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Full resolution (TIFF) - On this page / på denna sida - III. Population and Migration - 7. Population - 3. Summary
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1 66 An American Dilemma
ideas are wrong. In their reproduction American Negroes are like American
whites and show the same sort of differentials by regions and groups.
From 1790 to 1930 the proportion of Negroes in America decreased to
about a half of what it had been in the beginning of this period (Figure
i). But this was due, not to any peculiarities in reproduction, but to the
overweight of white immigration. The situation began to change during the
First World War and the ’twenties: the immigration of whites from
Europe fell until it was no longer significant. If there is no substantial
change in foreign immigration again, and if conditions affecting births and
deaths of both whites and Negroes remain about the same as they are now,
or change so that the effect on whites is similar to the effect on Negroes, it
is probable that the proportion of Negroes in the total population will rise
slowly. There was a rise of one-tenth of i per cent of the proportion of
Negroes in the total population during the ’thirties. This increase may con-
tinue and even become somewhat more marked, but not much. The main
reason for this is that Negroes are concentrated in the rural South where the
birth rate is generally very high.
If Negroes continue to migrate to Southern and Northern cities, the rate
of Negro reproduction will be lowered in relation to the white rate
—
although possibly not so much as in the past. If there were an economic
improvement among Negroes, which does not seem immediately likely,
it would seem probable that this would also tend to decrease fertility more
than mortality. The development of a social welfare policy, which seems
much more probable, would in all likelihood brake the fall in fertility as
well as decrease mortality. A mitigation of discrimination in the granting
of medical and other health advantages to Negroes, particularly if con-
comitant with a general improvement of these advantages for all poor
people, would have profound effects in reducing the large Negro death
rate and in raising Negro reproduction. The spread of birth control among
Negroes will decrease the rate of reproduction. Immigration of foreign-born
Negroes—which does not promise to become important—would increase
the Negro population, not only because it adds directly to their numbers,
but also because these immigrants seem to have a high fertility.
Of course, changes affecting the Negro population will not go on in
vacuoy and there will be similar changes in the white population—all of
which will affect the future proportion of Negroes in the total population
of the United States. A dominating factor will be the decline in fertility in
both population groups. Comparisons with other countries, as well as
between different groups in America, make it seem highly probable that
this decline will continue. But for several reasons which we have noted,
it is likely that, for a short time at least, the decline in the white birth rate
will be more rapid than the decline in the Negro birth rate.
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