To properly make an in-depth comparison of The Birth of a Nation and Race Amalgamation it is important to first briefly summarize both.  I will begin with The Birth of a Nation by D.W. Griffith, a giant commercial success that had a great impact on both the film industry and American culture. It is a silent film, released in 1915, which is comprised of two main parts. The first part begins just prior to the outbreak of the Civil War depicting two families, one from the north and the other southern from South Carolina, engaged in friendship and budding love. It continues into and through the war as the young men of each family enlist and fight for their respective sides, culminating in the death of most of them by the end of the war. The elder son of the Northern family, the Stonemans, survives along with the youngest son of the Camerons, the southern family. The assassination of Abraham Lincoln and the employ of harsh, punishing Reconstruction Era policies by the radical republicans, including representative and patriarch of the Stoneman family, conclude part one. The second part of the film entirely portrays the reconstruction post-civil war. Here, representative Austin Stoneman and his protégé Silas Lynch, travel to the south to oversee the implementation of the policies. Lynch ends up elected as Lt. Governor through a ballot stuffing campaign by the blacks whereas whites are being denied the right to vote. The young Cameron, having returned home after the war, is inspired to form the Ku Klux Klan to fight back eventually reclaiming the town and restoring order back to the white citizens. Griffith’s film closes with an intertitle stating, “Dare we dream of a golden day when the bestial War shall rule no more. But instead – the gentle Prince in the Hall of Brotherly Love in the City of Peace”, while transition from an image of a crowd tormented by the Horseman of Apocalypse to a group in that “City of Peace” under a visage of Jesus Christ.

                For Race Amalgamation by Frederick L. Hoffman, a chapter from his book Race Traits and Tendencies of the American Negro, he makes the case that intermingling between the white and black races is to the detriment of civilization. He creates a sense of journey to be embarked upon with him for the reader as he starts from a neutral question: is racial crossing to the betterment or the deterioration of the races? He combs through a mountain of data with the audience in his pursuit to a conclusion referencing studies that measure the weight, circumference of the chest, lung capacity, rate of respiration, head circumference, facial angle, and weight of the brain of whites, pure blacks, and mixed-race individuals. Hoffman dismantles popular support arguments for racial assimilation, specifically referring to the most popular case of Mr. Lille Geoffroy as an example, to further prop his conclusions and claim. Furthermore, Hoffman invokes the law of similarity, the natural equilibrium that if disturbed by the intermingling of races will result in the deterioration and eventual annihilation of civilization. In the end, both men made compelling arguments to their respective audiences, however, Griffith found truer aim in the purpose of persuading viewers of Birth of a Nation.