The Justice for Black Farmers Act, introduced into Congress this year aims to address the history of discrimination in federal agricultural policy. This Act represents a social phenomenon where Black farmers have lost land throughout history due to histories of racial discrimination, Jim Crow policies, and discriminatory lending practices. This Act aims to provide debt relief and create a land program to encourage Black farmers and protect remaining Black farmers from further land loss. To truly understand the significance of this Act and its relationship to rural America, we have to take a look at the rural landscape and delve deeper into the historical roots of slavery and Black land ownership.
Forty-six million people are currently living in rural America, comprising 14% of the U.S. population. This population is also associated with a large swath of land, 97% of the nation's territory. Compared with their metropolitan counterparts, non-metropolitan economies depend more on agriculture, with the industry accounting for nearly 17 percent of employment in rural areas according to the Center on American Progress. Agriculture can play a key role in the rural economy contributing to about 5% of the GDP. Embedded within the agriculture sector is a racial hierarchy that led to the Black land loss, and which motivated attempts to remedy it.
Rural communities are home to people of color who can often be erased from the dominant narrative of rural America. Understanding the history of some of these communities can help address harm and bring equity to these areas. Focusing on Black farmers specifically within the Black Belt, demonstrates how discussing spatiality and geography as a component of identity can be useful in determining how to shape our understanding of rural America and the people of color within it.
The Black Belt is a region located in the Southern United States. It includes around 623 counties from Alabama, Arkansas, Florida, Georgia, Louisiana, and Mississippi to North Carolina, Tennessee, Texas, and Virginia. According to the Black Farmers Network, the older meaning of the term comes from the 1820s and 30s when it used to mean the rich dark soil in which white settlers planted cotton and built plantations.
First used to designate a part of the country that was distinguished by the color of the soil, the term has now come to refer to the large number of Black people who were enslaved there. Since the valuable, fertile land was controlled by rich whites, it was a source of Black slave labor who worked the land. Enslaved people then became the majority of the population over the course of the 19th century when more than 1 million enslaved people were transported and sold to the Southern states. In 1970, the US' first census recorded the Black population as around 760,000 people and by the time the Civil War started in 1861 the population had reached 4.4 million. Black free people only made up about 2% of this population. Slavery continued to be the dominant status for Black people in the Black Belt until the Emancipation Proclamation when formalized slavery became transformed into de facto racial codes.
Black land ownership peaked in 1910 when Black people accessed 16 to 19 million acres of land. The number of Black farmers also peaked at this time with nearly 1 million producers on Black-operated farms according to the same source above. However, these numbers soon began to decline. However, after the 13th Amendment "officially" ended slavery, the extension of it remained in the form of Jim Crow and Black codes continued to reinforce white power over the land. This prevented the accumulation and transfer of intergenerational wealth. According to Inequality.org, Black people, today, make up 13% of the U.S. population but only own 1% of rural land, a striking inequality.
Black land loss is important in understanding why geography matters. Racism has fueled Black land loss. This has taken the form of limited access to capital because of discriminatory lending practices, redlining, gentrification, lack of legal wills that can facilitate property transfers, federal policies that excluded Black people from land purchases such as the Homestead Act, and more. "Farming in the United States is enmeshed with both racism and capitalism in a way that has had a profound impact on who owns, accesses and benefits from farmland" according to Megan Horst, writing on Eater. As of 2021, just about 1.4% of farmers identify as Black compared to 14% in the 1900s.
The effects of the Black Belt slave economy are still felt by people of color who reside there. Formalized slavery has been transformed into substandard housing and education as well as poverty. According to the University of Alabama's report on Poverty, Housing & GDP in Alabama's Black Belt, all 25 Black Belt counties are among the top 35 counties with the highest poverty rate in the state. Black Belt counties have a poverty rate of around 30% while non-Black Belt counties have a poverty rate of 14% a significant disparity according to the same report.
To address the issues that those in the Black Belt face, and issues that Black farmers in rural America face, it is important to consider spatiality and geography. After all, Black people were enslaved and brought to the United States to grow the economy of the Deep South. Discussing rurality thus necessitates discussion of the economy, agriculture, and history.
In recent years, in the judicial and legislative scene, there has been some attempt at repair. The 1999 civil rights case Pigford v. Glickman resulted in a settlement of $1.15 billion in damages to thousands of Black farmers including those from the Black Belt. Black farmers alleged racial discrimination in farm loan assistance and allocation in their complaint. Ultimately, we need to repair the ongoing harms associated with our deep-seated history of slavery and colonialism. We need to ensure that Black farmers can access economic opportunities to build their families and livelihoods.
2 comments:
Thank you so much for your insightful post. I had never heard the term "Black Belt" before but understanding the history of it as I do now, the name is fitting. While reading your post, I couldn't help but think of the week we talked about land grant universities and stealing land from Native Americans. This, to me, is another reminder that all American land is stolen (and in the case of the Black Belt, stolen twice).
I would be interested to hear what you would think of a sort of land back program for Black Americans. Do you think this might encroach on the land back movement for Native Americans or is there an equitable solution for both?
Thank you for writing about this. I had also never heard of the term “Black Belt.” I have read recently about the role of property law in perpetuating dynastic systems of land management. Ann Eisenberg recently wrote about how “a de facto system of racial apartheid remains entrenched in most aspects of American life” when discussing housing and land issues. I see that so clearly in the history you’ve just outlined. I wonder about the role of reparations in paying back a loss we can barely quantify.
Post a Comment