The Complexites of Jim Crow
halcombe
Black Belt' (1941 pp277-80) in a law textbook, of all things, years
before I had any interest in US history.
Whereas the general tendency seems to be to simplify the experience of
Jim Crow for the popular reader, evidently a good part of the point of
the system lay in the intrinsically pointless differences from county
to county, as a means of keeping the Negro in his place 'literally' -
if he had the temerity to travel, even around his own state, he'd be
in a constant state of doubt as to the local customs.
[Some of the locations are puzzling - is any part of North Carolina or
Oklahoma in the 'Black Belt'? I thought it was pretty narrowly defined
according to soil type to areas in Alabama and Mississippi.]
************************************
"The two universally tabooed practices are intermarriage and
inter-dancing. Interdining is generally prohibited in all counties,
but occurs in minor instances in some. The exceptions are more
significant in some than in other areas. In one county eating together
is tolerated for a few at school exercises, in another county when
whites are invited to a barbecue. Whites and Negroes play games
together in semiprofessional baseball practice in Greene County,
Georgia, and at dice in Bolivar County, Mississippi. Young children
play together in any area, older ones occasionally in Macon County,
Alabama, and Davidson County, Tennessee. Whites use 'Mr' and 'Mrs'
only when as salesmen they are selling goods.Salesmen and department
store clerks in Madison County, Alabama, selectively employ the titles
when making sales or seeking patronage. The terms employed when titles
are not used are 'boy', 'John', 'Aunt', or 'Uncle'. Teachers and
well-to-do Negro farmers and businessmen in Bolivar are sometimes
addressed by their last names.
The exceptions in the case of entering white homes by the front door
are business and professional calls, and when a Negro knows a white
person personally. The practice depends upon the individual white man.
Negroes and whites occasionally shake hands under a variety of
conditions; when a salesman is trying to sell goods, when a former
employer meets a respected Negro who has worked for him, when whites
are attending public programs or meetings of Negroes, and occasionally
on the streets. The white man makes the first approach.
The following are, in general the rules of racial etiquette in the
eight countries studied as typical of the rural South.
(1) Negroes many never marry whites in any of the countries studied.
(2) Negroes may never dance with whites in any of the counties
studied.
(3) Negroes must always use 'Mr' and 'Mrs' when addressing whites in
all counties.
(4) Negroes never drink with whites in Madison and Shelby [TN or
AL?] counties except occasionally among the lower classes.
(5) Negroes never enter white people's houses by the front door in
Coahoma [MS] and Johnston [OK or NC].
(6) Negroes drink with whites sometimes in Bolivar, Coahoma,
Davidson, Greene, Johnston and Macon.
(7) Negroes and whites shake hands sometimes in all counties.
(8) Negroes enter white people's houses by the front door sometimes
in Bolivar, Davidson, Greene, Madison and Shelby.
(9) Whites use 'Mr' and 'Mrs' sometimes in Davidson, Greene, and
Madison when addressing Negroes.
(10) Whites and Negroes play games together sometimes in Bolivar,
Davidson and Madison.
(11) Negroes can try on gloves in all stores in Bolivar, Davidson,
Johnston and Macon, and in no stores in Greene.
(12) Negroes must occupy a separate section white being waited on in
all stores in Coahoma, Macon and Madison; in some stores in Davidson,
Greene, Johnston and Shelby; and in no stores in Bolivar.
(13) Negroes use hotels with whites in none of the counties.
(14) Negroes and whites worship together sometimes in Coahoma,
Davidson, Greene, Macon and Madison; never in Bolivar, Johnston and
Shelby.
(15) Negroes drink with whites in drug and liquor stores in Coahoma;
at beer 'joints' in Bolivar; when each party is about half drunk from
whisky in Greene; and among the lower classes occasionally in all
counties."
[Numbering added]
James Nevels
wrote:
>I came across this passage from Charles Johnson's 'Growing Up in the
>Black Belt' (1941 pp277-80) in a law textbook, of all things, years
>before I had any interest in US history.
>
>Whereas the general tendency seems to be to simplify the experience of
>Jim Crow for the popular reader, evidently a good part of the point of
>the system lay in the intrinsically pointless differences from county
>to county, as a means of keeping the Negro in his place 'literally' -
>if he had the temerity to travel, even around his own state, he'd be
>in a constant state of doubt as to the local customs.
>
>[Some of the locations are puzzling - is any part of North Carolina or
>Oklahoma in the 'Black Belt'? I thought it was pretty narrowly defined
>according to soil type to areas in Alabama and Mississippi.]
I was. The soil in those areas is gray-black. Very fertile.
>************************************
>
>
>
>"The two universally tabooed practices are intermarriage and
>inter-dancing. Interdining is generally prohibited in all counties,
>but occurs in minor instances in some. The exceptions are more
>significant in some than in other areas. In one county eating together
>is tolerated for a few at school exercises, in another county when
>whites are invited to a barbecue. Whites and Negroes play games
>together in semiprofessional baseball practice in Greene County,
>Georgia, and at dice in Bolivar County, Mississippi. Young children
>play together in any area, older ones occasionally in Macon County,
>Alabama, and Davidson County, Tennessee. Whites use 'Mr' and 'Mrs'
>only when as salesmen they are selling goods.Salesmen and department
>store clerks in Madison County, Alabama, selectively employ the titles
>when making sales or seeking patronage. The terms employed when titles
>are not used are 'boy', 'John', 'Aunt', or 'Uncle'. Teachers and
>well-to-do Negro farmers and businessmen in Bolivar are sometimes
>addressed by their last names.
I have no knowledge of these counties you mention. But if all of this
racial comradery was true then it would have been what the rest of the
South would have termed "a nest of white trash".
I do know that a Negro doctor was addressed as Doctor.
I recently read a book by Jerrold Packard: "American Nightmare: The
History of Jim Crow". It was fairly good if you consider the author
must be black. He did mention one aspect that is overlooked when
it came to titles. As is well known the whites addressed blacks as
"boy" or "girl" if they were under 50 and "Aunt" and "Uncle" if older.
But if a black was a teacher he would become a "professor". A
professor bewing a teacher of anything from pool sharking to
mathmatics.
The best all round book on the subject of Jim Crow is "The Strange
Career of Jim Crow" by Comer Vann Woodward.
It was written in the 1970s and is a very even handed truth to the
subject. Woodward recognises it was needed.
Did you by any chanch know that Jim Crow typoe laws were enacted in
the North 80 years before they were in the South ? In the South
blacks and whites lived far closer together than in the north.
Here is a good summation of Woodward's book:
http://www.bedfordstmartins.com/usingseries/hovey/smith.htm
Just a snippet:
".....Woodward argued that segregation was not deeply rooted in
southern history but rather was a modern innovation of the New South,
one which replaced a postwar environment characterized more by
relative fluidity than by rigid separation in racial relations....."
JN
David McDuffee
> As is well known the whites addressed blacks as "boy" or "girl" if
> they were under 50 and "Aunt" and "Uncle" if older.
I spent some time in Georgia as a child, and both addressed and
referred to most of the adults in the neighborhood as "Aunt [first
name]" or "Uncle [first name]". My friends both addressed and
referred to my parents the same way. I don't know how widespread the
practice was; it didn't seem to be customary in any other state in
which I've lived. Some adults in the neighborhood were still "Mr."
and "Mrs."; the "Aunt" and "Uncle" seems to have been reserved for
those with whom our family had closer friendships. The next
door neighbors were "Aunt Hazel" and "Uncle Norman" while the neighbor
across the street was "Mrs. Pendley".
The adults would refer to "Aunt Gladys" or "Uncle Perry" when speaking
to us children, but simply used their names (both to reference and to
address) when speaking with another adult.
--
David McDuffee
mcdu...@best.com