Civil Rights 191741

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Civil Rights 1917-41

• KEY THEMES

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Impact of WW1

• Mass migration North took place as blacks moved
  to Northern cities with the promise of better
  jobs and treatment
• But their presence evoked white hostility, blacks
  found themselves confined to racial ghettos
• Raised hopes, awareness of the extent of
  discrimination, sense of impatience amongst black
  soldiers

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Post war

• Post war resentment, competition for jobs and
  housing between blacks and white American
  soldiers returning home led to hostility and
  violence
• Red Summer 1919 saw race riots in Chicago
• Voting rights, growing political influence in
  local elections

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Re-emergence of the KKK

• Membership rose to between 2-5 million in the mid
  1920s
• Beatings, mutilation, murder and intimidation
  once again became the norm in some communities

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Black Pride

• Role of Marcus Garvey in new kindled pride in
  blackness
• Strategy of separation

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The Harlem Renaissance

• Wave of new writers, musicians and artists form
  Harlem district of New York drew attention to the
  poverty and suffering of blacks EG Langston
  Hughes and James Baldwin p.84
• Escape for the few due to opportunities in new
  clubs and bars to entertain white audiences

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The Depression

• Effects of Depression more severe on blacks as
  they were the first to lose their jobs
• New Deal programmes did not challenge racial
  segregation but it did extend its benefits to
  blacks
• Popularity of FDR saw a shift in black votes to
  the Democrats. Democratic Presidents now had to
  balance the interests of black voters in the
  North and whites in the South
• FDR appointed Mary McLeod Bethune to the post of
  Director of Negro Affairs at the National Youth
  Administartion
• Economic changes saw more blacks heading North as
  new technology in the Cotton industry forced
  Sharecroppers of the land. In the North they
  enjoyed more freedom and they could vote
• Eleanor Roosevelt demonstrated strong opposition
  to racism
• Attempts to outlaw lynching were unsuccessful in
  1935 and 1938 during FDRs presidency

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The situation in 1941

• In 1941 racial discrimination infected the entire
  nation, North and South
• Racial segregation was still the official policy
  of the federal government, blacks served in
  segregated units in the armed forces
• The constitutional amendments that had been
  enacted after the Civil War were ignored
• Most Whites did not regard racial segregation as
  a problem
• Blacks had high hopes that WW2 would enable them
  to regain their lost rights
• Fighting for your country should receive the
  reward of full citizenship
• Blacks compared the racial theories of the Nazis
  with the racist beliefs of Southern whites vowing
  to conquer Hitlerism without and Hitlerism
  within

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Further reading

• Better Day Coming Blacks and Equality 1890-2000
  by Professor Adam Fairclough selected extracts
  on www.bbc.co.uk/history/society

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