Black Politics in New Deal Atlanta (review)

Black Politics in New Deal Atlanta provides a major contribution to the understanding the role of the black elite in the transformation years of the New Deal. During this period Atlanta, as well as much of the nation, began the process of ending Jim Crow. By the close of the New Deal era, it was possible to see raised expectations for the role of blacks in American society.

Ferguson consulted African-American, southern, urban, and twentieth-century historical research; she also made use of scholarship from African-American studies. Some of her sources have never been used before in scholarly work. Her emphasis on explaining the role of the black elite led her to base most of her research in Atlanta. The book follows a generally chronological pattern beginning with the background of Jim Crow there. The excellent introduction sets forth the major ideas of the work.

Chapter 1 considers the Jim Crow era prior to the New Deal when Atlanta's black elite pursued an "uplift ideology." The black-reform elite worked for the betterment of Atlanta's black population by stressing the building of a respectable black society, centered on Atlanta's black colleges. This approach followed Du Bois' "wheel within a wheel," describing a black society that would imitate and exist in a world controlled by white society.¹ The relationship between the black elite and the black poor becomes a major focus throughout the book. In Chapter 2, the reader is presented with a sympathetic account of communist and socialist activity in Atlanta during the early Depression years. Although this activity received some support from working-class blacks in Atlanta, the black elite found little in the radical approach that they could support.

The third through sixth chapters discuss the New Deal and Black Atlanta. Various Atlanta groups saw the New Deal in different terms. Georgia's white politicians tried to thwart its impact and soon lost control over its programs. White New Dealers introduced liberal social-work ideas, but almost always intended programs and reforms to follow the racial customs of segregation. The black elite saw the New Deal as an opportunity to use their considerable influence upon New Deal operations in the city to "uplift" Atlanta blacks. This activity resulted in greater opportunities for better-educated and skilled blacks but far fewer for unskilled, poor blacks.

Chapters seven and eight provide a noteworthy survey of New Deal public housing and slum clearance in Atlanta, a process controlled by white and black elites with little to offer poor black residents. Chapter eight explains the impact of World War II upon the black community, including economic opportunities and the development of a new, post-Jim Crow, black citizenship.

Although a major contribution to historical scholarship on Atlanta, Black Politics in New Deal Atlanta suggests the importance of additional research into the impact of the New Deal upon the lives of ordinary Atlantans, blacks and whites, and its role in urban planning.