Lesson 12: The Great Depression and the New Deal (1929-1940)
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Lesson 12: The Great Depression and the New Deal (1929-1940)
Objectives
By the end of this lesson, students will be able to:
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contrast the struggles African Americans faced during the Great Depression with those of white
Americans
analyze the shift in black political support from the Republican Party to the Democratic Party during the
New Deal
describe the new political role of African American men and women during the Roosevelt administration
identify the gains of African Americans within the labor movement
identify and examine early racial discrimination challenges in the American court system
Glossary
Reading Guide
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Introduction
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The 1930s were a trying decade for all Americans. The Great Depression crippled the nation’s economy and left millions of Americans
unemployed. African Americans throughout the country suffered in particular and were typically the first to be fired and the last to be
hired.
As unemployment rose, black workers faced competition from white workers who demanded hiring preference. Cotton prices in the South
dove, forcing many African American sharecroppers out of work. Even as newly elected President Franklin D. Roosevelt (FDR) extended his
New Deal, government aid programs reached African Americans at a slow pace. In response, African Americans became more politically
active, and black civil rights groups deepened their commitment to fair treatment.
This lesson charts the plight of African Americans on southern farms and in northern factories during the Great Depression. The lesson also
highlights the progress of the African American labor movement and the appointment of black officials during FDR’s administration. As the
prospect of another World War loomed, African Americans continued their fight for equality in the darkest decade of the 20th century.
The Great Depression
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The Great Depression, which occurred from 1929 to 1933, was a period of drastic economic hardship in America. During this period, national
income declined more than 50%, dropping from $81 billion in 1929 to $40 billion in 1932. At its peak, national unemployment was at 25%,
which was over 13.5 million people in 1933. Over 25 million Americans sought the assistance of public and private relief groups in the face of
poverty, homelessness, and starvation.
During the Depression, many relied on breadlines set up by charities and governments.
The Depression spread throughout the U.S. following the October 1929 stock market crash. Though the stock market crash was a major
factor, it was not the only cause of this economic catastrophe.Many point to the period's under-regulation of corporations, weak
international trading system, public and private sector official's unfamiliarity with economics, and large wage gap as contributing factors.
Others say that cities and businesses grew faster than their infrastructure could support. The period's huge wealth inequality resulted in a
lowered purchasing power, the number of goods and services one can purchase with a unit of money. At the onset of the Great
Depression, more than half of the nation’s population lived at or below the subsistence level, the level at which expenses matched income.
This income drop left the average consumer vulnerable to the high prices set by corporations. The cost of goods and services was set at
whatever price the leaders of these corporations desired, rather than by the system of supply-and-demand. Limited purchasing power
decreased more as unemployment rose, thereby starving the economy even further.
Unfortunately, the Great Depression was not just a time of limited purchasing power. For many, it was a time of sheer desperation.
Homeless men, women, and children of all races clustered together in destitute settlements made of cardboard and tin homes. African
Americans across the country and in every class faced unique challenges during the Depression. Northerners and southerners, men and
women, business owners and sharecroppers all faced specific challenges in receiving aid and welfare because of the system’s inherent
racism.
The Depression's Impact on Black Southerners
The Great Depression probably hit rural southern African Americans hardest of all. In the early 1930s, the majority of black Americans still
made a living as agricultural workers in the South. During the Depression, the demand for cotton decreased as Americans lost the ability to
buy goods and services. To make ends meet, cotton farmers produced as much cotton as they could. This oversupply of cotton led to a
dramatic decrease in its price. Originally 18 cents per pound, it decreased to 6 cents per pound by 1933. This decrease had a devastating
impact on rural African American laborers, which included cash tenants, sharecroppers, wage laborers, and landowners. To make matters
worse, technological advancements replaced farm laborers with machines. Both the decrease in the price of cotton and technological
advancements in machinery led to a drastic decrease in the need for rural black laborers. In 1930, almost 400,000 were sharecroppers. By
1933, this number dropped to 300,000. Many rural farm workers faced starvation as they were thrown off the land.
Those who could maintain their positions as tenant farmers or sharecroppers did so with difficulty. Landlords faced with economic troubles
of their own limited the supplies that they provided to their farm workers. Tools, clothing, fertilizer, food, and domestic product supplies
decreased.
The Depression and Urban African Americans
The Depression was also hard for African Americans who lived in the urban North and South. These men and women had experienced a
decline in living standards and employment in the 1920s. This trend worsened in the early 1930s. Prior to the Depression, urban African
Americans had found an economic niche in low-status jobs such as domestic service, foundry work, garbage collection, and unskilled
factory labor. These jobs were often referred to as “negro work.” Black workers traditionally did not have to compete with white workers
for these jobs.
However, as more white people faced joblessness, competition for these jobs increased. In the urban South, some white people
intimidated employers into giving them preferential hiring. Throughout the country, unions still denied African Americans membership. To
make matters worse, these unions pressured employers to replace their black workers with white ones.
Black Women in the Depression
The majority of urban black women worked as domestic servants. These positions were even harder hit than the jobs of black men. In the
midst of the economic downturn, many white employers could no longer afford the luxury of domestic servants. Those who did keep their
maids, nannies, and laundresses reduced their already low wages, knowing they could get away with it. Unemployed black women entered
what became known as the slave market. Every morning, black women would gather on street corners. White women would drive by and
pick women for temporary work. They would pay their desperate black employees as little as $5 per week. Others who would only work a
few hours per day would receive between 15 and 25 cents per hour.
The NAACP magazine, The Crisis, featured an exposé on the slave market in 1935. The article, "The Bronx Slave Market," was written by two
black women, Ella Baker and Marvel Cooke. In their article, they drew comparisons between this hiring practice and the treatment of
enslaved people in Harriet Beecher Stowe's 1832 novel, Uncle Tom's Cabin. Some women, the article revealed, would not get paid at all:
Fortunate, indeed, is she who gets the full hourly rate promised. Often, her day's slavery is rewarded with a single dollar bill or whatever
her unscrupulous employer pleases to pay. More often, the clock is set back for an hour or more. Too often she is sent away without any
pay at all.
J. Franklin and A. Moss Jr., From Slavery to Freedom (New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 2006), 438.
The Depression and Black Businesses
The Depression caused particular problems for African American entrepreneurs and employers. Many black businesses were particularly
troubled because their black clientele fared even worse than white businesses' clientele. The Binga Bank, Chicago's first black-owned
financial institution, was one such business. Jesse Binga founded the bank in 1908. An effective manager, Binga grew the bank's deposits to
over $1.5 million by the 1930s. Before the Depression, the bank was an object of black pride and demonstrated the potential for African
Americans within a capitalist economy. Unfortunately, many of his investments were in the form of mortgage loans to black fraternal
societies and churches. Many of the members of these black churches and fraternal societies lost their jobs in the Depression. As a result,
they were unable to make their mortgage payments and the bank failed. Binga was sentenced to prison for misuse-of-funds in 1930. He was
later pardoned by President Roosevelt, but he was never able to rebuild his bank.
Some black businesses survived and even thrived during the Depression. Most of these were leading insurance companies such as the
North Carolina Mutual Life Insurance Company, Golden Life, Supreme Life, and Atlanta Life Insurance Company. Atlanta Life was founded
by Alonzo Franklin Herndon in 1905. This former enslaved worker's company survived the Depression and gained profits. The company's
assets increased by over $1 million between 1931 and 1936. Insurance services remained in demand during the Depression because people
faced more risk during this time period. Consequently, insurance companies like Atlanta Life received a steady flow of premiums, even
during the Depression.
Federal Leadership
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Herbert Hoover
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Herbert Hoover tried to combat the Depression with government efforts, which were unable to meet the demands of the unemployed.
While in office from 1929 to 1933, President Herbert Hoover failed to provide effective public relief to Americans. The
preceding Progressive Era of American history saw the rise of private charities and relief services. Hoover believed these organizations and
market improvement through big business success would help the economy recover. His Reconstruction Finance Corporation provided
federal loans to large companies that struggled with debt. Such aid, Hoover believed, would stimulate production, create new jobs, and
trickle down to the rest of the economy. Hoover also tried to convince business owners not to lay off workers. Businesses, however,
preferred to save themselves. They would take federal money in the form of aid or loans and still lay off their employees.
Meanwhile, unemployed, hungry, homeless people were desperate for relief. The magnitude of the citizens' economic struggles was too
much for private organizations and local governments to handle. Even in healthy economic periods, these entities were unable to meet the
demands of the needy. Because of the lack of resources, the private charities could meet only a fraction of the needs of these citizens.
State and local governments were not much help either. They either could not or would not increase welfare benefits or offer
unemployment insurance for those in need. Depression-era unemployment significantly lowered their income tax revenue.
With Hoover’s presidency came a dramatic shift toward Republican efforts to gain white, southern support. African Americans voted for
Hoover because of their longtime devotion to the Republican Party. It was Lincoln's party: the party of emancipation. Two-thirds of African
Americans voted for Hoover when he ran for re-election against FDR in 1932. With his victory and subsequent terms, Roosevelt eventually
proved to be a more progressive president than even his supporters anticipated.
Roosevelt's New Deal
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FDR's victory in 1932 reflected Americans' dissatisfaction with the Republican Party’s economic policies. FDR drew his support from around
the country. The intellectuals, the white South, the white urban voters in the North, the farmers in the West, the industrial workers, and the
white immigrants in the North all demanded reform. Though most black voters cast their ballot for Hoover, the 1932 election was the last
one in which they would give their overwhelming support to the Republican Party.
Within his first 100 days in office, Roosevelt laid the foundation for what was to be his presidential legacy: The New Deal. The New Deal
referred to the numerous programs put forth by his administration to fight the Depression. Although New Deal programs at first focused
primarily on poor and unemployed white people, the programs became more inclusive and helpful to African Americans by 1935.
Think About It
Roosevelt’s First 100 Days in office was a time when he set into motion many of his New Deal plans and initiatives. As a result, he set
the expectation for following presidents to achieve a great deal during their first 100 days in office. Do you think this is fair? Why or
why not?
The First New Deal: 1933-1935
Historians refer to Roosevelt's initial set of economic initiatives created to fight the Depression as the First New Deal. Unlike Hoover,
Roosevelt preferred to experiment with federal policies rather than stick to a strict ideology. A cooperative Democratic Congress passed a
large and diverse set of initiatives designed to reform the industrial, agricultural, and financial systems. More importantly, Roosevelt took
swift action to provide federal relief to the nation's poor and unemployed. Many of these initial programs were color-blind in theory but
not in practice. Roosevelt recognized the importance of political support from the white South and blamed the discriminatory aspects of
the First New Deal on the need to maintain southern support. Although the systems were in place to help African Americans, bureaucracy
and hostile individuals often stood in the way of progress.
One of the largest New Deal welfare initiatives was the creation of the Federal Emergency Relief Administration (FERA). FERA was based
on a Hoover program that funded local and state relief groups. The program exists today and is more commonly known as welfare.
Between 25% and 40% of urban African Americans were on FERA welfare rolls during this period.
Another Roosevelt policy was the Agricultural Adjustment Act (AAA), which paid farmers to produce fewer crops. The idea was that the
policy would create shortages so that the price of farmer's goods would increase. AAA subsidies provided for sharecroppers and tenant
farmers. Through the passage of this law, many rural African Americans received relief from the AAA. Unfortunately, sharecroppers and
tenant farmers had to rely upon the integrity of their employers to receive their AAA checks. Many white farmers and planters would
pocket AAA money that was intended for their black employees.
Another measure the Roosevelt administration took was to revive the manufacturing sector. The administration encouraged different
industries to work together to create fair employment practices, wage levels, and codes of conduct. This program was overseen by
the National Recovery Administration (NRA). Under the NRA, employees' bargaining power was strengthened through unions. However,
as with previous efforts to work with unions, African Americans failed to receive equal pay. In Atlanta, for example, relief checks to white
workers averaged $32.66 a month, but for African Americans, they only averaged $19.29. Members of the black press often referred to this
inactivity as “Negro Run Around.”
Other First New Deal programs failed to help African Americans. The Social Security Act (SSA) initially excluded farm and domestic workers
from its provisions. The Tennessee Valley Authority (TVA) was created in 1933 to stimulate employment for all through the creation of
public projects in seven states of the Tennessee River Valley. However, the administration excluded African Americans from attaining
skilled positions and prevented their attendance in vocational training programs.
The Civilian Conservation Corps (CCC) was another organization meant to aid unemployed youth. It provided employment in
environmental work, including soil erosion prevention, reforestation, and conservation. Yet, the CCC gave preferential treatment to young
white men and segregated African American beneficiaries who were placed in the program.
In Their Own Words
The following passage is a young black man's description of his induction at a CCC camp:
We reached Camp Dix [New Jersey] about 7:30 that evening. When my record was taken at Pier I a C was placed on it. When the
busloads were made up at Whitehall street an officer reported as follows: "35, 8 colored." ...Before we left the bus the officer
shouted emphatically: "Colored boys fall out in the rear." The colored from several buses were herded together, and stood in line
until after the white boys had been registered and taken to their tents...This separation of the colored from the whites was
complete and rigidly maintained at this camp....Our officers who, of course, are white, are a captain, a first lieutenant, a doctor,
and several sergeants.
Joe William Trotter, The African American Experience (New York: Houghton Mifflin Company, 2001), 447-8.
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The Second New Deal
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As Roosevelt began his second term in 1936, it was apparent that the New Deal’s initiatives had helped to ease suffering but ultimately
failed to create fast economic recovery. The U.S. Supreme Court had declared certain parts of it unconstitutional. Therefore, Roosevelt
faced increasing opposition in the form of conservative backlash. Despite these challenges, the President pushed new initiatives more
radical than those during his first term. These initiatives were known as the Second New Deal. The programs of the Second New Deal
included the National Labor Relations Act (NLRA) and the Works Progress Administration (WPA). These laws significantly increased the
federal government's role in the United States.
African Americans working under Workers Progress Administration found jobs creating roads and public buildings.
The Works Progress Administration
The WPA was headed by Harry Hopkins. It produced thousands of jobs through the creation of massive public projects. All around the
country, the federal government hired unemployed workers to build new city halls, courthouses, schools, hospitals, bridges, and roads.
Artists, musicians, and academics were also included in the WPA programs. During the Depression, these groups had high rates of
unemployment. The WPA responded with the creation of four arts programs under the umbrella of the Federal Art Project which
encompassed the Federal Theater Project, the Federal Art Project, the Federal Writers Project, and the Federal Music Project. Together,
these programs helped employ thousands of people.
The Federal Theater Program created 16 African American theater companies. An artist of the WPA Federal Artist Project made this poster for the play Noah.
The Federal Writers Project provided research and writing opportunities for both African American and white scholars. One of the most
significant products of this program was the collection of oral histories from formerly enslaved African Americans. More than 2,300
narratives, or first-person accounts, and 500 photos of enslavement were collected. In 1941, the records were compiled in the 17
volume Slave Narratives: A Folk History of Slavery in the United States from Interviews with Former Slaves. The records have since been placed
online at the Library of Congress’s Web site.
The WPA reflected a change in bureaucratic policies and initiatives. Administrators were far more vigilant and proactive in their
enforcement of non-discriminatory policy. Additionally, by incorporating African American arts and scholarship into the study, the federal
government made strides to acknowledge and celebrate black culture and history.
The Era of Social Services
Many black clinics, hospitals, and nurse-training schools failed during the Depression and African American health declined with the lower
standard of living for black people. Black doctors and nurses began to encourage African Americans to demand health care at white-only
facilities. Dr. Matilda A. Evans was the first African American woman licensed to practice medicine in South Carolina and remained a
particularly strong political force in the field of health care throughout her career. Evans pressured the government to meet black people's
health care needs.
Evans treated African American and white patients out of her own home until she opened the Taylor Lane Hospital in Columbia, South
Carolina, the first medical center in the city to treat African American patients. She also founded the Columbia Clinic Association which
trained African American health workers and provided public health education services to the black community.
Desperate economic conditions also opened the door for unethical medical experimentation. The most infamous of these was the
Tuskegee Study of Untreated Syphilis in the Negro Male. This program was launched by the U.S. Public Health Service's (USPHS) notorious
Tuskegee Study in 1932. It lasted until 1972, despite the discovery of penicillin as an effective treatment for the disease in the 1940s.
In 1974, Tuskegee Study participants and their families won a $10 million out-of-court settlement. Additionally, the U.S. government promised to give lifetime medical
benefits and burial services to all living participants.
Approximately 400 African American men with syphilis were recruited and led to believe that they were taking part in a syphilis treatment
program. In fact, the Tuskegee Study gave them ineffective placebo drugs to monitor the effects of untreated syphilis. The program's
participants received free rides to examination centers, hot meals on test day, and a guaranteed burial stipend for their families. Little did
the sick men know, they were receiving everything but treatment. The Tuskegee Study would be exposed decades later as unethical and an
overt example of racist medicine. By the time the study was exposed in 1972 and ended on November 16 of the same year, 28 men had died
of syphilis, 100 others were dead due to syphilis related complications, at least 40 wives had been infected, and 19 children had contracted
the disease at birth.
Practice Questions
Take some time to answer the following questions and to write your answers down in your notebook. Then click the "Check Your
Answer" button to see a suggested answer. Some of these questions may be asked in the submission for this lesson.
Why did African American women have a particularly difficult time finding employment during the Depression?
Check Your Answer
Describe how Herbert Hoover thought the Depression would resolve itself.
Check Your Answer
Did most African Americans remain Republicans or did they change their political loyalties during the Depression?
Check Your Answer
Briefly summarize the Tuskegee Study. Describe why it was considered unethical.
Check Your Answer
African American Political Agency
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The 1930s were a time of increasing political agency for African Americans. Although southern black voters were still largely disfranchised,
urban African Americans began to view politics as a means to advancing their social and economic interests. They gave more attention to
elections and political news on a local and national level. After years of loyalty to the Republicans, many African Americans began to favor
the Democrats. Many members of the Democratic Party became increasingly supportive of anti-lynching legislation.
In 1934, Arthur W. Mitchell was the first black Democrat elected to serve in the U.S. House of Representatives for Illinois's First
District. Mitchell supported President Roosevelt in speeches. He liked to highlight him as an anti-lynching president, further endearing black
voters to his Democratic Party. By the end of the 1930s, black voters had elected black legislators in California, Illinois, Indiana, Kansas,
Kentucky, New Jersey, New York, Ohio, Pennsylvania, and West Virginia.
Turning away from the Republican Party was not easy for some African American voters. Many associated the Democratic Party with one of
their political bases: white southern conservatives. They did not want their vote to benefit these conservatives who had a long history of
undermining the black cause. By the 1936 presidential election, however, many were willing to abandon the Republican Party.
Black Participation in the Roosevelt Administration
Despite southern Democratic opposition, the Roosevelt administration offered hope to African Americans. Black and white bureaucrats
and advocates for equality increased their influence on the Roosevelt administration. Consequently, the New Deal improved health and
opportunities for African Americans.
African American soloist Marian Anderson performed in front of 75,000 people on the steps of the Lincoln Memorial at the invitation of Eleanor Roosevelt.
The First Lady, Eleanor Roosevelt, was strongly committed to racial justice and an advocate for African Americans. She wrote articles that
were widely-dispersed about the need for equal opportunity for black citizens. She refused to sit in white-only sections in segregated
facilities. She also influenced her husband to create legislation that helped African Americans and appointed black officials to his
administration.
When the Daughters of the American Revolution (DAR) refused to allow African American opera singer Marian Anderson to sing at
Constitution Hall in Washington, Eleanor Roosevelt resigned her membership. The DAR was a women's organization that traced family
roots to those who helped achieve American independence. The First Lady and the Secretary of the Interior Harold L. Ickes later invited
Anderson to perform on Easter Sunday on the steps of the Lincoln Memorial.
Ickes proved himself to be an advocate for African Americans throughout his career. Before his federal appointments, he was the president
of the Chicago Chapter of the NAACP. Under Roosevelt, Ickes served as secretary of the interior as well as director of the Public Works
Administration (PWA). He ended segregation within the Department of the Interior and demanded that African Americans receive PWA
jobs at the same rate as their white counterparts. Even with highly-visible white supporters, African Americans were ultimately the
strongest champions of their own cause.
The Black Cabinet was the nickname for the highly-placed black government officials who worked from within the government to effect
federal policies that bettered African Americans. Most of them worked in temporary New Deal emergency agencies. They included Harvard
graduates such as Ralph Bunche, William Hastie, Charles Hamilton Houston, Robert W. Weaver, and John P. Davis. Many were social
scientists and race specialists. They pressured the Roosevelt administration to adopt anti-discrimination legislation and to support racial
justice. Accordingly, the relationship between African Americans and the New Deal began to change for the better. Roosevelt's Black
Cabinet was partially responsible for this change.
Robert W. Weaver and John P. Davis were active members of the Black Cabinet. Together, they established the Negro Industrial
League (NIL) in 1933. They created the league to monitor how the New Deal affected African Americans. The league kept a particularly
vigilant eye on the NLRA, and Weaver and Davis would drop in unexpectedly at the organization's meetings.
In 1973, Mary McLeod Bethune was inducted into the National Women's Hall of Fame.
Washington bureaucrats were impressed by the pair's outspokenness. Through the NIL, Weaver and Davis also attacked the Republican
Party, citing how it helped people with connections but left masses of desperate black people by the wayside. Like many other Black
Cabinet members, the two men believed that the federal government could be an effective tool for the acquisition of black social and
economic justice. As Weaver explained, state-level lobbying was ineffective in certain regions: "This was the only way you were going to
get meaningful activity because, of course, by this time all the states in the South had completely disfranchised blacks."
The NIL also united 15 African American organizations in September 1933 to form the Joint Committee on National Recovery(JCNR). The
NAACP and the Urban League were among the participating groups. Davis acted as secretary and Weaver became the director of research.
The JCNR's purpose was to lobby for more black representation in New Deal agencies. African Americans began to constitute a significant
portion of Roosevelt's support base. This support base was organized in the form of the JCNR, the NAACP, and other organizations.
Roosevelt responded to these two organizations. By the mid-1930s, the Black Cabinet consisted of almost 45 members.
Mary McLeod Bethune acted as the informal leader of the Black Cabinet. Bethune was appointed as the director of the Negro division of
the National Youth Administration in 1935. By then, she had built a reputation for herself as a civil rights activist. Prior to this appointment,
she had founded Florida's Bethune-Cookman College. During the 1920s and 1930s, she was an outspoken advocate for black women's
rights. She was active at the grassroots level with several black women's organizations.
In Their Own Words
The excerpt below comes from a report Bethune presented in 1937 in Washington, at the National Conference on the Problems of the
Negro and Negro Youth. The report reflects her view of the national government as a source for social change:
The stark reality of the present employment situation in the United States as it affects Negroes calls for a blunt recital of the
disabilities under which they labor. Their social and economic existence is tragically at stake. Despite the tremendous efforts of
the Governmental agencies during the past three or four years to rescue the country from the destroying effects of the
depression, the mass Negro population of the United States still, at this time, January, 1937, is living on the lowest levels of
existence, with attendant hunger and misery.
It is a matter of common knowledge that the Negro has not shared equitably in all the services the Government offers its
citizens. We are mindful of the fact that during the past four years many benefits have come to him that before that time he did
not have. But there still remain numerous instances of racial difference and inequality from which he suffers. While presenting
specifically recommendations for action touching the negro, we are not unmindful of the condition which faces the country,
calling for the continuance of the policies and practices which have been in effect for the past four years.
We urge that in emergency relief and work programs care be exercised to secure Federal control and supervision of these
programs in all their phases as opposed to the decentralization through reference to states and localities. We further urge that in
all administration of these programs specific steps be made to eliminate racial discrimination. And finally, it is our urgent belief
that not less than nine hundred million dollars ($900,000,000) must be appropriated for Federal emergency relief work for the
period up to June 30, 1937 if the basic needs of the needy and indigent American population are to be met.
Joe William Trotter, The African American Experience (New York: Houghton Mifflin Company, 2001), 464.
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African Americans and Organized Labor
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The Second New Deal was a time of advancement for the country's labor movement. The 1935 National Labor Relations Act (NLRA) helped
national unions grow and organize through the National Labor Relations Board. The board's efforts combined with union militancy helped
establish a stronger union presence in America. However, African Americans and immigrants remained barred from labor’s strongest union,
the American Federation of Labor (AFL), who continued to exclude unskilled workers.
Black Labor
Since the 18th century, working people tried to establish fair labor conditions and wages. African Americans were excluded from labor
unions until the 1920s, when they began to achieve real power within the movement. The First Great Migration brought large numbers of
African Americans into the industrial workforce. Despite this flooding of American cities, more than two-thirds of African Americans
remained in agriculture and domestic service in 1920. Most of the 20% of African Americans in the industrial sector held dirty, dreary,
physically demanding jobs. Though only one-fifth of African Americans held manufacturing jobs, they were a substantial presence in U.S.
cities. Labor unions, who generally excluded black workers, began to feel greater pressure to admit them.
Directly following WWI, the NAACP and the Urban League stepped up its efforts to gain black admission to unions. They made regular
appeals to business owners and unions. Their efforts were largely unsuccessful. Employers exploited the division between black and white
workers. They liked using African American workers to break strikes held by white union members. African Americans typically were paid
lower wages than the amount that striking white workers demanded. Hiring African Americas created more tension between white and
black workers. In an effort to negotiate African American admission into unions, the Urban League met with Samuel Gompers, the
president of the American Federation of Labor (AFL), in 1918. Gompers promised to admit more African Americans into the AFL but did little
to help the cause of black union membership.
The Brotherhood of Sleeping Car Porters
A. Philip Randolph made the most significant step toward black unionization with his Brotherhood of Sleeping Car Porters. Randolph was
born in Florida and migrated to New York City in 1911. There he attended City College and joined the Socialist Party. Along with Chandler
Owen he founded The Messenger, a monthly socialist journal. In 1919, he was arrested and briefly held for conducting radical activities. He
later gained a reputation in Harlem as a passionate leader. By 1925, the African American workers of the Pullman Palace Car Company
invited him to be their general organizer.
This advertisement reflects the image of African American Pullman porters as offering friendly, submissive service to white clients.
The Pullman Company owned and operated rail coaches, employed more African Americans than any other company in the country. In the
early 1920s, over 12,000 African American men worked as car porters. The company exclusively hired black porters because wealthy white
people were used to being served by African Americans. In addition, African American workers could be paid lower wages than white
employees.
Many African Americans were attracted to a job as a Pullman porter. College educated African Americans found themselves blocked from
getting business jobs. As a result, the most dignified work was that of a sleeping car porter. They earned far less than white workers but
still more than most black workers. A porter's average monthly wage in 1924 was $81.75. In 1926, a porter earned an additional $698 in tips
per year on average, or $58 per month.
Although it paid relatively well, porter work was difficult. They worked over 400 hours a month and were only paid for the hours between a
train's departure and a train's arrival. Their work hours, however, extended beyond that. They had to prepare cars prior to the train's
departure and clean them after their arrival. They also needed to buy their own uniforms and shoe polish for passenger shoe shines.
Additionally, the job required them to be on call during the entire trip and to do everything from making beds to serving food. To add
further insult, white passengers referred to them as "George," regardless of their real names.
Eventually, the plan to create a union for Pullman car porters surfaced. This plan faced opposition from many corners, including from white
unions and from the African American community. Because Pullman car porters were kept out of white unions, they decided to form
the Brotherhood of Sleeping Car Porters(BSCP) in 1925. Many car porters were too frightened to unionize and join the BSCP. They were
certain that they would be fired for doing so. Black newspapers like The Chicago Defender published articles opposing the Brotherhood.
Some black clergymen even spoke against union activities, cautioning parishioners against “biting the hand that feeds them.” Petitions
from Randolph and the BSCP were largely ignored by Pullman executives. After years of negotiations, the BSCP received its first wage
increase and overtime pay for porters in 1937. It took 12 years of fighting against labor, management, and even other African Americans,
but for the next few decades the BSCP was the largest African American union and Randolph was the most important African American
union leader. Following this recognition, the AFL granted the BSCP membership as an international union.
However, the head of the United Mine Workers, John L. Lewis, was fed up by the AFL's exclusivity. Lewis understood that in the labor
movement, power was in the numbers. The exclusion of unskilled workers prevented unions from gaining influence through expanded
membership. In 1935, Lewis and his supporters established the Committee for Industrial Organization (CIO) as an alternative to the
AFL. The CIO did not exclude based on race and ethnicity. The CIO allowed more black workers to take part in the labor movement and by
1940, it had 210,000 black members.
Most black union members were men. By the late 1930s and 1940s, black women were also beginning to participate in organized labor. The
tobacco industry, for example, employed many African American women as stemmers, which was one of the most tedious tobacco
industry jobs. Stemmers stripped the stems from tobacco leaves and bound the leaves together.
One stemmer, Louise "Mama" Harris, became frustrated with her difficult working conditions. In 1939, she began to organize walkouts
among her female colleagues. Various CIO affiliates supported these strikes including the all-white International Ladies Garment Workers
Union. The walkout participants eventually formed the Tobacco Workers Organizing Committee, which also became a CIO affiliate.
Legal Battles for Civil Rights
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As countless African Americans fought for employment and other quality of life opportunities, the NAACP continued to lead the black civil
rights movement. In 1931, Walter Whitebecame executive secretary of the organization and served in this role until 1955. White’s 24-year
tenure was defined by the fight against public segregation, most of which was carried out in the court system.
In 1930, the group hired Charles Hamilton Houston as its litigation director. He would be responsible for setting the legal goals and strategy
for the organization. Houston was an African American lawyer who designed a legal campaign that zeroed in on black disfranchisement in
the South and inequality in education. Houston attacked racially unjust state and local governments with lawsuits. When dealing with
inequality in education, Houston did not attack segregation itself. Instead, he tried to get southern governments to equalize their black
educational facilities. Houston hoped that governments would eventually opt to combine black and white schools rather than endure the
cost of equalizing the black ones.
In 1936, Thurgood Marshall was hired by the Baltimore NAACP and quickly became a protégé of Houston. Together the two worked to
equalize the salaries of black and white teachers. They attempted to increase NAACP membership among teachers and their students. Their
graduate education campaign yielded some positive precedents. The NAACP had a significant legal victory in the 1938 Supreme Court
case, Missouri ex rel. Gaines v. Canada. The Court required Missouri to create an opportunity for black students to study law in a statefunded institution. By not doing so, the state violated the Fourteenth Amendment which guaranteed equal, if separate, schooling for
African Americans. In response, Missouri created a law school at Lincoln University, a black school. In the next decade, Oklahoma, North
and South Carolina, and Texas also established black law schools in order to maintain segregation.
The NAACP and the Texas Primary
The NAACP's most intense legal battle of the period was against the Texas white primary. The 1923 Terrell Law prohibited African
Americans from participating in Texas Democratic primaries. Since the South was dominated by the Democratic Party, primary elections
had more weight than general elections. Texas was a place where Democratic victories were practically guaranteed. Primary election
participation was important because it helped determine which Democratic candidates could run. Exclusion from the primary election in
Texas essentially disenfranchised African Americans.
The NAACP fight against the Terrell Law lasted 20 years. The first was Nixon v. Herndon, which deemed the Texas Democratic primary
unconstitutional. Houston and Marshall won their final victory over the law in 1947. The Supreme Court case Smith v. Allwright put an end
to the all white primary. Led by Houston and Marshall, the NAACP won several small, but significant, victories that chipped away at Jim
Crow Laws.
A Fair Trial
Even as African Americans gained ground in some arenas, inequalities in others remained. Racist institutions and conventions persisted,
particularly in the South. The notoriousScottsboro Boys case was one such incident. In 1931, nine young black men were arrested and jailed
in Scottsboro, Alabama, for the rape of two white women. The young men ranged in age from 13 to 20 years old. Nearly all defendants
were rapidly tried and sentenced to death by all white juries. The youngest received life imprisonment.
The International Labor Defense (ILD), an affiliate of the Communist Party, was one of the first groups to side with the defendants. The ILD
turned the case into an international story and appealed the Scottsboro verdict to the U.S. Supreme Court. The ILD’s involvement yielded
two important Supreme Court decisions.
In 1932, the Supreme Court ruled that the young men had not received sufficient legal counsel in Powell v. Alabama. As a violation of their
Fourteenth Amendment right to due process, the defendants received a new trial. The men remained in prison as this judgment only meant
that they were improperly tried, not that they were innocent. The second trial also yielded nine guilty verdicts. Again, the ILD appealed to
the Supreme Court.
In 1935, the Supreme Court ruled that American citizens should have a right to a trial by their peers in Norris v. Alabama. African Americans
had been excluded from the Scottsboro juries. This, the court ruled, violated the defendants' rights to equal protection under the law.
Again, the Supreme Court called for another trial. Despite one of the accuser’s withdrawals from the case, the state of Alabama pursued
the case anyway. Together, the Scottsboro boys collectively served more than 75 years in prison; the last man was released and exonerated
in the 1940s.
Lesson Review
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The Depression era was a difficult time for America. This was particularly true for African American citizens. The negative effects of the
Depression hit them the hardest. The relief that came from Roosevelt's First New Deal was helpful but insufficient. His initiatives failed to
prevent discrimination in the distribution of aid and relief. The Second New Deal was an improvement over the first. Gradually, as African
Americans turned toward the Democratic Party, they gained greater representation in the Roosevelt administration. This was made
particularly evident by Roosevelt's Black Cabinet. The 1930s were also a time of advancement for black participation in organized labor.
National laws and the CIO created more opportunities for black involvement. Finally, the NAACP won some important Supreme Court cases
in its fight against disfranchisement and inequality in educational institutions.
Practice Questions
Take some time to answer the following questions and to write your answers down in your notebook. Then click the "Check Your
Answer" button to see a suggested answer. Some of these questions may be asked in the submission for this lesson.
What were some of the positive advances made for African Americans during the Second New Deal?
Check Your Answer
Did the relocation of African Americans during the First Great Migration have a positive or a negative effect on their political power?
Why?
Check Your Answer
What victory did A. Philip Randolph's Brotherhood of Sleeping Car Porters achieve in the late 1930s? Briefly explain why this victory
was so important.
Check Your Answer
Name at least one unfair aspect of the trials that convicted the Scottsboro Boys. Why did the U.S. Supreme Court reject their
conviction several times?
Check Your Answer
To Learn More
Brisbane, Robert. The Black Vanguard: Origins of the Negro Social Revolution, 1900-1960. Valley Forge: Judson Press, 1970.
Gordon-Reed, Annette. Race on Trial: Law and Justice in American History. New York: Oxford University Press, 2002.
Sitkoff, Harvard. A New Deal for Blacks: The Emergence of Civil Rights as a National Issue: The Depression Decade. New York: Oxford
University Press, 1978.
Sullivan, Patricia. Days of Hope: Race and Democracy in the New Deal Era. Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 1996.
Kersten, Andrew E. A. Philip Randolph: A Life in the Vanguard. Maryland: Rowan and Littlefield, 2006.