Charles W. Chesnutt to Albion W. Tourgée, 25 June 1895
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8566
CHAS. W. CHESNUTT,
I am in receipt of yours of June 14th enclosing three (3) certificates of stock in the Basis. Before making any effort to dispose of them, I should like to know what has became of the "Basis?" Has it suspended, or been changed to a monthly, or what? I ask because I have not received a number for several weeks.1
I was sorry I did not see you while you were in Cleveland. I did not learn for a day or two after you had gone, that you had been here, although I had supposed I read the papers every day.2 I did not have time to attend the sessions ‸of the you convention you attended. I shall not let such another opportunity pass, however,
Yours very Truly, Chas. W. Chesnutt.Correspondent: Albion Winegar Tourgée (1838–1905) was a White activist, author, and judge. During Reconstruction, he settled in North Carolina and became an advocate for racial equality. Tourgée wrote his bestselling autobiographical novel, A Fool's Errand (1879), before moving to Mayville, New York, in 1881. He published fifteen more novels in the next seventeen years, and several times attempted to found magazines, often inviting Chesnutt to serve as editor. In 1891, he founded the National Citizens' Rights Association, an organization devoted to equality for African-American citizens, and in 1896 served as Homer Plessy's lead counsel in the U.S. Supreme Court case Plessy v. Ferguson (1896).
1. The Basis: A Journal of Citizenship was founded by Albion W. Tourgée along with several Buffalo, New York, reformers and businessmen. The journal lasted thirteen months. [back]
2. It is likely that Albion W. Tourgée was in Cleveland for the convention of the National Republican League, which was held in the city on June 20–June 23, 1895 ("Three Days' Session at Cleveland of the National Republican League," News Herald [Port Clinton, OH] 30, no. 12, 28 June 1895: 2.). [back]
