Both agreed that a change was needed. They wanted racism in America to end and they both wanted education for the African American race. However, the lives each leader lived and the obstacles along with the opportunities shaped different visions in the minds of both men. Washington, born into slavery, still saw black life through those eyes, and Dubois, being a freedman, neither understood nor agreed with this view. Being free he saw the world through a different lens not only through his life as a free man but also through the education he received and a