Arc of Justice

As an idea, W.E.B. Du Bois's Talented Tenth represents the group of black "scholars and scientists, professionals and poets" (74) who will lead black America through their intelligence and resources. In Ossian Sweet's life, though, the Talented Tenth of Detroit represent the "upper reaches of black society" (115) towards which he strives. Detroit's Tenth includes many of the doctors at Dunbar Memorial, religious leaders, attorneys, and others. They exercise a considerable amount of activist potential, including political actions, and assisting with defense and fundraising for cases like Ossian's. Though he comes from humble beginnings and starts out with "wildly unrealistic" (86) goals, like becoming a doctor, Ossian does eventually count himself in Detroit's Talented Tenth. 

The KKK comes to Detroit in 1921 and within two years establishes a membership of more than twenty-two thousand. A white supremacist terrorist organization formed in Tennessee in early 1866 by former Confederate soldiers, the KKK uses racist rhetoric, intimidation, and violence to further its agenda of "moral renewal, 100 percent Americanism anti-unionism, anti-Catholicism, anti-Semitism, and racism" (140). In Detroit, from 1923 to 1926, the Klan holds multiple rallies for its cause, and even backs a mayoral candidate, Charles Bowles, against Johnny Smith. Preying on native-born whites’ fears of moral decay, the Klan pushes a schism through Detroit by raising "the specter of the Negro masses pouring across the color line into white man's land" (143). 

Both of the institutions Ossian attends, Wilberforce and Howard, are considered historically black colleges and universities, meaning that they were formed before the 1964 Civil Rights Act primarily to serve black communities. It's through these HBCUs that migrants like Ossian get access to the education and qualities of life once out of reach for black Americans.