Correspondence, mostly from 1922-23, to and from Robert Russa Moton appears in the selections from the National Negro Business League files of the Booker T. Washington Papers at the Library of Congress. In addition, the Coolidge-Consumerism collection contains selections from the Robert Russa Moton Papers in the Moton Family Papers at the Library of Congress. Among them are Moton's keynote address at the dedication of the Lincoln Memorial, Moton Speech, Speech Draft and Correspondence . . . at the Dedication of the Lincoln Memorial, Washington, D.C., May 30, 1922, and three magazine articles, Moton Articles on the Economic Status of African Americans in the 1920s. The fact that Moton delivered the main address at the dedication of the Lincoln Memorial suggests that he was perceived as Booker T. Washington's heir with regard to leadership of the African-American community.
During the years that form the focus of the Coolidge-Consumer collection, Dr. Moton (1867-1940) had succeeded Booker T. Washington as principal of Tuskegee Institute and president of the National Negro Business League. (For a portrait photograph of Robert R. Moton, see the January 1925 issue of Opportunity, p. 21.) The League was founded by Booker T. Washington in 1900 "to promote the commercial and financial development of the Negro." (DIRECTORY NOTE Booker T. Washington Papers) Washington, and later Moton, felt that solutions to the problem of racial discrimination were primarily economic, and that the key lay in efforts to bring African Americans into the middle class. (INTRO NOTE African Americans)
Membership in the League was open to "any member of the race in good standing in his or her community," whether the person was in business, professional or private life. Meetings provided a forum for sharing stories of African-American small businessmen's struggles and successes. The organization promoted the commercial endeavors and economic advancement of blacks, mainly but not solely in the South, via a network of state and local negro business leagues, and affiliated professional and trade organizations. (DETAIL NOTE National Negro Business League)
In keeping with the interracial economic approach of its founder, the League maintained substantial connections, direct and indirect, with white businessmen. Under Dr. Moton's leadership, the League worked with the Association of National Advertisers and, as correspondence from the National Negro Business League files of the Booker T. Washington Papers shows, such other established promoters of mainstream business development as the prestigious Associated Advertising Clubs of the World. (DETAIL NOTE Associated Advertising) (Advertising Clubs Manager Carl Hunt is the contact person whose correspondence appears in the file.) The goal was to publicize Negro business both to African Americans and to American society in general. Readers interested in reviewing the correspondence should consult the National Negro Business League Correspondence, 1922 (A-B), National Negro Business League Correspondence, 1922 (C-D), and National Negro Business League Correspondence, 1922 (E-H), in the Booker T. Washington Papers.
In Moton's own papers, the Moton Correspondence with the Dunbar National Bank of New York City 1928-29 further suggests the League president's contacts with the white business world. Early in 1929, he was invited to serve on the Board of Directors of the Dunbar National Bank, established in 1928 to service the African-American community in Harlem but built with a low-interest loan from the Rockefeller family.
Moton was also instrumental in the growth of the Colored Merchants Association (C.M.A.), a national cooperative of black grocery stores. (DETAIL NOTE The Colored Merchants' Association)