Jonathan Small, OCPAThink.org
Remembrances of the Tulsa Race Bloodbath have targeted largely —and understandably — on the tragic and pointless lack of life and property. However Oklahomans shouldn’t ignore different classes supplied by the rise and resurrection of “Black Wall Road,” Tulsa’s Greenwood district.
Too many observers gloss over the truth that a middle of wealth and commerce was a black group in a state the place Jim Crow legal guidelines have been nonetheless enforced—at instances, brutally so. How may this be so? As a result of the facility of free markets is usually better than even the facility of true systemic oppression.
By 1921, the Greenwood district coated 35 blocks and was residence to not less than 200 black-owned companies, though some officers consider the precise variety of companies might have been nearer to 600.
The worth of these properties and companies was equal to not less than $22 million in present {dollars}, primarily based on insurance coverage claims filed after the neighborhood was destroyed by white mobs. Once more, that determine seemingly understates the wealth accrued by Greenwood residents.
These companies arose as a result of free black women and men, regardless of the boundaries created by Jim Crow legal guidelines and racist attitudes, have been capable of work arduous, make investments, and develop companies and job alternatives. The alternatives created by their efforts within the market allowed great financial progress regardless of racist opposition.
True, racism created boundaries. However racism couldn’t overcome market forces and particular person initiative. If white-owned companies wouldn’t serve black clients, black-owned companies rapidly sprang as much as fill the void, and nice fortunes have been made within the course of. Black women and men have been capable of take pleasure in a lifetime of prosperity beforehand unimaginable inside the dwelling reminiscence of a few of these people or their members of the family who had been slaves.
The alternatives supplied by {the marketplace} additionally performed a task in Greenwood’s resurrection. Whereas the group was diminished to rubble by the Tulsa Race Bloodbath, it didn’t keep that manner. Residents rapidly rebuilt.
The rebuilding occurred despite the fact that, as The Wall Road Journal just lately famous, there “was little or no authorities help.” It additionally occurred regardless of insurers refusing to cowl the losses skilled by enterprise and householders.
How did African People rebuild their group? By utilizing their property as collateral to safe short-term mortgages. These bets on the long run paid off. By 1940, the homeownership fee in Tulsa’s African American group was 49 p.c, a greater fee than the 45 p.c achieved by whites at the moment.
The Tulsa Race Bloodbath is rightly remembered as a horrible act of racism and terrorism. However the resilience of the Greenwood group shouldn’t be overshadowed within the retelling, nor ought to the function {that a} free market and particular person initiative performed in producing alternative and prosperity.
The free-market forces that allowed blacks to construct — and rebuild — a group of great prosperity in 1921 stay viable right this moment.
Oklahoma policymakers ought to take be aware.
Be aware: Jonathan Small is president on the Oklahoma Council of Public Affairs in Oklahoma Metropolis. This essay first appeared at their web site. Small’s observations about public coverage seem sometimes in The Metropolis Sentinel newspaper’s print version, and sometimes on CapitolBeatOK.com, an impartial, non-partisan information service.
