to accomplish through the vehicle of philosophy?
In a retrospective look at his career in Howard University, Locke wrote
that his “main objectives” had been “to use philosophy as an agent for
stimulating critical mindedness in Negro youth, to help transform
segregated educational missions into centers of cultural and social
leadership, and to organize an advance guard of creative talent for cultural
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inspiration and prestige.” Moreover, he wanted to link “the discussion of
colonial problems with the American race situation, toward the
internationalization of American Negro thought and action.”203 Indeed, as
Michael Winston observes: “With the dramatic rise of racial
consciousness in the former European colonies, Locke’s influence became
internationalized.”204
Locke was deeply influenced by pragmatism, a contemporary
philosophical movement that countered both idealism and realism.
“Pragmatism is an account of the way people think,” according to
Menand, “the way they come up with ideas, form beliefs, and reach
decisions.”205 It correlates truth and experience, self and world.
Experience is real, and not a mere mental phenomenon; a dynamic
interaction between self and world. Knowledge derives from experience
and truth is transformed by experience. Pragmatism is process. It
advocates a method. Ideas are relative to time and place. It purports that
the truth of a proposition depends on its practical value, not on any
intrinsic meaning. Like the scientific method, knowledge can be tested by
experience. This has profound cultural [128] implications. If truth is
judged by its consequences, it cannot be divorced from the practical and
moral. America, it follows, is accountable to itself.
The originators of pragmatism include the trinity of Charles Sanders
Peirce (d. 1914), who claimed to have “invented” pragmatism and
expounded its theory of meaning, William James (d. 1910) who
developed pragmatism’s theory of truth, and John Dewey (d. 1952), who
contributed his notion of “instrumentalism” to the movement.206 W. E. B.
Du Bois had been a student of James.207 Locke had a passion for William
James,208 although he rejected James’ radical empiricism. Both Du Bois
and Locke read James’ Oxford lectures, A Pluralistic Universe (1909), as a
philosophical allegory for making a “vital connection between pluralism
and democracy.” 209
Pragmatists put a premium on “experience.” They sought to test the truth
of ideas in actual experience as a “pragmatic” indicator. They also felt that
their philosophical ideas had ethical and political consequences.210
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Moreover, John Dewey felt that pragmatism provided a philosophical
basis for democracy, which he viewed as an ethical principle that
extended beyond politics to economics and social interactions as well.211
Despite his influences, Locke pursued an independent course by
deforming the master code of symbols that dominated the world of
American pragmatism and reforming them by means of what Houston
Baker, Jr. called a “radical marronage” 212 or reorientation, in order that
philosophy might have something meaningful to say about race relations.
Pragmatism gave birth to cultural pluralism, which Locke espoused with
almost religious zeal. “Cultural pluralism” (coined by Horace Kallen in
conversation with Locke and known now as multiculturalism) was
Locke’s philosophical faith, “a new Americanism,” as he called it.213
Compensating for liberalism’s fixation on freedom, cultural pluralism
provides a philosophical foundation for unity in diversity by extending the
idea of democracy beyond individuals and individual rights to the equal
recognition of cultural, racial and other group rights. During the 1920s,
the question as to what constitutes American identity was “a national
preoccupation.” 214 Posnock states that “pragmatism’s answer” was
“cultural pluralism,” as [129] opposed to the coercions of assimilation—
the pressure to conform—in the American paradigm of the “melting
pot.”215 “American democracy for Locke,” writes Leonard Harris, “was
hardly a finished social experiment, especially since it excluded most of
the population from participation.”216 For Locke, cultural pluralism
provided the social philosophy most needed by democracy,217 not just in
America, but across the world. Cultural pluralism was thus “the
philosophic faith that Alain Locke became a notable spokesman for.”218
As his primary philosophical framework, cultural pluralism would make
possible a general theory of “unity in diversity.”219
Locke’s philosophy is really a fusion of pluralism and relativism, as seen
in the synonyms he uses for it. “Cultural pluralism” is variously referred
to in Locke’s writings as “cultural relativism,” “critical relativism” as well
as “value relativism.”220 Locke’s use of technical terms is not, however,
always consistent. As Winston Napier points out, Locke’s “semantic
inconsistency clouds his argument.”221 Strictly speaking, pluralism is a
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distinctive concept, while relativism is a normative one.222 As Mason
observes: “It is precisely the separation between pluralism and relativism
that explains much of America’s intolerance. For a plurality of ethnic
groups simply cannot exist within a society that refuses to recognize the
relative and functional nature of values and institutions. Locke’s critique
of democracy centers around democracy’s need to develop a relativistic
perspective to fit its pluralistic society.”223 Cultural pluralism has since
evolved into what is now known as “multiculturalism.”224 Recently, Locke
has been acknowledged as “the father of multiculturalism.”225
It is clear that Locke wanted to make a contribution to world peace as
well. If intellectuals were inspired with the same vision and could agree
on a common paradigm, their leadership had the potential to further that
aim. In his essay, “Cultural Relativism and Ideological Peace,”226 Locke
states: “Cultural relativism may become an important source for
ideological peace” and, indeed, may serve “as a possible ideological
peacemaker.”227 “Cultural relativism” Locke believed, “can become a very
constructive philosophy by way of integrating values and value
systems.” 228 “In looking for cultural [130] agreements on a world scale,”
Locke further explained, “we shall probably have to content ourselves
with agreement of the common–denominator type and with ‘unity in
diversity’ discovered in the search for unities of a functional rather than a
content character, and therefore of a pragmatic rather than an ideological
sort.”229 In other words, Locke has proposed a formula for promoting
cultural relativism as a “realistic instrument of social reorientation and
cultural enlightenment.”230
Locke gave specific reasons as to why this program might work. For
Locke, cultural relativism had “constructive potentialities”231 and offered
new hope for ideological peace. For relativism to work, it first had to be
implemented. Just how would one begin to carry out a program of
cultural relativity? Locke had such a plan. Its rationale is developed
alongside its strategy. There were three stages in his plan, each of which
was intended to have a calculated, cumulative result. The three stages
were: (1) cultural equivalence; (2) reciprocity; and (3) limited cultural
convertibility. An explanation of these three stages is as follows:
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“Equivalence”: In his efforts to universalize philosophy, Locke sought to
promote intercultural understanding, and thought that scholars
(especially “cultural anthropologists”) ought to lead the way—through a
systematic process of conceptual translation based on formal comparison:
The principle of cultural equivalence, under which we would more
widely press the search for functional similarities in our analyses
and comparisons of human cultures; thus offsetting our traditional
and excessive emphasis upon cultural difference. Such functional
equivalences, which we might term ‘culture–cognates’ or ‘culture–
correlates,’ discovered underneath deceptive but superficial
institutional divergence, would provide objective but soundly
neutral common denominators for intercultural understanding and
cooperation.232
The search for cultural counterparts is, for Locke, a sound way of trying
to make sense of the bewildering diversity of societal norms and mores
that, upon investigation, reveal a recognizable logic. “Functional
equivalence” for Locke, seems to be synonymous with “real basic
similarity” in values.233 Similarities are seen in function rather than form.
[131] “Reciprocity”: Beyond tolerance, but assuming notions of
equivalence based on “loyalty to loyalty,” is a second concept: reciprocity.
Reciprocity approaches cross–cultural dialogue and cooperation. “Social
reciprocity for value loyalties,” writes Locke, “is but a new name for the
old virtue of tolerance, yet it does bring the question of tolerance down
from the lofty thin air of idealism and chivalry to the plane of enlightened
self–interest and the practical possibilities of value–sharing.”234 This is an
understatement, for reciprocity is something much more than mere
toleration for the purpose of reducing inter-communal conflict:
The principle of cultural reciprocity, which, by a general recognition
of the reciprocal character of all contacts between cultures and the
fact that all modern cultures are highly composite ones, would
invalidate the lump estimating of cultures in terms of generalized,
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en bloc assumptions of superiority and inferiority, substituting
scientific, point–by–point comparisons with their correspondingly
limited, specific, and objectively verifiable superiorities or
inferiorities.235
This is both a historical as well as procedural statement. Cultures are
syncretistic. A simple realization of this fact should suffice to dispel
pretensions of cultural superiority. This new virtue—reciprocity—is
tolerance transformed into a real exchange of values. As Moses observes:
“Locke’s principle of reciprocity first emerges as a historical law that may
be discerned through careful consideration of what has contributed to
civilized progress in many an age.”236 Locke translates this historical law
into a present-day ethic. In this part of Locke’s plan, comparisons would
become very specific. The “culture-correlates” would then be weighed,
and even judged as to their relative superiority or inferiority. There would
be particular cultural values that could be exported and taken up within
other modern cultures, which are themselves composite anyway.
“Cultural convertibility”: As a student of history, Locke foresaw the strong
possibility that culture might selectively adopt a foreign cultural value. In
assimilating that value to itself, the transplanted value would take root
and become part of the new cultural landscape. An example of this might
be seen in the import, populariza [132] tion and eventual westernization
of the eastern practice of meditation. Locke sees a third concept coming
into play:
The principle of limited cultural convertibility, that, since culture
elements, though widely interchangeable, are so separable, the
institutional forms from their values and the values from their
institutional forms, the organic selectivity and assimilative capacity
of a borrowing culture becomes a limiting criterion for cultural
exchange. Conversely, pressure acculturation and the mass
transplanting of culture, the stock procedure of groups with
traditions of culture “superiority” and dominance, are counter–
indicated as against both the interests of cultural efficiency and the
natural trends of cultural selectivity.237
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Locke claims that these “three objectively grounded principles of culture
relations” might, if properly implemented, “correct some of our basic
culture dogmatism and progressively cure many of our most intolerant
and prejudicial cultural attitudes and practices.”238 How? Discovery of
cultural equivalences was supposed to result in an agenda for
intercultural understanding, which would, in turn, provide a common
foundation for intercultural cooperation.
Whom did Locke expect or hope to carry out this plan? Quite possibly his
peers. He states: “There has never been a new age without a new
scholarship or, to put it more accurately, without a profound realignment
of scholarship.”239 “It is for this reason that one can so heartily concur in
the suggestions of Professor Northrop’s paper that a value analysis of our
basic cultures in broadscale comparison is the philosophical, or rather the
scholarly, task of the hour.”240
Locke as Bahá’í thinker
In general terms, Locke regarded the Bahá’í Faith as a “movement for
human brotherhood.”241 This is not to say that he reduced the religion to
an amorphous universalism, for, in “The Orientation of Hope,” Locke
calls the Bahá’í Faith “a virile and truly prophetic spiritual revelation.”242
What relationship, if any, exists between Locke’s religion and his
philosophy? Philosophy has traditionally served as the great sys- [133]
tematiser of religious thinking. Locke’s religious works (his Bahá’í World
essays) were certainly informed by his philosophy, which served—as
philosophy was supposed to in medieval times—as the “handmaid of
theology.” Indeed, the presence of key philosophical concepts in Locke’s
Bahá’í World essays accentuates the religio-philosophical (Bahá’í–cultural
relativist) synergy. “What we need to learn most,” writes Locke, “is how
to discover unity and spiritual equivalence underneath the differences
which at present so disunite and sunder us, and how to establish some
basic spiritual reciprocity on the principle of unity in diversity.”243 “The
purity of Bahá’í principles,” Locke argues, “must be gauged by their
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universality on this practical plane.”244 Locke then poses a challenge in
the form of a test of authenticity: “Do they [Bahá’í principles] fraternize
and fuse with all their kindred expressions? Are they happy in their
collaborations that advocate other sanctions but advance toward the same
spiritual goal? Can they reduce themselves to the vital common
denominators necessary to mediate between other partisan loyalties?”245
This is classic Lockean philosophy, transposed within a Bahá’í value
system.
The reverse also held true, in that religion served as Locke’s handmaid of
philosophy. Bahá’í values suffuse Locke’s philosophical thought. Judith
Green observes that “Locke’s work shows the influence of serious
engagements with Marxism, with diverse religious and spiritual traditions
including, among others, Christianity, Buddhism, and Bahá’í.”246 This
appears to underestimate the relative importance of the Bahá’í influence
on Locke. As Johnny Washington notes: “During the latter part of his
career, he accepted the Bahá’í faith and attempted to integrate it into his
own philosophy of values.”247 This statement suggests that Locke himself
transposed Bahá’í principles of unity into his philosophy.
Locke stressed Bahá’í universality as its primary mission for the present:
“But it is not the time for insisting on this side of the claim; the
intelligent, loyal Bahá’í should stress not the source, but the importance
of the idea, and rejoice not in the originality and uniqueness of the
principle but rather in its prevalence and practicality.”248 Locke continues:
“The idea has to be translated into every [134] important province of
modern life and thought, and in many of these must seem to be
independently derived and justified.”249 This statement signals Locke’s
intention and method: namely, that he would apply Bahá’í principles to
his own “province of modern life and thought”—philosophy.
A closer comparison of Locke’s essays reveals a synergy between the two.
“For Locke, cultural pluralism and cultural relativism,” Ernest Mason
claims, “both have their foundation in the Bahá’í principle of unity in
diversity.”250 In demonstrating a thematic simultaneity in Locke’s
religious and philosophical writings, Mason declares: “In the following
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examination of Locke’s social philosophy I hope to demonstrate fully that
Locke was, theoretically and practically, concerned with the very social
issues stressed in the Bahá’í Faith: justice, equality, nonviolence,
tolerance, and racial and ideological peace.” 251 Mason was not alone in
making this assertion. Kenneth Stikkers observes:
The Bahá’í religion provided Locke the concrete experience of unity
in diversity, for a central teaching of that faith is that the Word of
God is essentially one but is spoken differently through the
prophets of the various religions of the world, in ways relative to
unique sociohistorical conditions. Locke expressed the Bahá’í
principle with this metaphor: “think of reality as a central fact and
a white light broken up by the prism of human nature into a
spectrum of values.”252
This has implications for future Lockean studies in particular, and for
African American and for mainstream American philosophy in general.
Unity in diversity is a Bahá’í principle that Locke transposed into his
philosophy: “It is just at this juncture that the idea of unity in diversity
seems to me to become relevant, and to offer a spiritual common
denominator of both ideal and practical efficacy.”253 Locke wanted to
replace absolutes with universalisms: “Even though it is not yet accepted
as a general principle, as a general desire and an ideal goal, the demand
for universality is beyond doubt the most characteristic modern thing in
the realm of spiritual [135] values, and in the world of the mind that
reflects this realm.”254 Through the vehicle of philosophy, Locke replaced
“identity” with “equivalence” and “difference” with “unity in diversity.”
In so doing, Locke offered “a solution reconciling nationalism with
internationalism, racialism with universalism.”255
Both as a philosopher and as a Bahá’í, Locke, as a matter of principle,
envisioned a series of “progressive integrations” that would take place “in
due course” and “step by step, from an initial stage of cultural tolerance,
mutual respect, reciprocal exchange, some specific communities of
agreement and, finally, commonality of purpose and action.” But since he
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was not a thoroughly systematic thinker, we cannot read this statement
with full confidence in its sequence. Green calls this a “peacemaking
democratic transformation […] by stage-wise progression.”256
In my own reading, there is a progression in Locke’s social philosophy in
which tolerance leads to reciprocity which, in turn, culminates in “unity
in diversity.” Locke describes his own universalism as a “fluid and
functional unity that begins in a basic progression of value pluralism,
converts itself to value relativism, and then passes over into a ready and
willing admission of both cultural relativism and pluralism.” 257 Locke’s
hierarchy of loyalty, tolerance, reciprocity, and cultural relativism and
pluralism (the philosophical equivalent of “unity in diversity”) was a
pragmatic application of quintessentially Bahá’í values. In its practical
application, this hierarchy is formulaic:
Loyalty expresses group solidarity. Loyalty is related to the idea of
tolerance. Loyalty is love of one’s own race, ethnicity, culture. The
concept of loyalty is connected with the notion of community. “Indeed,”
as Stikkers corroborates, “it was Royce’s theories of loyalty and
community and Locke’s experience in the Bahá’í faith […] that provided
the main intellectual influences on Locke’s pluralism.” 258 As mentioned,
Josiah Royce was one of Locke’s professors in Harvard’s philosophy
department.259 Locke’s attraction to Royce’s ideas owes a great deal to the
fact that Royce was “the only major American philosopher during the
early 1900s to publish a book condemning racism.”260 Locke’s cultural
relativism was grounded in Royce’s social ethic of “loyalty [136] to
loyalty,” which values a people’s loyalty to their own particular culture
and value system, so long as respect is maintained for broadly humane
values as well.261
Tolerance has both individual and social dimensions. Locke’s concept of
“tolerance” has its roots in the philosophy of John Locke (individualism),
but goes far beyond. In his essay, “Two Lockes, Two Keys, Tolerance and
Reciprocity in a Culture of Democracy,” Greg Moses compares the
philosophies of Alain Locke and John Locke. If not in theory then in
practice, John Locke’s ethic of toleration has been “poorly applied by
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liberal civilizations.”262 While John Locke stressed mutual tolerance in an
exchange of ideas between individuals, Alain Locke advocated such
tolerance between groups.263 All too often, however, tolerance has proven
to be little more than a thin veneer of acceptance, with an air of
condescension and paternalism by the dominant group.
Reciprocity—as mentioned in the previous section—is really an extension
of democracy in that it constrains group dominance through promoting
the equality of groups, each having a place at the table, so to speak.
Moses sums this up eloquently when he concludes his essay by saying:
“Reciprocity—to shift figures in function and form—would be key to the
new Locke [Alain Locke], as tolerance had been key to the old [the
philosopher John Locke].”264
Cultural relativism and pluralism are Locke’s philosophical equivalents of the
Bahá’í principle of “unity in diversity.” The most recent and sophisticated
treatment of Locke’s philosophy of unity in diversity is that of Judith M.
Green. In her book, Deep Democracy: Community, Diversity, and Transformation
(1999), Green devotes an entire chapter to Locke.265 Green observes that
a great deal of Locke’s work remains unpublished, and that his
contribution has been largely forgotten until recently. Due to the sudden
and vigorous explosion of scholarly interest in Locke, his philosophical
thought will no longer suffer a death by silence.
Green identifies two streams of thought and experience in Locke’s life
and work. One stream is an African American historical, cultural, and
intellectual tradition—the specific loyalty that “links Locke with forebears
in struggle like Frederick Douglass and Sojourner Truth, with older
contemporaries like Booker T. Washington and W. E. B. Du Bois (who
assisted his early career), with younger contemporaries like Martin Luther
King, Jr., and Malcolm (X) Shabazz, and with our living generations of
African American public intellectuals.” 266 Speaking of America, Locke
stated that “this ominous rainbow […] shows a wide diffusion of bias and
prejudice in our social atmosphere and, unfortunately, presages not the
passing, but the coming of a storm […] and unless America solves these
minority issues constructively and achieves minority peace or minority
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tolerance, in less than half a generation she will be in the flaming
predicament of Europe.”267
The other stream is his cosmopolitan outlook, particularly his
commitment to “cultural pluralism” (now known as multiculturalism).
Locke’s pluralism compensated for some of the deficiencies of liberalism.
As Segun Gbadegesin rhetorically asks: “How, if at all, does liberalism
differ from pluralism? Liberalism’s emphasis is freedom: freedom is its
battle cry. But there are other values, including justice […] and
community.”268 Locke’s cosmopolitan paradigm of unity is a “theoretical
and praxical transformation of classical American pragmatism.” 269
According to Green, Locke had precociously conceptualized “deep
democracy” as “cosmopolitan unity amidst valued diversity.”270
Education would play a transformative role in helping to bring about this
world culture—one characterized by a “race-transcending” 271
consciousness. Locke also spoke of the role of education in cultivating
“international-mindedness.”272 Art, education, as well as philosophy were
venues through which Locke sought to move the world.
Conclusion
If interracial unity, beyond racial justice, was Martin Luther King, Jr.’s
“dream” for America, it was Alain LeRoy Locke’s vision for the world.
Locke prized unity. He had a disdain for black “self–segregation”273 as
well as for Jim Crow segregation.274 In an unpublished essay that Johnny
Washington titled, “The Paradox of Race,” Locke [138] not only
advocated racial integration but encouraged interracial marriage as
well.275 It is quite clear that Locke’s vision of interracial unity was
inspired by his experience as a member of the early American Bahá’í
community. Interracial unity, in Bahá’í parlance, is often described as
“unity in diversity”—a term that encompasses the entire range of human
differences.276 This term appears in both Locke’s philosophical as well as
religious essays.
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One can tentatively say that the Bahá’í principle of “unity in diversity”
has indirectly influenced African American philosophy by way of Locke.
This essay has also suggested that Locke’s religious works were informed
by his philosophy, which served as the “handmaid of theology” while the
Bahá’í Faith served as Locke’s handmaid of philosophy. Not only was
there a synergy between the two, but there was also a creative connection
between Locke’s Bahá’í values and philosophical commitments. For
instance, in his essay, “Unity through Diversity: A Bahá’í Principle,”
Locke praises Royce: “Josiah Royce, one of the greatest American
philosophers[,] saw this problem more clearly than any other western
thinker, which is nothing more or less than a vindication of the principle
of unity and diversity carried out to a practical degree of spiritual
reciprocity.” Here, Locke directly correlates religious and philosophical
principles. Locke’s philosophy may be seen as an unique synthesis of the
following thinkers:
VALUE THEORY
Christian Freiherr von Ehrenfel
Alexius Meinong
Wilbur Urban
IDEAS
values as intrinsic to cognition
values as feelings
value types/qualities
PRAGMATISM
Charles Sanders Peirce
William James
John Dewey
IDEAS
theory of meaning
theory of truth
pluralism and democracy
PHILOSOPHY OF LOYALTY
Josiah Royce
IDEAS
philosophy of loyalty
CULTURAL PLURALISM
Franz Boas
Melville J. Herskovits
IDEAS
race and culture
race and culture
CULTURAL NATIONALISM
W. E. B. Du Bois
IDEAS
the Talented Tenth
Christopher Buck
Alain Locke and Cultural Pluralism
[139]
NATURALISM
George Santayana
IDEAS
pragmatist aesthetics277
BAHÁ’Í PRINCIPLES
Bahá’u’lláh
‘Abdu’l-Bahá
Shoghi Effendi
IDEAS
world unity
interracial unity
unity in diversity
140
This list is by no means exhaustive. It should also be borne is mind that,
despite his intense commitment to Bahá’í principles, Locke did not
directly cite Bahá’í writings. Although he acknowledged that “there is no
escaping the historical evidences of its [unity through diversity’s] early
advocacy and its uncompromising adoption by the Bahá’í prophets and
teachers,” Locke followed his own advice to Bahá’ís in that “the intelligent, loyal Bahá’í should stress not the source, but the importance of the
idea, and rejoice not in the originality and uniqueness of the principle but
rather in its prevalence and practicality.” 278
The salience of race remains a social fact. Locke adroitly linked race
progress with world peace. In one of his Bahá’í essays, Locke states:
“Each period of a faith imposes a special new problem.”279 In a
philosophical essay, “Cultural Relativism and Ideological Peace,” Locke
expresses a similar conviction, hinting at what would today be called a
paradigm shift: “There has never been a new age without a new
scholarship, or, to put it more accurately, without a profound realignment
of scholarship.”280 Locke’s realignment of scholarship was to detoxify
“race” of its biologism, to transform “race” into culture, to “convert
parochial thinking into global thinking”281 and to promote “progressive
vistas of the new intercultural internationalism” with “passports of world
citizenship good for safe ideological conduct anywhere.”282 “The
intellectual core of the problems of peace,” Locke maintains, “[...] will be
the discovery of the necessary common denominators and the basic
equivalences involved in a democratic world order or democracy on a
world scale.”283
Christopher Buck
Alain Locke and Cultural Pluralism
141
As a religious personality, throughout his adult life, Locke vacillated and
oscillated between Christianity and the Bahá’í Faith. [140] Locke was
always listed in biographies as an Episcopalian, the denomination in
which he was raised. While his mother at first urged him to become a
Methodist, 284 she later encouraged him to become a more fully
committed Bahá’í.285 In an unpublished and undated autobiographical
statement, Locke wrote: “I am really a Xtian [sic] without believing any of
its dogma, because I am incapable of feeling hatred, revenge or jealously
[...] I have always hoped to be big enough to have to justify myself not to
my contemporaries but to posterity. Small men apologize to their
neighbors, big men to posterity.” 286 In an untitled and undated
manuscript in the Alain Locke papers, Locke expresses his appreciation of
the Bahá’í Faith in these words:
The gospel for the Twentieth Century rises out of the heart of its
greatest problems—and few who are spiritually enlightened doubt
the nature of that problem. [...] The redemption of society—social
salvation, should have been sought after first [...] The fundamental
problems of current America are materiality and prejudice. [...]
And so we must say[,] with the acute actualities of America’s race
problem and the acute potentialities of her economic problem,
[that] the land that is nearest to material democracy is furthest
away from spiritual democracy [...]
And we must begin heroically with the greatest apparent
irreconcilables: the East and the west, the black man and the self–
arrogating Anglo–Saxon, for unless these are reconciled, the
salvation of society cannot be. If the world had believingly
understood the full significance of Him [Jesus Christ] who taught
it to pray and hope[,] “Thy kingdom come on earth as it is in
Heaven[,]” who also said[,] “In my Father’s house are many
mansions,” already we should be further toward the realization of
this great millen[n]ial vision. The word of God is still insistent,
and more emphatic as the human redemption delays and becomes
more crucial, and we have what Dr. Elsemont [Esslemont] rightly
calls Baha’u’llah’s “one great trumpet–call to humanity”:
Christopher Buck
Alain Locke and Cultural Pluralism
142
“That all nations shall become one in faith, and all men as
brothers; that the bonds of affection and unity between the
sons of men should be strengthened; that diversity of
religion should cease, and differences of race be annulled...
These strifes and this bloodshed and discord must cease,
and all men be as one kindred and family.[”]287
In that same essay, Locke speaks of the “Old South” as well as [141] the
“New Negro,” of “a New South” in a “new era.” Locke’s vision was
world–embracing, as he was equally as concerned for “suppressed
minorities the world over today.” Moreover, he believed that any real
solution to these problems would have to come about through “a
revolution within the soul.” Indeed, there were moments when, for
various personal reasons,288 Locke later withdrew from active
involvement in the Washington, DC, Bahá’í community. But there were
moments of courage and grandeur, when Locke publicly identified himself
as a Bahá’í. As late in his life as 1952, Locke gave a Bahá’í “fireside”—his
last known Bahá’í speaking engagement. One of those present states that,
“He certainly clearly identified himself — indeed was introduced — as a
Bahá’í to all of us there, Bahá’ís and seekers.”289
The important point to bear in mind is that, as late as 1952, we have
evidence that Locke continued to identify himself as a Bahá’í. Almost all
of Locke’s previous Bahá’í speaking engagements were highly visible,
public events. In the instant case, Locke spoke at a private fireside—one
that was by invitation only and, most likely, not publicized. This episode
shows that Locke was willing to participate in private and well as public
Bahá’í events. It shows a dimension of Locke’s life as a Bahá’í that was
hitherto unknown to us.
Perhaps the greatest significance this new information holds is that it
dispels the notion, held was some authorities, that, late in life, Locke was
a “freethinker,” uncommitted to any religion. It can now be argued, based
on this fresh evidence, that Locke remained a committed Bahá’í until the
end of his life. Also in 1952, it must have been with Locke’s permission
Christopher Buck
Alain Locke and Cultural Pluralism
143
that his photograph appeared (alongside a picture of a fellow Bahá’í,
Robert S. Abbott, founder of the Chicago Defender) in an Ebony magazine
article entitled, “Baha’i Faith: Only church in world that does not
discriminate.”290 Of Locke, Shoghi Effendi reportedly said that: “People as
you, Mr Gregory, Dr Esslemont and some other dear souls are as rare as
diamond.”291
Just as one cannot understand Locke without reference to his intellectual
pedigree, the Bahá’í Faith was part and parcel of his spiritual pedigree. It
was the dominant spiritual influence on Locke.
[142] Note: Christopher Buck, author of Symbol and Secret (Kalimát,
1995) and Paradise and Paradigm (State University of New York, 1999)
teaches at Michigan State University.
1.
2.
3.
4.
Alain Locke, “Unity through Diversity: A Bahá’í Principle,” in The Bahá’í World: A
Biennial International Record, Volume IV, April 1930–April 1932, comp. National
Spiritual Assembly of the Bahá’ís of the United States and Canada (New York:
Bahá’í Publishing Committee, 1933; reprint, Wilmette: Bahá’í Publishing Trust,
1980) 372–74. Reprint in Leonard Harris (ed.) The Philosophy of Alain Locke
(Philadelphia: Temple University Press, 1989) 133–38 [above quote from 137].
Harris’ reference (133 n.) should be emended to read, Volume IV, 1930–1932 (not “V,
1932–1934”).
Use was made of archival sources in the Moorland–Spingarn Research Center
(MSRC), Howard University, courtesy of Ms. Ida Jones, manuscript librarian, who
assistance is gratefully acknowledged; and the National Bahá’í Archives (NBA), US
Bahá’í National Center, courtesy of Roger M. Dahl, archivist, whose assistance is
also gratefully acknowledged. My research trip to the Moorland–Spingarn Research
Center at Howard University (6–9 August 2001) and to the Washington, D.C.
Bahá’í Center (10 August 2001) was made possible through the generous support
of Kalimát Press, and also with the assistance of the Department of American
Thought and Language, Michigan State University. I am also indebted to Gayle
Morrison for her careful reading and critical comments on a previous version of this
manuscript, which is part of a work–in–progress, Alain Locke: Faith and Philosophy
(Los Angeles: Kalimát Press, forthcoming).
Alain Locke, “Pluralism and Ideological Peace,” in Sidney Hook and Milton R.
Konvitz, eds. Freedom and Experience: Essays Presented to Horace M. Kallen (Ithaca:
Cornell University Press, 1947) 67.
Judith Green, “Cosmopolitan Unity Amidst Valued Diversity: Alain Locke’s Vision
of Deeply Democratic Transformation,” in Deep Democracy: Community, Diversity, and
Transformation (Lanham, MD: Rowman & Littlefield, 1999) 132.
Gayle Morrison, To Move the World: Louis G. Gregory and the Advancement of Racial Unity
in America (Wilmette: Bahá’í Publishing Trust, 1982) 4, note.
Christopher Buck
5.
6.
7.
8.
9.
10.
11.
12.
13.
14.
15
16
17
18
19.
20.
Alain Locke and Cultural Pluralism
144
Ernest Mason, “Alain Locke’s Social Philosophy,” World Order 13.2 (1979): 25–34.
See also idem, “Alain Locke on Race and Race Relations,” Phylon 40.4 (1979): 342–
50. Cf. Yvonne Ochillo, “The Race–Consciousness of Alain Locke,” Phylon 47.3
(1986): 173–81.
Columbus Salley, The Black 100: A Ranking of the Most Influential African–Americans,
Past and Present. Revised and Updated (Secaucus, NJ: Citadel Press, 1999 [1993])
137.
George Hutchison, The Harlem Renaissance in Black and White (Cambridge, MA and
London: Harvard University Press, 1995) 390.
Winston Napier, “Affirming Critical Conceptualism: Harlem Renaissance Aesthetics
and the Formation of Alain Locke’s Social Philosophy,” The Massachusetts Review 39.1
(1998): 94.
Rudolph A. Cain, “Alain Leroy Locke: Crusader and Advocate for the Education of
African American Adults,” Journal of Negro Education 64.1 (1995): 87; Michael R.
Winston, “Locke, Alain LeRoy,” in Rayford W. Logan and Michael R. Winston, eds.
Dictionary of American Negro Biography (New York and London: W. W. Norton, 1982)
403. See also Tommy Lee Lott, “Alain LeRoy Locke,” in Michael P. Kelly (ed.)
Encyclopedia of Aesthetics (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1998) 160–65; and
Sandra L. Quinn–Musgrove, “Lost in Blackness: Alain LeRoy Locke,” Ethnic Forum
12.2 (1992): 48–68. The present writer has not yet accessed Jeffrey Stewart, A
Biography of Alain Locke, Philosopher of the Harlem Renaissance, 1886–1930 (PhD
dissertation, Yale University, 1979). Abstracted in Dissertation Abstracts International
(1981) 42.4: 1696–1697–A.
Winston, op. cit., 403.
Mason, “Alain Locke’s Social Philosophy.”
Alain Locke, “Values and Imperatives” in Sidney Hook and Horace M. Kallen, eds.
American Philosophy, Today and Tomorrow (New York: Lee Furman, 1935) 313–33.
Locke, ibid.
Cited by Horace M. Kallen, “Alain Locke and Cultural Pluralism,” Journal of
Philosophy 54.5 (28 February 1957): 121.
Kallen, op. cit., 122.
Winston, op. cit., 398.
For verification of Locke’s birthdate, I obtained a document issued by the
“Department of Public Health and Charities, Bureau of Health” (City Hall,
Philadelphia), Alain Locke Papers, Box 164–1, Folder 1, Manuscript Division,
Moorland–Spingarn Research Center, Howard University. See note by Leonard
Harris, “Rendering the Text,” in idem (ed.) The Philosophy of Alain Locke: Harlem
Renaissance and Beyond (Philadelphia: Temple University Press, 1989)
As was the case when Locke filled out his “Bahá’í Historical Record” card. Under
“Birthdate,” Locke had entered “September 13, 1886.” Bahá’í Historical Record
Cards Collection, and Biographical Information Collection, NBA.
Alain Locke Papers, MSRC, Box 164–1, Folder 2 (Autobiographical statements).
Although his middle name was formally spelled “LeRoy,” in full signature he would
write “Leroy,” as evident on his “Bahá’í Historical Record” card signature. Bahá’í
Historical Record Cards Collection, and Biographical Information Collection, NBA.
Kallen, op. cit., 122.
Christopher Buck
Alain Locke and Cultural Pluralism
145
21. Late in life, Locke reminisced about some of his childhood experiences. See
Douglas K. Stafford, “Alain Locke: The Child, the Man, and the People,” Journal of
Negro Education 30.1 (1961): 25–34.
22. Anthony Fitchue, “Locke and Du Bois: Two Major Black Voices Muzzled by
Philanthropic Organizations,” Journal of Blacks in Higher Education, Issue 14 (1996–
1997): 111.
23. Winston, op. cit., 398.
24. Winston, ibid.
25. Winston, ibid.
26. Hutchison, op. cit., 40.
27. Hutchison, op. cit., 39–40.
28. Kallen, op. cit., 122.
29. Harris, Philosophy of Alain Locke, 5.
30. Harris, Philosophy of Alain Locke, 3–5.
31. Harris, Philosophy of Alain Locke, 4 and 293.
32. Locke to Parsons, 28 June 1922, Agnes Parsons Papers, NBA.
33. Winston, op. cit., 398.
34. Mason, “Locke’s Social Philosophy,” 25.
35. Harris, Philosophy of Alain Locke, 4.
36. Winston, op. cit., 398.
37. Nancy Fraser, “Another Pragmatism: Alain Locke, Critical ‘Race’ Theory, and the
Politics of Culture,” in Leonard Harris (ed.) The Critical Pragmatism of Alain Locke: A
Reader on Value Theory, Aesthetics, Community, Culture, Race, and Education (Lanham,
MD: Rowman & Littlefield, 1999) 6.
38. Kallen, op. cit., 121.
39. Jeffrey C. Stewart, “A Black Aesthete at Oxford.” Massachusetts Review 34.3 (1993):
411–28.
40. Kallen, op. cit., 119.
41. Hutchison, op. cit., 85. See also Ross Posnock, Color and Culture: Black Writers and the
Making of the Modern Intellectual (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1998)
191.
42. Menand, op. cit., 391.
43. Posnock, op. cit., 192.
44. Kallen, op. cit., 119.
45. Kallen, op. cit., 122.
46. Hutchison, op. cit., 85.
47. Louis Menand, The Metaphysical Club: A Story of Ideas in America (New York: Farrar,
Straus and Giroux, 2001) 390.
[145]
48. Menand, ibid.
49. Menand, op. cit., 391.
50. Menand, op. cit., 391.
51. Kallen, op. cit., 122.
52. Alain Locke, “Oxford Contrasts,” Independent 67 (July 1909): 139–42. See also idem,
“The American Temperament,” North American Review 194 (August 1911): 262–70.
Christopher Buck
53.
54.
55.
56.
57.
58.
59.
60.
61.
62.
63.
64.
65.
66.
67.
68.
69.
70.
71.
72.
73.
74.
75.
76.
77.
78.
79.
Alain Locke and Cultural Pluralism
146
Harris, Philosophy of Alain Locke, 294.
Posnock, op. cit., 194.
Kallen, op. cit., 122.
Winston, op. cit., 399.
Stewart, op. cit.
Kallen, op. cit., 122.
M. G. Brock and M. C. Curthoys, eds. The History of the University of Oxford, Vol. VII.
Nineteenth–Century Oxford, Part 2 (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2000) 804, citing
Jeffrey Green, Black Edwardians (1998) 154.
Kallen, op. cit., 122.
Menand, op. cit., 390.
Kallen, op. cit., 121–22.
Menand, op. cit., 390.
William B. Harvey, “The Philosophical Anthropology of Alain Locke,” in Russell J.
Linnemann (ed.) Alain Locke: Reflections on a Modern Renaissance Man (Baton Rouge
and London: Louisiana State University, 1982) 18.
Kallen, “Alain Locke and Cultural Pluralism,” 122. For an analysis of Locke’s
dissertation on value theory, see Ernest Mason, “Alain Locke’s Philosophy of
Value,” in Russell J. Linnemann (ed.) Alain Locke: Reflections on a Modern Renaissance
Man, 1–16. Locke had originally intended to study under Royce as his PhD
supervisor, but Royce had died by the time Locke returned to Harvard.
Harris, Philosophy of Alain Locke, 10.
Molesworth, op. cit., 176.
Mason, “Alain Locke’s Social Philosophy,” 28.
Locke, op. cit., 45.
Locke, op. cit., 36.
Locke, “The Need for a New Organon in Education,” in Harris, Philosophy of Alain
Locke, 272.
Charles Molesworth, “Alain Locke and Walt Whitman: Manifestos and National
Identity,” in Leonard Harris (ed.) The Critical Pragmatism of Alain Locke, 175.
Fitchue, op. cit., 113.
Kallen, op. cit., 122.
Menand, op. cit., 396 and Harris, Philosophy of Alain Locke, 205. These lectures were
later edited and published: Alain Locke, Race Contacts and Interracial Relations, edited
by Jeffery C. Stewart (Washington: Howard University Press, 1992).
See Alain Locke, “Major Prophet of Democracy.” Review of Race and Demo- [146]
cratic Society by Franz Boas. Journal of Negro Education 15.2 (Spring 1946): 191–92.
See also Mark Helbling, “Feeling Universality and Thinking Particularistically: Alain
Locke, Franz Boas, Melville Herkskovits, and the Harlem Renaissance,” Prospects 19
(1994): 289–314.
Cited by Peggy Pascoe, “Miscegenation Law, Court Cases, and Ideologies of ‘Race’
in Twentieth–Century America,” Journal of American History 83.1 (June 1996): 53, n.
23.
Pascoe, op. cit., 53.
Menand, op. cit., 396–97.
Christopher Buck
Alain Locke and Cultural Pluralism
147
80. Fraser, op. cit., 7.
81. “The Negro’s Contribution to American Culture,” Journal of Negro Education 8
(July 1939): 521–39, reprinted in Jeffrey C. Stewart (ed.) The Critical Temper of Alain
Locke: A Selection of His Essays on Art and Culture (New York: Garland, 1983) and
quoted in Tommy Lee Lott, “Nationalism and Pluralism in Alain Locke’s Social
Philosophy,” in Lawrence Foster and Patricia Herzog (eds.) Defending Diversity:
Contemporary Philosophical Perspectives on Pluralism and Multiculturalism (Amherst:
University of Massachusetts Press, 1994): 106.
82. Fraser, op. cit., 17.
83. Harris, Philosophy of Alain Locke, 296–97.
84. Harvey, op. cit., 21.
85. Alain Locke, “The Negro in the Three Americas,” Journal of Negro Education 14
(Winter 1944): 7 (editorial note).
86. Beth J. Singer, “Alain Locke Remembered,” in Leonard Harris (ed.) The Critical
Pragmatism of Alain Locke, 328.
87. Singer, op. cit., 329.
88. Singer, op. cit., 329–30.
89. The text of that speech is extant, to which the newspaper account may be
compared. The present writer has requested—but not yet received—the text of this
speech, archived in the Alain Locke Papers, MSRC, Box 164–123, Folder 8 (“On
Becoming World Citizens.” Commencement Address at University of Wisconsin
High School, 28 May 1946. [typescript]).
90. Kallen, op. cit., 122.
91. See Verner D. Mitchell, “Alain Locke: Philosophical ‘Midwife’ of the Harlem
Renaissance,” in Leonard Harris (ed.) The Critical Pragmatism of Alain Locke, 192.
92. Locke, The New Negro, 6 and 47, quoted in Franke, op. cit., 23 and 26.
93. Alain Locke (ed.) The New Negro: An Interpretation (New York: Albert and Charles
Boni, Inc., 1925). Reprinted, with a new preface by Robert Hayden (New York:
Atheneum, 1969).
94. Shusterman, op. cit., 102 and 109, n. 8.
95. Astrid Franke, “Struggling with Stereotypes: The Problems of Representing a
Collective Identity,” in Leonard Harris (ed.) The Critical Pragmatism of Alain Locke, 22.
96. Locke, The New Negro 11, 47, 99, quoted in Shusterman, op. cit., 105.
97. Fraser, op. cit., 15–17.
98. Alain Locke, The New Negro, 52–3 and 9, quoted in Richard J. Shusterman,
“Pragmatist Aesthetics: Roots and Radicalism,” in Leonard Harris (ed.) The Critical
Pragmatism of Alain Locke, 102 and 104.
[147]
99. Molesworth, op. cit., 185.
100. Harris, Philosophy of Alain Locke, 6. Locke expressed his enthusiastic support for Du
Bois’s concept in an essay, “The Talented Tenth,” Howard University Record 12.7
(December 1918): 15–18, but locked antlers with Du Bois over the latter’s
insistence that art be propaganda, in a later essay, “Art or Propaganda?” Harlem 1
(November 1928): 12–13. See discussion in Richard Keaveny, “Aesthetics and the
Isuue of Identity,” in Harris (ed.) The Critical Pragmatism of Alain Locke, 127–40.
101. See Alain Locke, “Art or Propaganda?” Harlem 1 (November 1928): 12–13.
Christopher Buck
Alain Locke and Cultural Pluralism
148
102. Molesworth, op. cit., 176.
103. Johnny Washington, Alain Locke and Philosophy: A Quest for Cultural Pluralism (New
York: Greenwood Press, 1986) xxv.
104. Fraser, op. cit., 16.
105 Posnock, op. cit., 198.
106 Kallen, op. cit., 121.
107 A facsimile of Louis Gregory’s “Bahá’í Historical Record” card is reproduced in
Morrison, op. cit., between pp. 208 and 209.
108 On the Bahá’í Historical Record cards, see Robert Stockman, The Bahá’í Faith in
America: Early Expansion, 1900–1912 (Oxford: George Ronald, 1995) 412; and
“Bahá’í Historical Record,” Bahá’í News, No. 94 (August 1935): 2. The Historical
Record Cards have been available to researchers for some time, but they gave no
clues about Locke because his card has only recently been discovered.
109. Gayle Morrison, op. cit., “Table. Information about 99 black respondents among
1,1813 Bahá’ís surveyed, 1935–c. 1937, from Bahá’í Historical Record Cards in the
National Bahá’í Archives, Wilmette, Illinois,” 204.
110. Bahá’í Historical Record Cards Collection, and Biographical Information Collection,
NBA. The date, “1918,” given in the table compiled by Morrison (ibid.) is certainly
based on the personal data Locke provided.
111. See Charlotte Linfoot, “Alain LeRoy Locke, 1886–1954,” in The Bahá’í World: An
International Record, Volume XIII, 1954–1963 (Haifa: Universal House of Justice,
[1970] 1980) 894–5. In this obituary, Linfoot states: “In the early 1920’s Dr. Locke
came into contact with the Bahá’í Faith in Washington, DC” (895).
112. My thanks to Gayle Morrison for suggesting these possibilities.
113. Office of the Secretary Records, Bahá’í Membership Lists Files, Bahá’í National
Center. These lists include: March 1922; September 1925; 1928–1929 (appears to
be updated by hand and written over the typewritten 1927–1928 list); 14 January
1934; 22 January 1936; 1937; January 1938; 11 January 1939; 1940; 1941; 1942; 15
January 1943; 1944; 1945; 1946; 1947; 1948; 1949; 1950; 1951. Courtesy of Roger
M. Dahl, Archivist, National Bahá’í Archives.
114. Harris, Philosophy of Alain Locke, 300. Locke instructed that his remains be cremated.
See Alain Locke Papers, MSRC, Box 164–1, Folder 6 (Will and [148] instructions
in case of death); and Folder 7 (Last will and testament, 1943). In neither of these
executory documents was there any testament of faith. Along with many other
Bahá’ís at that time, Locke was probably unaware of the Bahá’í proscription against
cremation.
Christopher Buck
Alain Locke and Cultural Pluralism
149
115. This may be deduced from a letter written by Mariam Haney to “My dear Mr.
Locke,” in which she urges Locke to attend his first Bahá’í fireside (evidently, at the
home of the Obers) for not only his sake, but for her sake and for the sake of other
Bahá’ís as well: “My friends write me that you have never been to see them. I really
was quite surprised, for my first thought about it all was that you would be
rendering them a service. If you ever go once, I know you will want to go again,
even if this first time I should ask you to go just to please me! I have your interests
at heart and theirs as well, so you can gather why I should be anxious for a meeting
between you. Through Mr. and Mrs. Ober, you would meet— (if you cared to) some
very lovely people, and I should feel proud to have them know you.” Haney to
Locke, February 1915, Alain Locke Papers, MSRC, Box 164–33, Folder 49 (Haney,
Mariam).
116. Bahá’í Historical Record Cards Collection, and Biographical Information Collection,
NBA. Locke received three copies of this form from Joseph F. Harley, III, secretary
of the Spiritual Assembly of the Bahá’ís of Washington, DC. Harley to Locke, 27
August 1935, Alain Locke Papers, MSRC, Box 164–176, Folder 13 (Bahá’í Faith).
117. Louis Gregory, “Convention for Amity Between the Colored and White Races.” In
Star of the West 12.6 (24 June 1921): 117–18. Reprinted as vol. 7 (Oxford: George
Ronald, 1978). See also idem, “Inter-Racial Amity,” in The Bahá’í World: A Biennial
International Record, Volume Two, 1926–1928, comp. National Spiritual Assembly of
the Bahá’ís of the United States and Canada (New York: Bahá’í Publishing
Committee, 1929; reprint, Wilmette: Bahá’í Publishing Trust, 1980) 281; and idem,
“Racial Amity in America.” In The Bahá’í World: A Biennial International Record, Volume
VII, 1936–1938 (National Spiritual Assembly of the Bahá’ís of the United States and
Canada, 1939; reprint, Wilmette: Bahá’í Publishing Trust, 1980) 655; Mariam
Haney (secretary, The Teaching Committee of Nineteen), “A Compilation of the
Story of the Convention for Amity,” 31 May 1921, Box 164–176, Folder 13 (Bahá’í
Faith).
118. Of that meeting, Locke writes: “Through a miscarriage of plans, due to necessity of
taking some [heart] treatment, I could not manage to meet the group of friends in
Stuttgart. I did, however, have some very appreciated hours with the friends in
England, especially Miss Rosenberg.” Locke to Parsons, 21 October 1922, Agnes
Parsons Papers, NBA. See also Remey to Locke, 10 February 1923, Alain Locke
Papers, MSRC, Box 164–80, Folder 1 (Remey, Charles Mason).
119. On his passport issued 26 June 1922, Locke, while in Berlin, was granted a visa,
dated 25 August 1923, to “Egypt, Palestine & United Kingdom.” Alain Locke
Papers, MSRC, Box 164–2, Folder 2 (Passports 1922, 1924).
120. “It is certain that the youth for whom you are now doing so much will[,] to a
greater and greater degree, as the years pass, appreciate your service.” Gregory to
Locke, 12 March 1923, Alain Locke Papers, MSRC, Box 164–32, Folder 50 (Gregory,
Louis G.)
[149]
121. Morrison, op. cit., 146; Gregory, “Inter-Racial Amity,” 283; idem, “Racial Amity in
America.,” 657; Locke to Parsons, 21 October 1922, Agnes Parsons Papers, NBA.
Members of the committee included Agnes Parsons, Elizabeth Greenleaf, Mariam
Haney, Alain Locke, Mabel Ives, Louise Waite, Louise Boyle, Roy Williams, Philip
R. Seville, and Mrs. Atwater.
Christopher Buck
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122. Morrison, op. cit., 147. Locke’s response to his appointment was enthusiastic: “I
received word today of the appointment on the Inter–Amity Committee, and am
especially anxious to be able to contribute my share to its conferences and
findings.” Locke to Parsons, 22 May 1924, Agnes Parsons Papers, NBA.
123. Morrison, op. cit., 149; Gregory, “Racial Amity in America.,” 658.
124. This committee had “essentially the same membership for the period 1925–26.”
Morrison, op. cit., 155.
125. “The Seventeenth Annual Convention and Bahá’í Congress,” Bahá’í News Letter,
No. 6 (1925): 3. Holley to Locke, 1 June 1925; Holley to Locke, undated (“Sunday
P.M.” [sic]); Holley to Locke, 23 June 1925, western Union Cablegram, Alain Locke
Papers, MSRC, Box 164–36, Folder 47 (Holley, Horace).
126. “News of the Cause,” Bahá’í News Letter, No. 10 (Feb. 1926): 6.
127. Alaine [sic] Locke, “Impressions of Haifa,” in Bahá’í Year Book, Volume One, April
1925–April 1926, comp. National Spiritual Assembly of the Bahá’ís of the United
States and Canada (New York: Bahá’í Publishing Committee, 1926) 81, 83.
Morrison, op. cit., 151 and 343, n. 18. Holley to Locke, 29 December 1925; Holley
to Locke, 28 January 1926, Alain Locke Papers, MSRC, Box 164–36, Folder 47
(Holley, Horace). “Impressions of Haifa” was first published in Star of the West 15,
13–14. In probable reference to this article, Shoghi Effendi wrote: “The article by
Prof. Locke is very good and sufficient.” (From a letter dated 12 March 1996 written
on behalf of Shoghi Effendi to the National Spiritual Assembly of the Bahá’ís of the
United States and Canada Publishing Committee). Courtesy of the Universal House
of Justice, enclosure to letter dated 16 July 2001 to the present writer.
128. Morrison, op. cit., 164.
129. Holley to Locke, 17 March 1927; Holley to Locke, 20 March 1927; Holley to Locke,
30 March 1927, Alain Locke Papers, MSRC, Box 164–36, Folder 47 (Holley,
Horace); and Box 164–112, Folder 21 (“Cultural Reciprocity”).
130. Holley to Locke, 20 April 1927; Holley to Locke, 16 June 1927; Holley to Locke, 13
February 1930, Alain Locke Papers, MSRC, Box 164–36, Folder 47 (Holley,
Horace).
131. “National Committee on Race Amity Appointed,” Bahá’í News Letter, No. 16 (March
1927): 5. Committee members: Agnes Parsons (“Chairman”), Louis Gregory
(Executive Secretary), Louise Boyle, Mariam Haney, Coralie Cook, Dr. Zia M.
Bagdadi, Dr. Alain Locke. Morrison, op. cit., 166 and 344, n. 4.
132. Louis Gregory, National Committee on Inter-Racial Unity, Gregory to National
Spiritual Assembly and all Local Spiritual Assemblies of the United States and
Canada, 23 February 1927, Alain Locke Papers, MSRC, Box 164–176, Folder 13
(Bahá’í Faith). This report was praised by Shoghi Effendi as a [150] “splendid
document [...] so admirable in its conception, so sound and sober in its language”
and which “has struck a responsive chord in my heart” (Morrison, op. cit., 173 and
347, n. 20). Excerpts published in “Inter-Racial Amity Conferences,” Bahá’í News
Letter, no. 22 (March 1928).
133. “Committees of the National Spiritual Assembly 1927–1928,” Bahá’í News Letter,
No. 19 (August 1927): 4. Members of this new committee: Agnes Parsons, Louis
Gregory, Coralie Cook, Miss Elizabeth Hopper, Dr. Zia M. Bagdadi, Dr. Alain Locke,
Miss Isabel Rives.
Christopher Buck
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134. Alaine [sic] Locke, “Impressions of Haifa,” in The Bahá’í World: A Biennial
International Record, Volume II, April 1926–April 1928, comp. National Spiritual
Assembly of the Bahá’ís of the United States and Canada (New York: Bahá’í
Publishing Committee, 1928; reprint, Wilmette: Bahá’í Publishing Trust, 1980)
125, 127. Original manuscript in Alain Locke Papers, MSRC, Box 164–115, Folder
29 (“Impressions of Haifa” [typescript]).
135. “Committees of the National Spiritual Assembly 1929–1930,” Bahá’í News Letter,
No. 32 (May 1929): 4. Members: Louis Gregory (Chairman), Shelley Parker
(Secretary), Agnes Parsons, Louise Boyle, Mariam Haney, Dr. Zia Bagdadi, Dr. Alain
Locke, Loulie Mathews, Miss Alice Higginbotham.
136. Alain Locke, “Impressions of Haifa,” in The Bahá’í World: A Biennial International
Record, Volume III, April 1928–April 1930, comp. National Spiritual Assembly of the
Bahá’ís of the United States and Canada (New York: Bahá’í Publishing Committee,
1930; reprint, Wilmette: Bahá’í Publishing Trust, 1980) 280, 282.
137. Louis Gregory, “Interracial Amity Committee” [1929–1930 Annual Report], Bahá’í
News Letter, no. 40 (April 1930) 10–12. The committee members were: Louis G.
Gregory (chairman), Shelley N. Parker (secretary), Agnes Parsons, Mariam Haney,
Louise D. Boyle, Zia M. Bagdadi, Alain Locke, Alice Higgenbotham, Loulie A.
Matthews. In reference to a draft letter (requested by the NSA) to Mrs. Herbert
Hoover, who held a reception for black Congressman Oscar DePriest, the
committee “pointed out that interracial amity is the basis of universal peace” (ibid.,
12).
138. Ruhi Afnan (on behalf of Shoghi Effendi) to Locke, 15 February 1930; Afnan (on
behalf of Shoghi Effendi) to Locke, 5 July 1930; Shoghi Effendi to Locke, 5 July
1930, Alain Locke Papers, MSRC, Box 164–10, Folder 2 (Afnan, Ruhi).
139. “National Bahá’í Committees 1931–1932,” Bahá’í News Letter, No. 53 (July 1931): 2.
Members: Loulie Mathews (chairman), Louis G. Gregory (secretary), Dr. Zia M.
Bagdadi, Mabelle L. Davis, Frances Fales, Sara L. Witt, Alain L. Locke, Shelley N.
Parker, Annie K. Lewis. Of his acceptance, Locke writes: “Your letter about the
Interracial committee was welcome and enheartening. I have written Mr. Lunt my
acceptance, and hope next year to participate more actively in the Amity
conferences and consultations.” Locke to Gregory, 6 June 1931, Louis Gregory
Papers, NBA. Louis Gregory, “The Annual Convention,” Bahá’í News, no. 52 (May
1931): 3. See Morrison, op. cit., 349, n. 29.
140. Locke spoke at the second session. Louis Gregory (on behalf of the National Bahá’í
Committee for Racial Amity), “Inter-Racial Amity Activities,” Bahá’í News, No. 72
(April 1933): 6. See also Morrison, op. cit., 194, [151] citing “Committee Reports:
Committee on Inter-Racial Amity,” Bahá’í News, No. 74 (May 1933): 13 as well.
141. See note 1, supra.
142. Spiritual Assembly of the Bahá’ís of Washington, DC, untitled report, 1935, Alain
Locke Papers, MSRC, Box 164–176, Folder 13 (Bahá’í Faith). Members of the
Teaching Committee: Stanwood Cobb (chairman), Charles Mason Remey (vice–
chairman), Mrs. John Stewart (secretary), Clarence Baker, Louise Boyle, William
Gibson, Alain Locke, George Miller, Ethel Murray.
143. Locke to Holley, 18 April 1935, Alain Locke Papers, MSRC, Box 164–36, Folder 47
(Holley, Horace).
Christopher Buck
Alain Locke and Cultural Pluralism
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144. Held at the Tea House of the Dodge Hotel. Official program, Alain Locke Papers,
MSRC, Box 164–176, Folder 13 (Bahá’í Faith). In a note to Locke written on an
announcement of this event sent out by the local spiritual assembly of the Bahá’ís
of Washington, DC, Joseph Harley III wrote: “Your Bahá’í record cards have not
been received– Bring them Monday, please.” (From the Washington, DC, Bahá’í
Archives.)
145. Locke to Cobb, 10 December 1935, Alain Locke Papers, MSRC, Box 164–21, Folder
16 (Stanwood Cobb).
146. Alain Locke, “The Orientation of Hope,” in The Bahá’í World: A Biennial International
Record, Volume V, April 1932–April 1934, comp. National Spiritual Assembly of the
Bahá’ís of the United States and Canada (New York: Bahá’í Publishing Committee,
1936; reprint, Wilmette: Bahá’í Publishing Trust, 1980) 527–28. Reprint in Leonard
Harris (ed.) The Philosophy of Alain Locke, 129–132. Leonard Harris’ reference (129
n.) should be emended to read, “Volume V, 1932–1934” (not “Volume IV, 1930–
1932”). Original manuscript in Alain Locke Papers, MSRC, Box 164–123, Folder 11
(“The Orientation of Hope.” 1934 [typescript]).
147. “I understand from Miss Juliet Thompson that you are going to speak at the Bahá’í
center on the afternoon of October 24th.” Gulick to Locke, 11 October 1943, Alain
Locke Papers, MSRC, Box 164–33, Folder 17 (Gulick, Robert L. Jr.).
148. Morrison, op. cit., 285.
149. Gulick to Locke, 28 January 1944; Gulick to Locke, “25" [February 1944], Alain
Locke Papers, MSRC, Box 164–33, Folder 17 (Gulick, Robert L. Jr.).
150. Alain Locke, “Lessons in World Crisis,” in The Bahá’í World: A Biennial International
Record, Volume IX, April 1940–April 1944, comp. National Spiritual Assembly of the
Bahá’ís of the United States and Canada (Wilmette: Bahá’í Publishing Committee,
1945; reprint, Wilmette: Bahá’í Publishing Trust, 1981) 745–47.
151. “Local Communities,” Bahá’í News, No. 182 (April 1946): 6.
152. “Voting Members of the Washington, DC Bahá’í Community, 6 April 1949, Alain
Locke Papers, MSRC, Box 164–176, Folder 13 (Bahá’í Faith).
153. Gregory to Locke, 6 April 1949, Alain Locke Papers, MSRC, Box 164–32, Folder 50
(Gregory, Louis G.): “Although your Bahá’í spirit has been admirably shown by so
many traits and activities, yet I have the deepest longing that you will see the
wisdom of wholly identifying yourself with the Faith, thereby increasing your joys
and usefulness, perhaps twenty-fold.”
[152]
154. Gregory to Locke, 21 January 1951, Alain Locke Papers, MSRC, Box 164–32, Folder
50 (Gregory, Louis G.): “... my longing is, that your identify yourself fully with
it” [the Bahá’í Faith] ... My most earnest hope is that you will see clearly the way to
unite with the Bahá’ís in either Washington or New York, in the latter of which, I
am told, you maintain a residence.”
155. Nina Matthisen to Locke, 5 September 1952; and press release (1953), Alain Locke
Papers, MSRC, Box 164–176, Folder 13 (Bahá’í Faith).
156. Research Department, Bahá’í World Centre, Memorandum to The Universal House
of Justice, 12 June 2002.
157. Ibid.
158. Research Department, Bahá’í World Centre, Memorandum to The Universal House
of Justice, 26 December 2001.
Christopher Buck
Alain Locke and Cultural Pluralism
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159. From a letter dated 12 March 1926 written on behalf of Shoghi Effendi to the
National Spiritual Assembly of the Bahá’ís of the United States and Canada
Publishing Committee, “References to Dr. Alain Locke in Letters Written on Behalf
of Shoghi Effendi,” Attachment, The Universal House of Justice to Buck, 16 July
2001.
160. Research Department, Bahá’í World Centre, Memorandum to The Universal House
of Justice, 26 December 2001.
161. Ibid.
162. Locke, “Impressions of Haifa” (1926, 1929, 1930).
163. Locke, “Impressions” (1930) 280.
164. Locke, ibid.
165. Locke, ibid.
166. Gregory, “Inter–racial Amity,” 281. See Morrison, op. cit., 134–43.
167. In a message conveyed by Mountfort Mills (an American Bahá’í recently returned
from a visit to Palestine), ‘Abdu’l-Bahá was reported to have said: “Say to this
convention that never since the beginning of time has a convention of more
importance been held. This convention stands for the oneness of humanity. It will
become the cause of the removal of hostilities between the races. It will become the
cause of the enlightenment of America. It will, if wisely managed and continued,
check the deadly struggle between these races, which otherwise will inevitably
break out” (Gregory, “Convention for Amity Between the Colored and White
Races,” 115).
168. Harris, Philosophy of Alain Locke, 5.
169. Gregory, “Interracial Amity Committee” (1930) 10. (Note that this text differs from
the translation given in another report: Gregory, “Convention for Amity Between
the Colored and White Races,” 115), but the gist is the same. In all likelihood, both
translations were taken from the same Persian original.)
170. ‘Abdu’l-Bahá to Parsons, 26 July 1921 and 27 September 1921. See Morrison, op.
cit., 143 and 342, n. 34.
171. Dahl to Buck, 16 February 2001.
172. Locke to Gregory, 6 June 1931, Louis Gregory Papers, NBA.
173. Locke to Holley, 18 April 1935, Alain Locke Papers, MSRC, Box 164–36, Folder 47
(Holley, Horace).
174. Robert Stockman, The Bahá’í Faith in America: Early Expansion, 1900–1912 (Oxford:
George Ronald, 1995) 189.
[153]
175. Locke to Parsons, 21 October 1922, Agnes Parsons Papers, NBA.
176. Morrison, op. cit., 140. See Alain Locke, “Obituary of George Cook,” Star of the
West 18, 254. Mariam Haney had solicited this obituary. Haney to Locke, 25
September 1931, Alain Locke Papers, MSRC, Box 164–33, Folder 49 (“Haney,
Mariam”).
177. Locke to Gregory, 6 June 1931, Louis Gregory Papers, NBA.
178. Morrison, op. cit., 148–49, 164 and 182.
179. Agnes Parsons, who once again served as the chair of that committee, was struck
by a car and killed in January 1934. She was seventy-three years old at her death.
Morrison, op. cit, 198.
Christopher Buck
Alain Locke and Cultural Pluralism
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180. Morrison, op. cit., 194–213.
181. Morrison, op. cit., 213.
182. Locke to Mariam Haney (corresponding secretary of the Washington, DC LSA), 30
March 1941, MSRC, Box 164–33, Folder 49 (“Haney, Mariam”).
183. Louis Gregory (on behalf of the National Bahá’í Committee for Racial Amity),
“Inter-Racial Amity Activities,” Bahá’í News, No. 72 (April 1933): 6.
184. “Local Communities,” Bahá’í News, No. 182 (April 1946): 6.
185. “News of the Cause,” Bahá’í News Letter, No. 10 (Feb. 1926): 6. Cf. Morrison, op.
cit., 151, who states that this tour occurred in 1925. However, Horace Holley
indicates 1926: “I am delighted that the plans have worked out so well for your
southern trip. I hope you will keep in touch with me during this trip and send me
little memorandums of your public talks and any other news that might be of
interest to the friends in the Bahá’í News Letter. You understand, of course, that I
will present the story of your trip in an impersonal way and not refer to you as the
source of the news. Consequently, please do not be so modest that you lean
backward, because trips of this kind are most inspiring to all the friends and I feel
that they have a right to know the details of what I am sure is going to be a
remarkable speaking journey.” Holley to Locke, 28 January 1926, Alain Locke
Papers, MSRC, Box 164–36, Folder 47 (Holley, Horace). In a later letter, it is clear
that this trip must have taken place prior to August, as Locke was in Paris at that
time. Holley to Locke, 17 August 1926, Alain Locke Papers, MSRC, Box 164–36,
Folder 47 (Holley, Horace).
186. “The Seventeenth Annual Convention and Bahá’í Congress,” Bahá’í News Letter, No.
6 (1925): 3.
187. “News of the Cause,” Bahá’í News Letter, No. 10 (Feb. 1926): 6–7.
188. Morrison, op. cit., 124. See entry in index on 387, which says that Louis Gregory
“helps form first Spiritual Assembly in South.”
189. Office of the Secretary Records, National Bahá’í Convention Files, Box 4. Courtesy
Gayle Morrison. email communication, 11 Oct. 2002.
190. Gayle Morrison, email communication, 11 Oct. 2002.
191. Southern Regional Teaching Committee (Louise D. Boyle, Agnes Parsons, Louis
Gregory), “Report of the Southern Regional Teaching Committee” (15 April 1926),
73–74. Courtesy of Gayle Morrison, email communication, 17 Oct. 2002.
192. Southern Regional Teaching Committee (Louise D. Boyle, Agnes Parsons, Louis
Gregory), “Report of the Southern Regional Teaching Committee” (15 April 1926),
73–74. Courtesy of Gayle Morrison, email communication, 17 Oct. 2002.
193. Ibid.
[154]
194. See Christopher Buck, Symbol and Secret: Qur’an Commentary in Bahá’u’lláh’s Kitáb-i
Íqán. Studies in the Babi and Bahá’í Religions, vol. 7 (Los Angeles: Kalimát Press,
1995). Republished online as an electronic book at: http://bahai-library.com/
buck_symbol_secret_quran.
195. Harris, Philosophy of Alain Locke, 129–32.
196. Harris, Philosophy of Alain Locke, 133–38.
197. Harris, Philosophy of Alain Locke, 129.
Christopher Buck
Alain Locke and Cultural Pluralism
155
198. Shoghi Effendi to Locke, Western Union cablegram, 17 January 1944; Mabel Paine
to Locke, 3 February 1944. See also Holley to Locke, 1 February 1944, Alain Locke
Papers, MSRC, Box 164–36, Folder 47 (Holley, Horace), and Paine to Locke, 4
March 1944, Alain Locke Papers, MSRC, Box 164–12, Folder 3 (Bahá’í World).
Original manuscript in Alain Locke Papers, MSRC, Box 164–106, Folder 22 (re:
Bahá’í revelation of principles)
199. Locke, “The Orientation of Hope,” in Harris, Philosophy of Alain Locke, 130, 132.
200. Harris, Philosophy of Alain Locke, 8, 10.
201. Kallen, op. cit., 122.
202. Harris, Philosophy of Alain Locke, 9.
203. Private memorandum, Alain Locke Papers (MSRC), cited by Winston, op. cit., 402.
204. Winston, op. cit., 404.
205. Menand, op. cit., 351.
206. James T. Kloppenberg, “Pragmatism: An Old Name for Some New Ways of
Thinking?” Journal of American History 83.1 (1996): 102, n. 3.
207. Posnock, op. cit., 184.
208. Harris, Philosophy of Alain Locke, 4.
209. Alain Locke, “Pluralism and Intellectual Democracy,” in Conference on Science,
Philosophy and Religion, Second Symposium (New York: Conference on Science,
Philosophy and Religion, 1942). Reprinted in Leonard Harris (ed.) The Philosophy of
Alain Locke, 53.
210. Kloppenberg, op. cit., 101.
211. Kloppenberg, op. cit., 120.
212. Houston Baker, Jr., Modernism and the Harlem Renaissance (Chicago: University of
Chicago Press, 1987) 75, quoted by Harris, Philosophy of Alain Locke, 12. See
Ernest Mason, “Deconstruction in the Philosophy of Alain Locke,” Transactions of the
Charles S. Pierce Society 24 (Winter 1988): 85–106.
213. Lecture, 8 Nov. 1950, Howard University.
214. Posnock, op. cit., 187.
215. Posnock, op. cit., 187.
[155]
216. Leonard Harris, “Preface,” in idem (ed.) The Critical Pragmatism of Alain Locke, xi.
217. Mason, “Social Philosophy of Alain Locke,” 26.
218. Kallen, op. cit., 127.
219. Green, “Alain Locke’s Multicultural Philosophy of Value,” 87.
220. Judith Green, “Alain Locke’s Multicultural Philosophy of Value,” in Leonard Harris
(ed.) The Critical Pragmatism of Alain Locke, 87.
221. Napier, op. cit.
222. Mason, “Social Philosophy of Alain Locke,” 34.
223. Ibid.
224. Posnock, op. cit., 192.
225. Molesworth, op. cit., 175–76.
226. Alain Locke, “Cultural Relativism and Ideological Peace,” in Lyman Bryson, Louis
Finkelstein, and R. M. MacIver (eds.) Approaches to World Peace (New York: Harper &
Brothers, 1944) 609–618. Reprinted in Harris, Philosophy of Alain Locke, 67–78.
Christopher Buck
227.
228.
229.
230.
231.
232.
233.
234.
235.
Alain Locke and Cultural Pluralism
156
Locke, op. cit., 70.
Ibid.
Locke, op. cit., 75.
Locke, op. cit., 72.
Ibid.
Locke, op. cit., 73.
Locke, “Pluralism and Intellectual Democracy,” 60.
Locke, “Values and Imperatives,” in Harris, Philosophy of Alain Locke, 48.
Locke, “Cultural Relativism and Ideological Peace,” in Harris, Philosophy of Alain
Locke, 73.
236. Moses, op. cit., 166.
237. Locke, “Cultural Relativism and Ideological Peace,” in Harris, Philosophy of Alain
Locke, 73.
238. Ibid.
239. Locke, op. cit., 70.
240. Locke, op. cit., 75.
241. Locke to Parsons, 28 June 1922, Agnes Parsons Papers, NBA.
242. Locke, “Unity through Diversity: A Bahá’í Principle,” in Harris, Philosophy of Alain
Locke, 130.
243. Locke, op. cit., 135.
244. Locke, op. cit., 136.
245. Ibid.
246. Green, Deep Democracy, 97.
247. Washington, Alain Locke and Philosophy, xxv.
248. Locke, op. cit., 135.
249. Ibid., emphasis added.
250. Mason, “Locke’s Social Philosophy,” 26.
251. Mason, “Locke’s Social Philosophy,” 28.
252. Stikkers, op. cit., 214–15.
253. Locke, op. cit., 135.
254. Locke, “Unity through Diversity: A Bahá’í Principle,” in Harris, Philosophy of Alain
Locke, 134.
255. Locke, “The Contribution of Race to Culture,” in Harris, Philosophy of Alain Locke,
203.
256. Green, op. cit., 124.
257. Alain Locke, “Pluralism and Ideological Peace,” 65, cited by Harvey, op. cit., 26.
258. Kenneth W. Stikkers, “Instrumental Relativism and Cultivated Pluralism: Alain
Locke and Philosophy’s Quest for a Common World,” in Leonard Harris (ed.) The
Critical Pragmatism of Alain Locke, 214–15.
259. [156] See Josiah Royce, The Philosophy of Loyalty. Republished with an introduction
by John J. McDermott (Nashville: Vanderbilt University Press, 1995 [1908]).
260. Leonard Harris, Philosophy of Alain Locke, 4. See Josiah Royce, Race Questions,
Provincialism, and Other American Problems (1908; reprint, Freeport: Books of Libraries
Press 1967).
Christopher Buck
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261. Green, “Alain Locke’s Multicultural Philosophy of Value,” 88. See also Royce, Race
Questions.
262. Moses, op. cit., 168.
263. Greg Moses, “Two Lockes, Two Keys: Tolerance and Reciprocity in a Culture of
Democracy,” in Leonard Harris (ed.) The Critical Pragmatism of Alain Locke, 165.
264. Moses, op. cit., 173.
265. Green, “Cosmopolitan Unity Amidst Valued Diversity,” 132.
266. Green, op. cit., 97.
267. Alain Locke, “Minorities and the Social Mind,” Progressive Education 12 (March
1935): 142.
268. Segun Gbadegesin, “Values, Imperatives, and the Imperative of Democratic Values,”
in Leonard Harris (ed.) The Critical Pragmatism of Alain Locke, 288.
269. Ibid.
270. Green, Deep Democracy, 96.
271. Rudolph V. Vanterpool, “Open–Textured Aesthetic Boundaries: Matters of Art,
Race, and Culture,” in Leonard Harris (ed.) The Critical Pragmatism of Alain Lock, 141.
272. Alain Locke, “Lessons in World Crisis,” 746.
273. Hutchison, op. cit., 86.
274. Named after a pre-Civil War minstrel show character, Jim Crow laws were late
nineteenth-century statutes passed by Southern states that created an American
apartheid. In 1883, although slavery had been abolished in 1863, the Supreme
Court declared the Civil Rights Act of 1875 unconstitutional, reflecting the
widespread white supremacist attitudes of the day and effectively demolishing the
foundations of post-Civil War Reconstruction. In 1896, the high court promulgated
the “separate but equal doctrine” in Plessy v. Ferguson, leading to a profusion of Jim
Crow laws. By 1914, every Southern state had established two separate societies
“colored.” Segregation was enforced by the creation of separate facilities in virtually
every sector of civil [157] society: restaurants, health care institutions, and
cemeteries. In 1954, this racial caste system was successfully challenged in Brown v.
Board of Education of Topeka, Kansas, which declared segregation in the public schools
unconstitutional. The Jim Crow system was finally dismantled by civil rights
legislation in 1964 68.
275. Johnny Washington, A Journey into the Philosophy of Alain Locke (Westport, CT and
London: Greenwood Press, 1994) 103.
276. It should be noted that Shoghi Effendi, in The World Order of Bahá’u’lláh, 2nd rev.
edn. (Wilmette: Bahá’í Publishing Trust, 1974 [1938]), used this term to refer to
differences of ethnic origins, climate, history, language, tradition, thought and habit
(41)—generally, in the sense of a lack of conformity except in essentials—as the
bedrock of the Bahá’í community. It is therefore misleading to represent “unity in
diversity” as applying only to race. (I am indebted to Gayle Morrison for this
important observation.)
277. See Jonathan Levin, “The Esthetics of Pragmatism,” American Literary History 6
(1994): 658–83.
278. Locke, “Unity through Diversity: A Bahá’í Principle,” in Harris, Philosophy of Alain
Locke, 135.
279. Locke, op. cit., 137.
Christopher Buck
Alain Locke and Cultural Pluralism
158
280. Locke, “Cultural Relativism and Ideological Peace,” in Harris, Philosophy of Alain
Locke, 72.
281. Locke, “The Need for a New Organon in Education,” in Harris, Philosophy of Alain
Locke, 268.
282. Locke, “Pluralism and Ideological Peace,” in Harris, Philosophy of Alain Locke, 99.
283. Locke, “Pluralism and Intellectual Democracy,” in Harris, Philosophy of Alain Locke,
62.
284. “You had better make up your mind to become a Methodist—They are certainly
loyal to you—I heard your praises sung by several of them.” Mary Locke to Alain
Locke, 14 May 1916), Alain Locke Papers, MSRC, Box 164–65, Folder 21 (page 5).
285. Locke to Parsons, 28 June 1922, Agnes Parsons Papers, NBA.
286. Alain Locke Papers, MSRC, Box 164–1, Folder 2 (Autobiographical statements).
287. Untitled essay, Alain Locke Papers, MSRC, Box 164–143, Folder 3 (Writings by
Locke—Notes. Christianity, spirituality, religion).
288. Locke’s probable homosexual orientation may be relevant to this. See, e.g., Leonard
Harris, “‘Outing’ Alain Locke: Empowering the Silenced,” in Sexual Identities,
Queer Politics, ed. Mark Blasius (Princeton University Press, 2001) 321–41. In my
own research of the Alain Locke Papers at Howard University, I discovered an
unpublished autobiographical statement in which Locke referred to his “Achilles
heel of homosexuality” which he “kept in an armoured shell [?] of reserve &
haughty caution” (Alain Locke Papers, MSRC, Box 164–143, Folder 5
[Autobiographical writings]).
289. Michael Rochester, personal communication, dated 5.2.02. Dr Rochester states:
“Having been strongly attracted to the Bahá’í teachings in November 1951, as a
student at the University of Toronto, I vividly remember attending a [158] fireside
held in January or February 1952, in a home in what was then a suburb of Toronto,
at which Alain Locke was the speaker. Unfortunately Elizabeth Manser (later my
wife) who organized that fireside, no longer remembers how Dr. Locke came to be
in Toronto, to be invited to the fireside or the title of his talk. His persona made a
great impression on me, not only because what I understood of the Bahá’í stand on
the oneness of the human race and the importance of efforts to free ourselves from
racial prejudice was immensely attractive to me, but because his modest
demeanour, and the wisdom and thoughtfulness with which he expressed himself,
were so consonant with what I had already come to appreciate in and expect from
the best Bahá’í speakers. He certainly clearly identified himself — indeed was
introduced — as a Bahá’í to all of us there, Bahá’ís and seekers.”
290. Ebony (October 1952) 39. Locke kept a copy of this article. Alain Locke Papers,
MSRC, Box 164–147, Folder 12 (Articles, advertisements that mention Locke).
291. Bahadur to Locke, 27 February 1924, Alain Locke Papers, MSRC, Box 164–12,
Folder 2 (Bahadur, Azizullah).