Chapter 5
The Selection of Negroes, 1933-1937
The act of March 31, 1933, which gave the CCC legal
existence, contained the clause: "That in employing citizens for the
purpose of this Act, no discrimination shall be made on account of race,
color, and creed." [1] The intention was
clearly to protect the rights of Negro citizens within the CCC
organization, but these mere words did not insure them full benefits
from the newly created agency.
Certainly the plight of the American Negroes was
desperate. The depression had added further misery to their normal
condition of chronic poverty. In 1933 Negro unemployment rates were
double the national average, and more than two million Negroes were on
relief, twice as many as there should have been in terms of national
population figures. In Northern states Negro laborers found that the
adage "first fired, last hired" rang bitterly true, while in the South
the depression had erased even the structure of traditionally "Negro"
jobs. White men now cleaned the streets in Atlanta or collected garbage
in Memphis, and Negro deprivation was compounded. Federal relief schemes
like the CCC were almost all that was left for them. [2]
Scarcely had selection begun, however, when reports
from the South indicated that in that desperately poor region local
selection agents were deliberately excluding Negroes from all CCC
activities. Particularly deplorable were events in Georgia, which had a
Negro population of 1,071,125 in 1930, or 36 per cent of the total state
population. [3] On May 2, 1933, an Atlanta
resident, W. H. Harris, protested to the secretary of labor that in
Clarke County, Georgia, with a 60 per cent Negro population, no
non-whites had yet been selected for CCC work. [4] Persons, director of CCC selection,
immediately demanded an explanation from the Georgia state director of
selection, John de la Perriere. The Georgia director blandly replied
that all applications for CCC enrolment in Clarke County were "classed
A, B and C. All colored applications fell into the classes B and C. The
A class being the most needy, the selections were made from same." [5] Persons continued to insist that selections
be made regardless of race, but reports trickling in from other Georgia
counties indicated that de la Perriere was ignoring his orders. Jessie
O. Thomas, secretary of the Atlanta branch of the National Urban League,
complained on May 9 that in Washington County, Georgia, no Negroes were
included in the first fifty men selected, although in that county too
the population was more than 60 per cent Negro. [6] Persons was reluctant to take stronger
measures at this time, however, stressing to Fechner the importance to
the success of the CCC in the South of adjusting the matter locally
"without any apparent intervention from Washington." [7] The extent of his action, then, was merely to
write to de la Perriere and other Georgia officials demanding that they
treat Negro applicants fairly.
On May 19 a long telegram from the widely respected
Southern liberal, Will Alexander, director of the Committee on
Interracial Co-operation in Atlanta and later head of the Farm Security
Administration, spurred Persons into a more positive approach. Alexander
claimed that local committees in Georgia were not registering Negroes,
nor did they believe that the federal government was serious in
directing them to do so. He contended that the men in charge of
Georgia's relief measures were "rural politicians," devout adherents to
the dogma of white supremacy, and as a result of their discrimination
the Communists had been given a strong opportunity "for further
agitation" in their drive for Negro support. Alexander pleaded for more
decisive federal action. [8]
Upon receipt of the telegram, Persons immediately
telephoned de la Perriere, who admitted that Negroes were not being
selected, but denied that this was due to racial discrimination. Rather,
he insisted that "at this time of the farming period in the State, it is
vitally important that negroes remain in the counties for chopping
cotton and for planting other produce. The negroes in this way are able
to obtain work on the farms throughout the state." [9] Since this optimistic picture of full Negro
employment did not coincide with figures on the state of Negro
joblessness in Georgia, Persons asked de la Perriere for a definite
commitment to increasing Negro enrolment. When this was not forthcoming,
he called Governor Eugene Talmadge. At first Talmadge showed few signs
of co-operating, but when Persons threatened to withhold Georgia quotas
entirely unless Negroes were selected, the governor reluctantly agreed
to "instruct Mr. de la Perriere" to proceed with their enrolment. [10]
The Selection Division had won its first battle,
though not without further tribulations. Indeed, de la Perriere
protested to Persons on June 1 that county committees believed that
"there are few negro families who . . . need an income as great as $25 a
month in cash," [11] hence their reluctance
to enrol them. Nevertheless, Fechner was able to report to the President
that Negroes were at last being enrolled in Georgia, though "not as many
as the Department of Labor would like." [12]
Persons, however, realized the basic weakness of his position. He knew
that the attitudes of local communities in Georgia could not be
revolutionized "by means of our own transitory contacts with the race
problem in that state," and he was satisfied with what small gains he
had made. [13]
Georgia was not the only Southern state to balk at
the selection of Negroes on the same basis as white enrollees. The state
director of Florida, John C. Huskisson, reported: "on the basis of
merit, no negroes have yet been selected for the CCC." After Persons had
applied pressure, Huskisson agreed to "lower his standards" enough to
accommodate two hundred Negroes, though he refused to select them at the
same depots as whites. [14] Similarly, after
investigating an NAACP complaint of discrimination in Arkansas, Persons
again threatened to withhold quotas. The state's indignant relief
director, William A. Rooksbery, unequivocally denied the charge that no
Negroes had been selected. No less than three had in fact been enrolled,
he protested, but Persons was unimpressed, and told him so. The
chastened state official promised to induct more within the following
few weeks. [15] In Alabama, on the other
hand, Persons won the co-operation of the state director of relief, Thad
Holt, who was willing to select Negroes but found that some local
councils were "trying to force" them not to enrol. Persons once more
threatened to withhold quotas pending compliance with the law. [16]
Gradually, therefore, by combining pressure and
persuasion, Persons was able to insist that Southern state directors
enrol at least a token number of Negroes in their CCC quotas. By June
12, Georgia had selected 178 and Alabama 776. Mississippi, with a Negro
population of more than 50 per cent, had the poorest record with
forty-six, or only 1.7 per cent of the total enrolment; South Carolina,
also with a Negro population of more than 50 per cent, had the best
record of Negro enrolment with 36 per cent of the state's total. [17] The effort expended in effecting these
modest returns, however, was an ominous preview of what was to follow
throughout the country as the CCC tried to place its Negro enrollees in
work camps.
It was never the policy of CCC officials to attempt
to create a nationwide system of integrated camps. Given the custom of
the era, to do so would have invited trouble. From the first, the mixing
of the races was usually permitted only in those regions where Negro
enrolment was so slight that no Negro company could be formed.
Elsewhere, Negroes were usually assigned to all-Negro camps.
It was soon obvious that the success of Negro camps
was conditional on winning the acquiescence of the local communities in
their establishment. This was no easy task. No sooner had such camps
been occupied than angry complaints began to flood Fechner's office
insisting that they be filled with white enrollees or be removed. [18] In an effort to relieve local tension,
Fechner quickly ruled that no Negro was to be transported outside his
own state, and that all Negro campsites were to be selected by the
state's governor, but even these moves had little effect in quelling
local apprehension. [19]
The South was not alone in such agitation; rather, as
Fechner once bitterly attested, "there was far less protest" on this
matter from Southern communities than from other regions. [20] The director complained that "there is
hardly a locality in this country that looks favorably, or even with
indifference, on the location of a Negro CCC camp in their vicinity."
[21] The reasons for the disinclination to
accept Negro camps varied in detail from locality to locality but were
similar in general trend. Residents feared the effect of a large body of
Negroes on the social stability of their community. They anticipated
great increases in drunkenness and other social vices, and, in
particular, they feared for the safety of white women and children. The
citizens of Thornhurst, in Lackawanna County, Pennsylvania, for example,
hearing a rumor that a Negro CCC camp would be established in their
area, petitioned Fechner "righteously and vigorously" for its removal.
While "truly disavowing any prejudice against those people on account of
race and color," the petition drew attention to the social danger of
"isolating so great a number of unattached Negro males" in an area
occupied "permanently and exclusively by white people." The petition
added:
Many of these, especially unescorted women of various
ages, are obliged . . . to travel by the site of these camps and along
the highways thereabouts at all hours of the day and night. Among the
families who live . . . at Thornhurst . . . are to be found scores of
boys and girls just attaining youth and early womanhood who should not
be exposed to dangers that are possible, if not indeed, probable. [22]
Similar protests came from most parts of the country.
Residents of Washington, D.C., protested the establishment of a Negro
camp near a residential area where "women are left alone." [23] In Ligonia, Indiana, according to a
petitioner, "women were afraid to venture on the streets after
nightfall," so frightened were they of the enrollees from a nearby Negro
camp. These youths, he alleged, periodically "go on a rampage and they
do not appear to be responsible to any of the officers of the camp on
such occasions." [24] Citizens of Contra
Costa County, California, noted that members of a Negro company there
were frequently "in an intoxicated condition" and that the camp was "a
menace to the peace and quiet of the community." [25] Fechner vainly insisted that there had not
been "one single case where the conduct of Negro enrollees in the CCC
camps had disturbed the peace and quiet of any community." [26] Negro camps were simply not welcome in most
localities.
Almost all of the glimpses of moderation on the issue
came, perhaps paradoxically, from some Southern communities,
particularly in Alabama, where a well-rounded Negro CCC program
developed by Governor Bibb Graves performed much useful work. [27] Arkansas citizens, too, accepted with
equanimity many Negro camps. Residents of Laurens County, Georgia,
considering themselves "above prejudice" in racial matters, successfully
petitioned Fechner for the establishment of a Negro soil erosion camp in
their vicinity. White citizens of Morton, Mississippi, declared that
they had had no trouble with the two Negro camps in their district and
predicted that if only the protesting communities could see the high
standard of the work accomplished, they "would be glad to get them
instead of some white camps." [28] But such
isolated gestures could not balance the widespread hostility to Negro
camps. Fechner himself never attempted to force communities to accept
them. If protests showed no signs of abating, he usually removed the
camps and either cancelled them or placed them on an Army reservation.
He was "a Southerner by birth and raising," he said frequently, and
"clearly understood the Negro problem." [29]
He was reluctant, therefore, to force the issue.
At the same time that Fechner was being petitioned to
remove Negro camps, other sources pressed for expanded Negro
participation. The NAACP and similar Negro action groups were constantly
complaining about discrimination in CCC selection, and, although not all
their assertions were well founded, it was clear that Persons had not
convinced most selection agents that Negroes should be given an equal
chance to enrol. [30] Some appealed directly
to the President. Alton Wright, superintendent of the Colored Rescue
Mission, Inc., of Kansas City, protested to Roosevelt that "Negroes
can't get into the CCC" and that "no-one seems to care." [31] In Delaware, where the state's potential
Negro enrolment was insufficient to justify a separate Negro company,
yet where racial feeling did not permit of integrated camps, no Negroes
at all could be enrolled. When that state's outraged relief director
sought redress, Fechner told her that the non-existence of CCC
opportunity for Delaware's Negroes was a fact "she would have to
accept." [32] "Just a Colored Mother"
wondered "if war was declared, would they pick all the white boys first
and leave the negro boys as the last called for service? This is what
they do in the CCC." [33] An investigation
by the Julius Rosenwald Fund brought the whole question of
discrimination squarely to the director's attention. The fund found that
"Negroes have not been placed in CCC jobs at anything like their
proportion of the population, to say nothing of their greater need of
employment as indicated by relief statistics." The fund's report asked
Persons if he "could select 863 white juniors in the State of Florida,
and only 18 Negro juniors without discrimination against Negroes." [34]
Negro complaints were not confined solely to matters
of enrolment policy. The Administration had decided that Negroes would
not be widely employed in Negro camps in any position of authority other
than that of educational adviser, [35] a
ruling predictably opposed by the leading Negro spokesmen. Fechner
justified the policy on the grounds that the only way to get communities
to accept Negro companies "was on the assurance that white supervisors
would be in charge of the camps. Because of the practical difficulties
of the situation it had not been felt desirable to extend the
appointment of Negroes to include any large responsibilities." [36] Negro pressure groups carried their
protests to the President, who decided in 1936 that a few Negro officers
and supervisory personnel should be used in the camps. Some white
groups, of course, bitterly opposed the extension of any responsibility
in the camps to Negroes as "detrimental to the best interests" of the
Corps and the country. [37]
In 1934 Fechner, in an attempt to unravel the tangled
threads of the Negro problem, asked the War Department to undertake a
full investigation of Negro enrolment and placement. The Army reported
varying practices in each Corps area. In the New England states, for
example, there were about 250 Negroes as signed to sixty-eight mainly
white companies, and similar conditions prevailed in most other areas.
Strict segregation was maintained in the South, but in all other
regions, though segregated camps predominated, Negroes were attached to
many white companies. Some had even been sent out of their home state,
strictly contrary to Fechner's ruling. The Army realized that such a
situation was not satisfactory, but recommended against change because
the maintenance of strictly segregated camps in all Corps areas would
only increase the number of Negro units and compound the problem of
their placement. [38]
Fechner's response, however, was unequivocal. He
ordered that all Negroes in camps outside their home states were to be
repatriated as soon as possible, that they be replaced by white
enrollees, and that strict segregation was to be maintained in all Corps
areas. There was to be absolutely no latitude allowed. He claimed that
only by maintaining rigid segregation would he check racial violence
within the camps. Such violence, however, had been a negligible factor
in the context of the whole problem. [39]
What Fechner had done, in fact, was to exacerbate greatly his own
difficulties by increasing the need for Negro campsites without doing
anything to lessen the prejudice in local areas against their
establishment. His policy on placement would therefore have to be firmer
or else Negro enrolment would surely have to be curtailed. It is hard to
understand why he made this decision, so contrary to Army advice, unless
he was strongly influenced by personal beliefs and prejudices. A
Southerner himself, his absorption of the social mores of that region
may have been so complete that he preferred not to act as head of an
organization which permitted even the smallest amount of racial
intermingling.
The Army report also confirmed what reports from the
field had long indicated: in defiance of the provisions of the CCC Act
and Persons' repeated instructions, local authorities were using a
definite quota system in the selection of Negro enrollees. Negroes were
chosen in most areas only as vacancies occurred in Negro camps.
Furthermore, this quota system had been established with the direct
cognizance and encouragement of area and district military authorities.
Several state selection agents reported to Persons that Army authorities
had refused to accept Negro selectees because they had "no vacancies for
colored men," [40] and actually had notified
selection agents how many, if any, Negro enrollees were required from
each particular district. [41]
To Persons, such policies blatantly contravened both
the spirit and letter of the CCC legislation. He strongly emphasized to
the Advisory Council that "the Department of Labor is responsible for
the enforcement and observance of the law. The law definitely states
that there must be no discrimination, and it [the Department] cannot be
put in the position of discriminating against the negro race. We have
been placed in an intolerable position." [42] In his dealings with state directors,
Persons was insistent that they adhere rigidly to the Labor Department's
position. To the Missouri state director, Wallace Crossley, he wrote:
"Arbitrary colored quotas are not to be established by the selecting
agencies, nor are limitations amounting to discrimination to be placed
in the way of qualified applicants voluntarily desiring the privilege of
enrollment." [43] To a New Jersey official,
he demanded that all Negro eligibles be accommodated, even if it meant
camp reorganization. [44]
The basic fault lay not entirely in the local area,
however, as the Missouri selection director recognized when he retorted
to Persons that he would enrol more Negroes when his state got more
Negro camps. [45] By insisting on the dual
policy of rigid segregation and confinement to the home state, Fechner
had closed the two safety valves selection agents could use, while his
reluctance to override local protests in placing Negro camps put
definite limits on their expansion. Given these restrictions, state
directors were forced to use a quota system, in spite of Persons' strong
protests. Fechner himself was leaning more and more toward authorizing a
definite restriction of Negro enrolment as the easiest solution to the
problem. He told the Advisory Council: "I think we can easily defend and
justify a policy of making replacements in accordance with the color of
the vacancy existing. The practical thing is to maintain the
organization we've got. Every time we make a change, it constantly
brings up more friction." [46] Against such
a tendency, Persons' fight to uphold the intent of the original act was
of little consequence. Fechner now needed only an incident of sufficient
importance to enable him to establish his policy of curtailing Negro
enrolment on a national basis.
The chance came in July, 1935, when there was serious
unrest among white communities in California, Arkansas, and especially
Texas at the proposed establishment of new Negro camps as part of the
general plan of CCC expansion. To Senator Joseph Robinson, Fechner
admitted that he was "completely at a loss to know what I can do in
handling these protests. The local welfare boards select the Negroes,
and under the law we are compelled to take them. Something should be
done to regulate the number of Negroes who are selected." [47] "Something should be done," he had written,
and immediately he resolved to do it. He accordingly instructed Persons
to stop all colored enrolment in Texas on the grounds that there were no
more camps for Negroes there. Incensed, Persons refused to do so. He
considered the director's request to be "a direct violation of the law,"
especially because
the CCC has never adequately fulfilled its
opportunities for the selection of colored enrollees. For us now to
expressly deny the right of selection to such men when there are
eligible and qualified applications available and when state quotas
cannot be filled would be an indefensible procedure. [48]
Fechner was not at all swayed by these protests.
After Persons' refusal to order the curtailment of Negro enrolment, he
put the whole position before the President. Roosevelt termed the
situation "political dynamite" and decided to approve Fechner's policy,
though he asked that his name "be not drawn into the discussion." [49] Since Persons still refused to issue the
required instructions, however, Fechner was forced to do so himself. [50] In his announcement that henceforth Negroes
would be selected only as vacancies became available in already
established Negro companies, he indicated that the policy had the
President's approval. The order applied not only to Texas but to the
entire country. [51]
The Selection Division, though objecting bitterly,
was forced to acquiesce in the new policy. Dean Snyder angrily reminded
the Advisory Council that the decision was clearly "a violation of the
basic Act," but the council, unmoved, upheld the director. [52] Persons made no further attempt to
investigate alleged instances of racial discrimination. He had lost his
fight, and he now turned all such matters over to Fechner rather than
deal with them himself according to a policy personally repugnant to
him. Fechner, courteous but definite, had no interest in reopening the
question. He insisted that he was sorry that he could not "accept every
person who wanted to enroll in a CCC camp," but, he added, this was not
possible. [53] That the "degree of
impossibility" varied according to the color of the applicant's skin was
conveniently overlooked. Though the problem of the Negro enrollee had
not been solved and was to return sharply into focus when increasing
white reemployment made the arbitrary racial distinction even more
inequitable, Fechner had at least secured some respite from the constant
irritation of locating Negro camps and dealing with white protests.
That, perhaps, he had also shrugged off some of his responsibilities as
director seemed to him only a minor quibble.
The outcome of the controversy over Negro enrolment
is an obvious blot on the record of the CCC. The Negro never gained the
measure of relief from the agency's activities to which his economic
privation entitled him. The clause in the basic act prohibiting
discrimination was honored far more in the breach than in the
observance. Much of the blame for the curtailment of Negro enrolment
must, of course, lie firmly with the director. His Southern attitudes
influenced his approach to Negro policy. Unwilling to permit integrated
camps or to allow the Negro the latitude of interstate travel permitted
to white enrollees, and only too ready to heed the demands for removing
Negro camps, he made little attempt to extend to Negroes the fullest
benefits of CCC life. Further, the ambivalence of the War Department on
the issue and the willingness of Army authorities to go along with local
protests in order to preserve an organizational equilibrium helped to
prompt Fechner into making his decision. Though no one expected the Army
to be an active agent in promoting social revolution, its equivocation
is nevertheless an additional factor in explaining the shabby side of
the CCC's treatment of Negroes. Moreover, to place a quasi-fascist like
General Moseley in command of the Fourth Corps Area, which included most
of the South, indicated at best a lack of tact, at worst a contempt for
Negro sensitivities and aspirations.
Neither Fechner nor the War Department, however, can
be held entirely culpable. President Roosevelt himself made no attempt
to insure fairer treatment for Negroes, and he acquiesced in the
restriction of their enrolment. Much of the responsibility must also lie
with the local communities, Northern and Southern, which refused to
accept Negro CCC camps. Without community good will, some curtailment of
Negro selection was probably inevitable, even if Fechner and the Army
had adopted a stronger line. Negroes could be enrolled only to the
extent that there were camps in which to place them; therefore, in a
sense, by restricting their selection, Fechner was merely reflecting a
strong section of prevailing white opinion.
It is true, too, that the director was not running
the camps to further the cause of American race relations, but to reduce
unemployment and accomplish useful conservation work. However desirable,
the fullest employment of Negroes was only a matter of subsidiary
concern to him and not worth constant irritation and worry. It should be
remembered that only 10 per cent of the United States population was
Negro, and though their economic state was indeed parlous, there were
plenty of white youths whose position was little better. Fechner owed an
obligation to them as well; his main concern was to run the CCC as
smoothly as possible. A public outcry every time he tried to place a
Negro camp was hardly good for public relations, nor did constant
bickering with selection agents make for efficient selection policies.
Viewed in this light, his decision appears perhaps more easily
understood.
Besides, the CCC in its nine-year life span enrolled
about 2,500,000 men. Almost 200,000 of these were Negroes. [54] Though their economic state certainly
warranted better treatment, the Corps did provide relief for a
considerable number. In so doing, it fed many of them better than ever
before, provided them with living conditions far superior to their home
environments, and gave them valuable academic and vocational training.
About 87 per cent of all Negro enrollees participated in the education
program, learning a variety of skills particularly suited to their own
job opportunities. Some left the Corps to become gardeners, poultry
farmers, or cooks; more were placed by Corps officials as janitors,
table waiters, or chauffeurs. "Negro jobs" they may have been, but in an
era when any employment was prized, training for such fields represented
the best practical approach to the problem. [55]
To look at the place of the Negro in the CCC purely
from the viewpoint of opportunities missed, or ideals compromised, is to
neglect much of the positive achievement. The CCC opened up new vistas
for most Negro enrollees. Certainly, they remained in the Corps far
longer than white youths. [56] As one Negro
wrote: "as a job and an experience for a man who has no work, I can
heartily recommend it." [57] In short, the
CCC, despite its obvious failures, did fulfil at least some of its
obligations toward unemployed American Negro youth.
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