Max Yergan

by Anthony, David Henry, III;

  Kadalie’s movement was noteworthy for the presence within its ranks of a small but prominent set of African and “Coloured” active members of the Communist Party, most notably Jimmy la Guma10 and John Gomas, both widely known Cape Town militants. Yergan almost certainly knew of them and had opportunities to notice them in action. He also read Communist literature, especially the party organ, Umsebenzi (The Worker). Given his personal contacts and awareness of local and international news, he may have read of the Sixth World Congress of the Communist International, held in September 1928. However, responding to liberal and state pressure, by 1928 C. K. Kadalie was expelling Communists from the ICU ranks.

  While the “Negro question” in the United States was of keen concern to social radicals after the Bolshevik revolution, class distinctions separated middle-class or petit-bourgeois elements from working-class African-Americans. As early as the Fifth Congress of the Communist International in 1924, Black U.S. delegate James Jackson reflected this stratification by criticizing a Chicago conference of Negro organizations held that February that was dominated by an ecclesiastical and professional elite. Jackson ended his critique on what party stalwarts would have felt was a triumphal note: “Nevertheless we were successful in the last two days of the congress in provoking a split.”11 The matter was placed under consideration by the Fourth Enlarged Plenum of the Executive Committee of the Communist International (ECCI).12 It recurred at the ECCI’s Fifth Enlarged Plenum one year later. But few anticipated the centrality of this aspect of class struggle before the Sixth World Congress.

  Learning from the accumulated experience of fraternal socialist parties in addressing the vexing nationalities question, certain Comintern operatives launched trenchant attacks on particular parties for their alleged failure to regard oppressed national groups with sensitivity. Japan’s Katayama Sen13 (a resident in several historically Black colleges) took the occasion of the Sixth World Congress to criticize the Communist Party of Great Britain for its “criminal neglect” of Ireland and India, and laid into the parties of the Netherlands and North America for similar crimes against Indonesia, the Philippines, and African-American toilers in the United States. Together these groups warranted consideration as colonized peoples.

  Thus the North American “Negro” and South African “Native” questions became connected. South Africa’s delegates helped draft a protocol beginning,

  In the union of South Africa, the Negro masses, who constitute the majority of the population and whose land is being expropriated by the White colonists and by the State, are deprived of political rights and of freedom of movement, are exposed to the worst kinds of racial and class oppression, and suffer simultaneously from pre-capitalist and capitalist methods of oppression and exploitation.14

  The document then proceeded:

  The communist party, which has already had some successes among the Negro proletariat, has the duty of continuing still more energetically the struggle for the complete equality of rights for the Negroes, for the abolition of all special regulations and laws directed against Negroes, and for confiscation of the estates of the landlords. In drawing into its ranks Negro workers, organizing them in trade unions, fighting for their admission into the trade unions of white workers, the communist party is obliged to struggle by every means against racial prejudice among white workers and to eradicate such prejudices entirely from its own ranks. The party must vigorously and consistently advance the slogan of the creation of an independent Native Republic, with guarantee for the rights of the white minority, and translate this fight into action.15

  Yergan’s comments from late 1928 reveal a further frustration that a furlough may have both relieved and inflamed, especially when he returned to a seething cauldron from which only he had escaped. This was clear in his remarks on the deteriorating position of the African majority in South Africa, especially that of the small, vibrant stratum of Christian-educated, property-holding “school people,” middle-class African professionals whose social backgrounds, aspirations, and painful experiences with formal and informal racial discrimination so mirrored his own. Elite African freeholders in Cape Province, voters since the nineteenth century, now risked losing the right to vote. In the peculiar way in which words have often been used to mean their opposite in South Africa, in the middle to late 1920s the Nationalist-Labour Pact government struck at the last vestiges of African autonomy in landholding, labor, and the franchise. The semantic deceit of the Pact government was clear in the ironically titled “Representation of Natives in Parliament Bill,” a maneuver intended to disfranchise black voters. This was met by universal African outrage, spurring Yergan to report home heatedly:

  The Representation of Natives in Parliament Bill, whereby those Africans of the Cape Province (that province of the Union in which Africans vote) will cease to exercise the vote on the present basis, and in its place a new system will be instituted whereby certain Africans throughout the country will vote for seven Europeans to represent them in Parliament. Very strong, almost unanimous, objection has been registered against the last two of the above proposals by the Africans themselves. In addition various groups of Europeans as well as individuals have protested against the last two measures as being retrogressive and unjust. The Bills are now in the hands of a Parliamentary Select Committee and it remains to be seen in what new forms they will be brought before Parliament when it convenes early next year. The effect of this proposed legislation upon the entire life of Africans is extremely vital and they are watching it closely.

  This trend, and the severity of the Depression, led Yergan to evoke the plight of the African masses.

  The economic condition of the Native population according to careful observers is not improving. Dr. James Henderson, Principal of Lovedale Institution, states as the result of a survey made in a given district that “over the greater part of South Africa the Native population is economically losing ground, that, relative to its members, its resources are shrinking, and becoming exhausted, and that the means at the disposal of many African communities have normally ceased to be sufficient for sustaining healthy life.” There is no longer any doubt about the grave economic condition of Native Africans; and it is equally as clear that its improvement must be undertaken from almost as many angles as there are in life here.

  Africa, the West, and Christianity

  By the end of 1928, Yergan was on the move again, this time to greet the General Meeting of the World Student Christian Federation in Mysore, India, where he reconnected with the leaders of the Indian YMCA, K. T. Paul and Surendra K. Datta. The previous May, Paul had asked that WSCF authorities release Yergan to spend an extended period in India, suggesting five to six weeks, during which time he could investigate the major regional YMCA centers in such cities as Madras, Calcutta, Delhi, Lahore and Bombay.16 Also representing South Africa were D. D. T. Jabavu and Z. R. Mahabane.

  On the eve of Yergan’s departure, Fort Hare principal Alexander Kerr took advantage of the opportunity his latest sojourn provided to write a reminder of what he saw as Yergan’s fitness for this mission. To do so, Kerr recapped the history of Yergan’s South African work. Beginning by telling the origins of Student Christian Movement (SCM) work in South Africa in 1896, Kerr mentioned early contacts with Native training institutions. Describing the problem of recruiting an American Negro as “an affair of some delicacy,” he revisited the saga of “stringent immigration restrictions” leveled at Black Americans. Then Kerr shifted to Yergan, indicating precisely what he faced and how he discharged his duties:

  The man sent out, therefore, had to meet a very exacting test. First of all he had to possess the qualifications of character, of scholarship, of training in, and experience of, work among students, of sympathy with men belonging indeed to his own great race, but separated from him by language, customs, outlook and awareness of modern civilization. Secondly, he had to have such breadth of Christian sympathy as would allow him to work hand in hand with missionaries of many
Christian denominations, each with its own peculiar approach to the heart of the African. Thirdly, he had to possess such tact as would enable him to commend his work to a European population not at large impressed with any grave necessity for the uplift of the Native people and by no means convinced of their capacity for progress in the ways of civilization. Fourthly, he had to have such a fund of sound doctrine and appreciation of the realities of the situation as would make it easy for a government traditionally nervous, not without reason, of movements of native opinion, to countenance his activities amongst the more educated section of the Native people. In the providence of God, as it now seems to us, the choice of the American Committee fell upon Max Yergan.17

  Yergan’s Mysore address proved detailed and erudite. Building upon the firm foundation of his presentation to the Enlarged Meeting of the International Missionary Council in Jerusalem in March, he presented an extensive survey of challenges facing committed Christians in South Africa, later published as Africa, the West, and Christianity. Drawn from a close reading of some of the best available literature on European colonization, the text showed impressive command of source material for someone who was essentially a self-trained Africanist.18 It bore the earmarks of Yergan’s prior writings, as well as profiting from his lecturing acumen. Following Parker Moon, he saw the rationale behind imperial expansion as principally economic, a response to the need for new markets, but also as influenced by the revolution in communications, desire for raw materials and surplus capital. Quoting C. J. H. Hayes, he then stressed the decisive role played by the growth of nationalism. From Leonard Woolf he derived the notions of the “beliefs and desires” of Western peoples, which, according to Basil Mathews, were powerful forces in the successful realization of the aims of the occupiers.

  In considering instances of direct occupation and control, he analyzed Eastern and Southern Africa, raising a few pointed queries. Presenting the issue of the clash of cultures in terms of competing claims laid by Africans and European occupiers in these regions, he gently stated that “from the point of view of the African, rights of personality, rights of previous occupation of the land, the right to live and grow in terms of the new life in the midst of which he finds himself, are involved.” But then he judiciously added that “European interests on the other hand demand the black man’s labour and land; and sometimes the land which the black man himself needs.”

  The remainder of Yergan’s text concerned South Africa, which historically resembled the United States. The South African problem pivoted around race, culture, and land. Race mattered not in the abstract but as a mechanism whereby social inequality was mandated and enforced by a body of legislation and institutions. Competing cultures and claims led to intractable conflict. Maintaining an accustomed and practiced, evenhanded stance, Yergan gave weight to the views of both sides in this combat, measuring but not judging the African or the European, acknowledging where the power lay—within White-created structures of dominance—but also emphasizing the primacy of the issue of land.

  There is deep seated dissatisfaction and real unrest among Africans because of the inadequate extent of land to which they have access. This dissatisfaction is by competent authority recognised and admitted as justly based. Africans and many Europeans contend that there can never be the basis for right racial relations until there is a provision whereby Africans may purchase more land. Indeed it is argued that the absence of opportunity for purchasing or leasing sufficient land is very largely responsible for most of the disabilities under which Africans live. The land question then, in the opinion of most Africans and many Europeans, is the root of the larger question affecting the relations between the two races.19

  Assessing the effects of the European presence upon Africa, Yergan saw mixed results. Unable to state categorically that Africa’s encounter with the West was in every sense an evil one, he balanced his scale of objective achievement with a counterweight of chaotic erosion of preexisting structures, beliefs, values, and societal controls, painting a picture at once subjective, subtle, and sharp:

  With family life very largely broken up wherever western industry has touched, the old restraining influences of the African social code no longer serve. The simplicity of village life of yesterday has been destroyed, never to return again.

  Nothing so solid and so well understood as their own ideas and customs of the past are available for Africans of to-day. New diseases against which there is built up no immunity beset Africans as a result of the penetration of outside forces. Strange food and new living conditions have lowered the vitality and power of resistance to disease on the part of large numbers of Africans, especially those engaged in industries. The power and authority of their traditional rulers, their chiefs, have been shaken and in many instances destroyed by the power of the white man.20

  Having diagnosed the ills afflicting occupied Africa in general and South Africa in particular, Yergan proceeded to his prescription, an application of the Golden Rule. This uplifted the “personality” of Africans, ceased color stigmatization, and led to increased “European” cooperation and acceptance in policies directed toward Africa and African people. Max was especially hopeful about the force of public opinion, embodied in institutions like the International Labor section of the League of Nations and within colonial governments. Lastly, he lauded the younger generation:

  In South Africa, for instance, the youth and student sections are becoming rapidly acquainted with the great social questions of that land and are not only seeking the facts but are progressively arriving at right conclusions about responsibilities and relationships. The Church of South Africa is likewise acquiring an increasing conviction of its social mission and function and is undertaking to fulfill its responsibilities in these respects.21

  Yergan arrived in India late in November, remaining for the entire month of December and well into January 1929. We do not know much about his movements during his sojourn there, but it is likely that he traveled extensively across the country, perhaps by rail and motorcar, possibly revisiting old haunts in the Bangalore of his youthful World War One years, but also taking note of the progress of the appeal of Gandhi’s satyagraha movement, about which he would have read for years.

  Back home in the United States, Yergan’s star continued ascending, as his fund-raising efforts to match Rockefeller and Carnegie grants stirred the imaginations of both anonymous masses and thoughtful, well-heeled individual donors. In March, pharmaceutical magnate, Tuskegee University trustee, and Black YMCA supporter William J. Schieffelin reported that the great tenor Roland Hayes was permitting the proceeds of the sale of box seats in his final Carnegie Hall recital to be given to benefit the Max Yergan Building Fund.22

  Yergan’s extended WSCF stay in India greatly stimulated his thinking on the direction of his work in the federation’s Executive Committee in general, and in South Africa in particular. In the latter his first order of business was to attend Fort Hare’s Governing Council, where he revealed his plans for a YMCA building and dwelling house, where the Executive Council was empowered to act in concert with Yergan in connection with these intentions. Upon finishing this business, he contemplated decisions relative to other parts of Africa as well, notably Rhodesia, Central Africa, Eastern Africa, and even the Gold Coast and Sierra Leone in West Africa. Anxious to share his short-term plans with WSCF leader F. P. Miller, he wrote,

  The remaining portion of 1929 must certainly be given to a most intensive strengthening of our associations in South Africa. Visits must be made to Southern Rhodesia and to Portuguese East Africa, but as I see things now, my main emphasis must be in South Africa. At the same time I must carry certain responsibilities in connection with the South African Missionary Conference and give some attention to the building project which we have on involving our new National headquarters and the Students’ Union at Fort Hare on which about £10,000 will be expended. Time must also be found to respond to the quickened interest among European students in a new appr
oach to the racial question—a task to which almost all of one’s time could with ample justification be given.23

  After his note to Miller, Yergan wrote David R. Porter of the International Committee. This missive, unlike the one to Miller, differed on the scope of WSCF work. The crux of the dispute was this:

  I appreciated your insistence at Mysore upon the necessity of the Federation definitely committing itself to projects in parts of the world other than those in Europe. I think it was helpful for you to make known the fact in the article which you wrote at Mysore that the Federation had committed itself to some such undertaking in relation to our work in Africa. Following this decision I have taken the liberty in one or two communications to headquarters, especially to Francis, to outline for them what I think they should do.24

  This, then, was the raison d’être of his Miller letter, a copy of which Yergan enclosed, while revealing confidentially to Porter his broader aim, namely, to push for greater integration of extra-European work. Yergan did this “so as not to embarrass Francis.” Then, he enumerated his objections:

  (1) The decision taken at Nyborg did not in my opinion contemplate the formation of a Council for the purposes which are true of the present European council; but rather an all European conference somewhat along the lines of the Pacific Area Conference; (2) Our concentration in Europe will greatly handicap the Federation in pursuit and in achievement of its world wide mission. (3)… My conception of the Federation’s task is to make for the largest exchange between nations and races and to give its aid to gatherings of the largest possible international and interracial nature. This point is the more real to me in view of one reason for the formation of this council as stated by Pastor Lilje at Mysore, namely, the necessity on the part of Europe to organize in order to combat a threatened religious invasion from the outside.25