Summary of Lala Lajpat Rai, "The United States of America: A Hindu's Impressions..." (1916)
Below are summaries of select chapters from the book, with long quotations from the text on topics likely to be of interest to researchers. The full text of the book is here.
Note: To produce this book, Rai met with many thinkers and educators around the country. He describes visiting the Tuskegee Institute in Alabama, where he met with Booker T. Washington and his wife. He also met with John Hope, President of Morehouse College in Atlanta. He did not meet W.E.B. Du Bois in person, though he corresponded with him extensively and used letters of introduction from Du Bois to facilitate meetings with others. He also describes a number of academics on both the east coast (mainly Columbia University) and the west coast (mainly the University of California at Berkeley) who met with him and introduced him to others. In his acknowledgments, he suggests that two substantial chapters were in fact written for him by a Miss Frieda Hauswirth -- a Stanford graduate who not only wrote the chapters on the history of the United States and the women's movement for the book but also helped Rai prepare the final manuscript. If that is accurate, the book should be described as co-authored.
"The Education of the Negro"
Lala Lajpat Rai describes the African American as the "Pariah of America," drawing parallels between their struggle and that of the depressed classes in India. Before the Civil War, literacy among slaves was systematically discouraged or legally prohibited in many Southern states, with severe penalties like fines and whippings for those who taught them. Despite these barriers, individuals like Frederick Douglass learned to read and write surreptitiously. Systematic education only began in earnest after the 1865 emancipation, which transformed four million people from "chattels" to citizens.
In the North, schools became integrated, but the South maintained segregated systems. Higher education for African Americans was largely founded by Northern missionary and benevolent organizations. A significant ideological divide exists regarding the goal of this education: industrial training versus higher liberal education. Proponents of industrial training, exemplified by Booker T. Washington’s Tuskegee Institute, emphasize vocational skills to improve economic efficiency and "manhood" through labor. Conversely, thinkers like Dean Kelly Miller argue that higher liberal education is essential to develop personality, provide "racial inspiration," and produce the leaders and thinkers necessary for the race's survival.
Rai notes that while Black illiteracy dropped to 45% within fifty years, Southern states often underfunded African American schools compared to white ones, using disenfranchisement to cut school funds. Notably, Rai observes that facilities for the education of Black women, such as Spelman School, are superior to those available for women in India at the time.
"The Negro in American Politics"
Slavery in America began in 1619, creating a system that Lajpat Rai argues debased both master and slave by destroying self-respect and humanity. For centuries, stringent laws ensured masters held absolute dominion over Negroes as property. Resistance took the form of insurrections and the "Underground Railroad," a secret network that helped thousands escape to the North and Canada. The Civil War ultimately led to the final abolition of slavery through the 13th, 14th, and 15th Amendments, which granted Negroes freedom, citizenship, and the right to vote.
During Reconstruction, "Negro Governments" briefly held power in the South under federal protection, but this era was met with intense white resentment and the rise of secret organizations that used violence to regain control. Once federal troops were withdrawn, Southern states effectively disenfranchised the Negro through "force or fraud," and later through "quasi-legal" means like property tests and "Grandfather clauses". This led to the era of "Jim Crow" laws, which enforced strict segregation in transport, housing, and schools.
The most extreme manifestation of race prejudice is lynching, where African Americans are murdered by mobs without trial, sometimes with the condonement of local officials. Politically, Negro leadership is split: Booker T. Washington suggests temporary submission and focus on economic accumulation, while W.E.B. Du Bois and the N.A.A.C.P. demand immediate civic equality, the right to vote, and education according to ability. Despite these "shackles," the Negro population has shown marvelous progress in land ownership and professional development.
"The Philippine Islands"
Lajpat Rai examines the American administration of the Philippines as a case study in anti-imperialism and preparation for self-government. He highlights that the stated objective of the U.S. is to withdraw once a stable government is established, a policy explicitly contrasted with the former Spanish regime that sought to keep the populace in ignorance. The American system emphasizes local autonomy, starting from the "barrios" and municipalities where Filipinos exercise suffrage to elect their own officers. This democratic framework extends to provincial boards and a bicameral central legislature, which includes an elected Assembly and is protected by a comprehensive Bill of Rights ensuring due process, freedom of speech, and religious liberty.
Education is the cornerstone of this transformation. Rai observes a "democratic, secular, and free school system" that has seen enrollment skyrocket, with a heavy emphasis on industrial and vocational training alongside English-language instruction. He notes that the U.S. bears the cost of its own military presence, while local revenues—derived from customs and internal taxes—are reinvested in the islands. Rai holds this model up as a potential example for India, noting that the Filipino is granted more power in his own government than almost any other Oriental people, largely due to the active oversight of anti-imperialist sentiments in the U.S..
"Caste in America"
Lajpat Rai challenges the Western notion that caste is a uniquely Hindu phenomenon, arguing that the American "color line" functions as a rigid caste system. He suggests that the Sanskrit term for caste, varna (meaning color), mirrors the American preoccupation with skin tone.
Rai observes that even "white" blood does not improve an African American person's status; highly educated individuals like Dr. Du Bois are still barred from white restaurants and theaters. He points out a glaring moral double standard: while laws often forbid intermarriage to prevent "mongrelization," white men frequently maintain illicit unions with Black women without social penalty.In India we are led to think that caste distinctions are a peculiarity of Hinduism and are to be found nowhere else in the world. It is true that the caste system, as developed by Hinduism, is perhaps unique. Nowhere has it been organized on such a scale and to such an extent as in Hindu India. But the principles and the reasons on which caste is based in Hinduism are by no means entirely peculiar to that system. It is remarkable that the original Sanskrit term denoting caste should be an equivalent of the English word "color." The English word Caste means "jat," which is not to be found in any authoritative exposition of Hindu Law or Hindu religion. These latter talk of "varna," but never of "jat" or "jat dharma." Similarly, speaking of what are practically caste distinctions in America, American writers of all classes and creeds speak of "color line" or "color prejudice." The word caste also occurs frequently in their writings, in fact more frequently than it occurs either in ancient or in classical Sanskrit, but not so markedly or so often as the "color line."
This leads one to think that the caste system in India owed its origin to probably the same considerations and causes as are to be found at the bottom of the caste feeling in the United States of America. In his chapter on "the color line," Mr. Haworth, an American writer, remarks that if the subject be considered in all its aspects, "it is hardly too much to say that the problem of the color line is one of the biggest problems of the ages."*
That gifted Negro writer, Dr. Du Bois, so often referred to in my articles on the Negro problem in America, also re- marks in rather striking language that the color question is the problem of the twentieth century. His book, "The Souls of Black Folk," is a most forcible, pathetic and masterly exposition of the iniquity of the color distinctions in this country. The best American writers are agreed that in beauty of composition, grandeur of style and artistic expression, the book stands unsurpassed in the whole range of American literature. Yet such is the strength of the color prejudice in this country that this great writer (although fair in color) would not be admitted into any restaurant, hotel, or theater, in the capital of the Union Government. A Harvard professor of economics told me how once, on the occasion of a conference of the sociologists of the United States, after the sitting of the conference was over, he with other American (white) professors expressed a desire that they should in a body go to an eating place and continue their talk, in reply to which Dr. Du Bois remarked that the only eating place open to him was the refreshment room of the railway station, and how eventually all of them had to go there in order to have the pleasure of Dr. Du Bois' company.
This prejudice is not merely social but manifests in legal and political disqualifications similar to the ancient Code of Manu. For instance, Negroes often face different, harsher standards of justice—symbolized by the horror of lynching—and are systematically denied political equality regardless of their educational or professional achievements.
Some of the best and the wisest of American writers of fame deplore this feeling, but they are helpless in the face of the universal hold which the feeling has over the country. The subject has had a great fascination for me, and wherever I have been in the course of my ramblings in this country, I have tried to probe the best minds on the point.
At New York, I put a direct question to the greatest sociologist of the Columbia University as to how, in his opinion, the problem was going to be solved. The reply was very discouraging and depressing. The amalgamation of the two races was, in his opinion, impossible. The intensity of the race prejudice might or perhaps will lessen in course of time. In some cases, the mention of the subject at the table or in conversation at a social function was declared to be bad taste. In two cases, my hostesses, very kind to me personally and expressing a great admiration for Hindus and Hinduism, flew into a sort of temper at my even remotely suggesting that the Negro was not having a fair and square deal in this country. "Oh, Mr. Rai", said one of them, "you do not know how wicked the modern Negroes in this country are. The old generation was very good, even lovable. They knew their place and were very faithful servants. My father had a Negro gardener, and he was a dear. We used to love him; but the new generation are so wicked that every time I went out for a ride in Virginia, my father armed me with a revolver lest a Negro might assault me."
The wife of a University professor in one of the mid-Western states expressed similar sentiments. All this is evidence of the deep-rooted prejudice that defies all education and enlightenment. To me the prospect of the disappearance of the caste feeling in America, in the near future at least, seems to be very meagre. And this in spite of the fact that the best mind of the nation is engaged in disproving the theory of inherent intellectual or social inferiority in any race of men merely by reason of their physical differences.
One of the most advanced and respected thinkers of America, Professor Royce of the Harvard University, had examined the subject in a masterly essay, wherein, after summarizing the scientific evidence on the question, he says: "In brief, there is hardly any one thing that our actual knowledge of the human mind enables us to assert with any scientific exactness, regarding the permanent, the hereditary, the unchangeable mental characteristics which distinguish even the most widely sundered physical varieties of mankind."* Later on he concludes that "our so-called race problems are merely the problems caused by our antipathies.” These antipathies he considers to be "extremely capricious and extremely suggestive mental phenomena" which on closer examination are nothing but "illusions." We all have illusions, says he, but let us not hug them. Let us not sanctify them by the name of science.
The color line, however, is not the only caste line in the Western world, though that is the most obvious and one that obtrudes itself rather too prominently and too frequently. A century ago there were four well known and well recognized castes in Europe, viz., that of the serf, who had no freedom of action, that of the ordinary labourer, who had some free- dom, that of the trader, and that of the feudal lord. The fifth was that of the priest. The priest and the feudal lord were almost above the law. They were the law-makers and they were the judges. The social interchange between them was extremely circumscribed and the chances of one's rising higher than the caste in which he was born were only few and far between, though there was no such bar as was till lately to be found in the Hindu system.
Beyond race, Rai identifies economic castes in the West, where the industrial system treats laborers with a severity comparable to old-world serfdom. While he does not defend the "social curse" of the Hindu caste system, he asserts that the Western industrial version is equally soul-killing. He concludes that while the Brahmin legislators of old were expected to be selfless, the capitalist legislators of the modern West are often driven by property interests, highlighting a different form of institutionalized inequality.
"India in America"
Lajpat Rai provides a detailed classification of the Indian diaspora in the United States, which he estimates exceeds ten thousand on the Pacific Coast alone. He identifies three primary groups: laborers, students, and religious preachers. The laborers, primarily Punjabi Sikhs, are described as conscientious and efficient workers who face severe prejudice due to their turbans, illiteracy, and perceived low standard of living. Despite their hard work, they are often exploited and lack an organization to protect their interests or provide healthy social recreation, leading some toward the "havoc" of liquor.
Some people are not disposed to attach much importance to the question of what they eat, but I do. In my view the question is one of stamina and character. The Sikh in America, whether in Canada or in the United States, must have donated hundreds of thousands of dollars for the Panth, but the Panth has done precious little for them. There are Sikh Gurdwaras in both countries, where Sikh Scriptures are kept and where Granthis are stationed and maintained, but no class of human beings can live on credal religion alone. Religion cannot fill all their life outside work.
The religious leaders have by overzeal added to their difficulties. For example, they brought nothing but ridicule on themselves by insisting on singing Bhajans and doing Kirtans to. the accompaniment of Sikh instruments of music, like the Kartal, Dholki, etc., in the streets of Stockton. I have not so far heard of any attempts having been made to educate them, to create and encourage a habit of reading among them, to establish social and recreative centres for them and otherwise to cater to their social and physical desires on wholesome lines. The Sikh and the Hindu laborer on this coast have been exploited in turns by the religious and the political fanatic, but neither of them has done anything for him in the way of supplying him intellectual or social food or creating for him a healthy social and mental atmosphere.
Oh how I wish that some worthy Indians were to consecrate their lives to the service of these men, cater to their intellectual and social wants and guide them out of harm's way. Any one attempt- ing to do that, will have a tough battle to fight and can only succeed if in addition to disinterested devotion to duty and love of his countrymen, he gives not only his time free, but also finds funds for his cause outside of America, for these people have become extermely suspicious of those who ask them to contribute. They have so often been cheated and imposed upon, that they now strongly resent being asked to pay either in the name of patriotism or philanthropy or religion; yet both the religious and the political movements are financed by them.
Besides, for want of an organization to look after their material interests, in the absence of intellectual and business leaders, with none of their class in the banking or trading circles, they do not get the full value of their labour and are oftener than not deceived and defrauded. Both Indian and American sharpers victimize them. They are a fine, good-looking, hard-working, simple-minded, honest, warmhearted set of people, these "Hindu" laborers (including Sikhs and Mahommedans) on the Pacific Coast, and my heart goes forth to them in love and sympathy.
Except in one or two instances, I have seen and studied them without disclosing my identity. I have partaken of their prasada (their bread and vegetable and meat) without their knowing exactly who I was and whence I had come and why I was there. Of course they have their own hotels and eating places as the American hotels and restaurants would not receive them. The Chinese and some of the Japanese hotels and restaurants are, however, open to them and such of them as wear hats may even go to American hotels and restaurants. In the South and in the West of America, the position of the Hindu is rather curious. In the South he is con- founded with the Negro and the only way to escape the indignities, that are heaped on the Negro there, is to put on a turban. In the West, a turban has to be scrupulously tabooed, because with a turban you stand the chance of being excluded from hotels, restaurants and theaters and of being looked down upon. I am of opinion that public bodies in India should find out some means of improving the lot of the Hindu laborers on this coast.
The students are characterized by a "prodigy of enterprise," often arriving with minimal funds and working as farmhands, waiters, or domestic servants to pay for their university education. Rai expresses deep pride in their industry and self-reliance, noting that they often overcome color and race prejudice to earn the respect of their American professors. Finally, Rai critiques the "Swamis" or religious teachers. While some, like Vivekananda, were great, he finds many modern preachers to be "beardless youths" who commercialize religion and lack the scriptural depth or life experience required for their mission.
With the exception of a few high class Hindu teachers of the class of Swami Vivekananda and Swami Ram Tirtha, the general run of Swamis that come to this country are not above criticism. Their youth, their style of living, their lack of experience of the world and other things create enemies for them. I am afraid they are by no means the best representatives of Hinduism. In spite of misrepresentation and misstatements made by missionaries, Hinduism in the best circles of this country stands for high spirituality, high ethics, mysticism, purity of life and high morality.
I have no reason to say that the Swamis that come to this country are anything but good men, but surely they are not the best representatives of Hinduism. Oftener than not, their knowledge of their own scriptures is poor; their age subjects them to temptations which are fatal to their mission ; their pretensions to high spirituality or yogic or psychic powers place them on a level with American dabblers in occultism and with professional clair- voyants. The fact that they depend for their maintenance and wants and also for the maintenance of their organization upon the support of Americans, also brings in a spirit of greed and commercialism which is alien to the true spirit of Hinduism and tends to bring discredit sometimes.
In fixing prices for admission to lectures or classes and in asking for offerings at the end of lectures, they adopt the American spirit of commercialism which jars on Hindu ears and drags them down to the level of professional men. At times in their eagerness to manage their affairs well, and efficiently, they take lodgers in their buildings and deal with them on strictly business lines. All this takes away from their character of places of worship or places of "Dharma" and stamps upon them the trade mark of American commercialism. To me it seems absurd and quite opposed to the spirit of the Hindu Shastras that a young man of 20 or 25 or 30 years of age should assume the position of a religious teacher or preacher, especially when he has not passed through the first three Ashramas and has not undergone the discipline that is necessary for the conquest of the senses and without which one does not acquire the experience of human nature and human weaknesses which is so essential for a successful preacher.
It is bad that modern religious movements in India should have to act in opposition to the spirit of the Hindu Shastras in this respect; but it is worse that we should send mere beardless youths to interpret Hinduism to the world at large. I am afraid poor Hinduism has to suffer a great deal from this mistake. Yet it is marvellous to what a great extent Hinduism has influenced the religious thought of America. Reincarnation and the previous and future lives of the soul are accepted almost as an axiomatic truth. "Karma" is a very common word in religious phraseology. The Bible is being very labo- riously overhauled to bring it into conformity with modern religious thought, and many a Hindu idea is being given out to the world in Biblical language and Christian phraseology. A true Hindu has reason to be mighty glad of it without cavilling at the use which the Christian world is making of Hindu thought without acknowledging the debt.
He concludes by lamenting the "colossal ignorance" regarding India's history in America and urges for better representation, suggesting that Indian philanthropists and princes should endow lectureships to interpret Indian culture to the West accurately.