A "Black" State - Historum

VM1138 · June 20th, 2012, 05:36 AM

Before Oklahoma became a state, it was known as "Indian Territory," an area set aside for the various relocation efforts over the years. This fact got me thinking about the black condition after the Civil War, the Radical Republican stranglehold on power over the ten years or so of Reconstruction, and the earlier movement to relocate black slaves to Africa.

In all my studies, I can't recall ever hearing about Congress trying to organize a "black state" after the war. Was there ever such an effort? Perhaps combined with a Homestead Act style bill offering land to blacks who relocated into the West? I mention Radical Republican control because their hold on power would have made such a drastic move possible.

DwnSouthJukin · June 20th, 2012, 06:08 AM

Liberia

VM1138 · June 20th, 2012, 06:10 AM

I'm talking about within the boundaries of the United States. Radical Republicans needed black votes, it gave them their political power. So why was there no attempt to concentrate them in a state or two to generate more electoral votes? Or were they tipping the scales on close elections in existing states that they couldn't risk losing votes in those locations?

**pikeshot1600** · June 20th, 2012, 06:12 AM

It may have occurred to someone in the Radical Republicans, and perhaps to southerners as well. However, the economy of the agrarian South was dependant on the labor of both white farmers who had ownership of some land, and Black sharecroppers (and also White sharecroppers) who did not.

Sizeable migrations would have impacted available labor - and driven up its costs in a period of economic distress in the South.

**tjadams** · June 20th, 2012, 08:25 AM

I don't know if it falls within your question parameters, but
there was a huge black migration from the South to the North
during the first decade of the 20th century.

**Patito de Hule** · June 20th, 2012, 10:50 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by tjadams

I don't know if it falls within your question parameters, but
there was a huge black migration from the South to the North
during the first decade of the 20th century.

To Kansas especially.

How about Texas as a black state? You might find Sutton Griggs novel Imperium in Imperio interesting. Although I enjoyed his The Hindered Hand more, this novel is his best known and is widely available as an inexpensive paperback or as an e-book. Here is a review from Goodreads.com

Quote:

Self-published in 1899 and sold door-to-door by the author, this classic African-American novel—a gripping exploration of oppression, miscegenation, exploitation, and black empowerment—was a major bestseller in its day. The dramatic story of a conciliatory black man and a mulatto nationalist who grow up in a racist America and are driven to join a radical movement dedicated to the creation of an all-black nation in Texas, Imperium in Imperio had a profound influence on the development of black nationalism.

Sutton is often overlooked in Black literature because he peddled all his books from door to door. Many have been republished, however, and some are good reads.

Amazon.com: Imperium in Imperio: A Study of the Negro Race Problem (Dodo Press) (9781409970552): Sutton E. Griggs: Books

**Patito de Hule** · June 20th, 2012, 11:20 AM

I take that back. The huge black migration to Kansas was in the 1870's and 1880's. The story is in this book:

Amazon.com: Exodusters: Black Migration to Kansas After Reconstruction (9780393009514): Nell Irvin Painter: Books

**Rongo** · June 20th, 2012, 11:21 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Patito de Hule

To Kansas especially.

Yes, there was a migration to Kansas in the 1870s called the "Exoduster Movement":

Quote:

Benjamin "Pap" Singleton (1809-1892), a former slave born in Nashville, Tennessee, became the leader of the "Exoduster Movement" of 1879, and in later years he was accorded the title "Father of the Exodus." In the late 1860s, Singleton and his associates urged blacks to acquire farmland in Tennessee, but whites would not sell productive land to them. As an alternative Singleton began scouting land in Kansas in the early 1870s. Soon several black families migrated from Nashville. By 1874, Singleton and his associates had formed the Edgefield Real Estate and Homestead Association in Tennessee, which steered more than 20,000 black migrants to Kansas between 1877 and 1879. In 1880 Singleton claimed to be "the whole cause of the Kansas immigration," in testimony before a U.S. committee on the "exodus to Kansas."

Source: Western Migration and Homesteading: The African-American Mosaic (Library of Congress Exhibition)

But it only had limited success. Many blacks opposed it, including Frederick Douglass.

VM1138 · June 21st, 2012, 06:22 AM

The Great Migration occurred in the 1920s and '30s if I'm not mistaken, and had many blacks settle in northern industrial towns like Detroit. That's actually what got me thinking about this "black state" idea. Around the turn of the 20th Century blacks were actually prohibited from relocating because the exodus was picking up steam. But during Reconstruction I'm not aware of any similar prohibitions on such a large scale.

An economic historian could probably correct me here, but I don't think agrarianism was that big in the South after the war. I don't think it ever reached pre-war levels again and the South struggled economically for almost one hundred years. Naturally Southerners wouldn't want blacks to leave (cheap labor) but Northern Radical Republicans it seems would want to "solve" the racial issue, foster reunion under those terms, potentially solve some unemployment issues in the north, and settle the West all in one blow.

It's probably a stretch, though. I bet a lot of immigrants wouldn't be willing to do work that slaves had done for centuries. But I guess I'm just surprised no one tried it.

**pikeshot1600** · June 21st, 2012, 06:33 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by VM1138

The Great Migration occurred in the 1920s and '30s if I'm not mistaken, and had many blacks settle in northern industrial towns like Detroit. That's actually what got me thinking about this "black state" idea. Around the turn of the 20th Century blacks were actually prohibited from relocating because the exodus was picking up steam. But during Reconstruction I'm not aware of any similar prohibitions on such a large scale.

An economic historian could probably correct me here, but I don't think agrarianism was that big in the South after the war. I don't think it ever reached pre-war levels again and the South struggled economically for almost one hundred years. Naturally Southerners wouldn't want blacks to leave (cheap labor) but Northern Radical Republicans it seems would want to "solve" the racial issue, foster reunion under those terms, potentially solve some unemployment issues in the north, and settle the West all in one blow.

It's probably a stretch, though. I bet a lot of immigrants wouldn't be willing to do work that slaves had done for centuries. But I guess I'm just surprised no one tried it.

"Agrarianism" was all the South had for the most part. The "plantation economy" was somewhat dismantled, BUT, sharecropping basically replaced it in many places. The ownership of land in the South did not change all that much.

Of course you are correct in regard to immigrants. First, the ex-slaves needed work, and second, many immigrants came here looking for land they could own. The West (across the Mississippi R.) was mostly settled by White migrants from the East, and by White immigrants from Europe.

Land was available, and rather plentiful, but Whites were mostly who settled it.