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c h a p t e r t e n Triage for Terror When a wave of race riots roiled the United states during the turbulent postwar years, the American red cross became involved in assisting the survivors. This so-called disaster relief tested the limits of the Arc mission and ideals. The organization’s leaders wondered out loud whether such a neutral organization, which had thus far confined its assistance to survivors of natural hazards and accidents, should really get involved in helping those affected by such a politically charged and deliberate event as the July 1917 east st. Louis, illinois, race riot, where a murderous white mob routed five thousand black residents from their burning neighborhoods and lynched those who couldn’t escape. Was this instead a matter that should be left to the governing bodies of local communities—who had allowed racial tensions to spin out of control—or even state governments? The Arc had not offered relief following race riots that occurred in new York city in 1900; springfield, ohio, in 1905; Atlanta, Georgia, and Greensburg, indiana, in 1906; or springfield, illinois, in 1908, but in the intervening years it had grown and developed an extensive chapter system. Thus the st. Louis chapter, which had been left to exercise its own discretion on domestic relief while national headquarters concentrated on the war effort, offered its assistance to the black riot victims who fled on foot across the bridges from east st. Louis to st. Louis. Leaders of the all-white chapter worked with black community organizations to offer these victims food, shelter, medical assistance, and short-term help getting resettled.1 in 1919 local chapters around the country faced similar situations. As the bumpy transition to a peacetime economy caused “political turmoil, economic disruption, and social disorder,” in the words of one historian, whites in many cities vented their frustrations against African Americans, who had arrived in large numbers during the war to fill factory jobs. race riots erupted in chicago and twenty-four other places. Again, a few local chapters decided without guidance from headquarters to offer short-term assistance to people who were displaced or harmed. in chicago, after the riot of August 1919, the chapter worked with local factory owners and black and white community organizations to aid both black and white victims of the riot. 180 Between the Wars Following these events and instances of chapter relief to families of striking workers , Arc leaders decided in november 1919 to issue an official policy memo on “the attitude which should govern the red cross in the event of race riots and conditions arising out of lockouts and strikes.” emphasizing the organization’s “obligation to maintain a position of impartiality” in such situations, the leaders stipulated that chapters could “best serve through meeting the needs in the form of First Aid, medical Assistance, nursing service, etc., to those injured in disturbances, regardless of the faction to which they belong.” The memo officially sanctioned this emergency assistance but vaguely implied that longer-term aid, along the lines that ernest Bicknell had developed for miners’ families, lay beyond the Arc’s mission. Although it left considerable room for discretion in individual situations, the memo directed chapters to closely consult their division officials and national headquarters before acting: “situations do not develop so rapidly but that there remains time for discussion in each case as to the obligation if any on [the] part of [the] red cross,” it stated. But subsequent events in Tulsa proved this statement wrong.2 in 1921, after rioting whites shot hundreds of Tulsans and burned down the city’s black district, the Arc mounted an intensive, seven-month “disaster relief” operation in collaboration with the local black community. This operation demonstrated the Arc’s unique capability to apply humanitarianism, now embedded in a set of accepted relief practices, and its ideal of neutrality, now embodied in the paid professional managers who supposedly carried out relief in an objective, systematized manner , as effective tools. The organization’s workers helped the imperiled community survive and recover despite a local climate of extreme racially motivated antagonism and apathy. Given that these events took place at the end of the three worst decades of racial oppression against African Americans since emancipation—often called the nadir of African American history—the Arc workers in Tulsa showed a remarkable and unusual degree of commitment to the needs and basic rights of African Americans .3 in considering this response...

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