The Great Migration
During the early decades of the twentieth century, African Americansleft the South in growing numbers, migrating North, with hopes of leaving alife behind that was dictated by racism, Jim Crow law, disenfranchisement,and violence based on hatred of black skin. With dreams of newopportunities for economic self-sufficiency, political participation,integration and freedom from racial violence, African Americans were soonto be met with resistance from Northern whites and middle-class blacks whoperceived the migrants as representing a black mass who would change theface of the northern urban landscape forever. The immediate result of the influx of African Americans into urbanareas of the North was the eruption of violence during the 1919 race riots,which tore the Chicago apart. Headlines proclaiming a sense of horror,disdain and humor in white-oriented newspapers provided evidence of whiteresponse to the arrival of migrating African Americans into Northern citiesthat had remained predominantly white. There was a growing tension thatsuggested that there was a need for whites to engage in efforts to controlAfrican Americans as they moved into the North and to engage in violence
In the outlyingand fringe areas of the city, during the 1950s and 1960s, construction ofresidential homes for the upper and middle class whites increased. Ultimately,public housing in Chicago was largely constructed in slum areas, and, whenhousing projects were to be built on vacant land in outlying areas, aracial quota of less than ten percent black was to be maintained. However, frequently blackscould not afford the available homes and if they could, realtors continuedto attempt to block their purchasing what was available. But, as in earlier times, the court ruling was ignored until theSupreme Court handed down a decision in 1948 rendering restrictivecovenants illegal. In 1950, with the face of CHA so severely altered by the power ofpoliticians, more high-rise projects were built in slum areas, furtheringsegregation in Chicago and continuing to isolate African Americans inimpoverished living conditions. Conditions in the Black Belt grew massively worse, representing a secondghetto characterized by dangerous, unsanitary and unsafe living conditionsfor African Americans who were forced to live within the newly createdslums. Should a white owner sell to a black, it wasestablished that blacks would be evicted from the area in spite of havingbought a home. With friendsand relatives having already migrated to Chicago, newer migrants hoped tohave a solid base for initiating a new life for themselves and theirfamilies. They were increasingly concentrated in adistinct ghetto which was known as the South Side's Black Belt. " This effort was followedthree years later by a board policy to punish any white member who soldproperty to a black on a block where there were only white residents withimmediate expulsion. While in the 1920s over287,000 dwellings were constructed, during the 1930s, the years immediatelypreceding a massive increase in migration, only 15,500 dwellings were builtand 21,000 units were torn down due to a city demolition project. "Speculators"became common, producing the money needed by blacks to purchase homes whiledealing with resistant realtors and white home owners. When projects were built in these areas,politicians then fought to keep them racially segregated.
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Acceptance Essays
