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Chicago, and contributed nineteen special articles, not including
special releases, of press material to magazines of wide circulation.

2. RADICAL AND REVOLUTIONARY PROPAGANDA

A broad basis of appeal to Negroes as a group is provided in their

economic status. Placed by circumstances near the bottom of the
industrial ladder, victims of exploitation, restlessly resentful of
practices employed against them because of class as well as race, it
might be reasoned that they would be vitally interested in a
revolution, industrial if not social. The Industrial Workers of the
World has reasoned after this fashion and, probably because class
meant more to it than race, extended open arms to Negro workers.
This appeal was even stronger in view of the attitude of partial
exclusion adopted by many trades unions. To strengthen its
organization, ally with it a restless group, 90 per cent of whom are
laborers, while at the same time providing an unmistakable
demonstration of its own disregard for race lines in its so-called
struggle for "industrial freedom," the I.W.W. directed a definite
propaganda toward the Negro group, and founded it upon a very
human desire. Thousands of letters and pamphlets were addressed,
"To the colored workingmen and women," calling them fellow-
workers. Excerpts from one of them follow:
There is one question which, more than any other, presses upon the
mind of the worker today, regardless of whether he be of one race or
another, of one color or another, the question of how he can improve
his conditions, raise his wages, shorten his hours of labor, and gain
something more of freedom from his master, the owners of the
industry wherein he labors.
To the black race, who, but recently, with the assistance of the white
men of the northern states, broke their chains of bondage and ended
chattel slavery, a prospect of further freedom or real freedom should
be most appealing.
For it is a fact that the Negro worker is no better off under the
freedom he has gained than under the slavery from which he has
escaped. As chattel slaves we were the property of our masters and,
as a piece of valuable property, our masters were considerate of us
and careful of our health and welfare. Today, as wage workers, the
boss may work us to death, at the hardest and most hazardous labor,
at the longest hours, at the lowest pay, we may quietly starve when
out of work and the boss loses nothing by it and has no interest in us.
To him the worker is but a machine for producing profits and when
you, as a slave who sells himself to the master on the installment
plan, become old, or broken in health or strength, or should you be
killed while at work, the master merely gets another wage slave on
the same terms.
We who have worked in the South know that conditions in lumber and
turpentine camps, in the fields of cane, cotton and tobacco, in the
mills and mines of Dixie, are such that the workers suffer a more
miserable existence than ever prevailed among the chattel slaves
before the great Civil War. Thousands of us have come and are
coming northward, crossing the Mason and Dixon line, seeking better
conditions. As wage slaves we have run away from the masters in the
South, but to become the wage slaves of the masters in the North. In
the North we find that the hardest work and the poorest pay are our
portion. We are driven while on the job, and the high cost of living
offsets any higher pay we might receive.
The only problem then, which the colored worker should consider, as
a worker, is the problem of organization with other working men in
the labor organization that best expresses the interest of the whole
working class against the slavery and oppression of the whole
capitalist class. Such an organization is the I.W.W., the Industrial
Workers of the World, the only labor union that has never, in theory or
practice, since its beginning, twelve years ago, barred the workers of
any race or nation from membership. The following has stood as a
principle of the I.W.W., embodied in its official constitution since its
formation in 1905:
"By-Laws. Article I—Section 1
"No working man or woman shall be excluded from
membership in Unions because of creed or color."
If you are a wage worker you are welcome in the I.W.W. halls, no
matter what your color. By this you may see that the I.W.W. is not a
white man's union, not a black man's union, not a red or yellow man's
union, but a working man's union. All of the working class in one big
union.
 In the I.W.W. all wage workers meet on common ground. No matter
what language you may speak, whether you were born in Europe, in
Asia or in any other part of the world, you will find a welcome as a
fellow worker. In the harvest fields where the I.W.W. controls, last
summer saw white men, black men and Japanese working together as
union men and raising the pay of all who gathered the grain. In the
great strikes the I.W.W. has conducted at Lawrence, Massachusetts, in
the woolen mills, in the iron mills of Minnesota and elsewhere, the
I.W.W. has brought the workers of many races, colors and tongues
together in victorious battles for a better life.
The foundation of the I.W.W. is industrial unionism. All workers in any
division of any industry are organized into an industrial union of all
the workers in the entire industry; these industrial unions in turn are
organized into industrial departments of connecting or kindred
industries, while all are brought together in the central organization of
the Industrial Workers of the World—one big union of all the working
class of the world. No one but actual wage workers may join. The
working class cannot depend upon anyone but itself to free it from
wage slavery. "He who would be free, himself must strike the blow."
When the I.W.W. through this form of industrial unionism has become
powerful enough, it will institute an industrial commonwealth; it will
end slavery and oppression forever and in its place will be a world of
the workers, by the workers, and for the workers, a world where
there will be no poverty and want among those who feed and clothe
and house the world; a world where the word "master" and "slave"
shall be forgotten; a world where peace and happiness shall reign and
where the children of men shall live as brothers in a world-wide
industrial democracy.

Another pamphlet published a hideous picture of a lynching in the

South. In both of these pamphlets the appeal is about the same and
may be summarized as follows:
The Negro is oppressed. He is subjected to the worst possible
cruelties and indignities. The working men are oppressed. Negroes
have left one slavery for another which is shared by white workers.
Race hatred is played upon by capitalists to keep the two races apart
and thus thwart their efforts at improving their condition. The I.W.W.
union will unite all of the oppressed of all colors and all languages.
One big union of defensive brotherhood, not only in America but
throughout the world.
 3. MALICIOUS PROPAGANDA

Anti-Negro propaganda is not wholly new in the North, but it has

usually been carefully concealed. Recently there have been several
conspicuous instances of open and organized effort to influence the
minds of white persons against Negroes. The slogans, charges, and
incriminations have included, with gross exaggeration, not only all of
the actual but all of the fancied and rumored defects of Negro
character. Ignorance and suspicion, fear and prejudice, have been
played upon violently. A group of South Side real estate dealers and
owners, anxious to preserve exclusively for whites sections of the
city known as Hyde Park and Kenwood, formed themselves into an
organization to protect property values on the assumption that the
presence of Negroes depreciated real estate values. Since they did
not own or control enough property to be in themselves effective,
they sought to awaken the white residents to the "danger that
menaced them." Funds were raised, meetings held, a journal
started, bills and posters distributed, and many letters circulated. A
bulletin was widely distributed with this heading:
Your Rights and Mine
A Short Symposium on Current Events as Applied to and Effecting
Realty Values in Kenwood and Hyde Park

It began by disclaiming any desire to foment or foster race

antagonism, but stated its determination to work insistently and
persistently along legal lines for the elimination of undesirables of
whatever brand or color whose residence in this section lowered the
value of real estate. The remainder of the bulletin, however, was
devoted to a discussion of the Negro. A letter to Mayor Thompson
from the president of the Association mentioned the vicious element
of Negroes "haranguing about constitutional rights," aided by the
Negro press, claiming social equality, and then attributed the riot to
the scattering of Negroes in white residential sections. It spoke of a
feeling that was rampant because the "legal rights of Negroes have
been placed above his moral obligation to the white people." The
Chicago Tribune was quoted twice and the Chicago Real Estate
Board once on the desirability of segregation. The Daily News
afforded a fourth quotation from an article in which three solutions
were advanced—amalgamation, deportation, and segregation. As to
amalgamation the article said: "Every white man would rather see
the nation destroyed than adopt that method."
The Property Owners' Journal became so bitter in its utterances that
the protests of whites forced its discontinuance. A few selections
from the Journal picture the character of the campaign:
What a reputation for beauty Chicago would secure if visitors touring
the city would see crowds of idle, insolent Negroes lounging on the
South Side boulevards and adding beauty to the floricultural display in
the parks, filling the streets with old newspapers and tomato
containers and advertising the Poro-system for removing the
marcelled kinks from Negro hair in the windows of the derelict
remains of what had once been a clean, respectable residence.
The New Negro
Negroes are boasting, individually and through the colored press, that
the old order of things for the Negro is changing and that a new
condition is about to begin. As a result of the boastful attitude, the
Negro is filled with bold ideas, the realization of which means the
overturning of their older views and conditions of life. The Negro is
unwilling to resume his status of other years; he is exalting himself
with idiotic ideas on social equality. Only a few days ago Attorney
General Palmer informed the Senate of the nation of the Negroes'
boldest and most impudent ambition, sex equality.
From the Negro viewpoint sex equality, according to Mr. Palmer, is not
seen as the equality of men and women; it is the assertion by the
Negro of a right to marry any person whom he chooses, regardless of
color. The dangerous portion of their outrageous idea does not consist
in the accident that some black or white occasionally may forget the
dignity of their race and intermarry. That has happened before;
doubtless it will recur many times. Where the trouble lies is in the fact
that the Department of Justice has observed an organized tendency
on the part of Negroes to regard themselves in such a light as to
permit their idea to become a universal ambition of the Negro race.
As a corollary to their ambition on sex equality, it is not strange that
they are attempting to force their presence as neighbors on the
whites. The effrontery and impudence that nurses a desire on the part
of the Negro to choose a white as a marriage mate certainly will not
result in making the Negro a desirable neighbor. That fact alone is
enough to determine the property owners of this district to declare to
the Negroes that they must stay out. As neighbors they have nothing
to offer. "They lived for uncounted centuries in Africa on their own
resources, and never so much as improved the make-up of an arrow,
coined a new word, or crept an inch nearer to a spiritual religion," and
it is a certainty that their tenure of those unfortunate buildings now
occupied by them will not be improved by a single nail if it is left to
the Negro to provide and drive the nail.
Keep the Negro in his place, amongst his people, and he is healthy
and loyal. Remove him, or allow "his newly discovered importance to
remove him from his proper environment and the Negro becomes a
nuisance." He develops into an overbearing, inflated, irascible
individual, overburdening his brain to such an extent about social
equality that he becomes dangerous to all with whom he comes in
contact; he constitutes a nuisance of which the neighborhood is
anxious to rid itself. If the new Negro desires to display his newly
acquired veneer of impudence where it will be appreciated we advise
that they parade it in their own district. Their presence here is
intolerable.
As stated before, every colored man who moves into Hyde Park knows
that he is damaging his white neighbor's property.
Therefore, he is making war on the white man.
Consequently, he is not entitled to any consideration and forfeits his
right to be employed by the white man.
If employers should adopt a rule of refusing to employ Negroes who
reside in Hyde Park to the damage of the white man's property it
would soon show good results.
Food for Thought for Hyde-Parkers
Their solid vote is the Negroes' great weapon. They have a total vote
in Chicago of about 40,000. This total vote is cast solid for the
candidate who makes the best bargain with them. When both our
principal political parties are split, and when each of them has two or
more candidates in the field, this solid block of 40,000 becomes a
possible power and might be able to defeat or elect a candidate.
 This vote situation is the foundation of the Chicago Negro's effrontery
and his evil design against the white man's property. He feels that he
holds the balance of power and that he can dictate the policy of any
administration that happens to be elected by his controlling black
vote.
He therefore becomes arrogant, insulting, threatening. He abuses his
rights and liberties and feels that he is perfectly safe in doing so for
the reason that as he controls this block of votes he believes that he
can practically dictate to the police department, the city administration
and the courts. Consequently he is bold.
Now then, white property owners and voters, this vote situation must
be corrected. It is time for you to think and ponder. Remember this,
that this Negro vote power could not exist except for the fact that the
candidate who caters to it is traveling on his belief that the white man
will vote the ticket any way. The white voter is not supposed to think,
nor to indulge in any investigations of a candidate to ascertain
whether or not the candidate is favorable or inimical to his interests.
No, the white voter is supposed to be a blind ass who has no care for
his own interests, who does not know or care to know of the foul
plots against him, who has no knowledge of what is going on around
him, but who simply does as he is told and walks to the polls as in a
dream, having eyes and seeing not, ears and hearing not, and
religiously casts his vote for the ticket and against his own interests.
Wake up, white voters! Come out of your dream. Open your eyes and
ears. It is high time that you realize what is going on. Hereafter in
local affairs affecting your property and home interests, there should
be only one test of a candidate and that one should be, "Will his
election work for the betterment of Hyde Park or for its deterioration?"
The Negro should be consistent. As he segregates his vote and casts
it all together in one block, so he should live together all in one block.

Some of the slogans of the organization were: "Our neighborhood

must continue white"; "They shall not pass"; "Stay out of Hyde
Park"; "We base our rights on priority, majority and anthropological
superiority."

The sentiment was contagious.[102] Other literature of even more

pronounced anti-Negro character followed. An unsigned card was
distributed in large numbers throughout the district during the
presidential campaign, showing a vicious looking Negro and words of
warning for family protection.
The attempt still further to instill fear and bitterness was manifest in
a pamphlet sent, by whom it is not known, to the wives of
prominent white residents of the city and particularly of Hyde Park,
entitled An Appeal of White Women to American Womanhood. It was
a reprint from an article in the New Times, which in turn reprinted
an appeal from the German Women on the Rhine. Although there
could be slight connection between the conduct of colored French
colonial troops on the Rhine and Chicago Negroes, its circulation in
Hyde Park possibly helped to fan the flames of race feeling which
had already been so deliberately kindled. The pamphlet detailed the
"bestial ferocious conduct of Negroes against German women."

4. DEFENSIVE PROPAGANDA

Within the Negro group there are to be found many defensive

programs designed for group protection. They rarely reach the point
of organized effort for the control of opinion. The essence in all
appeals is "protest," which is tacitly understood to be an effective
sentiment to circulate. The most striking illustrations of this type of
propaganda are those which follow definite provocations. The appeal
of the propaganda is directed first to Negroes as a means of
cementing the group from within, and indirectly to the whole group
by way of impressing it with the strength of solidified opposition to
insults. One example of this type will suffice.
Following the bombing of Negro homes and the inauguration of a
campaign of reckless propaganda against Negroes in the interest of
exclusive white residence neighborhoods, Negroes organized the
"Protective Circle of Chicago." The object of this organization was to
"oppose segregation, bombing and the defiance of the Constitution."
The admitted method of combating these objectionable practices
was propaganda. The question on which certain white people living
in Hyde Park were greatly wrought up was that of keeping Negroes
out of "white residential districts." Negroes were classed as
"undesirables," and the efforts of the whites in offensive propaganda
were aimed at proving it. Fortunately for the Negroes, an article
appeared in a real estate publication, the Real Estate News,
presenting with unusual force an aspect of the neighborhood dispute
favorable to the contention of the Negroes. This was seized upon by
the Protective Circle, and the editor consented to elaborate it.
Twenty-five thousand copies were distributed among Negroes and
whites, residents of the district.
The heading "Solving Chicago's Race Problem," coupled with the fact
that the article had first appeared in a real estate periodical
published by whites, immediately attracted attention. The
subheadings of the article read: "South Side Property Owners
Warned against Perils of Boycott and Terrorism Being Promoted by
Local 'Protective Associations,'" "Conspiracies Violating Civil Rights
Act Bring Danger of Heavy Damages or Imprisonment," "A Complete
Analysis of Chicago's Race Movement Proves It to Be Small Factor in
Causing Great Changes in Residential Values," and "How Influence of
Stock Yards, Railroads, Auto Industry and City Growth Force Big and
Sweeping Changes on South Side of Chicago." One paragraph of the
article, printed in italics, ran:
Any association formed in Chicago for the purpose of, or having
among its aims, refusal to sell, lease or rent property to any citizen of
a certain race, is an unlawful association. Every act of such an
association for advancement of such an aim is an act of conspiracy,
punishable criminally and civilly in the District Court of the United
States. And every member of such an association is equally guilty with
every other member. If one member hires a bomber, or a thug who
commits murder in pursuance of the aims of the association, all in the
organization may be found guilty of conspiracy to destroy property or
to commit murder, as the case may be.

At a mass meeting held by the Protective Circle at which there were

2,000 Negroes present, $1,000 was collected to advance this
propaganda. As the chairman of the meeting stated:
 We wanted to get at the responsibility for these bombings and
intimidations, and we intended to give publicity to the Negro's side of
the story. Papers will not print the Negro's story. We wanted to get
this survey of white and colored property owned, and whites and
Negroes bombed, and send it to every white person living in
Kenwood, and just as we were about to start on our task, there came
like a flash out of the sky an article by the editor of the Real Estate
News. It was a godsend. We have secured thousands of copies of this
paper and are buying more as fast as we can get funds. We intend to
send copies to every white person interested in this question.

V. CONCLUSIONS

The inquiries of this Commission into racial sentiments which

characterize the opinions and behavior of white persons toward
Negroes lead us to the following conclusions:
That in seeking advice and information about Negroes, white
persons almost without exception fail to select for their informants
Negroes who are representative and can provide dependable
information.
That Negroes as a group are often judged by the manners, conduct,
and opinions of servants in families, or other Negroes whose general
standing and training do not qualify them to be spokesmen of the
group.
That the principal literature regarding Negroes is based upon
traditional opinions and does not always portray accurately the
present status of the group.
Most of the current beliefs concerning Negroes are traditional, and
were acquired during an earlier period when Negroes were
considerably less intelligent and responsible than now. Failure to
change these opinions, in spite of the great progress of the Negro
group, increases misunderstandings and the difficulties of mutual
adjustment.
That the common disposition to regard all Negroes as belonging to
one homogeneous group is as great a mistake as to assume that all
white persons are of the same class and kind.
That much of the current literature and pseudo-scientific treatises
concerning Negroes are responsible for such prevailing
misconceptions as: that Negroes have inferior mentality; that
Negroes have inferior morality; that Negroes are given to
emotionalism; that Negroes have an innate tendency to commit
crimes, especially sex crimes.
We believe that such deviations from recognized standards as have
been apparent among Negroes are due to circumstances of position
rather than to distinct racial traits. We urge especially upon white
persons to exert their efforts toward discrediting stories and
standing beliefs concerning Negroes which have no basis in fact but
which constantly serve to keep alive a spirit of mutual fear, distrust,
and opposition.
That much of the literature and scientific treatises concerning
Negroes are responsible for such prevailing misconceptions as that
Negroes are capable of mental and moral development only to an
inferior degree, are given to an uncontrolled emotionalism, and have
a distinctive innate tendency to commit crimes, especially sex
crimes.
 CHAPTER XI

SUMMARY OF THE REPORT AND RECOMMENDATIONS OF

THE COMMISSION

THE SUMMARY

I. The Chicago Riot

1. BACKGROUND

In July, 1919, a race riot involving whites and Negroes occurred in

Chicago. For some time thoughtful citizens, white and Negro, had
sensed increasing tension, but, having no local precedent of riot and
wholesale bloodshed, had neither prepared themselves for it nor
taken steps to prevent it. The collecting of arms by members of both
races was known to the authorities, and it was evident that this was
in preparation for aggression as well as for self-defense.
Several minor clashes preceded the riot. On July 3, 1917, a white
saloon-keeper who, according to the coroner's physician, died of
heart trouble, was incorrectly reported in the press to have been
killed by a Negro. That evening a party of young white men riding in
an automobile fired upon a group of Negroes at Fifty-third and
Federal streets. In July and August of the same year recruits from
the Great Lakes Naval Training Station clashed frequently with
Negroes, each side accusing the other of being the aggressor.
Gangs of white "toughs," made up largely of the membership of so-
called "athletic clubs" from the neighborhood between Roosevelt
Road and Sixty-third Street, Wentworth Avenue and the city limits—a
district contiguous to the neighborhood of the largest Negro
settlement—were a constant menace to Negroes who traversed
sections of the territory going to and returning from work. The
activities of these gangs and "athletic clubs" became bolder in the
spring of 1919, and on the night of June 21, five weeks before the
riot, two wanton murders of Negroes occurred, those of Sanford
Harris and Joseph Robinson. Harris returning to his home on
Dearborn Street, about 11:30 at night, passed a group of young
white men. They threatened him and he ran. He had gone but a
short distance when one of the group shot him. He died soon
afterward. Policemen who came on the scene made no arrests, even
when the assailant was pointed out by a white woman witness of
the murder. On the same evening Robinson, a Negro laborer, forty-
seven years of age, was attacked while returning from work by a
gang of white "roughs" at Fifty-fifth Street and Princeton Avenue,
apparently without provocation, and stabbed to death.
Negroes were greatly incensed over these murders, but their
leaders, joined by many friendly whites, tried to allay their fears and
counseled patience.
After the killing of Harris and Robinson notices were conspicuously
posted on the South Side that an effort would be made to "get all
the niggers on July 4th." The notices called for help from
sympathizers. Negroes in turn whispered around the warning to
prepare for a riot; and they did prepare.
Since the riot in East St. Louis, July 4, 1917, there had been others
in different parts of the country which evidenced a widespread lack
of restraint in mutual antipathies and suggested further resorts to
lawlessness. Riots and race clashes occurred in Chester,
Pennsylvania; Longview, Texas; Coatesville, Pennsylvania;
Washington, D.C.; and Norfolk, Virginia, before the Chicago riot.
Aside from general lawlessness and disastrous riots that preceded
the riot here discussed, there were other factors which may be
mentioned briefly here. In Chicago considerable unrest had been
occasioned in industry by increasing competition between white and
Negro laborers following a sudden increase in the Negro population
due to the migration of Negroes from the South. This increase
developed a housing crisis. The Negroes overran the hitherto
recognized area of Negro residence, and when they took houses in
adjoining neighborhoods friction ensued. In the two years just
preceding the riot, twenty-seven Negro dwellings were wrecked by
bombs thrown by unidentified persons.

2. STORY OF THE RIOT

Sunday afternoon, July 27, 1919, hundreds of white and Negro

bathers crowded the lake-front beaches at Twenty-sixth and Twenty-
ninth streets. This is the eastern boundary of the thickest Negro
residence area. At Twenty-sixth Street Negroes were in great
majority; at Twenty-ninth Street there were more whites. An
imaginary line in the water separating the two beaches had been
generally observed by the two races. Under the prevailing relations,
aided by wild rumors and reports, this line served virtually as a
challenge to either side to cross it. Four Negroes who attempted to
enter the water from the "white" side were driven away by the
whites. They returned with more Negroes, and there followed a
series of attacks with stones, first one side gaining the advantage,
then the other.
Eugene Williams, a Negro boy of seventeen, entered the water from
the side used by Negroes and drifted across the line supported by a
railroad tie. He was observed by the crowd on the beach and
promptly became a target for stones. He suddenly released the tie,
went down and was drowned. Guilt was immediately placed on
Stauber, a young white man, by Negro witnesses who declared that
he threw the fatal stone.[103]
White and Negro men dived for the boy without result. Negroes
demanded that the policeman present arrest Stauber. He refused;
and at this crucial moment arrested a Negro on a white man's
complaint. Negroes then attacked the officer. These two facts, the
drowning and the refusal of the policeman to arrest Stauber,
together marked the beginning of the riot.
Two hours after the drowning, a Negro, James Crawford, fired into a
group of officers summoned by the policeman at the beach and was
killed by a Negro policeman. Reports and rumors circulated rapidly,
and new crowds began to gather. Five white men were injured in
clashes near the beach. As darkness came Negroes in white districts
to the west suffered severely. Between 9:00 p.m. and 3:00 a.m.
twenty-seven Negroes were beaten, seven stabbed, and four shot.
Monday morning was quiet, and Negroes went to work as usual.
Returning from work in the afternoon many Negroes were attacked
by white ruffians. Street-car routes, especially at transfer points,
were the centers of lawlessness. Trolleys were pulled from the wires,
and Negro passengers were dragged into the street, beaten,
stabbed, and shot. The police were powerless to cope with these
numerous assaults. During Monday, four Negro men and one white
assailant were killed, and thirty Negroes were severely beaten in
street-car clashes. Four white men were killed, six stabbed, five
shot, and nine severely beaten. It was rumored that the white
occupants of the Angelus Building at Thirty-fifth Street and Wabash
Avenue had shot a Negro. Negroes gathered about the building. The
white tenants sought police protection, and one hundred policemen,
mounted and on foot, responded. In a clash with the mob the police
killed four Negroes and injured many.
Raids into the Negro residence area then began. Automobiles sped
through the streets, the occupants shooting at random. Negroes
retaliated by "sniping" from ambush. At midnight surface and
elevated car service was discontinued because of a strike for wage
increases, and thousands of employees were cut off from work.
On Tuesday, July 29, Negro men en route on foot to their jobs
through hostile territory were killed. White soldiers and sailors in
uniform, aided by civilians, raided the "Loop" business section, killing
two Negroes and beating and robbing several others. Negroes living
among white, neighbors in Englewood, far to the south, were driven
from their homes, their household goods were stolen, and their
houses were burned or wrecked. On the West Side an Italian mob,
excited by a false rumor that an Italian girl had been shot by a
Negro, killed Joseph Lovings, a Negro.
Wednesday night at 10:30 Mayor Thompson yielded to pressure and
asked the help of the three regiments of militia which had been
stationed in nearby armories during the most severe rioting,
awaiting the call. They immediately took up positions throughout the
South Side. A rainfall Wednesday night and Thursday kept many
people in their homes, and by Friday the rioting had abated. On
Saturday incendiary fires burned forty-nine houses in the immigrant
neighborhood west of the Stock Yards. Nine hundred and forty-eight
people, mostly Lithuanians, were made homeless, and the property
loss was about $250,000. Responsibility for the fires was never fixed.
The total casualties of this reign of terror were thirty-eight deaths—
fifteen white, twenty-three Negro—and 537 people injured. Forty-
one per cent of the reported clashes occurred in the white
neighborhood near the Stock Yards between the south branch of the
Chicago River and Fifty-fifth Street, Wentworth Avenue and the city
limits, and 34 per cent in the "Black Belt" between Twenty-second
and Thirty-ninth streets, Wentworth Avenue and Lake Michigan.
Others were scattered.
Responsibility for many attacks was definitely placed by many
witnesses upon the "athletic clubs," including "Ragen's Colts," the
"Hamburgers," "Aylwards," "Our Flag," the "Standard," the
"Sparklers," and several others. The mobs were made up for the
most part of boys between fifteen and twenty-two. Older persons
participated, but the youth of the rioters was conspicuous in every
clash. Little children witnessed the brutalities and frequently pointed
out the injured when the police arrived.

3. RUMORS AND THE RIOT

Wild rumors were in circulation by word of mouth and in the press
throughout the riot and provoked many clashes. These included
stories of atrocities committed by one race against the other. Reports
of the numbers of white and Negro dead tended to produce a feeling
that the score must be kept even. Newspaper reports, for example,
showed 6 per cent more whites injured than Negroes. As a matter of
fact there were 28 per cent more Negroes injured than whites. The
Chicago Tribune on July 29 reported twenty persons killed, of whom
thirteen were white and seven colored. The true figures were exactly
the opposite.
Among the rumors provoking fear were numerous references to the
arming of Negroes. In the Daily News of July 30, for example,
appeared the subheadline: "Alderman Jos. McDonough tells how he
was shot at on South Side visit. Says enough ammunition in section
to last for years of guerrilla warfare." In the article following, the
reference to ammunition was repeated but not elaborated or
explained.
The alderman was quoted as saying that the mayor contemplated
opening up Thirty-fifth and Forty-seventh streets in order that
colored people might get to their work. He thought this would be
most unwise for, he stated, "They are armed and white people are
not. We must defend ourselves if the city authorities won't protect
us." Continuing his story, he described bombs going off: "I saw
white men and women running through the streets dragging children
by the hands and carrying babies in their arms. Frightened white
men told me the police captains had just rushed through the district
crying, 'For God's sake, arm; they are coming; we cannot hold
them.'"
Whether or not the alderman was correctly quoted, the effect of
such statements on the public was the same. There is no record in
any of the riot testimony in the coroner's office or state's attorney's
office of any bombs going off during the riot, nor of police captains
warning the white people to arm, nor of any fear by whites of a
Negro invasion. In the Berger Odman case before a coroner's jury
there was a statement to the effect that a sergeant of police warned
the Negroes of Ogden Park to arm and to shoot at the feet of rioters
if they attempted to invade the few blocks marked off for Negroes
by the police. Negroes were warned, not whites.

4. CONDUCT OF THE POLICE

Chief of Police John J. Garrity, in explaining the inability of the police

to curb the rioters, said that there was not a sufficient force to police
one-third of the city. Aside from this, Negroes distrusted the white
police officers, and it was implied by the chief and stated by State's
Attorney Hoyne, that many of the police were "grossly unfair in
making arrests." There were instances of actual police participation
in the rioting as well as neglect of duty. Of 229 persons arrested and
accused of various criminal activities during the riot, 154 were
Negroes and seventy-five were whites. Of those indicted, eighty-one
were Negroes and forty-seven were whites. Although this, on its
face, would indicate great riot activity on the part of Negroes,
further reports of clashes show that of 520 persons injured, 342
were Negroes and 178 were whites. The fact that twice as many
Negroes appeared as defendants and twice as many Negroes as
whites were injured, leads to the conclusion that whites were not
apprehended as readily as Negroes.
Many of the depredations outside the "Black Belt" were encouraged
by the absence of policemen. Out of a force of 3,000 police, 2,800
were massed in the "Black Belt" during the height of the rioting. In
the "Loop" district, where two Negroes were killed and several
others wounded, there were only three policemen and one sergeant.
The Stock Yards district, where the greatest number of injuries
occurred, was also weakly protected.

5. THE MILITIA
Although Governor Lowden had ordered the militia into the city
promptly and they were on hand on the second day of the rioting,
their services were not requested by the mayor and chief of police
until the evening of the fourth day. The reason expressed by the
chief for this delay was a belief that inexperienced militiamen would
add to the deaths and disorder. But the troops, when called, proved
to be clearly of high character, and their discipline was good, not a
case of breach of discipline being reported during their occupation.
They were distributed more proportionately through all the riotous
areas than the police and, although they reported some hostility
from members of "athletic clubs," the rioting soon ceased.

6. RESTORATION OF ORDER

Throughout the rioting various social organizations and many

citizens were at work trying to hold hostilities in check and to restore
order. The Chicago Urban League, Wabash Avenue Y.M.C.A.,
American Red Cross, and various other social organizations and the
churches of the Negro community gave attention to caring for
stranded Negroes, advising them of dangers, keeping them off the
streets and, in such ways as were possible, co-operating with the
police. The packing companies took their pay to Negro employees,
and various banks made loans. Local newspapers in their editorial
columns insistently condemned the disorder and counseled
calmness.

7. THE AFTERMATH

Of the thirty-eight persons killed in the riot:

Fifteen met death at the hands of mobs. Coroner's juries
recommended that the members of the unknown mobs be
apprehended. They were never found.
Six were killed in circumstances fixing no criminal responsibility:
three white men were killed by Negroes in self-defense, and three
Negroes were shot by policemen in the discharge of their duty.
Four Negroes were killed in the Angelus riot. The coroner made no
recommendations, and the cases were not carried farther.
Four cases, two Negro and two white, resulted in recommendations
from coroner's juries for further investigation of certain persons.
Sufficient evidence was lacking for indictments against them.
Nine cases led to indictments. Of this number four cases resulted in
convictions.
Thus in only four cases of death was criminal responsibility fixed and
punishment meted out.
Indictments and convictions, divided according to the race of the
persons criminally involved, were as follows:
Negro White
Cases Persons Cases Persons
Indictments 6 17 3 4
Convictions 2 3 2 2

Despite the community's failure to deal firmly with those who

disturbed its peace and contributed to the reign of lawlessness that
shamed Chicago before the world, there is evidence that the riot
aroused many citizens of both races to a quickened sense of the
suffering and disgrace which had come and might again come to the
city, and developed a determination to prevent a recurrence of so
disastrous an outbreak of race hatred. This was manifest on at least
three occasions in 1920 when, confronted suddenly with events out
of which serious riots might easily have grown, people of both races
acted with such courage and promptness as to end the trouble early.
One of these was the murder of two innocent white men and the
wounding of a Negro policeman by a band of Negro fanatics who
styled themselves "Abyssinians"; another was the killing of a white
man by a Negro whom he had attacked while returning from work;
and still another was the riotous attacks of sailors from the Great
Lakes Naval Training Station on Negroes in Waukegan, Illinois.

8. OUTSTANDING FEATURES OF THE RIOT

This study of the facts of the riot of 1919, the events as they
happened hour by hour, the neighborhoods involved, the movements
of mobs, the part played by rumors, and the handling of the
emergency by the various authorities, shows certain outstanding
features which may be listed as follows:
a) The riot violence was not continuous hour by hour, but was
intermittent.
b) The greatest number of injuries occurred in the district west and
inclusive of Wentworth Avenue, and south of the south branch of the
Chicago River to Fifty-fifth Street, or in the Stock Yards district. The
next greatest number occurred in the so-called "Black Belt": Twenty-
second to Thirty-ninth streets, inclusive, and Wentworth Avenue to
the lake, exclusive of Wentworth Avenue; Thirty-ninth to Fifty-fifth
streets, inclusive, and Clark Street to Michigan Avenue, exclusive of
Michigan Avenue.
c) Organized raids occurred only after a period of sporadic clashes
and spontaneous mob outbreaks.
d) Main thoroughfares witnessed 76 per cent of the injuries on the
South Side. The streets which suffered most severely were State,
Halsted, Thirty-first, Thirty-fifth, and Forty-seventh. Transfer corners
were always centers of disturbances.
e) Most of the rioting occurred after work hours among idle crowds
on the streets. This was particularly true after the street-car strike
began.
f) Gangs, particularly of young whites, formed definite nuclei for
crowd and mob formation. "Athletic clubs" supplied the leaders of
many gangs.
g) Crowds and mobs engaged in rioting were generally composed of
a small nucleus of leaders and an acquiescing mass of spectators.
The leaders were mostly young men, usually between the ages of
sixteen and twenty-one. Dispersal was most effectively accomplished
by sudden, unexpected gun fire.
h) Rumor kept the crowds in an excited, potential mob state. The
press was responsible for giving wide dissemination to much of the
inflammatory matter in spoken rumors, though editorials calculated
to allay race hatred and help the forces of order were factors in the
restoration of peace.
i) The police lacked sufficient forces for handling the riot; they were
hampered by the Negroes' distrust of them; routing orders and
records were not handled with proper care; certain officers were
undoubtedly unsuited to police or riot duty.
j) The militiamen employed in this riot were of an unusually high
type. This unquestionably accounts for the confidence placed in
them by both races. Riot training, definite orders, and good staff
work contributed to their efficiency.
k) There was a lack of energetic co-operation between the police
department and the state's attorney's office in the discovery and
conviction of rioters.
The riot was merely a symptom of serious and profound disorders
lying beneath the surface of race relations in Chicago. The study of
the riot, therefore, as to its interlocking provocations and causes,
required a study of general race relations that made possible so
serious and sudden an outbreak. Thus to understand the riot and
guard against another, the Commission probed systematically into
the principal phases of race contact and sought accurate information
on matters which in the past have been influenced by dangerous
speculation; and on the basis of its discoveries certain suggestions to
the community are made.

II. The Migration of Negroes from the South

During the period 1916-18 approximately 500,000 Negroes moved
from southern to northern states. Some cities of the North received
increases in Negro population of 10 per cent to 300 per cent. The
Negro population of Gary, Indiana, increased from 383 in 1910 to
5,299 in 1920, an increase of 1,283 per cent.
Chicago was in direct line for migrants from the South, especially
along the Mississippi Valley, and received approximately 65,000, who
constituted a large proportion of the increase of 148.5 per cent in its
Negro population in the last decade. These migrants definitely
accentuated existing problems of race contact and brought new
problems of adjustment and assimilation. Southern Negroes with
southern manners, habits, and traditions, and mostly from rural
districts, became part of a northern urban community. Knowledge of
the causes of this movement of Negroes will make easier an
understanding of the difficulties following it. These causes were
economic as well as sentimental.
The South was paying to Negroes wages which varied from 75 cents
a day on a farm to $1.75 a day in certain city jobs. For two seasons
the boll weevil, a destructive pest, had been making heavy ravages
upon the cotton crops, ruining thousands of farms and throwing out
of employment many thousands of Negro workers. Lack of capital to
carry labor through a period of poor crops and over the normal
intervals between planting and harvesting largely increased Negro
unemployment. Unsatisfactory living conditions, on plantations and
in segregated quarters of southern cities, stimulated unrest. School
facilities for Negro children, described as lamentably poor even by
southerners, increased dissatisfaction with conditions in the South.
The Negro illiteracy in fifteen southern states was 33.3 per cent as
compared with 7.7 per cent for whites. The appropriations for
teachers in the schools of these states on a per capita basis was
$10.32 for each white child, and $2.89 for each Negro child.
On the other hand, the North was for the first time on a large scale
opening up opportunities for Negroes to earn a livelihood. The
cessation of immigration due to the war and the drawing of workers
into military service created a great demand for labor; and the
opening of new industries and the extension of old ones to meet the
demands of the war provided still greater opportunities. At the same
time, these industries were paying laborers from $3 to $8 per day,
and offering shorter hours and the opportunity for overtime work
and bonuses. The North also offered living accommodations which,
although below standard for city dwellers, were a vast improvement
over most of the plantation cabins and frail frame dwellings of the
South. There are no segregated schools in the North, and Negro
children are offered identical school privileges with white children.
Other causes of the migration, as stated by the migrants and
otherwise confirmed, were: lack of protection from mob violence,
injustice in the courts, inferior transportation facilities, deprivation of
the right to vote, "rough-handed and unfair competition of 'poor
whites,'" "persecution by petty officers of the law," and "persecution
by the press."
Between 1895 and 1918, 2,881 Negroes were lynched in the United
States, and more than 85 per cent of these lynchings occurred in the
South. The Atlanta Constitution declared that the heaviest migration
of Negroes was from those counties in which there had been the
worst outbreaks against Negroes.
How the migration began.—The migration began early in 1916.
Hard-pressed industries in the East, principally in Pennsylvania,
imported Negroes from Georgia and Florida. During July of that year,
13,000 were carried to Pennsylvania by one railroad company alone.
[104] They wrote back for their families and friends. Reports of high
wages and good treatment, aided by the hysteria of a mass
movement, accomplished the rest.
The migration was first noted in Chicago in 1917. It had been
rumored in the South that the Stock Yards needed 50,000 men; the
city had been regarded by Negroes as a future home since the
World's Columbian Exposition in 1893; it was the great city of mail-
order houses, the home of the Chicago Defender, a widely circulated