African American History: Sharecropping to Black Power

Sharecropping as Economic Bondage

The sharecropping system was established to allow formerly enslaved African Americans to claim a share of the economic value of their own labor by cultivating a plot of land in exchange for a portion of the harvest. It would eventually become its own version of slavery, and because so many people were drawn into this form of land lease, it had a profoundly negative effect on the lives of African Americans in the post-Civil War era (Billingsley, 1992). African Americans were most often not landowners themselves, and they worked portions of the land in order to keep a share of the profits. White landowners saw sharecropping as an excellent way to obtain extremely cheap labor, nearly identical to what had existed during the era of slavery (Billingsley, 1992). Black sharecroppers became dependent on the property to sustain themselves and their families, and were frequently vulnerable to the demands of white landowners. Sharecropping thus became a new form of slavery — African American workers were not legally held in bondage, but they were financially and emotionally tied and obligated to work the land they occupied (Billingsley, 1992). Society at large was either unable or unwilling to recognize that sharecropping was becoming a new form of servitude for African Americans until tens of thousands had already been drawn into the system.

Many African Americans preferred sharecropping to wage labor because they saw themselves as independent — free from the structured, biased economic and social systems of the South. Even though the Civil War was over and slavery had been abolished, African Americans faced an extremely difficult climb in southern society (Billingsley, 1992). They were still regarded as second class, and while they could no longer be legally enslaved, white land and plantation owners were reluctant to pay African Americans a fair wage, if they were hired at all. Sharecropping was viewed, quite idealistically, as a way for African Americans to control their own destiny through hard work. They believed they would be rewarded for working the fields for themselves, but often found that they had become, in effect, a type of non-wage laborer bound to their landowners. They also frequently found themselves further indebted to landowners, particularly after a season that had not yielded a profitable crop. This form of financial bondage affected thousands of African Americans across the South immediately after the Civil War and well into the twentieth century (Billingsley, 1992).

To make matters worse, the few African Americans who did own land after the Civil War often created similar sharecropping arrangements, in which other African Americans trusted them to help build a manageable future. Many African American landowners took advantage of the system to secure cheap laborers who became financially invested in and tied to the land they leased. Sharecropping therefore contributed significantly to the slowing of the economic recovery of African Americans affected by slavery earlier in the nineteenth century.

Cited: Billingsley, Andrew. (1992). Climbing Jacob's Ladder: The Enduring Legacy of African-American Families. Simon and Schuster: New York, NY.

The Great Migration, 1914–1929

A large African American population migration occurred between 1914 and the onset of the Great Depression (Sernett, 1997). This Great Migration saw millions of people move from southern states — traditionally the home of enslaved African Americans — to northern states where working, social, and cultural conditions were more favorable. Two draws were particularly important: the growth of labor unions and the promise of fairer treatment from neighbors. Urban centers also gave African Americans the opportunity to build community, whereas southern cities and states had often been actively hostile to the formation of African American organizations (Sernett, 1997).

Labor unions, which promised to desegregate working conditions and offer fair pay and benefits, were a major factor in the Great Migration. Northern industrial states such as Ohio, Michigan, and Illinois received the largest share of migrants, who numbered more than four million over the course of nearly two decades (Sernett, 1997). Because African Americans had so often been victims of wage fraud or had found themselves bound to white landowners through sharecropping, the promise of union-backed, steady employment was enormously appealing.

The cultural environment in the North was also different. Because northern states were not steeped in the culture and traditions of slavery, and therefore did not carry the same institutionalized bias against African Americans, Black migrants found it far easier to navigate socially, and the opportunities for class mobility were considerably greater (Sernett, 1997). This desire for upward mobility — following nearly fifty years of stagnation during the post-Civil War recovery era — created an environment in which African Americans were eager for a fair chance at success. They were also drawn to large urban centers because they could form inclusive, supportive communities with others who shared their experiences (Sernett, 1997). The combination of social and economic opportunity drew millions to cities like Detroit, Chicago, and Dayton, where technological and industrial development was creating abundant employment.

The Great Migration was not entirely free of negative consequences, however. As millions arrived in northern cities, white residents and established immigrants were often hostile to the new and very large African American presence (Sernett, 1997). Riots, lynchings, and beatings occurred in northern cities, and African Americans frequently found themselves unable to gain acceptance wherever they settled. The racial backlash was less severe than the tension they had faced in the South, but it nonetheless had a profound impact on race relations for decades to come.

The New Negro Movement, Garvey, and the Harlem Renaissance

Cited: Sernett, Milton C. (1997). Bound for the Promised Land: African American Religion and the Great Migration. Duke University Press: Durham, NC.

The New Negro movement emerged when African Americans collectively decided to resist racial segregation and bias by creating their own media and social networks (Locke, 1997). The Harlem Renaissance directly followed landmark legal and political setbacks such as Plessy v. Ferguson and the Compromise of 1877, both of which effectively erased many of the gains African Americans had achieved during Reconstruction (Locke, 1997). The Renaissance included the founding of the first African American newspaper, The Voice, and the first African American advocacy organization, the Liberty League (Locke, 1997). Hubert Harrison founded the League as a militant response to the anti-Black sentiment that was widespread at the time. Many of the movement's accomplishments occurred around or after World War I, when the nation was redefining itself both domestically and internationally (Locke, 1997). The movement coincided with the beginning of the Great Migration and likely provided vital cultural support to African Americans who found themselves adrift in northern cities, particularly in the Harlem neighborhood of New York. The Renaissance represented a rebirth of African American pride and culture, and jazz — one of the most influential musical forms in American history — also emerged from this period (Locke, 1997).

The hope generated by the New Negro movement, which had its roots in the late 1800s, persisted throughout the Harlem Renaissance and into the racial and class struggles of the 1920s (Locke, 1997). Marcus Garvey was an outspoken cultural advocate during both the New Negro movement and the Harlem Renaissance. He helped pioneer a renewed focus on Africa — a philosophy known as Garveyism — which gave African Americans a sense of pride and a common heritage they could identify with. Garvey went on to found the Universal Negro Improvement Association and African Communities League (UNIA-ACL) (Locke, 1997). The UNIA-ACL advocated peaceful expansion and recognition of African American culture and its roots in Africa, and it helped pave the way for more assertive African American advocacy groups that emerged during the Harlem Renaissance. The organization also had affiliated companies and corporations, giving African Americans greater cultural, economic, and political representation. Garvey was a crucial figure in uniting African Americans around the goal of improving their cultural and social conditions within the United States.

In summary, the New Negro movement represented a broad hopefulness that African American culture and society could flourish in the post-slavery era. Garvey played a major role in culturally establishing the African American agenda of upward social mobility and desegregation (Locke, 1997). The Harlem Renaissance, more limited in scope, took place during the 1920s and 1930s and represented a flowering of African American intellectual and cultural life. All three phenomena are connected in that they each helped legitimize the African American struggle for cultural independence and recognition, and all three found their most concentrated expression in New York City — the destination of enormous numbers of migrants and the nation's foremost urban cultural arena.