Niggers in the White House

"Niggers in the White House" is a poem that was published in newspapers around the United States between 1901 and 1903. The poem was written in reaction to an October 1901 White House dinner hosted by Republican President Theodore Roosevelt, who had invited Booker T. Washington, an African-American presidential adviser, as a guest. The poem reappeared in 1929 after First Lady Lou Hoover, wife of President Herbert Hoover, invited the wife of African-American congressman Oscar De Priest to a tea for congressmens' wives at the White House.

Both visits triggered widespread condemnation by many throughout the United States, particularly throughout the South. Elected representatives in Congress and state legislatures from southern states voiced objections to the presence of an African American as a guest of the First Family.

The poem is composed of fourteen four-line stanzas, in each of which the second and fourth lines rhyme. The poem also frequently uses the titular epithet "nigger" (over 20 times) as a term to represent African Americans. Republican Senator Hiram Bingham of Connecticut described the poem as "indecent, obscene doggerel."

The identity of the author, who used the byline "unchained poet", remains unknown.

The poem was written in 1901, appearing in the Missouri Sedalia Sentinel on 25 October. It followed widespread news reports that President Theodore Roosevelt and his family had dinner with African-American presidential adviser Booker T. Washington at the White House on 16 October of that year. Several journalists and politicians condemned Roosevelt's action, claiming, among other things, that such an act made the two men appear equal in terms of social status.Democratic Senator Benjamin Tillman from South Carolina remarked, "The action of President Roosevelt in entertaining that nigger will necessitate our killing a thousand niggers in the South before they will learn their place again."

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