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Full resolution (TIFF) - On this page / på denna sida - VIII. Social Stratification - 31. Caste and Class - 3. The Caste Struggle
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678 An American Dilemma
for all the minor caste violations which have aroused the whites, and he becomes a
warning against future violations. After such an outburst, the Negroes again abide
strictly by the caste rules, the enmity of the whites is dispelled, and the tension
relaxes. The whites always say after such an outburst: “We haven’t had any trouble
since then.”^®
In the North, a large proportion of the white population would never
discriminate against Negroes, and there is a small number who stand up
against violation of the Negro’s rights even if the matter does not concern
them personally. Since such friends of the Negroes are not ostracized, and
are in fact looked up to as ^^fighters,” the color line may be said to be broken
at spots in the North. Further, as seen in the previous chapter, the color
line in the North is not a part of the law or of the structure of buildings
and so does not have the concre eness that it has in the South. But still there
is a color line in the North: most white individuals and groups discriminate
in one way if not in another; all feel a difference between themselves and
Negroes even if the feeling is only that Negroes labor under a different
history, different conditions, and a different problem, and no Negro can
legitimately pass out of the Negro group. A crisis brings out the character
of the color line in the North more distinctly: An example is provided by
a struggle around a Negro housing project in Detroit that culminated in a
minor riot in early 1942. The federal government (U.S.H.A.) built a
housing project for Negro defense workers in Detroit and named it after
the Negro poet, Sojourner Truth. The project was built in a mixed white
and Negro neighborhood, and as the project neared completion the local
whites—aided by the Ku Klux Klan—^picketed the city hall in protest
against Negro occupancy. The congressman for the district joined in the
protest; the federal authorities temporarily abandoned the idea of giving
the project to Negroes but later went back to their original intention. When
Negroes tried to enter the homes for which they had paid rent, they were
prevented from doing so by a white mob that used violence, and the Detroit
police aided the mob and arrested Negroes. On the other hand, there was
a nation-wide protest against this treatment of the Negroes, and even the
common man of other Northern cities and towns could be heard to say
that it was ^^pretty bad” when the police were beating Negroes and prevent-
ing them from moving into homes built for them. Public opinion helped
to stiffen the backs of the federal authorities who, without this new and
powerful backing, would probably have bowed to local sentiment. The
caste line in the North exists, but has gaps.
The mechanism of the caste struggle in the South can be illuminated by
observing more closely what happens when a person breaks caste solidarity.
On the white side this exceptional person is called the ^^nigger lover.” To
be known by this characterization means social and economic death. Except
for legal differences, such a person is virtually dealt with as a traitor in
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