Welcome to the water cooler (7/08)

Update: Click here for an easier-to-read threaded version of this discussion, now archived at our wiki. You can read past discussions with Frances Moore Lappé and Matt Leighninger at our wiki, too.

Welcome to the summer installment of the Everyday Democracy Book Club. Our guest for today's live blog session (from 1 to 2 p.m. Eastern) is Dr. James W. Loewen, author of Sundown Towns: A Hidden Dimension of American Racism. I am Julie Fanselow, online organizer for Everyday Democracy and manager of its DemocracySpace blog, and I'll be the moderator for today's online discussion. (We call these events "water coolers.")

Published in 2005, Sundown Towns was a groundbreaking book that helped document how thousands of U.S. communities, mostly in the North, had "whites-only" policies, often stated via signs at the city limits, forbidding people of color to stay after sunset. More critically, Professor Loewen shows in his book how the legacy of those policies lingers across our landscape today: in towns where black families are still rare, in feelings of prejudice and privilege among whites who grow up in homogeneous places, and in nearly every major issue we face as a nation today.

In an article written recently for the World magazine published by the Unitarian Universalist Association (read it here), historian Dan Carter summed up the challenge Loewen's book presents to us:

Everywhere we look, we see the long shadow of our racist past in the re-segregation of our public schools and the growing isolation of the poorest African Americans in impoverished inner cities, in the continuing wealth and income gap between black and white, and in the unconscionable explosion of a "prison-industrial complex" that incarcerates millions of black men, consigning them to a lifetime in the shadows of our society.

None of us should feel personal responsibility for what our parents or grandparents did or did not do. But there will be guilt enough for our own generation if we do not confront and address the bitter consequences of the story that James Loewen has revealed so powerfully in Sundown Towns.

Because Everyday Democracy works with communities to address issues of racial equity, that quote seems like an especially apropos way to frame today's discussion. What can those of us working for racial equity and justice do to overcome the lingering legacies of our history? What's already happening (and where), and what more needs to be done?

Here's how the water cooler will work: I'll ask Jim the first question at 1 p.m. Eastern, and he will answer in the comments as well. To follow this Q&A discussion, click on the word "comments" below this post. If you'd like to pose a question or add a comment, look for the phrase "POST A COMMENT" at the end of the existing comments. Below it, insert your name (real names, please); email address (it will not be visible online); and, if you like, the URL of your organization or program’s website. Write your question or comment in the box, then click “post.”

Please note: You will need to refresh your browser periodically to see the latest questions and comments that have been posted and answered. If traffic gets heavy, you may be asked to verify your comment with a "captcha check," or typing in a string of letters.

Also, if you see that several questions have already been asked, please be kind and give Jim a chance to catch up before posting your question. We'll post a rethreaded, easier-to-read version of this live blog at our wiki within 24 hours. (You can read past water cooler discussions there, too.)

Thank you for joining us for today's meeting of the Everyday Democracy Book Club! And now, let the discussion begin ...

Comments

[Julie Fanselow]

Jim, thank you for being with us here today. To start off, can you give us just a brief primer on Sundown Towns: What they were/are, how many existed at their peak, and where were/are they located? And why did you decide to write this book?

I’m using the past/present tenses because you make the point that – although most Sundown Towns have reformed - some U.S. communities still exclude people of color, tacitly if not officially.

[Jim Loewen]

Sundown towns peaked in 1970. Well, in 1968. In that year, the US passed what's known as the "Fair Housing Act," and that started putting the federal govt. on the side of open housing.
I estimate that in 1970 there were about 10,000 sundown towns across the US, especially in the North. (They are rare in the S.)

[Jim Loewen]

When I went to write the book (1999), I had NO IDEA of the extent of the problem. Coming from IL, I had thought I'd do more research in that state than in any other single state, tho I have done research across the US. I thought I'd find maybe 10 sundown towns in IL, 50 across the US. To my astonishment, I am now at a count of 501 sundown towns in IL alone -- that's 70% of all incorporated communities in the state!

[Julie Fanselow]

It's been close to three years since your book was published, and yet your ideas continue to gain steady attention. Do you feel you've made a difference? Do you have some favorite new examples of communities that have taken steps to remediate the injustices of their sundown pasts?

[Jim Loewen]

And finally, to answer the last part of your question, sundown towns outraged me. I mean, long ago, in the 1960s, when I was a college student in MN, and I learned that Edina, the richest suburb of Minneapolis, had the unofficial slogan "Not one Negro and not one Jew," that did not seem right. The unofficial acronym for Anna, IL, to this day, "Ain't No Niggers Allowed," seems equally outlandish. (And yes, I know the town was named for a woman named Anna in 1854. In 1909, Anna drove out its black population, and since then....)

[Jim Loewen]

No, I don't feel I've made much of a difference.
Here are three things that I had hoped would have happened by now:
1. Some major civil rights law group, such as the U.S. Dept. of Justice, the Lawyers Committee for Civil Rights, or the Southern Poverty Law Center, would file suit against a sundown town, demanding that it renounce its exclusionary past and state that it now welcomes residents of all races, with more than just verbal assent required. If the city refused, then the state and federal governments should be asked to curtail all expenditures in the city.
2. Individuals would come forward with old sundown town signs or photos of same.
3. The Unitarian/Universalist Church and other organizations would take on the project of researching, "outing," and changing sundown towns.
One really good thing has happened: students, from middle school to grad school, are taking up this topic. Several middle school students in Ohio did research on their home communities as probable sundown towns. A Ph.D. candidate is studying the sundown town movement in Arkansas. This is a whole new field of study, with relevance to social psychology, economics, political science, even penology.

[Julie Fanselow]

Jim, the Anna, Illinois, story definitely hit home in my household. My husband's late uncle practiced as a doctor in that town. We weren't very close to him and never visited him there, but needless to say, the whites-only story never came up in casual family reunion conversation.

[Julie Fanselow]

If any of you out there in cyberspace has a question for Jim, just type it in the comments. Include your real name, please. Thanks!

[Jim Loewen]

Anna is becoming notorious due to the acronym, but it's no worse (or better) than, say, Vienna, just down the road, which drove out its black population in 1954, or Kenilworth, the richest suburb of Chicago, founded to be free of blacks and Jews back around 1905.
Anna just takes more heat for it.

[Carrie Boron]

Hi Jim,

My name is Carrie Boron and I work with Everyday Democracy. Thanks so much for being with us today.

Why do you think major groups like SPLC or the Dept. of Justice haven't taken action on this?

Thanks,
Carrie

[Julie Fanselow]

"One really good thing has happened: students, from middle school to grad school, are taking up this topic. ..."

I'd venture to say that people of the Baby Boomer generation and folks in their 40s and late 30s - many who lived through this - are appalled and don't want to think about growing up in Sundown Towns. (I'm on the cusp of Gen X and the Baby Boomers. I grew up in a subdivision called Plantation Place. You think black folks would want to live there?!)

It's good to hear the younger generations are taking this more seriously and are willing to research, speak out, publish.

[Jon Abercrombie]

When you say that 70% of the towns in Illinois are sundown towns, what are you talking about? Do you mean de facto segregation, or formal policies to exclude? A little more definition would help.

[Julie Fanselow]

Good question, Carrie.

Jim, as a fellow UU, I agree this issue is one that is a natural for our faith (as it would be for many other religious folks).

Of course, it's one among many, but I was heartened to see the recent coverage in the World, and I hope more attention is paid and action is taken as the stories spread.

[Jim Loewen]

I think there is a gap between good intentions and actions. Even under the Bush administration, which has no real interest in improving race relations, no one explicitly defends the "right" of whites to keep blacks out of a town. (We might note, however, that both Bush and Cheney chose to live in a sundown town, the same sundown town, Highland Park, Texas, for some years, and "inburb" of Dallas whose only real raison d'etre is to be racially and economically distinctive from Dallas.)

[Jim Loewen]

I define a sundown town as a community that is "all white" on purpose. Note that "all white" is in quotation marks. Some sundown towns were not quite all white. When Pana, IL, drove out its blacks in 1899, for example, they didn't drive out the barber. No one had anything against the barber, who cut whites' hair and was befriended by his clients. So altho Pana proceeded to post the usual sundown town signs at its city limits ("Nigger, Don't Let The Sun Go Down On You In Pana"), its black population did not immediately hit zero; it was 4, 7, 5 -- the barber and his family.

[Martha McCoy]

Jim, thank you so much for your extensive work, and for being with us today.

One of the most fascinating things you write about is the way in which "sundown towns" are just part of a larger phenomenon in our country. You say that many people don't understand the workings of history... how things came to be so separate. So, for example, you say that many people sincerely believe that residential segregation is the "natural" outgrowth of countless decisions by individual families.

Some of the communities we at Everyday Democracy work with are beginning to explore how racial disparities came to be in their own places, so that they can take steps to close the disparities and create a more equitable community. They may not have been part of a literal "sundown town" but the organizing across racial lines is difficult. Any comments on the way in which the sundown experience permeates our culture?

[Jim Loewen]

Moreover, I cannot know whether a town that remains all white today, and had a policy, formally or informally, not to allow blacks, is still a sundown town today. To test it, we'd have to have a black family move in last week. That has not happened, and if it had, I'd not know of it. Hence, there is an indeterminacy in my verb tense. "Was" sundown? Implies it's over. That may be wrong. "Is" sundown? Implies it continues. That may be wrong.

[Sarah Eisele]

Hi, Jim. Thanks for discussing your work with us!

I'm interested in the types of documents in which you found the information about these sundown towns. How can we find out about segregationist policies within our own communities, both past and present? Also, the inevitable question, how can we help move this issue forward in our own local communities and our states?

[Jim Loewen]

Even towns that never excluded blacks have neighborhoods that did. Moreover, these are usually prestigious neighborhoods. Indeed, Edina and Kenilworth, etc., teach us that the whiter the area, the more prestigious, as a general rule (with a few important exceptions). So, the first thing to deal with is this "paradox of exclusivity." People need to realize, to FEEL, that an all-white neighborhood is a BAD place to raise kids, an unfortunate place to live.

[Jim Loewen]

I do realize that, tho I'm typing as fast as I can, I have not completely answered some of the earlier posts. Sigh.

[Julie Fanselow]

Jon and all,

Jim's book goes into great detail on how the Sundown Towns phenomenon took place, mainly starting around 1890, as town after town - mostly in the North - ran out its black residents, sometimes after a single crime or alleged crime committed by a person of color.

These towns used everything from harassment and riots to subtle pressure to drive blacks away or keep them from settling in the first place. The book gets its name from the fact that many towns had signs at their city limits saying "Don't let the sun set on your black ass" (with a picture of a donkey), "N-----, don't let the sun set on you in (town name), etc.

[Jon Abercrombie]

I guess I am trying to understand what it means to be all white "on purpose" and how you define that. I have worked with a community that on purpose drove blacks from the county in the early 1900's outside of Atlanta.

Most of what I experience now are communities who choose to limit the number of low income residents through zoning etc. but would see themselves as open to middle and upper class families regardless of race.

Can you say more about how you determine "on purpose."

[Jim Loewen]

At my website, which I think is hyperlinked above, I have a short essay that tells people how to verify (or disconfirm) a town as a sundown town.
Briefly, here, let me say, (a) start with the census, but don't be fooled by nonhousehold minorities. Anna, for instance, has about 85 African Americans who are residents of the IL State Mental Hospital. Then, (b) if it looks overwhelmingly white, decade after decade, read the town histories. Probably these will say nothing, but some will surprise. (The town histories of Kenilworth and Edina, for example, are both forthcoming about their towns' practices.) Then (c) ask the oldest folks you can find. Genealogists are great. Historical society members are good, IF interviewed one-on-one in person. (Otherwise, they tend to avoid anything bad about their community). Do GOOD oral history. Get details. Get corroboration with folks in the nearest interracial town. Etc.
Then .... send ME the results, and I'll post 'em on my interactive website.

[Julie Fanselow]

No worries, Jim!

Let's hold off on further questions for a few minutes so Jim can catch up on Martha's query, then Sarah's, then Jon's follow-up (seeking more info on how towns exclude blacks "on purpose").

And this is a good time to say that I will post an easier-to-read threaded transcript of this session at our wiki later today. :)

[Nick Connell]

And Western towns in California and Oregon drove out Chinese residents in the same way that other towns drove out black residents.

[Julie Fanselow]

You can get to Jim's website by clicking his name, or clicking here:

http://www.uvm.edu/~jloewen/sundowntowns.php

The book ordering info there is a little out of date. A link to the hardcover edition at amazon says it's out of stock, but the paperback version is available here:

http://www.amazon.com/Sundown-Towns-Hidden-Dimension-American/dp/B0013L2EFO/ref=sr_1_2?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1216834341&sr=1-2

or have your friendly neighborhood bookseller order you a copy!

[Carrie Boron]

While these signs might not exist anymore (I hope!!), current town/city policies that Jon mentions certainly keep the sundown towns in existence.

[Sarah Eisele]

Hi, Jim. Thanks for discussing your work with us!

I'm interested in the types of documents in which you found the information about these sundown towns. How can we find out about segregationist policies within our own communities, both past and present? Also, the inevitable question, how can we help move this issue forward in our own local communities and our states?

[Jim Loewen]

I have "high standards." That is, a town the merely excludes on the basis of social class does not constitute a sundown town. Nor does a town like College Park, MD, that has approx. 8 sundown neighborhoods but 1 interracial neighborhood, hence never totally excluded blacks.
But the exclusion need not be formal. Often it is not. Some towns developed a sundown reputation with no signs, no ordinances -- just informally. If a black family tried to move in, realtors would not show them the house, or there would be threats, or even a fire, or the kids would get beaten up on the way to school, etc. All that counts. Indeed, no hard line can be drawn between formal and informal. For example, I have many stories of police harassing black motorists in sundown towns, even tho there is no ordinance. But if the police are enforcing it, well, then, that's an ordinance, for all intents!

[Jim Loewen]

Finding a written ordinance is very hard, even in towns that "know" they passed it. Most towns cannot find ANY ordinance. If, for example, it is illegal to park on the "wrong side" of a two-way street (i.e., headed in the wrong direction for that side of the street), which it is in some towns, and is not in others, everyone "knows" the law, but usually no one can FIND it. If anyone reading this does find a sundown ordinance, or an ordinance rescinding a town's sundown ordinance, do send it to me, via my website. Thank you!

[Jim Loewen]

To cause change: Some sundown towns have opened, usually as a result of a pioneering black family or two. Many white people in such towns are sick of their town's reputation and sick of the racism underlying it.
At least one former sundown town has signed the remarkable initiative for open cities sponsored by the National League of Cities.
Some Unitarians have DISCUSSED getting together to research and out sundown towns. (Unitarians are great at discussing things.)
But ... every (former) sundown town in the US needs to do at least these three things:
1. Admit it. ["We did this."]
2. Apologize. ["We did this and it was wrong, and we're sorry."]
3. State "We don't do it any more," and put teeth into that last statement -- if someone thinks we have discriminated, we have this racial ombudsperson to see, or this civil rights commission, or whatever. And we have indoctrinated our real estate agents. And we are hiring diversely for our school system and public works departments. And ....

[Julie Fanselow]

Jim, I'm reposting this from Martha McCoy, our executive director, because it may have gotten lost up-thread:

"One of the most fascinating things you write about is the way in which "sundown towns" are just part of a larger phenomenon in our country. You say that many people don't understand the workings of history... how things came to be so separate. So, for example, you say that many people sincerely believe that residential segregation is the "natural" outgrowth of countless decisions by individual families.

"Some of the communities we at Everyday Democracy work with are beginning to explore how racial disparities came to be in their own places, so that they can take steps to close the disparities and create a more equitable community. They may not have been part of a literal "sundown town" but the organizing across racial lines is difficult. Any comments on the way in which the sundown experience permeates our culture?"

[Julie Fanselow]

Jim, I love your three-step process above. I will likely feature that in a blog post tomorrow as the big "take away" from our discussion.

Any examples of towns that have done/are doing those three things?

[Jim Loewen]

Most Americans have no idea of the era called (by historians) the "Nadir of Race Relations." This was the sad period, 1890 to 1940, when race relations WORSENED. Indeed, whites grew more explicitly racist in ideology than at any other point in our history.
This period spawned most sundown towns. (Well, sundown suburbs came just a bit later, say 1905-1968.)
The basic story line of US history textbooks is, "we started out great and have been getting better ever since." This story line is not conducive to a Nadir in anything, let alone race relations.
Since most Americans don't know about this, they assume that race relations, have been getting better ever since the Civil War ended slavery. Sigh.
This vitiates our discussions of affirmative action, for example.

[Jim Loewen]

At least one former sundown town (Bluffton, IN) has signed the remarkable initiative for open cities sponsored by the National League of Cities.
Another former sundown town, Elwood, IN, has celebrated M.L.King Day for the last two years. While this might not seem like a big deal, the first time, the mayor called out swat teams and put police on roofs to protect the 20 or so marchers. Nothing bad happened. He participated.
Last Jan. he participated again, and about 25 people showed up. Well, that's progress! IS Elwood over it? Not sure, but the mayor has made an important symbolic gesture.

[Jim Loewen]

Before 2PM arrives and I turn into a pumpkin, let me make a plea: many of you, or people you know, can do the kind of research that confirms (or disconfirms) a sundown town. Please do, and please send me the result. This is one of the few times in the history of the world when just getting out information helps cure a problem. (Mainly because few people want to be known as living in a town that is overtly and intentionally racist.) If you know a history teacher whose students might do this as a project, or if you can form a study group or action group at your church or civic organization, or if you need a project for a course you plan to take next fall in college ... consider something on sundown towns. It's virgin territory, and your work will likely lead to change.

[Julie Fanselow]

Great examples, thanks.

Springfield, Illinois, is an interesting case. Race riots there drove out many blacks, but more recently the city has:

acknowledged this history via plaques and a walking tour brochure

in response to a visit from Matt Hale (the noted white supremacist) put up signs at the city limits that read "Hate: Not in Our Homes, Not in Our Neighborhoods, Not in Our City"

held dialogue-to-change programs such as those offered by Everyday Democracy to work on issues including police and fire hiring practices, etc.

[Martha McCoy]

Thanks, Jim, this is a very useful way of framing and re-framing our country's (and communities') history.

For us at EvDem, we've definitely seen (within our staff and Associates and communities we work with) a growing desire to figure out a more true, grounded history. That grew out of our drive to address the "gaps" along racial and ethnic lines that still persist... and from the honesty of people of color who were willing to say what had happened (and is happening) to them and their families.

[Julie Fanselow]

Jim, thanks for letting people know that they can send info to you on sundown towns in their areas.

Many people online with us may know that you also wrote the book "Lies My Teacher Told Me." Are you working on any other books?

[Jim Loewen]

This year is the centennial of the notorious 1908 race riot wherein white residents of Springfield tried to make it a sundown town. "Abe Lincoln brought you in, and we will drive you out!" they shouted.
Yes, the city put up a terrific walking tour, instigated by two white sixth-grade girls (with help then from the NAACP, professors at what is now UIS, etc.).
This example again shows, just one person (well, two) can make a difference!
In the aftermath of the race riot, towns around Springfield became sundown too. White mobs as far away as Tennessee yelled "Give 'em Springfield" as they attacked blacks in their communities.
I've been speaking in Springfield and will be there again in Sept. My hope is to help Springfield move toward such GOOD race relations that "Give 'em Springfield" takes on an entirely new meaning -- a town that eliminates the performance gap between black and white kids, that has no sundown neighborhoods, that ....

[Molly Barrett]

Jim, when you do your research, do you make a distinction between communities where there is overt racism (the signs at the edge of town) and/or things like zoning laws that violate the spirit, if not the letter of the civil rights act, and the places where racism is implicit? It seems to me that if the latter is true, it might be almost impossible to find a town that doesn't fall into the sundown category. It's a horrifying thought.
Molly at Everyday Democracy

[Jim Loewen]

I am working on two books at once. Thanks for asking. One, almost finished, is TEACHING WHAT HAPPENED, aimed at K-12 history and soc. stud. teachers. It grows from the workshops that I give around the US to teacher groups, school systems, and ed schools.
Second, I'm working on THE GREAT TRUTH; CONFEDERATES AND NEO-CONFEDERATES IN THEIR OWN WORDS. This book hopes to help Americans understand why the South seceded, what it stood for, and what Confederate nostalgia inevitably connotes today, by quoting the principals and their principles.

[Julie Fanselow]

Jim, I am sorry our time is winding down. I am going to post a few more questions here that we talked about, and if you have time to address them, great. And others can chime in, too, with comments on any of these.

If you have other commitments, please accept out thanks. We've had 500+ page views in the past hour, so I know many people looked on but didn't ask questions,, and many others will read this on our blog and wiki archives.

The extra questions (note from Julie, Jim emailed me his answers to these, which I've put in asterisks below):

There have lately been several other high-profile books and films - including the PBS documentary Traces of the Trade just last month - that demonstrate, as your book did, that racism was rife throughout the Northern U.S. Do you see people starting to acknowledge that more than we did perhaps five years ago? Is denial any less prevalent?

***Jim: Yes, it's heartening that Brown and Yale universities, for example, are looking at their complicity in the slave trade. I do wish that the Nadir of race relations, that terrible period from 1890 to 1940 when racism became more entrenched as an ideology even than during slavery time, was more known. THAT is the true handicap that African Americans face today. Slavery was long ago. (Of course, the racism that legitimized slavery lingered and formed the ideology of the Nadir, so I do not mean to minimize the importance of slavery in our nation's past.)***

You mention in your book that some towns that were sundown for blacks have welcomed recent Hispanic immigrants and in some cases made those towns more hospitable to African Americans. But anti-immigrant sentiment has risen quite a bit since 2005, and some cities – most notably Hazleton, Pa. - have enacted laws designed to drive out illegal immigrants. Have you noticed any other sort of latter-day sundown activity targeting Hispanic people? (And if so, has racism in general risen in those areas?)

***Jim: Although I have not proven it, I think Hazleton was (is?) a sundown town vis-a-vis blacks....***

Finally, It seems paradoxical that one of the worst sundown states four years ago elected the first black Senator since Reconstruction (in a campaign that pitted two black men), and that this same man will soon be the first major-party black nominee for president. Do you see the current presidential campaign changing the landscape for frank discussion of racial equity and sundown policies? Why or why not?

***Jim: So far I think the campaign has been helpful. PA speech. Some discussion of sundown towns in Indiana and PA. Alabama election, though Cullman County voted for H. Clinton.***

(Julie's note: Cullman, Ala., is a town about 50 miles from Birmingham, and a bedroom community for many people who make the long commute to Birmingham. In the presidential primary this year, Barack Obama got 56 percent of the vote statewide and 72 percent of the vote in Jefferson County, which includes Birmingham, but only 18 percent in Cullman County. http://politics.nytimes.com/election-guide/2008/results/states/AL.html

As of the 2000 Census, the racial makeup of the Cullman, Ala., was 96.43% White, 0.36% Black or African American, 0.24% Native American, 0.45% Asian, 0.04% Pacific Islander, 1.06% from other races, and 1.41% from two or more races. 4.85% of the population were Hispanic or Latino of any race.)

Here's a really interesting NYT article on how Cullman County elected a black man as its state rep this year. Cullman's sundown heritage is mentioned, but after reading Jim's book, I wonder whether state Rep. James Fields may be an example of the "file folder" phenomenon he mentions - of many whites in sundown towns allowing making isolated exceptions to their genera fear or unknowing of people of color.

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/02/21/us/politics/21race.html?_r=2&scp=1&sq=Cullman%20election&st=cse&oref=slogin&oref=slogin

[Martha McCoy]

Thank you for taking the time to be with us, Jim! Your new work sounds great and we look forward to continuing the conversation and finding ways to work with you.

[Jim Loewen]

Again, I have "high standards" -- to qualify as a sundown town, a community must be "all white," as defined above. Now, zoning was invented as a tool to remain all white, among other things. Many towns have used it for this purpose. Also they have used eminent domain, steering, etc., avoiding any explicit sundown language. So, yes, I do look at zoning, but I'm not trying to find communities that make it hard for blacks to live in them; I'm looking for towns that make it impossible.
Even rich towns like Kenilworth or Grosse Pointe (MI -- five different towns) prove to have been all white on purpose. That is, economic and social class considerations do not explain their whiteness. My book discusses this and cites the key evidence.

[Jim Loewen]

Thank you for having me. I too look forward to cooperating with you folks in any way that makes for social and racial change in the US.
Best wishes in your important work.