Redlining Outline

Beginning in the 1890’s Jim Crow laws or also known as the color-line was put into effect in the Southern states. These laws restricted the rights of blacks and segregation from the white population. These laws were put into effect as partially a result of the reaction of the whites to blacks not submitting to segregation of railroads, streetcars, and other public facilities. African Americans Ids B. Wells, Booker T. Washington, and W.E.B Dubois had differing opinions on the color-line. Wells and Dubois felt the color-line created prejudice toward blacks and that the black population could not become equal with the whites under such conditions. On the other hand, Booker T. Washington thought the laws were a good compromise between the

Under the Mississippi Black Code of 1867, all freed blacks were given the right to be employed, to have their own property and to be taught how to read and write. As you’re seeing, the law had constant government support to ensure equal rights to everybody regardless of the color of their skin. The rights the code granted were denied to them before the Civil War. Despite the grant of certain rights, the Mississippi Black Code also imposed restrictions against the newly freed blacks which constituted denial of basic rights. The code was a reflection of the powerful views in the Southern states. Northerners said these codes as a "Revival of slavery in “. In spite of the abolition of slavery and the amendments to the constitution, the Southern states wanted the racism to continue even during the period of

Access to resources has been historically constrained in the U.S. on the basis of ethnicity, race and most recently class. This differential access to resources is a result of overt structural forces that create barriers to employment, housing, education and neighborhood investment. The political policy of “redlining” is a great example of how public policy can affect access to resources. This policy selectively avoided giving mortgages to individuals living in predominantly Black

Wilson (2011) research proves that the Federal Housing Administration (FHA), contributed to the early decay of inner city neighborhoods by withholding mortgage capital and making it difficult for these areas to retain or attract families who were able to purchase their own homes. As the federal government created this program it excluded certain inner city neighborhoods. This exclusion created “redlining” which assessed primarily on racial composition. People who wanted to get out of public housing and purchase a home in a redlined neighborhood were denied proper mortgages, even if they had sufficient funds. Wilson (2011) says that such restrictions such redlining restricted many opportunities for building or even maintaining quality housing in the inner city, which in many ways set the stage for urban blight that many Americans now associate with black neighborhoods. Policies like this one were created to make blacks stay in the inner city

It was defined as “ Practice of banks or insurance companies to provide no loans or coverage for people, property, or businesses located in neighborhoods that are declining or deemed too risky for the financial commitment. “ (Yang. 178) “The government also set up a national neighborhood appraisal system that explicitly tied mortgage eligibility to race. Integrated and minority communities were ipso facto deemed a financial risk and made ineligible for low-cost home loans, a policy known today as ‘redlining.’” (The Power of an Illusion, "The House We Live In”)

During the early 1900’s, Louisville attempted to segregate by creating regulations that kept Caucasian people from moving into a neighborhood where most of the minority races were already living and visa versa. They did not want for the races to mix so they created these laws which were ruled unconstitutional by the Supreme Court trial “Buchanan v. Warley”(Broken Sidewalk). This also occurred in other cities but none were as prominent as the commotion created by Louisville. Because of the ruling of the Supreme Court, zonings were created where race was not able to be a reason for granting or denying the right to a house. There were still some places that were denying the sale of houses to blacks because they were in a “restricted housing covenant”. These were ruled unconstitutional by the Supreme Court in 1948, however, they still affected the lives and home sales of these houses that were considered “restricted”. Despite all these efforts, the neighborhoods were still heavily segregated socially and economically. People would only live with others of their same socioeconomic class which president Nixon saw as a big problem. He decided to take action in 1968 when he appointed George Romney the head of Housing and Urban development. George Romney was the governor for Michigan, and he strongly endorsed open housing and the integration of neighborhoods. Romney helped change the demographic of housing across the entire United

It was 1947, eight years before Mississippi lynched Emmett Till. The Great Migration was a mass exodus of six million African Americans out of the South that spanned most of the 20th century. Blacks did not journey north seeking better wages and work. Rather, they were fleeing the acquisitive warlords of the South. They were seeking the protection of the law. From the 1930-60s Blacks across the country had no access to legitimate home mortgages. This happened through means both legal and extralegal. In 1935, the Federal Home Loan Bank Board (FHLBB) asked Home Owners ' Loan Corporation (HOLC) to look at 239 cities and create "residential security maps." The purpose was to show the level of security for real-estate investments in each city. The resulting redlining caused a large increase in residential racial segregation and urban decay. Redlining denies services to residents of certain areas based on racial or ethnic criteria. John McKnight, a sociologist and community activist, coined the term in the late 1960s. The term comes from the practice of marking a red line on a map to delineate the area where banks would not invest. In addition to redlining, many Chicago Whites employed other measures to keep their neighborhoods segregated and to discourage non-white home buyers, including restrictive covenants and even bombings. Further, such local measures received broader support, including from a prominent national real estate

After the Civil War, following the Compromise of 1877 and the end of Reconstruction, the protection for the rights of African American ended if there was any. Southern States had moved to impose a system of segregation on nearly all areas of life. New laws that required segregation that stirred “separate but equal” doctrine that disenfranchise African Americans for almost six decades. It is hard in this days and age to be able to imagine segregation as a law, but the remnants just change form and name. A petition file on June 7, 1892, in the supreme court Louisiana by a local shoemaker named Homer Plessy against Honorable judge John H. Ferguson. His filling set a test case to challenge Separate Car Act that prompt Plessy v. Ferguson case perhaps one of the most noticeable actions to nullify “separate but equal” doctrine.

(https://www.britannica.com/event/Jim-Crow-law). “From the late 1870s, Southern state legislatures, no longer controlled by carpetbaggers and freedmen, passed laws requiring the separation of whites from “persons of colour”(https://www.britannica.com/event/Jim-Crow-law).

Much of the 20th century was plagued by a social barrier known as redlining. Redlining involves the denial of services by selectively altering prices in a certain area due to the racial or the ethnical make-up of the area. The most common form of redlining that is witnessed is the denial of financial services in the form of mortgages and loans. Other forms of redlining include health care firms and supermarkets. These two industries have tended to avoid areas where banks do not invest and this is in itself a form of redlining. The term ‘redlining’ was coined by a sociologist named John McKnight in the late 1960s who first described the term as the areas where banks would not invest. The definition has now shifted to discrimination to a certain

The ‘on-contract’ method of home led to “all the responsibilities of homeownership with all the disadvantages of renting—while offering the benefits of neither.” The white oppressors would give properties markups upwards of 230%. On top of which there was no insurance or equity for missed payments, which would lead to their later eviction. Upon being evicted a new cash cow black family would appear for the whites to reap. The Case for Reparations illustrates this point with: “85 percent of all black home buyers who bought in Chicago bought on contract.” as well as that the whites were getting rich, by noting “If anybody who is well established in this business in Chicago doesn’t earn $100,000 a year,” Then came the Redlining, a practice of “selectively granting loans and insisting that any property it insured be covered by a restrictive covenant—a clause in the deed forbidding the sale of the property to anyone other than whites.” This process, which effectively stopped blacks from buying houses “was not officially outlawed until 1968, by the Fair Housing

Redlining is a red line that are drawn on maps to designate neighborhoods too risky for loans; regardless of their credit says. White flight is when the white people would moved out of their neighborhood because blacks were moving in their suburbs which causes riots. Many of the realtors would not do businesses with blacks and many would have to pay a fee for it. FHA and VA made programs for the banks to follow making sure they don 't change or mixed racially neighborhoods. The FHA and VA only insured certain areas of neighborhoods. They also drew up restrictive sales barriers to nonwhites before the applied for FHA-insured financing.

Most African Americans were not able to get out of the homes that weren't well enough for a stable living and wanted to move out of the area. Back in the day, American banks used to draw maps redlining the areas in which they don’t want to lend cash to get out of those areas. In this case, this locked African Americans out of the American dream. Now, a more modern way to redline has popped-up which is called — Digital Redlining.

Redlining is a policy that impacted white privilege. About 70 years ago, the Federal Housing Administration played a significant role into the legalization of racism and segregation in the housing industry by denying mortgages based on race by practicing redlining. When red boundaries on a map were placed, these neighborhoods were those that financial institutions would not invest in (Loewen).

There was a time in the 1970’s when redlining was common. This means that financial institutions refused to give mortgages to low-income neighborhoods. This caused these neighborhoods to go down hill, making the poor people poorer, and the rich people richer. This issue was not fixed until the Home Mortgage Disclosure Act stopped banks from redlining.