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The Negro at Work in New York City: A Study in Economic Progress Chapter 1 IToC
The City[1] and the Negro-The Problem
The city of to-day, the growth of the past century, is a permanent development. Dr. Weber has effectively treated the history, nature, causes and effects of the concentration. He shows[2] that the percentage of urban population has varied in different countries; and that this is due mainly to the varying density of population and to the diverse physical features of the countries which have been differently affected by the Industrial Revolution and the era of railroads. The causes of this concentration have been the divorce of men from the soil, the growth of commercial centers, the growth of industrial centers, and such secondary and individual causes as legislation, educational and social advantages.
In the United States, city growth has been affected by all of the several causes that have operated in other countries, modified at times and in places by exceptional influences.[3]
In the discussions concerning the Negro and his movement cityward, it is often assumed that his migration is affected by causes of a different kind from those moving other populations; or that it is not similar in respect to the movement of the white population under similar conditions; or that the concentration can result only in dire disaster both to himself and to the community into which he moves. Such facts as are available suggest that these assumptions are ill-founded. The efforts that are being put forth to improve rural conditions and to advance agricultural arts among Negroes are highly commendable and effective. The thesis of this chapter is that, notwithstanding improvements resulting from these efforts for rural districts, wherever similar causes operate under similar conditions, the Negro, along with the white population, is coming to the city to stay; that the problems which grow out of his maladjustment to the new urban environment are solvable by methods similar to those that help other elements of the population.
In the first place, so far as we know now, the general movement of the Negroes, speaking for the South, does not seem to have been very different from that of the whites. Professor Wilcox says,[4]
It is sometimes alleged that the migration to cities, which has characterized nearly all countries and all classes of population during the last half century, has affected Southern whites more than Southern negroes, and that the latter race is thus being segregated in the rural districts. That such a movement may have gone on, or may now be in progress, in parts of the South can neither be affirmed nor denied on the basis of the present figures, but it may be said with some confidence that, as a general statement applied to the whole South, it is not correct. To be sure the negroes constitute 32.6 per cent of the population of the country districts in the entire South and only 30.9 per cent of the city population, but an examination of the figures (Census 1900) for the several divisions and states will show that what is in some degree true of the South as a whole is not true of most of its parts.
Therefore, it is of importance to note that the movement of white and Negro populations toward cities tends to be coincident. We may get some indication of these movements of white and Negro populations cityward by comparing the growth of their numbers in the principal Northern and Southern cities from 1860 to 1900.
The Negro population has shown a greater increase than the white in each southern city taken separately for the entire period, 1860 to 1900, but together the movement of the white and Negro populations was similar except between 1860 and 1870. That fourteen of the southern cities show an excessive proportional increase of Negro population between 1860 and 1870 is probably due (1) to the very small proportionate Negro population in each of these cities in 1860, the Negroes being almost entirely in the rural districts, and (2) to the exceptional influences following the Civil War which uprooted the rural Negro population that was proportionately larger than the white. The truth of this is corroborated by the per cent of increase by decades for these southern cities taken together. Comparisons with the white population in Northern cities were not made because of the influence of foreign immigration of whites. The per cent of increase of the populations in Southern cities from 1860 to 1870 were white 16.7 per cent, Negro 90.7 per cent; from 1870 to 1880, white 20.3 per cent, Negro 25.5 per cent; from 1880 to 1890, white 35.7 per cent, Negro 38.7 per cent; from 1890 to 1900, white 20.8 per cent, Negro 20.6 per cent; from 1900 to 1910, white 27.7 per cent, Negro 20.6 per cent. That is, when the proportion between the urban and rural populations of blacks and whites becomes normal, and exceptional influences no longer bear upon the Negro, the two populations show about the same rate of increase in their migrations to these Southern cities. The percent of increase of the Negro population for eight Northern cities (counting all the boroughs of New York City as now constituted as one) was as follows: 1860-1870, 51 per cent; 1870-1880, 36.4 per cent; 1880-1890, 32.3 per cent; 1890-1900, 59.2 per cent. The larger liberty of Northern cities was coupled with the economic call of better wages. And this probably may account for the fact that Southern cities show an increase of whites of 7.7 per cent more than of Negroes between 1900-1910. The migration to both Southern and Northern cities is graphically illustrated in the accompanying diagram.
Diagram I: Per Cent Increase of Whites and Negroes
The figures for Southern cities represented in the diagram are given in Table I.
Table I. Number and Per Cent. Increase of White and Negro Populations, Principal Southern Cities, 1860-1900.[A]
Population 14 cities. Increase 1860-1870. Population 15 cities. Increase 1870-1880.
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The Negro at Work in New York City: A Study in Economic Progress
George Edmund Haynes
Literature
Chapter 1 IToC
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Chapter 2 Per cent 1870. 1880. No. Per cent
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Chapter 3 Per cent 1900. No. Per cent
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Chapter 4 Per cent
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Chapter 5 1900. 1905[B]
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Chapter 6 1900. 1905.[D]
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Chapter 7 1890. 1900. Per cent increase.
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Chapter 8 1890. 1900. Per cent increase. 8
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Chapter 9 EARNERS
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Chapter 10 EARNERS 10
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Chapter 11 FAMILIES AND LODGERS
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Chapter 12 OCCUPATIONS IN 1890 AND 1900
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Chapter 13 1890. 1900. Per cent increase. 13
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Chapter 14 1890. 1900. Per cent increase. 14
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Chapter 15 WAGES IN OTHER OCCUPATIONS
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Chapter 16 THE BUSINESS PROMISE
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Chapter 17 A HISTORY OF THE NEGRO IN BUSINESS
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Chapter 18 THE NATURE OF THE ESTABLISHMENTS IN 1909
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Chapter 19 OWNERSHIP OF ESTABLISHMENTS
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Chapter 20 SIZE OF BUSINESS ENTERPRISES
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Chapter 21 THE AMOUNT OF MERCHANDISE ON HAND
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Chapter 22 GROSS RECEIPTS IN 1907 AND 1908
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Chapter 23 No.23
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Chapter 24 No.24
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Chapter 25 PERMANENCE OF LOCATION
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Chapter 26 BUSINESS METHODS
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Chapter 27 CREDIT RELATIONSHIPS
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Chapter 28 INDIVIDUALS AND PARTNERSHIPS
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Chapter 29 THE NEGRO CORPORATION
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