crime: judges of the juvenile, municipal, circuit, superior and criminal
courts; the general superintendent of police and police captains, former
high police officials; heads of correctional and penal institutions;
the state's attorney; experts on probation and parole, representatives
from the sheriff's office; and social workers having intimate knowledge
of crime conditions.
The views of those authorities are an important aid in giving proper
interpretation to the factors which cause crime among Negroes, and to the
circumstances connected with crime prejudicial to Negroes as compared
with whites. For example, the testimony is practically unanimous that
Negroes are much more liable to arrest than whites, since police officers
share in the general public opinion that Negroes "are more criminal than
whites," and also feel that there is little risk of trouble in arresting
Negroes, while greater care must be exercised in arresting whites.
The Negro crime rate is exaggerated quite as much by the fewer arrests of
whites than Negroes, in comparison with the number of crimes committed,
as by the ease with which many Negroes may be arrested for one crime. We
have already noted the remarkable discrepancy between the police reports
of crimes committed and the actual crimes listed by the Crime Commission.
Fewer Negroes than whites escape arrest and prosecution. When comparisons
are made on the basis of statistics for arrests and convictions, there
is presented, unless proper explanations of the statistics are made, an
exaggerated picture of Negro crime.
The views of many of these authorities on various branches of this
inquiry are here given:
1. FEWER PROFESSIONAL AND BANDED CRIMINALS AMONG NEGROES
Judge Edmund Jarecki, municipal court:
I know of no built-up organization of Negroes that would have
any particular control over criminals.
Judge Daniel P. Trude, municipal court:
I think Negro criminals are more isolated. My experience in
the boys' court was with the colored boys who would go out
and steal clothes, a new shirt or some socks, or something
of that sort that they could pick off the back porch. I found
that there was considerable of that, but they are very partial
and take from their own people.
Judge Charles M. Thomson, criminal court:
Negro crime is not organized, but individual, I should say,
almost without exception.
Judge Kickham Scanlan, criminal court:
In May, 1920, I was assigned to the North Side to try some
unbailable murder cases. It was found that there were over
500 homicide cases ... these were nearly all cases in which
gangs of young white men confederated together to go out and
hold up places, and they made a business of it, and some of
these gangs have committed any number of hold-ups, and one
member of the gang explained that he had killed as many as
twenty victims. The evidence showed that they killed when they
didn't have to kill, just recklessly and wantonly. In none of
the cases of the character I have talked about were there any
colored defendants. They were all white men ... there were
some of the most vicious cases I know anything about in my
thirty-four years of experience.
I just want to make that one point to this Commission, that
never in the history of this community has the white race
stood so low from the standpoint of crime as it does at the
present time. White young men are banding together in gangs
and deliberately going out and holding people up, right and
left, and shooting them down. I notice that there are a few
colored imitators of the white men, but the bad man of the
city of Chicago at the present time is the young white man.
General Leroy T. Steward, former chief of police:
I think generally speaking that the Negro criminals work as
individuals. I only recall one instance where there was a gang
of colored men that came to my attention, but I know of many
white gangs.
Dr. Herman Adler, state criminologist:
You asked a question in regard to gangs--whether there is a
combination among Negroes. There are not many. They are more
individual, but on the other hand the lower grade of Negroes
are likely to be the tools of the others at times; they have
been used that way. Where you are dealing with murder, with
sex crimes, with certain forms of burglary, larceny, you are
usually dealing with individual criminals....
Now there is here, in Chicago, professional organized crime.
The colored people as a whole are less engaged in professional
crime and they are more the accidental, casual criminal or the
low-grade person with a strong temper and a strong physique
etc., who slips into crime by following the line of least
resistance.
Major L. M. C. Funkhouser:
Negro criminals are not organized.
Professor Charles E. Merriam:
My belief is that the Negro criminals are not so well organized
as the white. They don't go much in bands; furthermore, they
are not so much in the class of professional criminals as they
are in the class of occasional criminals. It seems to me that
the colored offender is the individual offender; his crimes
are more of haste or passion. He is in the occasional offender
class.
[Illustration: ENVIRONMENT OF THE SOUTH SIDE NEGRO
NO. 3
RESORTS
SUMMER OF 1919]
2. SEX CRIME AMONG NEGROES AS COMPARED WITH WHITES
Judge Edmund Jarecki:
So far as sex crimes are concerned, during the time I have
been there [in the boys' court] I have not noticed anything
that would indicate any difference between colored and white
boys.
Judge Charles M. Thomson:
In my work with the criminal court, I was astonished at
the large number of criminals involving the sexual abuse of
children, but I remember no case in which a colored defendant
was charged with that crime. Almost all races were represented,
but I don't remember one colored man charged with the abuse
of a child. There were many, however, accused of adultery.
Judge Hugo Pam, criminal court:
I have had more serious rape cases against white than against
colored people. The most serious case I had was about ten days
ago, and I sentenced the man to life imprisonment. I never
had such a case involving a Negro.
Judge Kickham Scanlan, criminal court:
I do not think Negroes are more liable to sex crimes than
whites. I tried a colored man six or eight years ago for rape.
He founded an alleged orphan asylum. The evidence showed that
he had held a number of young children in that place. He got
life in the penitentiary. He was the only colored man ever tried
before me with any offense of that character. The children in
that case were colored children. But I have tried a number of
white men for rape, and while I have had ten or a dozen cases
of crimes against children, in my twelve years' experience on
the bench, I have never had a case of a colored man charged
with crime against children.
3. OFFENSES AGAINST MORALS
Judge Arnold Heap:
The number of colored cases in the morals court is largely
disproportionate to the number of Negroes in the total Chicago
population. There are more colored cases now in the morals
court than formerly because in the past the houses kept by
white people with colored inmates were alone held responsible.
Since colored people are now doing business on their own
responsibility, they are at present brought in the same as
white people. At first the Negro newcomers were strangers to
our surroundings and were not such frequent offenders, but as
that strangeness wore off they became familiar with vice as
it exists among us today. The offenses of these new comers are
about the same as those of the northern Negroes. Some persons
think that the immorality of the colored is more gross than
that of the whites, but I have my doubts about it. One factor
in the problem is that colored people of the poorer class crowd
together in smaller quarters than whites, and this tends to
a lesser type of morality because they are so crowded.
Judge Wells M. Cook, municipal court:
Prostitution among the white people in Chicago in 1918 was more
or less clandestine, in flats and cheap hotels and in private
homes, and more or less under cover. The colored people, living
largely in one section of the city, and being naturally of a
social, emotional temperament, are apt to congregate in places
and in resorts where the police could more easily raid them,
and are much more easily apprehended. That is about the only
reason I can see for the disproportionate number of colored
defendants brought into the morals court. It is not that there
is any greater percentage of immorality, but prostitution
among whites was more clandestine.
O. J. Milliken, superintendent, Chicago and Cook County School for
Delinquent Boys:
I don't think that homosexual relations are a racial matter
with the boys. The sex problem, I think, doesn't manifest
itself between races as much as it does in the lower classes
of whites that come in.
4. LYING AND STEALING
Judge Daniel P. Trude:
"I think the colored man, if he is not a desirable citizen, is
undesirable because he has not been given a chance; he has not
been given the advantages that a white fellow has from birth."
Judge Trude agreed with the view expressed in a question that
if the Negro were found careless as to the truth and as to
his promises, it was due to his heredity and lack of training
rather than anything inherently bad in him.
Judge Wells M. Cook:
I think there is a great deal of nonsense in the talk about
the colored man being more apt to lie or steal than the white
man. I think that is largely a question of environment and
training. He is not more inclined, in my judgment, to tell a
lie or steal than a white man.
Judge Charles M. Thomson:
I would say there is a far larger number of larceny cases
involving the white than the colored man, even in proportion
to the population. The larger proportion of cases involving
the colored is in having to do with fights, involving murder
in some instances.
Judge Edmund Jarecki:
No, I don't think Negroes are more likely to be guilty of
theft than whites; that is not usually the case.
5. TYPES OF NEGRO CRIMES
Judge Hugo Pam:
The colored man is frequently charged with robbery with a gun,
and a great many have guns. Relatively speaking, more colored
men have guns than white men.
Judge Kickham Scanlan:
The most prevalent crimes or types of crimes amongst Negroes,
according to my observation, are gambling, assault cases,
caused by drinking or women, petty theft.
F. Emory Lyon, superintendent, Central Howard Association:
My experience in dealing with colored offenders would indicate
a slightly larger proportion of crimes of violence than in
the case of white men.
Dr. Clara Hayes, Geneva School for Delinquent Girls:
I think there is a little more tendency on the part of colored
inmates toward violence than there is among white girls. I
mean such misconduct as attacks on other girls, etc.
6. MENTAL
Judge Daniel P. Trude:
I today received a letter from a young colored man who has
been in the boys' court several times. His father is a mental
defective, and he is a mental defective. That is the reason
he keeps committing these crimes. He is in the Dixon Home for
Feeble Minded. There are a number of colored boys that come up
from the South that way, and it is my judgment that southern
institutions are turning them loose. I think Illinois does as
well as other states. They all discharge mental defectives as
cured, and they wander all over the face of the earth, in and
out of other institutions.
Judge Charles M. Thomson:
As a rule the mentality of colored offenders was not high.
I had a few cases where the reverse was true, and one which
involved a man who was as smart a man as I ever tried.
Mary Bartelme, associate judge of the juvenile court:
As to mentality, I would say that in recent years we have had
a large number of girls who have come up to Chicago from the
South and their educations have not been equal to the educations
of the white girls and their mental development has not been
the same.
Dr. Herman Adler:
At Pontiac we find in general that the average of intelligence
in the colored people is rather less than in the whites. Take
the white people separately and you will find about the same
proportion of low grades as in the colored race. In actual
group comparison, the colored race is somewhat below that of
the whites. That is, in general the distribution is about the
same, but there is always a slight lag of the colored below
the white. The lower the intelligence, on the whole, the more
likely it is that the individual is in the institution for a
crime of violence or a sex crime or incendiarism; the higher
the intelligence, the more likely that the crime is forgery
or some crime involving fraud.
7. CHANGE IN CHARACTER OF CRIME OR INCREASE IN CRIME DUE TO MIGRATION
Judge Hugh Stewart:
I am of the impression that the colored men from the South
are in the courts in larger numbers than are those who have
lived here a long time.... A great many of the colored people
from the South are very dark skinned, and there is a larger
proportion, in my estimation, of offenses among dark-skinned
colored people than among those of the light color. I sometimes
try to trace out where they come from. I find a great many of
these cases come from the South.
I think there is a difference between offenses committed by
colored persons from the South and colored persons who have
resided for a long time in the North. I think there are more
hold-ups and burglaries committed by men who come from the
South than by the colored population before the influx.
I am of the opinion that Negroes who have recently come from
the South and find their way into the police courts do not
typify or reflect the general character of the southern Negroes
as a class, any more than the white people who find their way
into the police courts typify other whites who manage to keep
out of them.
Judge Daniel P. Trude:
It was frequently true that the boys would jump freights from
down South and come up here and be picked up and brought into
court and be left in jail for a while with nobody to keep
after them, or furnish bail. The South has never given the
Negro adequate educational advantages, so they come up here
more or less uneducated, many of them, and they are not given
a helping hand as they should be.
In the boys' court the number of southern boys recently arrived
in Chicago was startling. While I was in the boys' court, I
made it a practice to give every one of them a card to the
Urban League, so that they would know where to go to get advice
on any difficulty.
Judge Wells M. Cook:
I would say that of the colored men and women brought into court
in the summer of 1918, the greater percentage were colored
people who had recently come to Chicago. In most instances
the colored man brought in had money; he was receiving more
wages than in the South; the city was "wet"; he had come
from districts in the South where he could not get whiskey;
in a great many instances he had not brought his wife and
family with him, so he was easy prey for those engaged in
commercial sexual vice. In consequence he would be arrested
in these raids, made usually by the police on the night
when the underworld was supposed to be the busiest, usually
Saturday and Sunday nights. I do not think there are any more
vicious colored men than there are vicious white men, but the
colored man who was brought in largely was a newcomer. There
had been no particular increase in vice that I observed among
the native-born colored people or the man who had come to
Chicago a reasonable number of years back. As to the women,
they were almost entirely typical southern prostitutes, who
had come here from New Orleans, Memphis, Nashville, Atlanta,
Galveston, and other large cities in the South, attracted to
Chicago by reason of the fact there were a lot of colored men
up here who were making good money. I would say that so far
as the colored women of Chicago were concerned, there was no
noticeable increase in immorality among them.
Mr. O. J. Milliken:
In 1919, we ran up to 15 per cent colored. This year, 1920, it
is less than 7 per cent. The reason is found in the boys from
the South. They have stopped coming now and we are getting back
to normal. The boys from the South have been very illiterate.
We have received a number who could not write their own names
and would almost be counted subnormal on first examination
but are often found to be very bright. A great many asked to
come back or asked to remain in the institution until they
could get some education. I never noticed any difference as
to color in the handling of the boys in any department.
8. LIABILITY OF THE NEGRO TO ARREST
Judge Daniel P. Trude:
I think that at the time of the riot there was more disposition
on the part of the officers to make arrests of colored
offenders, frequently for protection. I think it was due to
what Dr. Shepardson used to call, out at the University, "the
mind of the mob"--a disturbed view of things which makes one
likely to go too far one way or the other. These people were
that way. They had to arrest a certain number and try to check
the riot, and they went too far in many cases.
Judge Charles M. Thomson:
I have seen cases where Negroes were arrested on suspicion; I
would not say there was any large proportion. I remember one
case was a young colored fellow arrested purely on suspicion.
The jury disagreed the first time. The next time he was tried
before me, and the jury found him guilty. Because it was a
second trial, and because of the disagreement, I watched it
very carefully as the evidence went in, and I became convinced
that it was a pure case of the officers having had some trouble
with this fellow before. A crime occurred in their district,
and they pounced on this chap. I felt pretty sure he was not
guilty. The state's attorney called the trial off. He became
convinced himself.
Mr. O. J. Milliken:
After a boy has been committed by the juvenile court, he is
known to the police, and I have four or five colored boys today
who are carrying letters from me asking that the police will
please allow these boys to go to work. Prejudice on the part
of the police in picking up alleged offenders is more apt to
occur against Negroes than whites.
Judge Kickham Scanlan:
Negroes are more likely to be arrested on suspicion than white
persons. If you will tell me why race prejudice exists in
this world, I will tell you why this is so. I don't think the
police are quite as careful with reference to the rights of
the colored man as with the white man. I think they hesitate
a little longer when a white man is involved; I am certain
that it is so.
State's Attorney Maclay Hoyne:
In the race riots, the police arrested almost exclusively
Negroes, and practically no white men.
General Leroy T. Steward:
Recently there have come to Chicago from the South large
numbers of colored men who have formerly lived in the country
and are not accustomed to city environments. These men have
largely been employed at the Stock Yards and, being unknown
to the police, there is concerning them naturally a greater
suspicion than would attach to the white man who had lived
for a greater length of time in the same district, and who
also would be more easily identified and traced, if need be,
and he would not, therefore, perhaps, be arrested but simply
be observed, while the police would, no doubt, feel if they
permitted the colored man to pass on at the time, they would
lose him completely. This would seem to me to be the real basis
of the feeling that has maintained on the part of these men,
that they are discriminated against as compared with the whites.
Another matter in this same connection that no doubt has a
bearing on the subject is that these same men who have been
accustomed to rather close surveillance in the South, seem
to feel that when they come to the North they must conduct
themselves in a manner to evidence to all concerned that they
have equal rights of every kind and character, with the result
that they sometimes are guilty of unnecessarily accentuating
these matters, and thus bringing on disputes which occasion bad
feeling and perhaps lead to disturbances resulting in arrest.
Dr. Herman C. Adler:
Repeatedly colored men have been convicted on evidence which
I know perfectly well would not have been satisfactory in
white cases. I know that was so in the case of the East St.
Louis riot where a colored man was sent down to the Southern
Illinois Penitentiary for participating in the riots on the
charge of murder. Even the prosecuting office, on reviewing the
facts, a year later, admitted he did not believe the evidence
sufficient. If that had been a white man the chances are that
he would not have been convicted upon that evidence.
We had the same thing here in Chicago: a colored man sent
to the penitentiary on a charge of attempted rape where the
identification was made by a child of six or eight years who
picked him out of a crowd under suspicion. No such evidence
ought to be accepted. We know there is prejudice, and when there
is prejudice we know the person against whom the prejudice is
directed has a hard time.
9. DISCRIMINATION IN THE COURTS
Judge Daniel P. Trude:
I think in the main the Negro gets as good a show as the white
man when he gets before the judge. Whether the other forces
before he gets up to that point treat him right or not, I
cannot say.... A certain number of policemen have "got it in"
for him and are going to "take a crack" at him because he is
a colored man.
Judge Hugo Pam:
In a murder case lawyers will challenge a Negro; if there were
a colored man in the box he would soon be put out.
Judge Charles M. Thomson:
Take for example a gun case, with twelve men in the box, and
one a colored man, and suppose that the lawyer challenged
the Negro. If you went to the lawyer and said, "Give me your
reason," I don't think he would give you any reason.... If you
had a case where the defendant was colored that juror would
stay in the box so far as the defendant was concerned.
Judge Kickham Scanlan:
Of course there is another thing about the colored man in the
criminal court that must be kept in mind. It is a peculiar
thing about human nature, that no man wants to admit that he
has prejudices. He will talk loosely on the outside that he
doesn't like the Negro, or doesn't like the Jew, or doesn't
like this person or that person, but you get him under oath in
the jury box and in my twelve years on the bench I never knew
a juror to admit that he was prejudiced against anybody. It
goes without saying that in such a state of affairs you will
probably get men on the juries that try colored men who have
some prejudice against Negroes. I would say that when there
is a colored defendant and white prosecuting witness there
would be grave danger that the jury might unconsciously favor
the white side of the case. Juries will convict a colored man
with less hesitation than they will convict a white man on the
same kind of evidence. For that reason, in the many cases in
which the colored man is involved, I watch the evidence like
a hawk. The verdict has got to pass me.
10. EASE WITH WHICH NEGROES ARE CONVICTED
Judge George Kersten, criminal court:
There is unfortunately a difference in the ease or difficulty
with which white and colored persons brought into court are
convicted, and the misfortune operates adversely towards
colored people. In many cases jurors have been excused from
service because upon examination under oath to test their
qualifications to act as jurors they said they could not give
a colored person a fair trial. In my experience I have known
verdicts to be set aside by the presiding judge, because he
was convinced that the jury was influenced by color prejudice.
As to the prosecution of colored offenders by white plaintiffs
and white offenders by colored plaintiffs, I believe that the
influence of color prejudice is sometimes felt in our courts.
I think it is easier under similar facts and circumstances in
evidence to convict a colored defendant than a white one. And
for the same reason, a white person on trial is less liable
to conviction if the prosecuting witnesses are all colored.
Perhaps an enlightening phase of the whole situation is to be
found in the fact that colored offenders, on being brought in
for trial, usually ask to be tried by the judge instead of a
jury.
Judge Hugo Pam:
In light cases involving pocket-picking, larceny, stealing a
bag of sugar, a barrel of flour, clothing, etc., I think the
races stand on an equality, but in a serious offense I think
the colored man has the less chance. I feel that the colored
man starts with a handicap. I haven't any question about it
in my mind. In the more serious crimes, where a hold-up is
committed or guns are used, I think there is great prejudice.
I think very few white or colored men are convicted that
shouldn't be; no judge would allow such a case to stand if he
thinks there has been unfair trial, but, for instance, where a
white man will be found guilty of manslaughter, a colored man
will be found guilty of murder. A white man might escape with
three to twenty years in the penitentiary, while the colored
man would get ten years to life.
I think the colored man would not be convicted if he is not
guilty, but I am not certain that the white man would be
convicted if he is guilty.
I see colored men, very resigned men, very often feeling that
most people are not interested in them. They come and take their
medicine, and go away. I feel that they are being disposed of
without the interest being shown that should be.
11. LEGAL REPRESENTATION FOR NEGRO DEFENDANTS
Judge Daniel P. Trude:
My experience in court work is that Negro lawyers in the main
lack education such as is necessary, but there are among the
members of the bar some very good colored attorneys. Many
Negroes cannot afford to pay the attorney's fees necessary to
obtain these, so that they are handicapped in court by lack of
competent counsel, and it becomes necessary for the judge to
give them more careful hearings and more careful consideration
to protect their interests.
Judge Wells M. Cook:
The handicap that the colored man seems to be under in the
severe cases is that he frequently does not get a good lawyer.
As a rule he is not represented by as good a lawyer as the
white. Of course there are capable Negro lawyers in Chicago,
but there were few such retained in the cases tried before me.
Judge Hugo Pam:
I do not think that Negroes have as able lawyers as whites.
I had a case of a colored man who I felt was misrepresented
instead of represented. He was convicted of murder and sentenced
to life imprisonment. I felt that the sentence was too severe.
I set it aside and granted a new trial and it resulted in a
verdict of manslaughter which was the thing that should have
been done.
Judge Kickham Scanlan:
The Negro hasn't the money to employ proper attorneys,
competent attorneys. In two out of three cases tried before
me in which there were colored defendants, I have appointed
attorneys to defend them. I appointed white attorneys. I asked
the defendants whom they wanted. They told me and I appointed
the white lawyers mentioned and made them serve.
12. IDENTIFICATION
Judge Daniel P. Trude:
I did find where certain of the police were going into Negro
clubs and arresting Negroes they found there, bringing them into
court without a bit of evidence of any offense. Somebody would
tip off the police that there was gambling going on so they
would raid the place, locking up all the men they found there
for the night and send them to the Bureau of Identification,
but that was all. Some policemen take many people to the Bureau
of Identification who absolutely should not be taken there,
but the judge only knows about it after they have been taken
there, when they are brought into court after the damage has
been done.
13. PROBATION ON PAROLE
Dr. F. Emory Lyon, superintendent, Central Howard Association:
In dealing with colored men on parole, our experience has
been that fully as large a proportion have completed their
parole with credit as in the case of white men under parole.
I should say that the task of securing employment has been
less difficult because colored men as a rule have been less
critical as to the kind of employment they would accept. They
have been willing to make an honest living at any work that
is offered.
John L. Whitman, superintendent of state prisons:
I have seen many colored men, young men or boys, who gave every
evidence of a sincere desire to do well on the outside. They
meet with disappointment that they did not expect, hardships,
difficulty in securing work as well as homes, and they fall.
The desire was there just the same. The opportunities were
not. But when the employer gives him a chance, the Negro
appreciates it and he sticks--and we have had employers say
during the last year many times, "If you have got such colored
men as you have sent before, give them to us in preference
to the whites, because there is a lack of appreciation on the
part of white men."
14. ENVIRONMENT: VICE IN NEGRO RESIDENCE AREAS
General Leroy T. Steward:
Where Negroes have come in and as a result white people
have moved out and the neighborhood has, plainly speaking,
deteriorated, there is a great tendency to permit infractions of
the law, as in any neighborhoods which are regarded as not as
important as high-class residence neighborhoods. For instance,
Calumet Avenue from Thirty-first to Thirty-ninth streets is
entirely colored. Fifteen years ago it was entirely white. Now
it would be much easier to establish vice there than it would
have been fifteen years ago when a lot of well-known people
lived in the neighborhood.
Major L. M. C. Funkhouser:
Most of the Negroes found in disorderly houses are employees.
There was one notorious place down there that we closed where
they were all colored. That was the most notorious one we had.
Professor Charles E. Merriam:
I think there is this to be said about the colored side of
it there [on the South Side]: I am asked whether the colored
protest against disorderly resorts would be as effective as a
protest made by an equal number of white men. Making allowance
for the fluctuating conditions in a long period, I don't believe
it would be quite as effective. Not only that, but I don't
think the colored people are so well organized to fight these
evils as a class of men ... they have not the wealth. In the
territory upon the North Side or in any territory where there
are many lawyers and people of some means, if they found a
place like that they would never rest until they got it out.
They would just keep at it with time and money until they
forced it out.
Dr. F. Emory Lyon, superintendent, Central Howard Association:
Our observation would indicate that the Negro delinquent has
suffered under the handicap of unsatisfactory home conditions.
Owing to the general public discrimination, fewer opportunities
have been offered him. In addition to adverse conditions in
the home, some opportunities in public places have been denied
him. Some of the discrimination and ostracism on the part of
his associates has been unconscious in many instances. The
colored boy has especially few recreational facilities.
Mr. O. J. Milliken:
It is up to us to give them the best that there is, and we
can clean up those districts. I don't believe the question
of color is going to enter into the matter at all if we once
clean up the districts where they are obliged to live.
Myron Adams, former pastor of the First Baptist Church:
North of my church for a block or two along Thirty-first
Street at the time I went there was almost exclusively a
white residence district. The moral conditions could not have
been worse. I had a list in my church study of the houses of
prostitution and other lawless agencies gathered by the police
and the Committee of Fifteen. I don't know of a district in
Chicago where there were more gunmen, more high-class criminals,
more high-class prostitutes than there were within three blocks
of the First Baptist Church when I came there as pastor.
Speaking from my observation I think that any colored community
is liable to be imposed upon by white men who are vicious, and
the colored people get no encouragement when they themselves
endeavor to rout out that vice. White prostitutes and white
gamblers and vicious resorts come into the "Black Belt" because
it is black; they operate with more safety than they do in the
white belt. That is true of every American city that I know
of personally.
15. ECONOMIC AND INDUSTRIAL ASPECTS OF NEGRO CRIME
Judge Charles M. Thomson:
Colored people who were up before me in the criminal court
were mostly men who did not have steady employment.... My
experience was that the environmental conditions out of which
the colored defendant arose were an environment of idleness,
very largely. I would say, as to the economic factors, that I
don't remember a case that I had involving a colored defendant
whom I would call prosperous, whereas there were many white
defendants who were very prosperous. Most of the colored people
tried were in stringent circumstances and poverty.
Judge Kickham Scanlan:
My experience in the criminal court is that the colored
defendant, even in bailable cases, is unable to give bail. He
has to stay in jail, and therefore his case is very quickly
disposed of by the prosecutor. Defendants locked up are
usually tried first. The colored man is more apt to be out of
work than the white man, and that is a possible reason for
the large number of arrests of Negroes. His sphere is very
limited, and if there is any let up in the industry that is
involved in that sphere, he is a victim. I have often wondered
if you could change the skins of a thousand white men in the
city of Chicago and handicap them the way the colored man is
handicapped today, how many of those white men in ten years'
time would be law-abiding citizens.
Professor Charles E. Merriam:
This problem as I see it is very complicated. We have to deal
first with the matter of economic class which is at the bottom
of a good deal of it, then with the matter of race, which is
at the bottom of a good deal more of it, although perhaps not
as much as class; then there is the matter of politics or a
system which has grown up for thirty or forty years back, which
makes the class and race relations a good deal more difficult
to deal with.
If every man had good housing conditions and a steady job, at
a living wage, a good opportunity for education, there would
not be very much crime.... Particularly in the case of the
colored people, the crime is on the part of the community,
on the part of the city that allows bad conditions to exist.
Negroes ought to be protected. They don't get protection for the
same reason that it is always hard to protect the economically
weak against the strong. There is not any use of making a lot
of fine phrases about it--that is largely where the trouble
lies.
CHAPTER VIII
THE NEGRO IN INDUSTRY
A. EMPLOYMENT OPPORTUNITIES AND CONDITIONS
I. INTRODUCTION
1. NEGRO WORKING POPULATION IN 1920
Between 1910 and 1920 the Negro population of Chicago increased from
44,103 to 109,594. Of this number it is estimated that about 70,000 were
engaged in industries in 1920 as compared with about 27,000 in 1910.[49]
Questions which naturally suggest themselves for answer in connection
with this great increase in the Negro working population in Chicago are:
How did this large number of Negroes fit into the industrial life of the
city? What were and are the opportunities open to them? Have they given
satisfaction to employers? Are they discriminated against by employers
or fellow-workers? Has racial friction developed because of competition
between white and Negro workers? Were the riots of 1919 in any sense the
result of labor troubles? What part have the Negroes taken in strikes?
What is the relation of the Negro to organized labor? What is the outlook
for the Negro in industry? These and other questions guided the inquiries
and investigations of the Commission in the industrial field.
2. OPPORTUNITIES CREATED BY THE WAR
The Negro's position in the industrial life of Chicago is so intimately
connected with the changes due to the war that a brief reference to
certain facts of common knowledge in connection with the war will be
helpful. With the beginning of the war in 1914 came an abnormally large
demand by the belligerent countries for American munitions, food products,
clothing, leather, iron and steel products, and other manufactured
goods. Existing establishments were enlarged and new ones were erected
in response to the demand for increased production. It was not uncommon
for a plant to double or treble its labor force. A typical case was one
of the large packing-plants in the Chicago "Yards" which increased its
workers during the war from 8,000 to 17,000.
The war stimulated the demand for goods, and therefore for labor, and at
the same time decreased the available labor supply. Immigration from the
belligerent nations immediately ceased, and there was a marked decrease
in immigration from other countries; aliens in large numbers departed
to join the fighting forces of their native lands.
The labor shortage became acute soon after the United States entered the
war in 1917, and enlistments withdrew hundreds of thousands of men from
northern industries. An unprecedented demand for Negro workers was the
result. The migration from the South was mainly a response to the call
of larger opportunity and higher wages in the North.
3. INDUSTRIAL BACKGROUND OF NEGRO WORKERS
For the United States as a whole in 1910 the industrial condition of
the gainfully occupied Negro population is shown in Table XVIII:
TABLE XVIII
GAINFULLY OCCUPIED NEGRO POPULATION TEN YEARS OF AGE AND OVER
IN THE UNITED STATES IN 1910
====================================================================
Industry |Both Sexes|Percentage| Male | Female
------------------------+----------+----------+----------+----------
Agriculture | 2,893,674| 55.7 | 1,842,537| 1,051,137
Domestic and personal | | | |
service | 1,074,543| 20.7 | 234,063| 840,480
Manufacturing and hand | | | |
trades | 657,130| 12.6 | 575,845| 81,285
Transportation | 276,648| 5.3 | 274,565| 2,083
Trade | 132,019| 2.5 | 123,635| 8,384
Professional service | 69,471| 1.3 | 39,400| 30,071
Public service | 26,295| 0.5 | 25,838| 457
Others | 62,755| 1.4 | 62,671| 84
+----------+----------+----------+----------
Total United States[50]| 5,192,535| 100.0 | 3,178,554| 2,013,981
------------------------+----------+----------+----------+----------
In 1910, more than three-fourths of the gainfully occupied Negroes in
the United States were engaged in two forms of industry--agriculture
and domestic and personal service. In the South at that time 78.8 per
cent of the Negro population lived in rural communities[51] and 62 per
cent of those employed were engaged in agriculture.[52] It is evident,
therefore, that the northward migration involved a sudden transition of
the southern Negro from farms or small towns to the highly specialized
industries of northern cities, with marked changes in modes of living.
On many southern plantations the Negroes were required to buy food and
clothing on credit at such high prices that their shares of the return
were usually spent before the crops were harvested.[53] This system
encouraged careless spending and did nothing to induce habits of thrift.
Even the hardest-working Negroes frequently found themselves in debt to
their landlords at the end of the year.[54] Incentive to sustained effort
and regular work was lacking in the hand-to-mouth existence under this
prevailing system of share rent and credit. It naturally produced habits
such as drawing against wages and working irregularly under the spur of
temporary need. Men handicapped by such habits joined the migration in
great numbers. Though ill-fitted for the keen competition, business-like
precision, and six-day-week routine of northern industry, the southern
Negro, in spite of these handicaps, has succeeded in Chicago.
II. THE NEGRO IN CHICAGO INDUSTRIES IN 1910 AND 1920
Of the Negro population of 44,103 in Chicago in 1910 the gainfully
occupied numbered 27,317. The distribution of this number, according
to industrial classification, is given in Table XIX, which shows that
60 per cent of all such Negroes were engaged in domestic and personal
service, as compared with 15 per cent in manufacturing and 3 per cent
in clerical occupations.
TABLE XIX
NEGROES GAINFULLY OCCUPIED IN CHICAGO IN 1910[55]
=======================================================================
| Both | | |
Industries | Sexes | Percentage | Male | Female
------------------------------+---------+------------+--------+--------
Manufacturing and mechanical | 4,071 | 15 | 3,073 | 998
Transportation | 1,852 | 7 | 1,849 | 3
Trade | 1,241 | 5 | 1,148 | 93
Public service | 224} | | {224 | 0
Professional | 963} | 4 | {640 | 323
Clerical occupations | 934 | 3 | 771 | 163
Domestic and personal service | 16,389 | 60 | 9,426 | 6,963
Agriculture, mining, and | | | |
unclassified | 1,643 | 6 | 1,306 | 337
+---------+------------+--------+--------
Totals | 27,317 | 100 | 18,437 | 8,880
------------------------------+---------+------------+--------+--------
1. METHOD AND SCOPE OF INVESTIGATION
To discover the industries in Chicago which were employing Negroes in
appreciable numbers in 1920, preliminary questionnaires were sent to 850
employers compiled from lists furnished by: (1) the Chicago Association
of Commerce (covering 591 establishments, with a total of 350,000
employees); (2) the Employment Department of the Chicago Urban League;
(3) the Illinois Free Employment Bureau; (4) the Federal Employment
Bureau; and (5) the classified telephone directory.
Questionnaires were returned by 460 establishments of 850 to which they
were mailed. We are satisfied that the replies received cover the field
of Negro labor, and that no establishments of importance in this field
have been overlooked. Table XX shows the results:
TABLE XX
====================================================================
| Number of |Total Negroes
Negroes Employed |Establishments| Employed
---------------------------------------+--------------+-------------
No Negroes | 264 | 0
Less than five Negroes | 59 | 111
Five Negroes or more (manufacturing) | 69 | 12,854
Five Negroes or more | |
(non-manufacturing) | 68 | 9,483
+--------------+-------------
Totals | 460 | 22,448
---------------------------------------+--------------+-------------
Answers came from 156 manufacturing establishments employing fifty-one
or more wage-earners. The representative character of this group is
indicated by the fact that over three-fourths of the total wage-earners
in Chicago engaged in manufacturing in 1914 were employed in factories of
this class. The United States Census of Manufactures for 1914 reported
the total number of wage-earners employed in manufacturing in Chicago
in that year as 313,710; of this number, 244,827, or 78 per cent, were
employed in 1,032 establishments employing fifty-one or more wage-earners.
The 156 questionnaires therefore represented 15 per cent of the 1,032
establishments in this class (in 1914) and included 107,403 wage-earners,
or almost 44 per cent of the total wage-earners in this class and 30
per cent of the total wage-earners engaged in manufacturing in 1914.
Questionnaires reporting Negro employees were returned by 104
manufacturing establishments of all classes. Of these, sixteen employed
one to fifty wage-earners, representing a total of 435 wage-earners;
and eighty-eight employed fifty-one or more wage-earners, representing
a total of 78,919 wage-earners.
Since thirty-five of the manufacturing establishments reporting Negro
labor (or 33 per cent of the 104 so reporting) employed less than five
Negroes each, or a total of seventy Negroes in all, while sixty-nine
employed 12,854 Negroes, or 99.4 per cent of the total Negroes reported
by manufacturing establishments, it seemed advisable in this report
to consider only those employing five Negroes or more, in order not to
give undue weight to conditions where only a relatively few Negroes were
concerned. A similar situation was disclosed by the returns furnished
by non-manufacturing establishments, and the returns from twenty-four
employing a total of forty-one Negroes have been disregarded in this
report in order to give proper weight to conditions in the sixty-eight
employing five or more Negroes which reported a total of 9,483
Negroes.[56] The combined number of establishments, both manufacturing
(69) and non-manufacturing (68), employing five or more Negroes each
was 137.
[Illustration: INDUSTRIAL PLANTS
120 INDUSTRIAL CONCERNS EMPLOYING 24,286 NEGROES]
On the basis of the returns reported in the preliminary questionnaires
certain establishments and industries were selected for more intensive
study through personal interviews with employers, conferences participated
in by employers and members of the Commission, and interviews with
employees. The basis on which the selection was made was either the
number of Negroes employed or the length of time during which Negroes
had been employed, special attention being given to those industries
and establishments which had employed Negro labor for the first time
since the war. The industries employing large numbers of Negro workers
which were selected for further study were: slaughtering, meat packing,
and other food products; iron foundries and iron and steel products;
laundries; needle trades; hotels; railroads; Pullman and dining-car
services; tanneries; taxicab upkeep and repair; mail order.
An investigator for the Commission visited 101 establishments of the 137
reporting five or more Negro employees (ten establishments employing less
than five Negroes each were also visited). Four industrial conferences or
informal hearings were held by the Commission, large employers of Negro
labor being invited to co-operate with the Commission by giving it the
benefit of their experience with Negro labor. Among those who reported
were general superintendents, assistant superintendents, employment
managers, and other representatives of the large employers of Negro
labor in Chicago as shown in Table XXI:
TABLE XXI
No. of Negroes
Employed in 1920
Pullman Car Shops 450
Armour & Co., Stock Yards 2,084
Morris & Co., Stock Yards 1,400
Swift & Co., Stock Yards 2,278
Wilson & Co., Stock Yards 818
Corn Products Refining Co., food products 500
International Harvester Co., agricultural machinery 1,551
Yellow Cab Co., taxicab 250
American Car and Foundry Co.[57] 20
American Brake Shoe and Foundry Co. 265
Brady Foundry Co. 125
National Malleable Castings Co. 427
Western Foundry Co. 200
Sears, Roebuck & Co., mail order 1,423
Montgomery Ward & Co., mail order 350
Gage Bros. Wholesale Millinery 73
Spring-filled Products Co., automobile cushions 250
------
Total 12,464
2. NUMBER AND PERCENTAGE OF NEGRO EMPLOYEES
The number and percentage of Negro employees to the total employees in
136 establishments reporting five or more Negroes are shown in Table XXII.
TABLE XXII
NUMBER AND PERCENTAGE OF NEGRO EMPLOYEES IN ESTABLISHMENTS
REPORTING FIVE OR MORE NEGROES
=================================+=========================================
|Number of | | | Negro
Industry |Establish-| Total | Negro |Percentage
| ments |Employees|Employees| of Total
---------------------------------+----------+---------+---------+----------
Manufacturing: | | | |
Box manufacturing (paper) | 3 | 995 | 143 | 14
Clothing | 9 | 1,405 | 203 | 14
Cooperage | 2 | 327 | 106 | 32
Food products | 8 | 35,278 | 7,597 | 22
Iron and steel products | | | |
(iron foundries) | 27 | 37,773 | 3,879 | 10
Tanneries | 7 | 2,230 | 462 | 21
Miscellaneous: | | | |
Lamp-shade manufacturing | 1 | 275 | 75 | 27
Auto-cushion manufacturing | 2 | 500 | 250 | 50
Other industries | | | |
(manufacturing) | 10 | 2,571 | 139 | 5
+----------+---------+---------+---------
Totals | 69 | 79,354 | 12,854 | 16
---------------------------------+----------+---------+---------+---------
Non-manufacturing: | | | |
Hotels | 9 | 1,714 | 923 | 53
Laundries | 20 | 1,736 | 764 | 44
Mail order[58] | 1 | 17,450 | 1,423 | 8
Railroads, dining- and Pullman-| | | |
car service | 16 | 7,816 | 5,408 | 68
Miscellaneous industries[59] | 21 | 10,028 | 615 | 6
+----------+---------+---------+---------
Totals | 67 | 38,744 | 9,133 | 23
---------------------------------+----------+---------+---------+---------
3. INCREASE IN NEGRO LABOR SINCE 1915
The data obtained from questionnaires, interviews, and conferences with
employers disclosed the fact that there has been a remarkable increase
since 1915 in the number of Negro workers employed in manufacturing, in
clerical occupations, and in laundries. As was to be expected, the number
of Negroes in personal service (hotels, dining-cars, and parlor-cars)
also increased, but the increase was negligible in comparison with the
gain in the other fields mentioned.
Inability to obtain competent white workers was the reason given in
practically every instance for the large increase in the number of
Negroes employed since 1914. All of the large employers of Negro labor
attending the conferences assigned shortage of labor as the principal
reason for the increased number of Negroes reported. A few establishments
(not represented in the conferences) reported that Negroes had first
been employed to take the place of strikers, and increasing numbers had
been employed thereafter. The establishments so reporting were hotels,
a small clothing factory, and a warehouse company. Because of the labor
shortage in the North, large numbers of Negroes left the southern states.
TABLE XXIII
NEGROES EMPLOYED FROM 1915 TO 1920 IN SIXTY-TWO MANUFACTURING
ESTABLISHMENTS CLASSIFIED ACCORDING TO INDUSTRIES[60]
======================+==========+======+======+======+======+======+=======
|Number of | | | | | |
Industries |Establish-| 1915 | 1916 | 1917 | 1918 | 1919 | 1920
| ments | | | | | |
----------------------+----------+------+------+------+------+------+-------
Box making | 3 | 3 | 3 | 116 | 116 | 145 | 143
Clothing | 9 | 75 | 110 | 140 | 108 | 161 | 203
Other needlework | 3 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 25 | 325 | 325
Cooperage | 2 | 29 | 34 | 95 | 110 | 15 | 106
Food products[61] | 16 |1,103 |2,529 |4,765 |6,518 |5,789 | 5,379
Iron and steel[62] | 22 | 121 | 672 |1,115 |1,580 |3,002 | 3,829
Tanneries | 7 | 0 | 17 | 36 | 87 | 229 | 462
Miscellaneous | | | | | | |
manufacturing | 10 | 15 | 15 | 24 | 48 | 75 | 140
+----------+------+------+------+------+------+-------
Totals | 62 |1,346 |3,380 |6,291 |8,592 |9,881 |10,587
----------------------+----------+------+------+------+------+------+-------
TABLE XXIV
NEGROES EMPLOYED FROM 1915 TO 1920 IN FORTY-SEVEN ESTABLISHMENTS
(NON-MANUFACTURING) CLASSIFIED ACCORDING TO INDUSTRIES[63]
======================+==========+======+======+======+======+======+======
|Number of | | | | | |
Industries |Establish-| 1915 | 1916 | 1917 | 1918 | 1919 | 1920
| ments | | | | | |
----------------------+----------+------+------+------+------+------+-------
Hotels | 9 | 544 | 559 | 615 | 684 | 693 | 956
Laundries | 20 | 118 | 180 | 220 | 350 | 520 | 764
Mail order (clerical | | | | | | |
occupations) | 2 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 664 |1,650 | 1,400
Railroads (dining- and| | | | | | |
parlor-car service) | 16 |3,939 |3,940 |4,274 |4,493 |4,506 | 5,363
+----------+------+------+------+------+------+-------
Totals | 47 |4,601 |4,679 |5,109 |6,191 |7,369 | 8,483
----------------------+----------+------+------+------+------+------+-------
4. CHICAGO EMPLOYERS AND SOUTHERN NEGRO LABOR
During the course of its inquiry the statement was frequently made to
members of the Commission or to its investigators that large employers of
labor in Chicago, and particularly the packers, had imported many Negroes
from the South. Although the Commission made a thorough investigation
of such statements, no evidence of any value was discovered to support
them.
The general superintendents of the Armour, Morris, Swift, and Wilson
plants who attended conferences declared emphatically that their companies
had not engaged in any encouragement of migration.
Mr. Samuel Gompers, president of the American Federation of Labor, being
asked through correspondence from the Commission if he could furnish any
evidence tending to prove the importation of Negroes into the Chicago
district by employers, replied, "There is a plentitude of such evidence,"
but when Mr. Gompers was urged to cite the evidence, his reply was: "It
cannot be unknown to you that some 30,000 Negroes were imported into
the Chicago district during the steel strike. They did not go there of
their own volition, but through inducements which were held out to them
by the agents of employers who visited southern and western cities."
As, however, the Chicago race riot occurred a year prior to the steel
strike, importation of Negroes at the latter time could not have affected
the situation out of which the riot came. But the fact remains that labor
leaders insist that employers in the Chicago district imported Negroes
from the South, notwithstanding their inability to cite facts in support
of this belief.
5. CLASSIFICATION OF NEGRO WORKERS
An accurate classification of Negro laborers into skilled, semi-skilled,
and unskilled would help to an understanding of the position of the Negro
in industry. In manufacturing, such a classification was attempted,
but the results were unsatisfactory. These classes cannot be strictly
defined, and different employers give them different meanings. In a number
of important cases employers reported the total number of skilled and
unskilled, and that figures for each class could not be compiled without
great labor. In all such cases the total is listed as "unskilled." This
class is thus unduly enlarged at the expense of the semi-skilled and
the skilled. So the number of semi-skilled workers appears to be less
than the skilled. These facts show that accuracy cannot be claimed for
the classification in Table XXV.
TABLE XXV
NEGRO EMPLOYEES IN SIXTY-SIX MANUFACTURING ESTABLISHMENTS
CLASSIFIED AS SKILLED, SEMI-SKILLED, AND UNSKILLED
==================+===============+=========+=========+=========+==========
| Number of | Total | | Semi- |
Industry |Establishments | Negroes | Skilled | skilled | Unskilled
------------------+---------------+---------+---------+---------+----------
Box manufacturing | 3 | 143 | ... | ... | 143
Clothing | 9 | 203 | 57 | 29 | 117
Cooperage | 2 | 106 | 8 | 45 | 53
Food products[64] | 8 | 7,597 | 229 | 12 | 7,356
Iron and steel | 27 | 3,879 | 434 | 180 | 3,265
Tanneries | 7 | 462 | 175 | ... | 287
Miscellaneous | 10 | 139 | 24 | 1 | 114
+---------------+---------+---------+---------+----------
Total[65] | 66 | 12,529 | 927 | 267 | 11,335
------------------+---------------+---------+---------+---------+----------
The attempt to classify Negro workers according to occupation failed
because the necessary information was not obtainable, especially from
large employers. Nevertheless the number of workers in certain occupations
reported by a few establishments is suggestive of the fields recently
opened to Negroes in Chicago. In 1910[66] there were only thirty-one
Negro molders in Chicago, while in 1920 there were 304 reported by ten
establishments. In 1910 there were but twenty-eight factory sewers or
machine operators, while in 1920 there were 382 in twelve factories. In
1910 there were 934 Negroes employed in clerical occupations as compared
with 1,400 in two concerns in 1920. In 1910 there were but 287 Negro
laundry operatives in Chicago, while there were 764 reported by twenty
laundries in 1920.
6. WAGES OF NEGRO WORKERS
The period of this industrial investigation--the spring and summer
of 1920--was one of exceptional demand for labor and of high wages.
Employers were glad to get workers of any sort at high pay.[67] In
branches of employment where Negroes were permitted to work, their wages
were generally the same as those of the white workers. In interviewing
many Negro workers the Commission's investigators found practically no
complaints of discrimination in wages on the same tasks. And the Chicago
Urban League which, through its industrial department, places more
Negroes in employment than any other agency in Chicago reported that it
had very few complaints of such discrimination.
Some discrimination was practiced by foremen in placing or keeping Negroes
at work on processes that yielded smaller returns than those to which
white workers were assigned. In the field of common labor, where the
largest number of Negroes are employed, some kinds of piecework yield
greater returns than others. The tendency of foremen in some plants was
to place Negroes on those processes yielding the smallest returns. The
following are instances of such discrimination in favor of the white
workers in the same plants.
In two large foundries white molders were given standard patterns, which
remain the same throughout the year and permit the working up of speed;
while patterns that were changed frequently, and made production slower
were given to the Negroes. As speed determined the piecework earnings,
the Negroes could not earn as much as the white molders in the same
foundry.
In the several plants the white workers were favored in the distribution
of overtime work; or Negroes were not permitted to work at all on overtime
at "time and a half" rates or on Sundays at "double pay" as long as
white workers were available.
While in the larger industries there was seldom any complaint about
inequality in the basic rate of pay for common labor, restrictions upon
the promotion and advancement of Negroes frequently prevented them from
earning higher wages. In one department of a large food-products plant
Negroes reached the maximum rate of 61 cents per hour after a few months'
employment. No further advancement could be had because the superintendent
was not willing to place Negro foremen over white workers. A Negro in
the starch-mixing department held a skilled position as starch tester.
It became apparent that in carrying out his duties many of the starch
mixers would be subject to his immediate direction. The foreman apparently
did not approve of this and ordered him to teach his duties to a Polish
workman. The Negro declined to do this, and the matter was referred to
the general superintendent. After an investigation it was decided to
permit the Negro to retain his position as tester, but he was given no
authority over the men.
In view of the fluctuations in wages, the impracticability of getting
actual records of wages from all plants, and the discrepancies which in
some instances did appear between reported and actual wages, it seemed
desirable to supplement the information of the Commission's investigators.
The records of the industrial department of the Chicago Urban League
afforded the most complete data on wages received by Negroes that could
be found in Chicago. During the year 1919 it placed more than 14,000
Negroes in plants in the Chicago District. In each case, when securing
Negro employment, it kept a record of the wages actually offered and of
conditions of work. If the Negro made complaint that the wage or work
conditions did not prove to be as stated, it investigated the complaint.
Included in these records are the Pullman Company, Wilson & Company
(packers), Armour & Company, Morris Company, Swift & Company, Illinois
Malleable Iron Company, National Malleable and Castings Company,
International Harvester Company, the General Can Company, the Republic Box
Company, Chicago Fire Brick Company, Sears, Roebuck & Company, Superior
Process Company, Consumers Coal Company, Corn Products Refining Company
at Argo, United States Quartermasters' Department, Adams & Westlake
Company, Griess Pfleger Tanning Company, and Inland Steel Company.
In the industries listed above, the minimum wage rate per hour is 42.5
cents, which is the minimum rate for the packing industries. The maximum
rate is sixty-one cents per hour paid by the Corn Products Refining
Company at Argo and the International Harvester Company. Neither of
the latter, however, represents a basic wage. The average wage for
the thirty-six companies is 48.7 cents. These wage rates cover the
most arduous tasks found in the list of common labor. Three items for
track laborers are included. Others include freight handlers, yardmen,
truckers, sweepers, foundry laborers, etc. Six companies work ten hours
per day, twelve companies nine hours, one company nine and one-half
hours, seventeen companies eight hours. Four pay bonuses, not including
packers, who also pay a bonus in compliance with the award of a judge
acting as mediator between the packers and the union.
The building trades are not included, but of the three independent
contractors listed the wage paid common laborers is 50 cents per hour,
60 cents per hour, and 70 cents per hour, respectively, for eight hours,
while the union rate of pay for common labor is $1.00 per hour for eight
hours, time and one-half for overtime, and double time for Sunday.
7. WOMEN EMPLOYEES IN INDUSTRIAL ESTABLISHMENTS
Negro women employed in thirty-one industrial establishments worked,
in five of them forty-four hours a week, in fifteen of them forty-eight
hours, in seven of them forty-nine hours, and in four of them fifty-one
hours. The weekly pay ranged from $9.00 to $15.00 a week as clothing
folders, to as high as $20.00 to $35.00 a week as clothing drapers
or finishers. Map mounting paid $15.00 a week, book binding $15.00,
paper-box making $13.00, tobacco stripping $16.40, core making (foundry
work) $16.40, twine weaving $17.40, silk-shade making $10.00 to $18.00,
food packing $12.00 to $15.00, mattress making $12.00 to $22.00,
riveters (canvas) $15.00, paper sorters $12.00, steam laundry workers
(unskilled) $13.00 to $16.00, steam laundry hand workers $18.00 to $29.00,
power-machine operators on men's caps $15.00 to $18.00, on aprons $14.00
to $18.00, on dresses $15.00 to $18.00, on overalls (union shop) $18.00
to $25.00, and on overalls (non-union shop) $15.00 to $18.00.
Of fourteen companies employing colored girls as operators, five paid
on a piecework basis only. Two paid from $12.00 to $18.00 per week,
depending on the skill of the operator, two companies paid $14.00 per
week to beginners, one paid $15.00 per week to beginners, three paid
$12.00 per week to beginners, one paid $18.00 per week to beginners,
the latter being a union shop.
Considerable unrest has been traceable to delay on the part of the
managers in promoting beginners above the beginning wage. Girls have been
retained at a beginning wage for an unreasonable time after acquiring
satisfactory skill and production. This condition is known to the Women's
Trade Union League, but no well-directed effort has ever been made to
unionize colored workers in the garment trades, except when they have
been called in as strike breakers to replace white workers. An instance
of this was the strike at the C. B. Shane Company, manufacturers of
raincoats, where colored girls were employed to replace striking white
union workers. At that time very few colored girls were members of the
local union. According to an official of the Women's Garment Workers'
Union not more than 125 colored workers have become members.
8. HOTEL AND RESTAURANT EMPLOYEES
_Men._--In about twenty-five hotels and restaurants in which colored
men are employed, wages are as follows:
Chief cooks $25.00 to $50.00 per week
Waiters 25.00 to 40.00 per week
Bus boys 14.00 to 20.00 per week
Hotel porters 45.00 to 65.00 per month
Dishwashers 15.00 to 20.00 per week
Second cooks 20.00 to 35.00 per week
Bell-boys 40.00 to 45.00 per month
Shoe shiners and washroom porters 15.00 to 17.00 per week
In all of the above-listed occupations the wages are augmented by tips.
It is difficult to form an accurate estimate of the amount earned in
tips for the reason that it is conditioned upon the character of service
rendered and the inclination of the person served to pay for personal
service. It would be fair to estimate that in hotels and restaurants
known to employees as "good houses" the tips range from $2.00 to $5.00
per day. In a colored restaurant in the neighborhood of Thirty-first and
State streets a wage of $5.00 per week is paid to waitresses, while the
tips have been known to total five times that amount.
_Women._--The twenty-five hotels and restaurants concerning which the
Chicago Urban League's Industrial Department has records, employ women
in the occupations and at the wages listed as follows:
Waitresses $ 8.00 to $15.00 per week and tips (board)
Chambermaids 25.00 to 45.00 per month and tips (board)
Pantry girls 15.00 to 18.00 per week and board
Kitchen help 9.00 to 16.00 per week and board
Allowing an average of 35 cents per meal for three meals, $1.05 per day
or $7.35 per week should be added where board is included. This would
make the following schedule of wages:
Waitresses $15.35 to $22.35 per week
Chambermaids 54.40 to 74.40 per month
Pantry girls 22.35 to 25.35 per week
Kitchen help 16.35 to 23.35 per week
In clerical positions colored men have had very little opportunity,
except in the post-office. There are exceptions, however, such as shipping
clerks, storekeepers, and bookkeepers.
The girls employed as long-hand entry clerks, typists, checkers, routers,
and Elliott-Fisher and adding-machine operators received during 1920 from
$15.00 to $16.00 as a beginning wage. The chief supervisor (colored)
in charge of 600 girls in one of the large mail-order houses received
$23.00 per week, and the assistant superintendent, a white man, received
$50.00 per week while studying the mail-order business under the chief
supervisor. When the management's attention was called to the inequality,
two additional supervisors were added and the work lessened without
increase of pay.
Another firm employing several hundred colored girls paid a welfare
worker $20.00 per week, while another with half that number of girls
paid $25.00 per week.
There was a deep-seated suspicion existing among the clerical force of
a firm employing a large number of colored girls that the white girls
employed by the same company received a higher wage than that paid the
colored girls. The suspicion grew out of the mistake of an employment
manager in mistaking a colored girl for a white one.
9. RAILROAD WORKERS
_Dining-car men._--According to the records of the Railway Men's
International Industrial Benevolent Association, wages of dining-car
waiters prior to 1916 were universally $25.00 per month, with the
exception of the Santa Fe, which paid from $35.00 to $40.00 per month for
"preferred" runs. The Chicago, Burlington & Quincy allowed an additional
$3.00 to the $25.00 standard for men in service ten years or more.
In 1918, after the roads had been federalized, the minimum wage became
$48.00 per month. In May, 1919, a further increase to $55.00 per month
and overtime on a mileage basis was granted. This gave an average of
$62.00 per month for so called "transcontinental" runs, that is, service
between Chicago and the Pacific Coast.
Effective February 1, 1920, wages were adjusted to an hourly basis,
which gave payment for overtime in excess of 240 hours per month. On
July 20, 1920, most roads allowed a general increase to dining-car men
which brought the average to $65.00 per month.
An official of the Railway Men's International Industrial Benevolent
Association estimated that the tips and salary of the average waiter
were $105.00 per month, including three meals valued at 35 cents per
day. This estimate was accepted by the Federal Railway Labor Board. This
low estimate is arrived at because it is generally the custom to feed
waiters and kitchen crews on leftovers which would otherwise become waste.
_Porters._--The wages of porters, including tips, is estimated at $105.00
per month. The present salary paid to porters is $65.00 per month. In
May, 1919, the minimum basis was $60.00 per month on a mileage basis of
$.0055 per mile in excess of 11,000 miles per month. In December of the
same year a final adjustment of the wage scale was made in which length
of service was taken as a basis. For three years or less the pay was
$63.00 per month; for from three to ten years the pay was $66.00 per
month; for ten years or more the pay was $69.00 per month. The Railway
Men's International Industrial Benevolent Association furnished the
above information.
According to the same authority, on January 1, 1921, most roads reduced
the hourly overtime for waiters, cooks, and stewards and placed it on
a straight time service, with pay ranging between $60.00 and $65.00 per
month. A twenty-four-day month was also established. This was equal to
a reduction of wages for the class of labor referred to.
In the case of thirty-one orders for porters in stores, restaurants,
cafés, and drugstores, office buildings, etc., the wages ran from $12.00
per week to $25.00. Some difficulty was experienced in determining a
minimum wage, for the reason that in many instances full time is not
required, porters being allowed to do odd jobs on their own account. Of
these thirty-one, three received $12 a week, one $13, four $15, two $16,
one $17, four $18, two $19, six $20, three $21, one $21.25, one $22 and
two $25.
Apartment-house janitors usually are affiliated with the labor unions.
An instance of financial benefit is as follows: F----, who is engineer
for an apartment in Evanston, before joining the union received $45.00
per month for his services, with quarters in a basement apartment. He
now receives $125.00 per month with the same quarters.
Firemen with licenses were offered from $125.00 to $150.00 per month in
ten different positions filled by the League.
10. DOMESTIC WORKERS
Eighty-one orders for maids for service in private families were listed
with the following results: maximum, $18.00 per week with room and board;
minimum, $6.00 per week with room and board; average, $12.84 per week
with room and board. Of these, twenty-six were paid $15, eight $14,
twelve $12, fifteen $10. Three received $18, and one $20.
_Children's nurses._--Fifteen were listed, of whom five were paid $15.00
per week with room and board, six were paid $12.00, one was paid $7.00,
two were paid $5.00, and one was paid $3.00.
_Cooks._--Sixteen were listed as follows: one was paid $25.00 per week
with room and board, four were paid $18.00, three were paid $16.00, six
were paid $15.00, and two were paid $14.00.
The minimum wage for cooks indicated is $14.00 per week with room and
board. The maximum wage is $25.00 per week with room and board, while
in the case of children's nurses the maximum wage is $15.00 per week
and the minimum $3.00 per week for part time.
_Housemen._--Out of a list of twenty-five orders, a minimum of $40.00
per month with room and board, a maximum of $100.00 per month with room
and board, and an average of $65.00 per month with room and board.
_Chauffeurs._--Minimum of $100.00 per month with room and board and
maximum of $150.00 per month with room and board. It is difficult to
outline the duties of chauffeurs for the reason that they often perform
the duties of butler, houseman, yardman, etc., in addition to that of
chauffeur.
_Couples._--(Man and wife.) Out of twenty-five orders listed, the
following wages were offered: minimum of $85.00 per month with room and
board. A maximum of $165.00 per month with room and board.
_Laundresses._--Usually employed by the day. The prevailing rate per
day over the past year was $4.00 and car fare, with one meal. This
wage was asked by common understanding and without any visible form of
organization. Since November 1, 1920, when the unemployment situation
became manifest, $3.60 per day, car fare, and one meal has been accepted.
From 1918 to November 1, 1920, a serious shortage of domestic help
was noted. Colored girls and women deserted this grade of work for the
factories, where shorter hours and free Sundays were secured. The larger
pay of domestic employment did not attract the average worker, for the
reason that free evenings for recreation and amusement were apparently
more desirable than the isolation and long hours of domestic service.
Recently housekeepers secured Negro girls from the southern states
and imported Negro girls from the British West India Islands[68] in
an attempted solution of the domestic-help problem. Transportation and
clothes were furnished by employers and some sort of verbal agreement
entered into by which the girls were expected to work out this
indebtedness. Instances have come to the attention of the Chicago Urban
League which seem to indicate that these agreements have not worked
out satisfactorily. For example: One colored woman was brought from a
small town in Florida to a Chicago suburb by a white family on such an
agreement. After a few weeks' service the employer complained that the
work performed by the woman as a general maid was unsatisfactory. Abuse
followed. The woman sought to go to a Negro family under the pretence
that she wished to return a pair of borrowed shoes. Her employer,
fearing that she wished to escape, drove her to the home of the Negro
family in his automobile. Once inside the home, she told a story of
how her employer had kicked, beaten, and threatened her with a revolver
if she attempted to leave. The Negro family gave asked-for shelter and
informed the employer that she would not return. After threatening to
take her away by force, the employer went away and the woman remained.
A suit followed on a charge of assault and battery and the employer was
discharged for lack of evidence.
A few weeks ago a white resident of another Chicago suburb applied to
the juvenile court for the guardianship of a colored girl. The court,
being unable to handle the case, requested the advice of the Chicago
Urban League. The details of the case were substantially as follows:
A Roman Catholic organization in Jamaica, British West Indies, sent
ten or twelve Jamaican girls to the United States, upon applications
of housekeepers, to serve as domestics. Some verbal agreement had been
entered into whereby the girls were to accept service as domestics and
work out the cost of transportation and clothing at a stipulated rate
per week. The arrangement seems to have progressed fairly until the girls
became acquainted with other colored people residing in the neighborhood.
It was then discovered that they were working at a wage considerably
lower than the usual wage. The girl in question, who was a minor but
seems to have misrepresented her age when applying for a passport, was
receiving $6.00 per week, one dollar of which was paid in cash and the
balance deducted to cover the expense of clothing and transportation.
After becoming dissatisfied with these wages, the girl left the home
of her white employer, who sought to be appointed her guardian so that
he could restrain her. A guardian has not thus far been appointed, for
the reason that the legal status of the girl and the legality of the
contract entered into are doubtful.
III. EMPLOYERS' EXPERIENCE WITH NEGRO LABOR
The entrance of Negroes in large numbers into manufacturing industries
and clerical occupations is one of the striking facts shown by this
investigation. Shortage of labor due to war conditions created many
openings for the Negro. Whether he will remain in these fields and become
an increasingly important factor in them will depend in a large degree
upon his efficiency and reliability, as well as upon absence of racial
friction, satisfactory wages, etc. It was therefore deemed important to
learn how the Negro improved his industrial opportunities.
The Commission made some investigation of this subject, seeking the
opinion of as many employers as possible who had had experience with
Negro workers. The inquiry covered two points: (1) a general question in
the preliminary questionnaire, to learn whether Negro labor had proved
satisfactory; and (2) a comparison of the Negro with the white worker
in efficiency, reliability, regularity, and labor turnover. The facts
under each head are considered separately below, following a brief
consideration of the difference between the southern and northern Negro.
1. SOUTHERN AND NORTHERN NEGROES COMPARED
Many employers drew a distinction between the recent southern migrants
and northern Negroes, and commented upon certain shortcomings of the
former, although they expressed themselves as satisfied on the whole
with Negro labor.
For instance, the representative of a foundry company with 200 Negroes
out of a total of 950 employees said:
It appears to me that the men coming from the South get here
and for a limited length of time seem to have a different view
of things. They do things that probably the Chicago Negro
wouldn't do. They don't seem to know exactly how to control
themselves. They are unsettled and to a great degree unsteady.
The northern-born Negro is more active. He is brighter in a way
and a little more ambitious. The southern Negroes are inclined
to work today, lay off tomorrow, and be back the next day on
the job again.
A representative of a large machinery-manufacturing establishment
employing 1,500 Negroes out of a total of 23,000 employees in Chicago
expressed the same opinion in these words:
Our experience with Negroes has a tendency to show that these
people do not realize that there is such a thing as steady work.
They work for possibly a week or two, then say they are obliged
to lay off for some imaginary cause and will probably return
within a week or four weeks. We believe they are improving
and will be better as time goes on and they become more used
to the way work and business are done in the North.
The superintendent of a foundry which increased its Negro employees in
five years from six to 125 out of a total of 466 employees was of the
following opinion:
The Negro up here from the South never heard of working six
days a week and being on time every morning and staying until
the job was done. It is entirely foreign to his idea of things,
but with a little persistent effort and showing him that it
is necessary he soon learns the system the same as the others,
and I do not believe he is any worse than the white man after
he has been here a year or two.
The superintendent of a company employing more that 2,000 Negroes out
of a total of 10,000 employees in Chicago declared:
The southern Negroes have not yet become thoroughly reconciled
to working six days a week. Down South they are accustomed
to taking off Saturdays, and they are quite frequently absent
on Saturday. That is not true of the colored man who has been
with us a long time. He is accustomed to the regularity of six
days a week, but the men from the South have the weakness of
being away on Saturdays.
In general it was the employers of large numbers of Negroes who
differentiated between the southern and the northern Negro. Employers
of Negroes in small numbers were more inclined to judge all Negroes by
those recently arrived from the South.
2. NEGRO LABOR SATISFACTORY
One of the questions contained in the preliminary questionnaire was: "Has
your Negro labor proved satisfactory?" Of 137 questionnaires returned by
establishments employing five or more Negro workers, 118 reported that
Negro labor had proved satisfactory and nineteen that it had not proved
satisfactory.
The significance of these returns is disclosed by Table XXVI, in which
the establishments are classified by industries, and the number of Negro
employees in establishments reporting Negro labor satisfactory is shown
to be 21,640 as contrasted with 697 Negro employees in the nineteen
establishments reporting Negro labor unsatisfactory.
TABLE XXVI
NEGRO LABOR SATISFACTORY OR UNSATISFACTORY IN ESTABLISHMENTS
CLASSIFIED BY INDUSTRIES
===================+==========+=========+================+=================
| | | ESTABLISHMENTS | ESTABLISHMENTS
| | | REPORTING | REPORTING
| | | NEGRO LABOR | NEGRO LABOR
| | | SATISFACTORY | UNSATISFACTORY
| TOTAL | TOTAL +------+---------+------+----------
INDUSTRY | NUMBER |Negroes | |Number of| |Number of
|Establish-|EMPLOYED | | Negroes | | Negroes
| MENTS | |Number|Employed |Number|Employed
| | | |in These | |in These
| | | | Estab- | | Estab-
| | | |lishments| |lishments
-------------------+----------+---------+------+---------+------+----------
Manufacturing: | | | | | |
Clothing | 9 | 203 | 8 | 191 | 1 | 12
Food products | 8 | 7,597 | 7 | 7,547 | 1 | 50
Iron and steel | 27 | 3,879 | 22 | 3,750 | 5 | 129
Tanneries | 7 | 462 | 6 | 421 | 1 | 41
Miscellaneous[69]| 18 | 713 | 13 | 464 | 5[70]| 249
+----------+---------+------+---------+------+----------
Totals | 69 | 12,854 | 56 | 12,373 | 13 | 481
| | | | | |
Non-manufacturing: | | | | | |
Railroads | 16 | 5,408 | 16 | 5,408 | |
Hotels | 9 | 923 | 8 | 911 | 1 | 12
Laundries | 20 | 764 | 16 | 587 | 4 | 177
Mail order | 2 | 1,773 | 2 | 1,773 | |
Public service | 4 | 42 | 4 | 42 | |
Taxicab upkeep | 1 | 250 | 1 | 250 | |
Miscellaneous[70]| 16 | 323 | 15 | 296 | 1 | 27
+----------+---------+------+---------+------+----------
Totals | 68 | 9,483 | 62 | 9,267 | 6 | 216
+----------+---------+------+---------+------+----------
Totals, all | | | | | |
industries | 137 | 22,337 | 118 | 21,640 | 19 | 697
-------------------+----------+---------+------+---------+------+----------
3. NEGRO AND WHITE LABOR COMPARED
At a conference at which Negro and white workers were under discussion a
large foundry representative suggested that such a comparison was unfair
to the Negro because he was still a newcomer in manufacturing industries
and could not be expected to be as efficient, reliable, and regular as
the white worker who had been thus engaged much longer. Other employers
felt that this point should be borne in mind.
_Efficiency._--Comparing the efficiency of the Negro worker and the white
worker, seventy-one employers interviewed (thirty-four manufacturing
and thirty-seven non-manufacturing establishments) considered the Negro
equally efficient, and twenty-two employers (thirteen manufacturing and
nine non-manufacturing) considered the Negro less efficient.[71]
The seventy-one establishments which reported Negro labor as equally
efficient as white labor included all of the large employers of Negro
labor, with very few exceptions. Ability shown by Negro workers in widely
dissimilar occupations and industries was commented upon. The following
instances are of interest:
Foundries: "Our star molder in the foundry is a Negro who has been with
us twenty years. Our best truck driver is a Negro who has been with us
about eighteen years." "About the best grinder we have in one department
is a colored man." The superintendent of a large foundry employing 125
Negroes said:
I covered thirty foundries, members of the National Association
when I was serving on a certain Committee, and I know that
in their departments Negroes have made very good. Out of the
thirty foundries, there are half or more which have colored
men in now which did not have colored men two years ago. One
of the instances, a little foundry I know of, had four men in
the grinding department; one colored man and his partner wanted
to take the job of running the grinding room. The partner
wanted to do it all himself, and is now doing what four men
were doing formerly.
That the Negro is apt in learning new work is illustrated by an instance
cited by the same superintendent:
I know of a Pullman porter who has been with the Pullman Company
twenty years who turned out to be as good a helper as we had
in the foundry. Take a man who has made beds for twenty years,
put him to carrying melted iron in a ladle, which is a real
man's job, and make good at it, and I think he's going some!
We had one man who did that and did it well. He was a helper
that the different foremen tried to get hold of, wanted to
have him with them.
Public service: The probation department of the juvenile court reported
six Negro employees. "The colored employees are intelligent, efficient
persons. With one exception they are probation officers. One employee
is in charge of the probation clerk's office and not only works with
white clerks but directs the work of nine white persons."
The office of the recorder of deeds reports seventeen Negro employees
in the folio or record-writing department. "The employees are marked
on their efficiency. Percentages of efficiency run from 94.5 to 98 per
cent among the colored clerks, and several of them averaged 97.9 per
cent and 98 per cent for the past three years."
Stock Yards: "Negroes make skilled workmen. They are among the best of
what are known as 'knife-men' we have."
Whether Negro labor shows greater efficiency in a working unit composed
entirely of colored workers or in a mixed unit of Negro and white workers
is an unsettled question. Only a few employers expressed an opinion on
this point (not affording a sufficient basis for generalization), but it
is interesting to note that of four foundries, one favored the separate
unit and three the mixed unit, while a large food-products company had
found both satisfactory.
Several employers mentioned the fact that, because of his knowledge of
English, the Negro is frequently more efficient than the foreign-speaking
worker. One wool warehouse company, for example, reported that Poles were
satisfactory under the old method of shipping wool in carloads from a
single shipper, but the new system, with shipments of hundreds of sacks
tagged with the names of as many shippers, required laborers unloading
the cars to separate the shipments into sections. This the Poles were
unable to do, while the Negroes did the work very efficiently.
_Reliability._--Does the Negro require more supervision than the white
worker in order to secure equally good results? An opinion was expressed
on this point by ninety-two employers; sixty-three (thirty manufacturing
and thirty-three non-manufacturing establishments) considered that
the Negro did not require more supervision while twenty-eight (sixteen
manufacturing and thirteen non-manufacturing establishments) considered
that he did. The general superintendents of two of the large packing
companies expressed contrary views on this point during one of the
conferences. One said:
Negroes do not require as much supervision as some of those
racial groups who do not understand the language. We can talk
to a man and tell him what to do, where to go to do the work
and how to do it, we can accomplish a whole lot more than if
we had to send an individual with him constantly from place to
place to show him how to do it. To that extent the Negro has
the advantage over the man who cannot talk the English language.
The superintendent of the other company expressed the opinion that
Negroes require more supervision than white workers:
For example, when they are working together in groups,
especially after pay-day, they are inclined to wander into
isolated spots and shoot craps. We've a good deal of trouble
of that kind. They spend their money when they get it more
recklessly than white people.
The representative of a food-products company with 500 Negro employees
in the working force of 3,000 stated that the company had found no need
of greater supervision of Negro workers than of white.
A representative of a taxicab company employing 250 colored workers stated:
We have some colored employees we trust absolutely and as far
as any white employees. We have some colored men in the garage,
and they take more supervision not because they are colored
but because they lack education and are shiftless, but this
you would find in the same grade of white workers.
A preliminary questionnaire returned by the president of a laundry company
employing eighty-two Negroes out of a total of 110 employees reported:
We have a number of exceptionally good and reliable Negro
employees. These men and women need very little supervision.
We get some, who have never worked in industries, who require
more supervision and are not very steady. On the whole we are
pleased with our Negro employees.
_Regularity._--Of the employers interviewed, fifty-seven (twenty-three
manufacturing and thirty-four non-manufacturing establishments) expressed
an opinion that "absenteeism" among colored workers was no greater than
among white workers, while thirty-six employers (twenty-four manufacturing
and twelve non-manufacturing establishments) reported that it was greater.
In this connection the habits of the southern Negro, commented upon
above, would naturally exercise great influence. The superintendent of
one of the packing companies employing 2,084 Negroes reported:
Previous to the war and up to the war the Negro was the poorest
in attendance in the plant. Since the war his attendance
compares favorably with any other class of employees in the
Yards. It is pretty hard to explain excepting this, as they
lived here longer they acquired better habits, I mean more
ambition, and ambition brought about the necessity for better
methods of living, better clothing, and they required more
money and I guess they found out in a short time that work
brought its compensations.
The tendency to work and accumulate a little and then take a vacation
is no more pronounced among the colored workers than among the white
workers, according to the representative of a food-products company
employing 500 Negroes out of a total of 3,000 employees.
_Labor turnover and "hope on the job."_--Of the fifty-two employers
expressing an opinion on the comparative labor turnover of Negro
and white workers twenty-four (eleven manufacturing and thirteen
non-manufacturing establishments) considered the labor turnover about
equal, and twenty-eight (eighteen manufacturing and ten non-manufacturing
establishments) considered the turnover greater among the Negro workers.
Closely connected with the question of labor turnover among Negroes is
the question of "hope on the job," as one alert Negro expressed it. The
desire to secure improved conditions of work and higher wages is shared
by all workers irrespective of race. If Negro workers are not allowed to
advance to better positions in a given plant, or if they are discriminated
against by having their efficiency underrated by foremen, the turnover
of Negro labor will naturally be high. The attitude of foremen largely
determines whether Negro workers will succeed or fail. Superintendents
of large plants realizing this fact have taken special care to educate
foremen in the treatment of Negro labor.
For example, the superintendent of a tannery with 175 Negroes out of a
total of 600 employees notified his foremen that he intended to use Negro
labor, and that any foreman who felt that he could not teach colored
workers would have to yield his place to someone who could. Frequent
lectures to foremen were necessary to make them realize that fairness to
Negro labor meant tolerance of a beginner's awkwardness and shortcomings
and refraining from the use of insulting terms such as "nigger," etc.
Another company reported that when it attempted to fill skilled positions
with Negroes the foremen said they would never be able to teach them as
long as they lived. "It couldn't be done." The foremen were told they
had to do it, and they now agree that it can be done and are "quite won
over to the point of employing Negroes." The experience of this plant
led the superintendent to the conclusion that no particular race is
especially fitted for any given kind of work.
The superintendent of a foundry employing 2,500 men, of whom 427 are
Negroes, said:
The foremen told me one time that they never could get a
colored man to grind because he was afraid of the wheel. I
thought we'd better try out a few of them. We found that was
not the fact at all. One of the best grinders we now have is
a colored man.
In discussing the attitude of foremen toward colored labor, the
superintendent of another large foundry made this significant statement:
I think 50 per cent of what trouble we who employ Negro labor
have is due to inefficient foremen, and the failure is in
the foreman directly over the man to understand the Negro.
As I see it, the Negro must be handled differently from the
Pole whom we have usually had in the common labor capacity.
We cannot handle the Negro the same as we could the Pole. Our
foremen have not been accustomed here in Chicago in our shops
to handling Negroes, and at times I have a real fight to see
a Negro get an absolutely square deal.
The industrial secretary of the Chicago Urban League, referring to a
large firm engaged in the manufacture of machinery, remarked:
I find the attitude of the company liberal. Negroes are
advanced to high-grade positions, although some foremen need
education in order to have them take the proper attitude toward
the employment of Negroes. One foreman set their efficiency
down to 75 per cent; the matter was taken to the efficiency
department and his statement was found to be untrue. This bears
out the point that Negroes will not succeed where foremen do
not intend them to succeed.
Despite occasional statements that the Negro is slow or shiftless,
the volume of evidence before the Commission shows that Negroes are
satisfactory employees and compare favorably with other racial groups.
4. NEGRO WOMEN IN INDUSTRY
Before the war created openings in industry for Negro women, they were
even more definitely restricted in their choice of occupations than were
Negro men. Restricted opportunity is evident from the fact that, in 1910,
almost two-thirds of the gainfully occupied Negro women in Chicago were
engaged in two occupational groups, "servants" and "laundresses not in
laundries," these being included among those in domestic and personal
service who numbered more than three-fourths. The enumeration of Negro
women gainfully employed in Chicago in 1910 classified in the census
according to industries is given in Table XXVII.
[Illustration: NEGRO WOMEN AND GIRLS EMPLOYED IN A LAMP-SHADE FACTORY
Work room is poorly lighted and generally unattractive.]
TABLE XXVII
NEGRO WOMEN GAINFULLY OCCUPIED IN CHICAGO IN 1910,
CLASSIFIED BY INDUSTRIES
========================================+=========+===========
| | Percentage
Industry | Number | of Total
----------------------------------------+---------+-----------
Manufacturing and mechanical industries | 998 | 11
Trade and transportation | 96 | 1
Professional service | 323 | 4
Clerical occupations | 163 | 2
Domestic and personal service: | |
Laundresses not in laundries | 2,115} |
Servants | 3,512} | 78
Other domestic and personal service | 1,336} |
General and unclassified occupations | 337 | 4
+---------+-----------
Total gainfully occupied | 8,880 | 100
----------------------------------------+---------+-----------
TABLE XXVIII
NEGRO WOMEN IN FIFTY ESTABLISHMENTS CLASSIFIED BY INDUSTRIES IN 1920[72]
==============================+==========+=========+=========|============
|Number of | | Total | Total
|Establish-| Total | Negro |Negro Women
Industry | ments |Employees|Employees| Employees
|Reporting | | |
------------------------------+----------+---------+---------+------------
Manufacturing: | | | |
Tanneries | 1 | 600 | 175 | 50
Iron and steel | 3 | 10,435 | 1,729 | 74
Slaughtering and packing | 3 | 20,990 | 4,818 | 437
Cooperage | 2 | 327 | 106 | 30
Clothing | 9 | 1,405 | 203 | 202
Other needle trades | 3 | 775 | 325 | 325
Box making (paper) | 3 | 995 | 143 | 104
Miscellaneous | 3 | 1,543 | 95 | 73
+----------+---------+---------+------------
Totals | 27 | 37,070 | 7,594 | 1,295
| | | |
Non-manufacturing:[73] | | | |
Hotels | 4 | 550 | 250 | 69
Taxicab upkeep | 1 | 1,600 | 250 | 100
Laundries | 16 | 1,511 | 664 | 543
Mail order | | | |
(clerical occupations)[74]| 2 | ... | 1,773 | 1,400
+----------+---------+---------+------------
Totals | 23 | ... | 2,937 | 2,112
------------------------------+----------+---------+---------+------------
To learn the special problems concerning Negro women in industry,
one conference was devoted to the industries recently opened to them.
Representatives of four establishments employing a total of 1,713 Negro
women attended the conference. The investigation of the 101 establishments
(employing five or more Negroes) disclosed the presence of women in a
large majority of cases, but in a number of instances the management
was unable to tell the sex of workers from the records kept and gave the
investigator the total number of Negroes employed without classification
by sex. Of the 137 establishments reporting, forty-two had no Negro
women employees; forty-five kept no separate sex records; fifty reported
separately the number of Negro women workers.
Comparing the industries in which Negro women were employed in 1910 with
the figures quoted for 1920, a striking increase is seen in the total
engaged in manufacturing, 998 being the total Negro women reported for
all manufacturing establishments in Chicago in 1910, as compared with
1,295 Negro women reported by twenty-seven establishments in 1920.
Comparisons for special industries and occupations show the contrasts
between 1910 and 1920 in Table XXIX.
TABLE XXIX
=================================================+======+=======+==========
| | |Number of
Industry | 1910 | 1920 |Establish-
| | | ments
-------------------------------------------------+------+-------+----------
Sewers and sewing-machine operators in factories | 25 | 527 | 12
Slaughtering and packing-house operatives | 8 | 437 | 3
Box making (paper) | 3 | 104 | 3
Tanneries | 0 | 50 | 1
Clerical occupations | 163 | 1,400 | 2
Laundry operatives | 184 | 543 | 16
Taxicab cleaning | 0 | 100 | 1
-------------------------------------------------+------+-------+----------
Labor shortage was given as the reason for employing Negro women and
girls by all of the firms employing them in large numbers. The outlook
for Negro women in industry when there is a labor surplus is uncertain.
Employers employing 1,713 Negro women represented at a conference,
May 18, 1920, agreed that there were no indications of a reduction of
employment. This question is considered at length hereafter in "Future
of the Negro in Chicago Industries."
EXPERIMENTS WITH NEGRO WOMEN WORKERS
Employers' opinions regarding the character of Negro labor without
reference to sex were considered above. Particular comments concerning
male workers were quoted there, comments upon women workers are now
given. Four employers of Negro women in large numbers within the past
two years gave the Commission the benefit of their experience. They were
two mail-order concerns, a manufacturer of automobile spring cushions,
and a wholesale millinery shop.
[Illustration: NEGRO WOMEN EMPLOYED ON POWER MACHINES IN A LARGE APRON
FACTORY
This concern when it increased its number of Negro women combined its
four shops and moved into this modern daylight factory building.]
The mail-order house which established a large office for Negro entry
clerks in September, 1918, was the first to try the experiment. It had
no precedent to guide it and "did not know how the colored girl would
act in business." The unit was opened with ninety girls, and increased in
the fall of 1919 to 650 girls, who were given the promise of advancement
and Negro supervision. In the early summer of 1920, when the investigator
visited this office, there were 311 girls at work, as follows:
Operators on Elliott-Fisher machines 30
Mail-order workers 76
Instructing new girls 9
Checkers 138
Supervisors 5
Mail opening, sorting, etc. 27
Posting 26
They were above the average in education, 75 per cent being high-school
graduates and 12 per cent having had two or more years in college.
The employment manager said that misunderstandings had arisen
occasionally, due to the colored girl being oversensitive and suspicious.
"The colored girl seems to suspect that her employer is going to put
something over on her. She is suspicious of any whites that come in her
vicinity and is ready to believe that any white person is prejudiced
against her on account of race."
The Negro welfare worker for this unit suggested that what might seem
supersensitiveness was often overzealousness on the part of girls who have
not had experience enough to judge their limitations or qualifications.
Being eager to succeed, they are very much disappointed when advancement
does not reward their efforts: "I think the best type of colored girl
we have in business is very ambitious. This is her first opportunity,
and she feels that she is really a pioneer making history for her race.
She is possibly a little overzealous, but can be made to get the right
attitude and accept it all very gracefully."
Another characteristic of Negro girls, in the opinion of the employment
manager, was an "excitable nature" which made it possible for a good
leader to influence them readily:
They complain of a change of supervisors, for instance. You
attempt to shift supervisors from one point of the office to
another and you immediately receive a petition signed by all
the girls, saying, "We love So-and-So, and please don't change
her." This is not to be criticized too harshly, but it does
represent something that does go on. It shows inexperience. The
white girl would expect that those things would take place.
The colored girl, not having been in the office very long,
would feel that the fact that the supervisor was changed was
something derogatory to the supervisor.
The whites didn't want to act as instructors, and the colored
girls didn't want to receive instructions from the whites. By
being very careful in the girls that were selected, and showing
the white girls where they were wrong, and then attempting to
show the colored people that these girls were not to exercise
supervision, but were merely to be instructors, both sides
came to an understanding on it, and we had pretty good results.
The white girls that we had over there became very used to it
and usually hated to leave, but we have always insisted that
they leave as soon as the girls learned the work.
During the conference on Negro women in industry the representative of
this mail-order establishment was asked why the Negro workers were put
into a separate unit instead of being intermingled with white girls. He
answered:
The first reason is that we haven't any room. The second is,
I imagine, because the officials who started the office and
who have carried it on since felt that it wouldn't be policy.
We haven't discussed the question because we've never had
occasion to consider such a move seriously. Our main office
is not large enough to accommodate any more employees than
we have white employees in the house. We keep that office
constantly recruited up to its present strength, and there has
never been any necessity or any reason to seriously consider
bringing colored girls in with the white girls....
Another thing to consider there would be the type of girl that
we employ. They are all young girls, mostly under twenty-five
years, and they don't think for themselves; they are influenced
very easily by what other girls say. You take one girl in an
office of that size who was very anti-colored, and it wouldn't
be very long until her sentiment would spread and pretty soon
you'd have a strong sentiment against the colored girls.
If a colored girl should want to obtain employment in that
part of our concern where we now employ all white girls, even
if she were very competent she would undoubtedly have some
trouble in securing employment in that department.
The result of the experiment with the colored unit, he said, was highly
satisfactory: "We have been very favorably impressed.... The girls have
made very rapid progress, in fact they surprised all of us. Their progress
along lines of leadership, as supervisors, etc., has been remarkable."
About six weeks after this conference the colored unit was closed. The
reasons given were lack of business, trouble with the lessor of the
office, and failure to find another convenient location. A letter of
recommendation was given to each employee showing that her service had
been satisfactory, and a letter was also sent to the Urban League, through
which the women had been employed, explaining why it had been necessary
to close the office and emphasizing the fact that this action should not
be considered in any sense a reflection upon the Negro workers employed.
The other mail-order house opened a unit for Negro women in the fall
of 1918, with 650 women who worked until the end of the "fall rush" in
January, 1919. In the following fall the unit was again opened, with
1,050 Negro women; and the office was still in operation in 1920. This
office was just outside the "Loop" district. The sudden influx of Negro
girls there caused complaints by the local restaurants, fearing the loss
of old patrons in handling this new business. The company then installed
an "at cost" cafeteria service. The work of these girls was clerical,
billing, labeling, addressing, etc. Considering their inexperience,
their service has been highly satisfactory. The employment manager said:
"It's not a defect in their minds, it's a defect in the country. They
haven't had the opportunity to gain the education and experience needed
for responsibility; the Negro girl is equal to the Italian or Bohemian
in working ability and superior for executive work, such as instructing
or supervising." Among 143 girls interviewed in the entry offices of
these two mail-order houses only three expressed dissatisfaction with
the conditions of work. The girls seemed to take pride in the fact that
they had succeeded in "making good" in a new and attractive field of work.
The experiment of the establishment manufacturing automobile spring
cushions had a very modest beginning. A factory was rented in the Negro
residential area on the South Side, and twenty machines were installed
to test out Negro women as sewing-machine operators. Gradually the
number increased to 120 in this plant, and a second plant was opened in
the same vicinity with about the same number of operators. During the
year 1919-20 there were 250 Negro women employed as machine operators
in these two plants. The superintendent considered that they required
less supervision than the white workers in the company's other shops
and rated them equal to white workers in efficiency. "We could take our
best white girl and our best colored girl, and they earn about the same
amount of money on piecework rates, in the same number of hours."
The superintendent of the wholesale millinery establishment represented
in conference considered that the employment of Negro women in that
industry had outgrown the experimental stage. Although a long period
of training is necessary in order to become a skilled milliner (four
years for hand sewers, eight years for machine operators), Negro women
were keen to learn the trade and willing to accept the low wages paid
to beginners. Of the forty-seven Negro women employed on the day of the
investigator's visit, thirty-three received less than $12.00 a week
and forty-two received less than $15.00 a week. These women were all
employed as hand sewers, and in the opinion of the superintendent they
had done "just as well as the white. They learn as quickly and are as
persevering, and in every respect equal to the whites as far as their
work is concerned. We are absolutely satisfied with their work."
Other industries in which Negro women are engaged in considerable
numbers include laundering, the manufacture of clothing, lamp shades,
gas mantles, paper boxes, barrels, and cheese making. An investigator
from the Commission visited establishments employing Negro women in each
of these industries.