
Def
inition Essays on
RacismBy the 1930s a few judicial decisions began to nibble at the edifice of racial segregation, and both the Great Depression and the New Deal policies exercised a certa
in level
ing effect between poor whites and poor Negroes. Migration outside the South cont
inued, if only
in search of nondiscrim
inatory relief. However, it took World War II to unleash forces powerful enough to underm
ine the racial status quo. Negro migration to the large
industrial centers of the North, the Great Lakes, and as far as the West Coast greatly accelerated dur
ing the war and cont
inued thereafter. By 1960 only 61 per cent of Negroes were liv
ing
in the South and only 21 per cent of the southern population were Negro. More servicemen than ever before fought and lived abroad, albeit
in a Jim Crow army, and came
in contact with societies
in which racial bigotry did not exist. The strong
incentive not to waste manpower motivated the establishment of Fair Employment Practices Commissions and opened up new occupational opportunities for Negroes.
Racism, of course, was far from dead, as shown by the wartime
internment of United States citizens of Japanese descent condoned by Frankl
in D. Roosevelt.