The Great Migration -Accomodated

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The Great Migration:A Document Based Essay Project

The goal of this project is to get comfortable using Primary and Secondary Resources to understand historical events and to write an essay that uses historical documents to make an argument.

This is a four-day assignment. On Day 1, we will briefly review the Introductory Essay and 19 Documents as a class. On Day 2 and 3, you will carefully examine the Documents and answer the 19 Document Clarifying Questions. On Day 4, you will begin writing your Document Based Essay Rough Draft. On Day 5, we will have a peer review day where you and a classmate exchange Essays and help one another improve your Essays for a final revision. The Document Based Essay (3-4 pages typed and double spaced) will be due the following Monday.

Directions:

1. Read the Introductory Essay.

2. Look over the 19 13 Documents included in this packet.

3. Answer the Questions that are provided for the 19 13 Documents.

4. Use your previous knowledge, the documents provided, and/or additional sources to answer the Document Based Essay Questions:

Why did many African-Americans leave their homes in the South to start new lives in the Northern Cities after World War I? How were their lives different after making this migration?

Flesch-Kincaid Grade level: 8.5

Strikethrough text indicates text from original lesson that will be omitted from accommodated version of the assignment.

Red Text indicates text that will be added to the accommodated version of the assignment.

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INTRODUCTORY ESSAY:

The Great Migration of Afro-Americans, 1915-40

Monthly Labor Review, March, 1987 by Spencer R. Crew

The Great Migration of Afro-Americans, 1915-40 The "Great Migration" of Afro-Americans from largely rural areas of the southern United States to northern cities during and after World War I altered the economic, social, and political fabric of American society. It made the regional problems of race and sociopolitical equality national issues and gave Afro-Americans a role in the election of northern political leaders, in contrast to the absence of a political role in the South. It helped to spawn a generation of black leaders who struggled for the full citizenship rights of Afro-Americans. Because the hundreds of thousands of people who participated in the migration tended to settle in northern urban areas, the effects of the population change were greatly magnified.

The momentousness of the migration as an event does not alter the fact that the migrants were ordinary people. Like colonial settlers or western pioneers of an earlier day, they were not looking to change the world, only their own status. A mixture of farmers, domestic servants, day laborers, and industrial workers, they came from all parts of the South, hoping for a chance to improve their own station or at least that of their children. When the outbreak of World War I drastically changed the job structure of northern urban areas, moving to these cities offered a fresh start and new opportunities for this massive wave of migrants.

Migrating North also meant leaving familiar surroundings and community institutions that provided support in times of need. Church activities, social clubs, and fraternal organizations were part of a vibrant Afro-American community in the South, which provided a buffer from the indignities faced in the outside community. For many Afro-Americans, this private community offered enough support to make their lives tolerable despite hardships. While hundreds of thousands of Afro-Americans chose to leave the South, many more remained behind or returned home after visiting northern cities.

Once a decision to depart was made, leaving was often a complicated process. Southern officials tried to slow the tide of migration by arresting or detaining Afro-Americans who tried to leave. Local police regularly searched departing trains for people they thought might be heading north. To escape police scrutiny, many migrants had to steal away late at night or devise elaborate plans to get away safely. These subterfuges forced the migrants either to sell their property and belongings secretly or to take with them only what they could carry. Most migrants were working people who did not possess great wealth and leaving under these circumstances hurt them financially. Items left behind or given away brought in no money and buyers rarely gave full value for items they knew the owner had to sell. Many migrants, therefore, did not have enough money with them to tide them over for long periods of time once they reached the North. Consequently, finding a job became a high priority as soon as they arrived.

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Afro-Americans typically wound up in dirty, backbreaking, unskilled, and low-paying occupations. These were the least desirable jobs in most industries, but the ones employers felt best suited their black workers. On average, more than eight of every ten Afro-American men worked as unskilled laborers in foundries, in the building trades, in meat-packing companies, on the railroads, or as servants, porters, janitors, cooks, and cleaners. Only a relatively few obtained work in semiskilled or skilled occupations.

Occupational choices for black women were even more limited because few of them, in concordance with women in general, had access to industrial jobs. While some women found employment in the garment industry, packinghouses, and steam laundries, the majority of Afro-American women worked as domestic servants or in service-related occupations. While none of these jobs paid high wages, they paid more than Afro-Americans could obtain for similar work in the South.

However, the cost of living in the North was higher than in the South. Funneled into certain areas in most northern cities, Afro-Americans have paid nearly twice as much as their white counterparts for equivalent housing. Higher rents made it harder for them to make housing payments and encouraged migrants to take in boarders or other family members to help meet expenses. While the extra income eased financial problems, it resulted in overcrowded living conditions, little privacy, and poor sanitation. With the additional financial burden of having to pay higher prices in neighborhood stores for food, clothing, and other necessities, settling in the North was a mixed experience for many migrants. Though they earned better wages in the North, higher living expenses offset much of the increased income.

The world then, which migrants found in northern cities, did not always correspond with their expectations. Despite the encouragements of newspapers like the Chicago Defender, residents of the northern cities did not always welcome migrants. Both black and white urban residents worried about the impact of so many new people and, on occasion, they sought to discourage migrants from coming. Although not as virulent as it was in the South, racial discrimination also existed in northern cities. And while work was available, it usually was at the bottom of the pay scale and the occupational pecking order. Housing options and higher prices presented additional adjustment problems for the migrants. As a consequence, moving north was not a panacea for the many troubles migrants faced in the South. Northern urban areas presented their own set of problems and adjustments for migrants once they reached their new destinations.

Despite these difficulties, Afro-Americans continued to migrate north and to stay. With the many adjustments migrants faced, strange environments, new neighbors, and different ways of behaving and dressing, most found northern cities more engaging than the places they left behind. Though many migrants returned south regularly and referred to it as "home," they did not remain. The South appeared to hold their hearts, but the North held their futures.


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The Great Migration of African-Americans, 1915-40

Adopted from “Monthly Labor Review”, March, 1987 by Spencer R. Crew

Between 1915- and 1940, many African-Americans migrated from rural areas in the south to northern cities. This movement was triggered by the many changes in America that came because of World War I. The north allowed African-Americans more opportunities to fully participate in politics. This improved level of freedom contributed to many leaders to demand full rights as American citizens. People in the North experienced the impact of this migration as a big change because the migrants settled mostly in cities.

The African-Americans that migrated north were ordinary people that wanted to improve their lives. The start of World War I created many new jobs in northern factories that helped migrants make a fresh start in a new location. These migrants left the comfort of their homes, churches, community groups, and friends behind in a search for a better life.

It was not always easy to make the move north once a person had made the decision to migrate. Often, police officers checked trains to stop people from leaving. Some African-Americans were forced to sell their property to pay people to help them escape the South. This meant that migrants were frequently desperate for work upon arriving in northern cities.

The move to northern cities was not a perfect situation for most migrants. In the North, African-Americans were given the most difficult, dirty, and low-paying jobs. Few were able to get jobs that required skilled labor or paid well.

The situation was even more difficult for black women. Unlike men, they could not work in industrial factories. Instead, they took jobs making clothing, doing laundry, cleaning people’s homes, or doing other low-paying work. Though employment prospects were low for African-American men and women by northern standards, they made more money than possible in the South.

However, the cost of living in the North was higher than in the South. African-Americans were only allowed to live in certain areas and were forced to pay much more money for housing than whites. This caused many migrants to have additional people live together. This overcrowding, combined with higher food and transportation costs, made life in the North nearly as difficult as the South.

Migrants sometimes were disappointed by the struggles of life in the North. Newspapers, like the Chicago Defender, made it seem like migrants would have an easier life in the North. Residents of the northern cities did not always welcome migrants. Despite these difficulties, Afro-Americans continued to migrate north and to stay. Though many migrants returned south regularly and referred to it as "home," they did not remain. The South appeared to hold their hearts, but the North held their futures.


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DOCUMENT 1

“Call” for a National Conference to Address Racial Inequality

In January 1909 an interracial group gathered in William English Walling’s New York apartment to discuss proposals for an organization that would advocate the civil and political rights of African Americans. Walling, Mary White Ovington, and Henry Moskowitz were the nucleus of the group. To garner support, the group decided to issue a call for a national conference on the centenary of Abraham Lincoln’s birth, February 12, 1909. Written by Oswald Garrison Villard, “the Call” supposed Abraham Lincoln revisiting the country in 1909 to assess the progress of race relations since the Emancipation Proclamation. It ended with an appeal to “all believers in democracy to join in a national conference for the discussion of present evils, the voicing of protests, and the renewal of the struggle for civil and political liberty.” “The Call” was sent to prominent white and black Americans for endorsement. Among the sixty signers of the call were Jane Addams, John Dewey, W.E.B. Dubois, Mary Church Terrell, Ida B. Wells-Barnett, Francis J. Grimke, and Ray Stannard Baker. Flesch-Kincaid Grade level: 12.

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DOCUMENT 1 (Continued)


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DOCUMENT 2

At School in the North

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One of the great benefits of life in the North was that, contrary to what they had been doing in the South, migrant children did not work. Because of compulsory education laws, they stayed in school much longer than they did in the South, and their parents' incomes were generally sufficient to ensure that the children would not have to work at an early age. This portable school responded to the demand for educational facilities for the children of southern migrants.

Flesch-Kincaid Grade level: 12

One reason many African-Americans wanted to move north was because of education. Laws in the north required children to stay in school much longer than they did in the South. Parents usually made enough money that children did not have to work. This portable school pictured below was used the children of southern migrants.


Source: Jay S. Stowell, J. W. Thinks Black (New York: The Methodist Book Concern, 1922)

DOCUMENT 3NAACP Conference in Chicago, 1917

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The National Association for the Advancement of Colored People was established in 1909, with local branches throughout the country. The association's journal, The Crisis, launched by W. E. B. Du Bois, introduced a wide audience to critical analyses by black scholars and the literary prowess of black writers. The journal published many articles on the migration north. It defined the role of the organization as follows: "The first job of this organization was the awakening, a quickening, a prickling of the American conscience, of public opinion and we have begun with the only weapon which we had at hand and that weapon was intelligent and persistent agitation about the right and the wrong.” Flesch-Kincaid Grade level: 13.1

The NAACP was started in 1909, with local branches throughout the country. The association's journal introduced a wide audience to the writing of black writers. The journal was called The Crisis and published many articles on the migration north. The goal of the NAACP was to report the truth about the experiences of African-Americans and to change public opinion. The organization believed that the only way to fight back was to describe the moral wrongs experienced by black people.


DOCUMENT 4

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Educating Newcomers

Organizations such as the Chicago Urban League took great pains to educate newcomers on correct decorum in public. Old-time residents feared a backlash on the whole community from any indiscretions by the migrants. They urged them to forget their "rural ways." The Chicago Defender declared, "It is evident that some of the people coming to this city have seriously erred in their conduct in public places, much to the humiliation of all respectable classes of our citizens." The paper urged strict observation of laws and customs and printed a list of twenty-six don'ts. Flesch-Kincaid Grade level: 13

The Chicago Urban League was a group of people who worked to teach migrants about the different culture of the North. People who had long lived in the North feared negative reactions to migrants. They urged them to forget their "rural ways." The Chicago Defender urged strict observation of laws and customs and printed a list of twenty-six don'ts. Flesch-Kincaid Grade level: 7.3

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DOCUMENT 5

“Can I Scrub Your White Marble Steps?”A Black Migrant Recalls Life in Philadelphia

In the 1910s hundreds of thousands of African Americans headed North in the Great Migration. Arthur Dingle was one of them. Dingle was born in the small town of Manning, North Carolina, in 1891. After holding hotel jobs in several cities, he took a job with the Pennsylvania Railroad in Philadelphia. Promised his job back if he enlisted in World War I, the company made good on its promise when Dingle remained in Philadelphia after the war. This interview with Arthur Dingle was conducted by Charles Hardy in 1983 for the Goin’ North Project.

Arthur Dingle: I came out of school pretty early, and I worked for the stores around town there, and then I worked in the little hotel. So when I was about 19, I got the idea that I liked hotel work. So I left home and went to Wilmington, North Carolina, worked at Oraton [inaudible] Hotel. Then the next year, I went on to Norfolk. In 1913, when Woodrow Wilson’s first inauguration, another friend of mine and I left Norfolk and went to Washington, and I got a job in the New Raleigh Hotel there, and I was a waiter there during Wilson’s first inauguration. And I worked around back and forth all over the country, you might say. I worked in the Saratoga in New York. Then I went to Scranton. I worked in the Casey Hotel there. And I went to school in Scranton, the International Business School. I didn’t get much education down South, so I tried to, you know, improve myself by working and going to school at night. So I stayed there quite a while.

Charles Hardy: What was it like then with all these new blacks up from the South in the city?

Dingle: Well, it was all right because everybody was working. They was coming up to get jobs. And there was the Navy Yard, there was Sun Shipyard, and there was Midvale’s and this big steel plant up here in the North, toward—I’ve forgotten the name of it—Allenwood. And all these big places was hiring people as fast as they came up. And everybody was working and everybody got money. Why, things seemed to be all right. When they got pretty close behind me to go to the Army, I came to Philadelphia and went to working for the railroad. And I worked here twenty-three days and they called me to the Army. Well, the luck was that they said that everybody at Pennsylvania Railroad said everybody that worked for the railroad and had to go to the Army, they had their job when they came back. Well, in 1919, when I came back from France, you couldn’t—it’s worse than it is

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now—you couldn’t buy a job because of all those fellows, you know, being discharged. So when I was discharged at Fort Meade—Camp Meade they called it then—I came right back to Philadelphia because I knowed that I had my job when I came back. I stayed there twelve years. In those days, there was no welfare and there was no Social Security, and people was actually suffering. I know when I was living in North Philadelphia, I was working, but there was plenty of people around there that had no job, no income, no nothing. It was very hard for them.

Hardy: What did they do? Did they go back South? Did they stay in the city?

Dingle: [laughter] I can’t remember anybody going back South.

Hardy: No?

Dingle: No. I can’t remember any of them going back South. But they made out somehow or another. They’d go around and hustle. And people had these white marble steps, and there was people who’d go around, ring your bell, asking, “Can I clean your steps, scrub your steps?” and they’d say, “Yeah,” give them twenty-five cents, and they’d scrub your steps. And there’s all kind of ways of making a few pennies.


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DOCUMENT 6

"We Thought State Street Would Be Heaven Itself": Black Migrants Speak Out

During the Great Migration, which peaked between 1916 and 1921, some 5 percent of all southern African Americans headed north. What were their experiences like in their new homes? Beginning in 1917, Charles Johnson, research investigator for the Chicago Urban League, began interviewing migrants in Chicago and Mississippi. Going door to door, Johnson questioned recent southern black migrants to Chicago about their histories and current thoughts about their experiences. Johnson’s summaries of his interviews conveyed a sense of migrants’ diverse response to life in Chicago. The following is one summary Johnson wrote after interviewing Mrs. Lynch, whose family came to Chicago that year.

Mrs. Lynch, husband, 7 children, 1 boarder, from Hattiesburg, Mississippi. Husband, 2 grown sons and 1 boarder and wife came in Jan. Wife and children followed in May. Husband been employed at Stockyards—two sons in foundry at Gary, girl at stockyards for short while. Wages at home $1.25 per day. Husband now in hospital. Boarder working with Gas Company.

White people don’t treat them as the Chicago Defender promised that they would. It was November 1916 that her husband first heard from agent of people leaving New Orleans. No interest at first. Finally when some of the men with whom he was working left, he decided to make the venture himself. He wrote back that Chicago was the place for them and they joined him in a few months. They could hardly wait for the money for transportation. The paper was “just stirring things up so we that State Street would be heaven itself.” Came in party of 80.

Has not had any trouble in the South. Her daughter worked out in service under excellent conditions. When she worked over time was sent home in a carriage. Here she is thrown in bad company at the stockyards. She doesn’t like the North. People here, “don’t love God.” and, “aint sociable.” This accounts for the close association of Mississippi people on Rhodes and in this community.

Just can’t keep well here; knows that they will contract pneumonia when winter comes. 120 Persons from their home have died since coming here. Thinks expenses outrageous. Too many people.


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DOCUMENT 7

Population Distribution of African Americans in Chicago - 1910

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Population Distribution of African Americans in Chicago - 1920

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DOCUMENT 8

Chicago Defender (1905- )

The Chicago Defender was founded in 1905 by Robert Sengstacke Abbott. Abbott published the first issue, a run of 300 copies, on May 6, 1905. The Defender began as a four page weekly handbill filled with local news and reproductions of clippings from other newspapers. Abbott initially sold both subscriptions and advertising for the paper himself by going door to door throughout Chicago.

Abbott used the Defender as a forum to attack racial injustice from the outset, and included a front-page heading on every issue that read, “American Race Justice Must Be Destroyed”. The Defender was a leading advocate in the fight against racial, economic, and social discrimination. It championed equal employment and fair housing for blacks, and boldly reported on lynchings, rapes, and black disfranchisement. What began as a four page handbill had become by 1915 a popular local newspaper with a weekly circulation of 16,000.

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DOCUMENT 8 (CONTINUED)

Chicago Defender (1905- )

The Defender however, saw its major growth during the Great Migration and is credited as being a major catalyst for that movement of half a million blacks from the South to the North between 1915 and 1920. Abbott used black Pullman Porters and entertainers to transport his paper across the Mason-Dixon Line. Often after being smuggled to the South, it is estimated that many copies of the Defender were read by four to five African Americans, who passed it from person to person and read it aloud wherever blacks congregated. Included in its pages were articles and editorials which tried to convince its oppressed southern readers to move north. Abbott even printed copies of train schedules and job listings to entice southern blacks to relocate. The black population of Chicago increased 148 percent from 1910 to 1920 with plenty of support and encouragement from the Defender.

The Defender grew with the migration north. By 1917 it became the first African American paper to reach a circulation of 100,000 copies and to achieve national circulation. By 1920 its circulation reached 230,000 copies per week. Throughout the years, the Defender had many notable columnists, including Walter White and Langston Hughes. It also published early works of poet Gwendolyn Brooks; the first African American to win a Pulitzer Prize in any category. As a result of the Defender’s success Robert Abbott became one of the first African American millionaires. Flesch-Kincaid Grade level: 13

Sources: Aurora Wallace, Newspapers and the Making of Modern America (Westport, Connecticut: Greenwood Press, 2005); W. Augustus Low, ed., Encyclopedia of Black America (New York: Da Capo Press, Inc., 1981)

DOCUMENT 9

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Boll Weevils

Over the last century boll weevils have represented the most serious threat to cotton production around the world. Adult females deposit eggs in the cotton flower bud and the larvae and newly hatched young proceed to feed on the maturing cotton boll destroying the crop. The map below shows the progress of the boll weevil infestation in the United States in the late 19th and early 20th century. Today there are statues to the boll weevil in the South recognizing the positive result of the infestation - the forced diversification of southern agriculture. In the first few decades of the 20th century, though, the bug caused agricultural, economic, and social devastation affecting black and white southerners alike.

Flesch-Kincaid Grade level: 14.

DOCUMENT 10

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Times is Gettin' HarderThe Great Migration was not just a movement of people. The culture of the migrants traveled north as well - including the narrative traditions embodied in the Blues. The lyrics in the following song provide insight in a unique way into the motives of many migrants.


Times is Gettin' Harder - Sing Along (A type of folk song that was usually sung in social groups rather than performed by an individual group)

Times is gettin' harder,Money's gettin' scarce.Soon as I get my cotton and corn,I'm bound to leave this place.

White folks sittin' in the parlor,Eatin' that cake and food,black person’s way down to the kitchen,Squabblin' over turnip greens.Times is gettin' harder,Money's gettin' scarce.Soon as I get my cotton and corn,I'm bound to leave this place.

Me and my brother was out.Thought we'd have some fun.He stole three chickens.We began to run.Times is gettin' harder,Money's gettin' scarce.Soon as I get my cotton and cornI'm bound to leave this place.


DOCUMENT 11

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Lynch Law Editorial – Cleveland Advocate Newspaper – 5-15-1920

DOCUMENT 12

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Afro-Americans Must Keep on One Side of Sidewalk

(Jim Crow Laws in Virginia)

AFRO-AMERICANS MUST KEEP ON ONE SIDE OF SIDEWALK

White School Girls Pushed Off Sidewalk in Danville, Va., And Appeal to Police—Blame Is Placed Upon Youngsters of the Race but White Children Are Just As Bad.

Richmond, Va. March 5.—The local officials at Danville, Va., have recently put into operation a new police rule which requires Afro-American children to limit their occupation of the sidewalks to and from school when white children happen to be coming or going in either direction.

From one of the white newspapers published in that city we clip this report:

Complaint has been made to the police department of the eternal habit of Negro school children trying to take the entire sidewalk when going and coming from school. This morning two young white girls appeared in court against a Negro for having shoved them from the sidewalk. Unfortunately they had the wrong Negro boy.

So indignant did the presiding judge become on account of the story ... by the young white girls and ... unable to inflict punishment on the innocent young boys, he ... the chief of police to report ... to the mayor. Subsequently, ... the mayor issued an order directing the police to arrest and bring ...court any Negro child or ... who obstructed the sidewalks where white children were passing. He also requested the judge to deal severely with any offenders of this rule brought before him.

This is the first time in the history of Danville that such harsh measures have been resorted to. The colored citizens are becoming alarmed, as such gross injustice and are taking steps to safeguard their rights in the premises.


Source: "Afro-Americans Must Keep on One Side of Sidewalk," Chicago Defender, March 6, 1915 v. 10, n. 10.

DOCUMENT 13

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An act to prohibit the co-education of the white and colored races (Tennessee, 1901)

An act to prohibit the co-education of the white and colored races and to prohibit the white and colored races from attending the same schools, academies, colleges or other places of learning in this state.

SECTION 1. Be it enacted by the General Assembly of the State of Tennessee, That hereafter it shall be unlawful for any school, academy, college or other place of learning to allow white and colored persons to attend the same school, academy, college or other place of learning.

SEC. 2. Be it further enacted, That it shall be unlawful for any teacher, professor or educator in the State, in any college, academy or school of learning, to allow the white and colored races to attend the same school or for any teacher or educator, or other person to instruct or teach both the white and colored races in the same class, school or college building, or in any other place or places of learning, or allow or permit the same to be done with their knowledge, consent or procurement.

SEC. 3. Be it further enacted, That any person or persons violating this Act or any of its provisions, when convicted shall be fined for each offense fifty ($50) dollars and imprisoned not less than thirty days nor more than six months, at the discretion of the Court.

SEC. 4. Be it further enacted, That Grand juries shall have inquisitorial powers of all violations of the Act, and the same to be given in charge Circuit Court judges to the Grand Juries.

SEC. 5. Be it further enacted, That this Act shall take effect from and after the first day of September, 1901, the public welfare requiring it.

APPROVED, March 13, 1901.


Source: "An act to prohibit the co-education of the white and colored races..." Laws of Tennessee, 1901, Ch. 7, House Bill No. 7, p. 9.

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DOCUMENT 14

“Their Own Hotheadedness”: Senator Benjamin R.“Pitchfork Ben” Tillman Justifies Violence Against Southern Blacks

In this March 23, 1900, speech before the U.S. Senate, Senator Benjamin R. “Pitchfork Ben” Tillman of South Carolina defended the actions of his white constituents who had murdered several black citizens of his home state. Tillman blamed the violence on the “hot-headedness” of Southern blacks and on the misguided efforts of Republicans during the Reconstruction era after the Civil War to “put white necks under black heels.” He also defended violence against black men, claiming that southern whites “will not submit to [the black man] gratifying his lust on our wives and daughters without lynching him”—an evocation of the deeply sexualized racist fantasies of many Southern whites.

. . . And he [Senator John C. Spooner, of Wisconsin] said we had taken their rights away from them. He asked me was it right to murder them in order to carry the elections. I never saw one murdered. I never saw one shot at an election. It was the riots before the elections precipitated by their own hot-headedness in attempting to hold the government, that brought on conflicts between the races and caused the shotgun to be used. That is what I meant by saying we used the shotgun.

I want to call the Senator’s attention to one fact. He said that the Republican Party gave the negroes the ballot in order to protect themselves against the indignities and wrongs that were attempted to be heaped upon them by the enactment of the black code. I say it was because the Republicans of that day, led by Thad Stevens, wanted to put white necks under black heels and to get revenge. There is a difference of opinion. You have your opinion about it, and I have mine, and we can never agree.

I want to ask the Senator this proposition in arithmetic: In my State there were 135,000 negro voters, or negroes of voting age, and some 90,000 or 95,000 white voters. General Canby set up a carpetbag government there and turned our State over to this majority. Now, I want to ask you, with a free vote and a fair count, how are you going to beat 135,000 by 95,000? How are you going to do it? You had set us an impossible task. You had handcuffed us and thrown away the key, and you propped your carpetbag negro government with bayonets. Whenever it was necessary to sustain the government you held it up by the Army.

Mr. President, I have not the facts and figures here, but I want the country to get the full view of the Southern side of this question and the justification for anything we did. We were sorry we had the necessity forced upon us, but we could not help it, and as white men we are not sorry for it, and we do not propose to apologize for anything we have done in connection with it. We took the government away from them in 1876. We did take it. If no other Senator has come here previous to this time who would acknowledge it, more is the pity. We have had no fraud in our elections in South Carolina since 1884. There has been no organized Republican party in the State.

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“Their Own Hotheadedness”: Senator Benjamin R.“Pitchfork Ben” Tillman Justifies Violence Against Southern Blacks

We did not disfranchise the negroes until 1895. Then we had a constitutional convention convened which took the matter up calmly, deliberately, and avowedly with the purpose of disfranchising as many of them as we could under the fourteenth and fifteenth amendments. We adopted the educational qualification as the only means left to us, and the negro is as contented and as prosperous and as well protected in South Carolina to-day as in any State of the Union south of the Potomac. He is not meddling with politics, for he found that the more he meddled with them the worse off he got. As to his “rights”—I will not discuss them now. We of the South have never recognized the right of the negro to govern white men, and we never will. We have never believed him to be equal to the white man, and we will not submit to his gratifying his lust on our wives and daughters without lynching him. I would to God the last one of them was in Africa and that none of them had ever been brought to our shores. But I will not pursue the subject further.

I want to ask permission in this connection to print a speech which I made in the constitutional convention of South Carolina when it convened in 1895, in which the whole carpetbag regime and the indignities and wrongs heaped upon our people, the robberies which we suffered, and all the facts and figures there brought out are incorporated, and let the whole of the facts go to the country. I am not ashamed to have those facts go to the country. They are our justification for the present situation in our State. If I can get it, I should like that permission; otherwise I shall be forced to bring that speech here and read it when I can put my hand on it. I will then leave this matter and let the dead past bury its dead.


Source: "Speech of Senator Benjamin R. Tillman, March 23, 1900," Congressional Record, 56th Congress, 1st Session, 3223–3224. Reprinted in Richard Purday, ed.,Document Sets for the South in U. S. History (Lexington, MA.: D.C. Heath and Company, 1991), 147.

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DOCUMENT 15

The Extent of Negro Progress

On December 18, 1865, the Thirteenth Amendment declaring slavery abolished in the United States was adopted. This freed the million or more slaves to whom the Emancipation Proclamation of 1863 did not apply. It may be said for this reason that January 1, 1866 was the beginning of the opportunity for the Negroes in every part of the nation to make progress. In the past fifty-six years he has made a most remarkable progress. What follows show the extent of this progress: Flesch-Kincaid Grade level: 12

On December 18, 1865, the Thirteenth Amendment ended slavery in the United States. This freed the million or more slaves. Some people argue that January 1, 1866 was the beginning of the opportunity for the Negroes in every part of the nation to make progress. In the past fifty-six years he has made much progress. What follows shows this progress: Flesch-Kincaid Grade level: 9.1

1866 1922 Gain in Fifty-six years

ECONOMIC PROGRESSHomes OwnedFarms OperatedBusiness ConductedWealth Accumulated

EDUCATIONAL PROGRESSPer Cent LiterateColleges and Normal SchoolsStudents in Public SchoolsTeachers in all SchoolsProperty for Higher EducationAnnual Expenditures for EducationRaised by Negroes

RELIGIOUS PROGRESSNumber of ChurchesNumber of CommunicantsNumber of Sunday SchoolsSunday School PupilsValue of Church Property

12,00020,0002,100

$20,000,000

1015

100,000600

$60,000$700,000$80,000

700600,000

1,000500,000

$1,500,000

650,0001,000,000

60,000$1,500,000,000

80500

2,000,00044,000

$30,000,000$28,000,000$2,000,000

45,0004,800,000

46,0002,250,000

$90,000,000

638,000980,00057,900

$1,480,000,000

70485

1,900,00043,400

$29,940,000$27,300,000$1,920,000

44,3004,200,000

45,0002,200,000

$88,500,000

Source: Monroe. N. Work. The Extent of Negro Progress. The Negro Yearbook, an Annual Encyclopedia of the Negro, 1921-1922. The Negro Year Book Publishing Company: Tuskegee Institute, 1922.

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Document 16

Educational Advertisements for Migrants [Howard University, etc.]

Source: Advertisements [Howard University, etc.], The Crisis, IXX (November, 1919), p. 351.

http://www.yale.edu/glc/images/img01.jpg

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DOCUMENT 17

Number and Percent of Negroes in United States Living In Urban and Rural Communities, 1890, 1900, 1910, 1920

YearNumber Per CentUrban Rural Urban Rural

1920191019001890

3,559,4732,689,2292,005,9721,481,142

6,903,6587,138,5346,828,0226,007,534

34.027.422.719.4

66.072.677.380.6

Source: Monroe. N. Work. Number and Percent of Negroes in United States Living In Urban and Rural Communities, 1890, 1900, 1910, 1920. The Negro Yearbook, an Annual Encyclopedia of the Negro, 1921-1922. The Negro Year Book Publishing Company: Tuskegee Institute, 1922.

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DOCUMENT 18

Letters from prospective migrants to Chicago Defender Newspaper

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DOCUMENT 19

Resurgence of the Ku Klux Klan

The original Ku Klux Klan had died out in the late 1870s as post-Civil War Reconstruction was drawing to a close. In 1915, a new Klan was started in Stone Mountain, Georgia, by William Simmons, a Methodist minister. Emphasizing costumes, rallies and secret rituals, the Klan grew rapidly in the South.

The appeal of the Klan spread to the North and West, and at its peak in the mid-1920s achieved a total membership of four million or more. Members served in state legislatures and Congress, and were elected to the governorship in several states. Indiana, Oklahoma, Texas and Oregon saw significant Klan influence.

Blacks were the subject of Klan activity in both the North and South, as were Jews, Catholics and immigrants. The Klan also organized to oppose the teaching of evolution in the schools, dissemination of birth control devices and information, and efforts to repeal prohibition. Violence was not uncommon — public whippings, tarring and feathering, and lynching occurred in many sections of the country.


In the years after the Civil War, the Ku Klux Klan lost popularity and died out. In 1915, a new Klan was started in Stone Mountain, Georgia. William Simmons, a Methodist minister, founded this new group. The Klan used rituals and secret meetings to grow rapidly in the South.

People all over the country joined the Klan. At one point, the Klan had a total membership of four million or more. Some members held political offices in several states.

Klan members spread prejudice against blacks, Jews, and Catholics. The Klan also organized to oppose the teaching of evolution in the schools, birth control, and efforts to repeal laws against alcohol. Violence was not uncommon. Public whippings, tarring and feathering, and lynching occurred in many sections of the country.


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The Klu Klux Klan hold a parade in Richmond, Virginia

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CLARIFYING QUESTIONS:

Answer the following questions in complete sentences:

DOCUMENT 1

According to this Document, how would Abraham Lincoln feel about the situation for African-Americans in the United States?

Page 3 of this document contains the sentence, “Silence under these conditions means tacit approval”. What do you think the author means by this?

DOCUMENT 2

How does this document answer the Document Based Essay Question?

Why was ensuring their children had opportunities for education important to African-American migrants?

Why do you think education of children was important to African-American migrants?

DOCUMENT 3

This document describes the original goals of the NAACP, what specific topics do you think they discussed at the 1917 Conference?

Look at the clothing of the people pictured in Document 3 and compare it with the clothing of the children in Document 2, what might account for this difference?

DOCUMENT 4

What might have motivated African-Americans already living in Chicago to reach out and try to help new African-American migrants?

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What type of assistance do you think was most needed by newly arrived migrants?

DOCUMENT 5

How did the end of World War I affect the lives of migrants in Northern Cities?

Do you think Arthur Dingle was happy with his decision to migrate north?

DOCUMENT 6

What specifically motivated Mrs. Lynch and her family to move north?

What were Mrs. Lynch’s complaints about life in Chicago?

DOCUMENT 7

Despite massive growth in numbers, the maps indicate that African-American people lived only in certain areas of Chicago, why do you think that was the case?

Are neighborhoods segregated by race today?

DOCUMENT 8

The Chicago Defender had the phrase “American Race Justice Must Be Destroyed” at the top of every paper published, what does this tell us about the perspective of the newspaper and what types of stories might be included?

Why do you think the newspaper became incredibly popular in the South?

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DOCUMENT 9

Some historians claim that the Boll Weevil was the biggest factor that contributed to the Great Migration, why might this be true?

Use a dictionary to look up “Tenant Farming” and describe how this term relates to Document 9.

DOCUMENT 10

The Great Migration is directly related to the rise of Blues Music in America. How are the lyrics of this song similar or different than those found in today’s popular music?

The last line of each stanza is “I'm bound to leave this place”. What do you think is meant by “this place”?

DOCUMENT 11

The author of this opinion article seems especially angry that lynch mobs frequently took victims from jails without police officers intervening, why do you think this is?

Do you think that this article reflects a change in white public opinion towards the widespread racist violence in the country? Why or Why not?

DOCUMENT 12

Document 12 describes what seems like a ridiculous law by today’s standards. How do you think African-Americans living in Richmond, Virginia might have reacted to this new law?

How does this document answer the Document Based Question for the Great Migration Essay?

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DOCUMENT 13

The Tennessee laws outlined in this document can be interpreted as an attempt to keep African-Americans in poverty, how so?

Imagine you are a poor African-American parent living in Tennessee in 1901, why might this be motivation to move north?

DOCUMENT 14

This speech was delivered in front of the United States Senate by a Senator, what does that say about the social acceptance of racist viewpoints in the era?

What fears does Senator Tillman refer to in this speech? How does he justify violence committed against African-Americans?

DOCUMENT 15

What is your impression of the chart and why might it have been included in the document packet?

Why do you think the author used these three categories, Economic, Educational, and Religious Progress, in the chart?

DOCUMENT 16

The advertisements in this document were published in The Crisis, an NAACP publication. What types of opportunities are advertised in this document?

How might this have motivated African-Americans in the South to migrate north?

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DOCUMENT 17

This document focuses on the scale of the Great Migration. What percentage of an increase was documented in the three cities with the most growth in African-American population from 1910-1930?

The Great Migration was not just about African-Americans moving from south to north, it also contributed to urbanization in America. Why do you think people accustomed to living in rural areas would move to big cities?

DOCUMENT 18

From reading these letters, what concerns seem to be most common among the people considering migrating north?

Choose one of the letters and put yourself in that person’s shoes (Indicate which letter you are focusing on). What are your biggest hopes and fears regarding moving north?

Try to imagine living as an African-American in the south during this time period. What emotions do the writers of these letters evoke?

DOCUMENT 19

The Klu Klux Klan was powerful enough during this era to actually control the governments of several states. What does this fact tell us about the possibility of justice for African-Americans in these states?

Look at the newspaper clipping on the bottom right. Imagine 2,000 people storming a Sherriff’s home to abduct a young man and lynch him, without an investigation of the crime he was accused of or a trial. How might you have reacted if you were an African-American living in this town?