Black Americans have to escape falling into this next level of permanent underclass status.
I started drafting this post back in October right when California deliberately did not pass the 2 reparations bills (Gov. Newsom in conjunction with The Black Caucus who are made up of Black American, Black African and Black Caribbean members—all and especially the Black American members who are NOT on code is a real problem; speaking of, watch out for Newsom when he more than likely will be running for President--remember his decisions he's made w/ Black Americans) and it just made me think of this permanent underclass. The Tulsa Massacre Survivors’ recent denial too.
I hadn’t heard of this term until a couple years back from Dr. Anderson. Hadn’t realized it was even stated in the film “Lean On Me” until this year.
When our ancestors were forced to enslavement in America, they were a completely free labor class that drove this country’s wealth and solidified this country’s power status globally. Post the “ending of slavery”, the free labor class of Black Americans became financially and socially obsolete to white America’s economic society. With no real way to eradicate all the millions of now free Black Americans or to have a “reverse transatlantic” transport of sending them out to other parts of the world, they became a nuisance to white society. To the people who ran America, Black Americans were no longer able to be extracted for their free labor and there was no need for them any longer.
As soon as Black Americans were freed or the idea of freedom was on the table, they weren't offered compensation of any kind -- not a mule, not a single acre. Instead, they were offered to be sent out of the country. One main proponent of this was none other than Abraham Lincoln. He consistently had this proposition to “send them to Africa”. Lincoln, “My first impulse would be to free all the slaves, and send them to Liberia, to their own native land.” (1854). Early in 1861, he secretly ordered an individual to investigate land in Chiriqui (now Panama) to support his plan. I’m just realizing, this “go back to Africa” diatribe has always been a thing for many white people, it’s not new by any stretch.
Mind you, those proposals were met with extreme disproval and rejection—our people absolutely was not with it. They built this country (some were already here way before colonization) and made it so that their survival under the most inhumane conditions was for themselves and later for us, their descendants, to reap all the benefits of their sacrifice—this was their native land, they were not leaving. They were not going to a continent they knew nothing about. In 1862, Lincoln was still on this resettlement and emigration tip, supporting Congressional bills to do so too: “…to be expended under the direction of the President of the United States, to aid in the colonization and settlement of such free persons of African descent now residing in said District, including those to be liberated by this act, as may desire to emigrate to the Republic of Haiti or Liberia, or such other country beyond the limits of the United States as the President may determine.” Unneeded and unwanted once “slavery ended”. Four days before his assassination, Lincoln also said, “I can hardly believe that the South and North can live in peace, unless we can get rid of the negroes…I believe that it would be better to export them all to some fertile country…” There was also simply a complete fear white people always held with Black Americans before slavery ended and then as newly freed and now, so removing our ancestors by any way was ideal for the dominant white society. Still is today.
The Chiriqui plan: “...the former slaves would work on a cotton plantation. Each family would receive homes and access to hospitals and schools. And after the end of their four-year work contracts, they would be given 16 acres of land and the wages they had earned over that period. Colonization was voluntary for former slaves but deeply encouraged by Lincoln, Kock and its many other proponents.” Another form of race-based slavery was Lincoln’s solution. Btw-none of these emigration proposals worked, all were total, catastrophic failures (particularly the Haiti proposition—around 450 Black Americans were sent and around 115 of them died under the harsh conditions there).
So once again, our people were the main source (the main producers) and only driving force of this country’s mass wealth and development otherwise there would not have been such huge efforts to force us out our own country we built once they no longer had the institutional backing of slavery.
Instead of retroactively compensating (endless hours of free & brutal labor, the use of their physical bodies for advancements of all kinds) the now free Black Americans, white America figured out a way to wipe them out. Instead of literal genocide (which lynchings are a form of genocide and lynchings only began to take place post the ending of slavery because enslavers didn’t murder their enslaved when slavery was law; you don’t kill your property that makes you money; the klu klux klan formed post the ending of slavery, not before it) and attempting to make due on reparative justice (reparations in the form of money and land that was stolen and promised), the idea to bring in other groups from outside of America came into play to undermine the newly freed Black Americans and what should’ve been reparative justice and progress and reconstruction and redress for the centuries of their free, brutal and deadly labor.
The response to the new freedom of the formerly enslaved Black Americans came the buffer class by way of the 1864 Immigration Act. It is no coincidence that act was right before 1865–even 1863 (which was supposed to be the official year of emancipation). America’s response to our emancipation—to remove who was once the largest demographic of the working class—Black Americans. It’s a pattern I’ve noticed with anything our ancestors have fought for and subsequently were victorious in…when we gain something, things are enacted following that victory to remind us that the minority-majority of society really doesn’t want to treat us as fellow humans. AND, Black Americans are always a permanent reminder of our country’s “original sin” and their ancestors’ involvement, participation and creation in that og sin. They don’t want to be reminded that slavery happened and that racism still exists, hence, why they prefer non-American Black and poc. Immigration policies have incentivized those immigrating to the country to directly further push Black Americans down the social hierarchy totem pole. So since they will never be able to expel us out by trying to banish us with non-incentives to emigrate elsewhere, they’ll use immigration to bring in immigrants to displace us.
“On August 14, 1862, Lincoln met at the White House delegation of Black leaders to make his case for the voluntary emigration of Black Americans to countries outside the U.S. “Your race suffer from living among us, while ours suffer from your presence… It is better for us both, therefore, to be separated,” Lincoln told the delegation.”
Here is where the conversation about "model minority" comes in (a notion many immigrants feed into as a token). When the white racists talking points about “Why do those who come from other countries do better than your people in so little of time” is injected into topics…this is why. When Black and non-white (and even white) immigrants regurgitate that same talking point about their vast and quick success by saying “My people had nothing when they came to America and are doing better than your people” while shaming us, this is why. Or peddling the “they/we work harder” or “they’re/we’re smarter” narrative. No. Working harder is what was abandoned when families fled their homelands to be able to work easier here. Working hard would’ve been to stay in your homeland and fight your own corrupt government and refusing to depart ways. All things Black Americans have done and do. Plus, there aren’t centuries of this history nor are there responses and reactive, harmful policy and ideas of this history that is tethered and affixed to your lineage. So yes, of course you do better in this country in comparison to the ones you abandoned. Leaders, presidents, departments, mayors, senators, policies, laws, governments and governors have never viewed your ancestors as constant reminders of chattel slavery therefore wanting nothing to do with them, so much so that they were highly suggesting to them to leave their homeland.
“It is disingenuous to equate Black Americans’ conditions with any other ethnic, religious or so-called disadvantaged minority. Blacks have a unique history in this country in that their status was predetermined by the dominant society’s national public policy on the use of Black Americans”. - Dr. Claud Anderson
1864 was a year before Black Americans in Texas even got word that they were no longer enslaved as a result of the Emancipation Proclamation, yet the Chinese and Irish were incentivized to immigrate to the country and immediately get paid for the alleged labor shortage to continue building the railroads (done by Black Americans first—unpaid). In 1847, The US helped the Irish during their famine—Voyage of Mercy. When your ancestors get reparations for their shorter-lived oppression or depression they faced, yes, you’ll do better because the federal government aided you in that. Even in more current times: (July 2024 article). NYC to spend millions on new round of pre-paid debit cards for immigrants. The Adams administration says another round of debit cards is expected to be distributed to more than 7,300 immigrants over the next six months, costing the city about $2.6 million. The move represents a major expansion of a pilot program that began earlier this year that doled out cards to about 3,000 immigrants. 2006: U.S. Government To Pay $492 Million To 17 American Indian Tribes; The Marshall Plan, On April 3, 1948, President Truman signed the Economic Recovery Act of 1948. It became known as the Marshall Plan, named for Secretary of State George Marshall, who in 1947 proposed that the United States provide economic assistance to restore the economic infrastructure of postwar Europe.
“From 1862 to 1986, the United States government ran a homestead program that gave 2,992,058 white settlers and European immigrants (both documented and undocumented) a minimum of 160 acres of land from the Mississippi River to the West coast of America, including the Alaskan territory. Authorized by the Homestead Act of 1862, this land giveaway program ended for all participating states in 1976 and ended for land awards in Alaska in 1986. White recipients in the land giveaway program were recruited through a widespread, government-sponsored advertising campaign in newspapers in America and Europe. The land was awarded to applicants who promised to live on it and develop the land for five years. Title to the property vested at the end of this five-year period. Congress passed additional laws in 1873 that allowed the government to award larger tracts of land to these white settlers and immigrants. A lot of the land grants included property that had timber rights, mineral rights, and oil and gas reserves, all of which the government eventually released to the land owners through various legislative enactments. In all, more than 270 million acres of valuable land -- about ten percent of the land area of the United States -- was given to white settlers and immigrants. The Homestead Act of 1862 was a 124-year-long, government-sponsored, wealth transfer program for a particular class of people -- white settlers and immigrants. It was the longest running, race-based, affirmative action program in United States history. Ironically, some of the descendants of the beneficiaries of this affirmative action program for whites were the first ones to claim their status as the "victims" of "reverse discrimination" in the 1970s and 80s. An estimated $10 trillion dollars (when measured in today's present value) was transferred to white homesteaders, essentially for free. This land giveaway program made thousands of millionaires in the agriculture, timber, mining of natural resources, and oil and gas industries. In addition to the gift of free public land to these white program recipients, the government-built land grant colleges to teach these settlers how to farm. It provided them with county agents to further their expertise in farming and the commercialization of natural resources running with the land. It also gave them low-interest loans so that they could mechanize their farms. Then, it provided them billions of dollars in federal subsidies not to farm certain crops. From the outset, blacks were not allowed to participate in the 1862 Homestead Act land giveaway program. The United States Supreme Court had already decided, on a 7-2 vote, in the 1857 Dred Scott case that blacks -- freed or slaves -- had no rights that white men were bound to respect. This holding included the right to own property. In contrast, the 400,000 acres was set aside for freed Black slaves. The land allotment was 40 acres. This land was never given to them. As a result, Blacks in the South and elsewhere languished in abject poverty for the next 100 years. This poverty was accompanied by widespread racial violence against Blacks nationwide, rigidly enforced racial segregation, ingrained racial discrimination, and massive resistance to equal rights for Blacks. The next time you hear people say, "the Black man ought to lift himself by his own bootstraps," please remind them of the white privilege embedded in these laws and historical events.”
Everybody who immigrated here got a leg-up, literally. “We’re all immigrants to America” is so disingenuous and inaccurate because if that was factual, there’d be no problem to treat Black Americans like an immigrant group as every immigrant group who gets monetarily compensated for their immigration status. We must not be immigrants then — and we aren’t. Many were trafficked to the Americas while many were enslaved in-place and were forcefully and forcibly taken against their will during the transatlantic slave trade. That wasn’t voluntary. Absolutely NOT “we’re all immigrants”!
“The missing ingredient is wealth and wealth is power. We can’t continue to exist without reparations. We have nothing — we don’t own and control anything. Without owning and controlling anything, we can’t compete. Permanent underclass means those individuals, who by the nature of their circumstances, will be forced to live as either beggars or criminals.” (Claud Anderson). When the opportunities are already minimal and bleak and to now have to contend and compete with those very jobs that are now being spread even thinner, yes, unfortunately the last resort can be this. It’s criminality to survive. But even with no systems in place to repair, our people have always made due—made the best of what is given.
2015 is almost a decade ago—done came and gone. No federal reparations as of yet. And with predictions based off projections, of $0 median wealth by the year of 2053, the permanent underclass sadly is already actively suffocating. Just in 1860, the value assigned to our ancestors’ labor, human capital was over $3 billion dollars. “This was more money than was invested in factories and railroads combined. In 1861, the value placed on cotton produced by enslaved Blacks was $250 million.” All this monetary value less than 200 years ago and to say by 2060, the wealth of our households will be at $0. To say that reparations for race-based American chattel slavery is imperative is an understatement. “…in 2016, based on the Survey of Consumer Finances, white families had the highest median family wealth at $171,000, compared to Black and Hispanic families, which had $17,600 and $20,700, respectively.”
It’s been very noticeably and intentionally stated that without immigrant groups, the country will fall into despair — all to further support the notion that without immigration, the country will collapse. It has been another very calculated plan to keep pushing Black Americans out of particular employment markets that have been largely held by Black Americans. Black Americans are getting boxed out and locked out of the job sector we once held in significant numbers. It’s also important to keep in mind that those who immigrate here in large portions go directly to Black communities and then open businesses or become managers of an establishment within that community and avoid hiring the Black residents who make up majority of the community or they hire those who they share ethnicity with only. There’s also the language barriers that block out Black Americans when some jobs are specifically requiring bilingual candidates. In all his inability to express his point and coherently flesh out facts and his horrible inarticulate way and his very bad-faith and self interests motives, Trump talking about “Black jobs” is a real thing. It is well documented that Black Americans do (have made) make up most of the demographic in the hospitality, healthcare, construction and governmental industries. We know our people were (are) maintenance workers, cementing roads, laying down bricks building homes and buildings, nurses, nursing aids, laundress, landscapers, professional cleaners, housekeepers, DMV workers, bus drivers, postal service workers--there are whole generations of households that have this in their family line. Jobs once held by majority Black Americans in these industries have now shifted to employ those newly coming to America and we’re now becoming locked out of those means to provide to be able to sustainably live.
(Let’s also not forget just how racist STEM is when it comes to Black Americans)
And absolutely no, pointing this out isn't to say that we don't hold positions as doctors, lawyers, CEOS, accountants, architects, professors, engineers, executives and more. Or that these “Black jobs” are less significant or less impactful. Pointing out stats in comparison is just that. There are differences in the majority of what occupations of particular jobs are held. And degreed or not degreed sometimes holds very little weight for Black Americans. Dating back to when our higher education didn't really make a difference in what opportunities are supposed to be afforded with degrees because of discrimination or how Black American households headed by someone with a college degree still hold less wealth in comparison to white households headed by someone with a high school diploma or GED or when certain job sectors had full regulation to exclude us out and the only options were specific jobs--like this is how certain jobs became "Black jobs". [the whole response to the "Black jobs" was weird and too comical to me when the severity and seriousness of it all was missing. Also, we absolutely gave way too much credit to him over it as if he conceptualized it.]
But just as well, white America has been pushing for immigration heavily and now, they themselves are at risk of potentially having to compete for occupation too. So, they got flipped on by being super anti-Black American by elevating others (to spite us) who also feel the same way about us and look, now they’re imploding. Good. And while that happens, let not one Black American be a casualty.
The notion of agricultural work and other sects of manual labor being so dependent on the immigrant class is capitalism. Black Americans want to work these jobs and have always fought for better, livable wages from these employers and corporations would rather not increase it; hence, they will seek outside help in the form of cheaper labor and those immigrating to America will more than likely accept that low wage because anything is much better than what they have to leave from, therefore, stunting the pressures corporations face for not increasing the wages. So, this is why we hear narratives of, “We can’t find workers…”, “We had to hire immigrants because American citizens don’t want to work these jobs…”. Those are lies! No, business owners and businesses and corporations financially prefer cheap labor and to keep wages low. Outsourcing everything is capitalism and that’s what y’all been doing. Black Americans will raise hell about it all the time! And Black Americans being loudly vocal alone is what drives the low, minimum wage pushers to find ways to just remove Black Americans out altogether. [one ref: Black workers dismissed from job sites after Hurricane Katrina]
My family is from Louisiana and in the South, there is a huge population of Black Americans who have generationally worked in agriculture. They own their own farms and purchased acres of land or acquired the land that has been passed down to them from their ancestors. Yes, they want these jobs! That narrative of “we don’t want to work in the fields” or “we don’t want to go back to the fields” is not true and not true for all (and yes, I completely understand the historical context of why some Black Americans have an aversion because there’s so much trauma passed down from our history. Along with the decades upon decades of discriminatory lending practices and land theft against Black farmers, the history is not smooth at all.)
But it isn’t the case for all of us as Black Americans. We have grandparents and great grandparents (my grandparents were born right before the 1950s and my greats were born in the early 1900s) who were sharecroppers—just one and two generations ago—who were agricultural experts and their descendants are following in their agricultural steps! The agrarian nature is innate in us.
There are so many young Black American millennials who are continuing their family’s rich, agrarian legacy. I have a family friend who recently got married and he and his wife purchased acres of land to grow their own food and they have livestock too. He and his wife are millennials and they have children who they will inherit the land once their parents pass it down. The growth is happening and it’s great to see! (which I also find the conversation around agriculture and Black Americans amongst ourselves to dominantly be from a very non-Southern perspective, which can also play into classism).
Agriculture isn’t the only industry we’ve historically occupied but this is one that is used the most to justify and condone capitalism to export the work.
We have to recognize what’s happening and get on code with one another of how we have to build to survive and be able to simply thrive in our homeland as Black Americans. That also means delineating from any groups that undercut us. I see more of us are beginning to recognize that. Wish it didn’t take us this long (as well as not having such a cemented system to perpetuate the subjugation) and I hope we still have time to sustain our rightful place that our ancestors created for us. We don't belong in this permanent underclass and as we keep fighting for our human rights, pushing for reparations and receiving reparations in our country, we will keep ourselves out of that next permanent underclass level.
Reparations is the only way.