Back To Birmingham: Richard Arrington, Jr., and His Times
376
Back To Birmingham: Richard Arrington, Jr., and His Times
376Paperback(First Edition, First Edition)
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Product Details
| ISBN-13: | 9780817359454 |
|---|---|
| Publisher: | University of Alabama Press |
| Publication date: | 03/19/2019 |
| Edition description: | First Edition, First Edition |
| Pages: | 376 |
| Product dimensions: | 6.00(w) x 9.00(h) x 1.20(d) |
About the Author
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CHAPTER 1
Depression and Segregation: Background in Sumter County
When Richard Arrington took the oath of office as Birmingham's first black mayor in November 1979, he still carried memories of his family's life in western Alabama. Time had eclipsed much that had taken place in his native county of Sumter, but history had indelibly imprinted many sharp images. Although he had left rural Livingston at an early age, subsequent trips back home helped him to appreciate the challenges the small town had offered his parents as they struggled to survive on the land and as they worked to help create a sense of community in the tiny place with its agrarian values. Through his parents, Arrington came to know the real meaning of "sense of place" and what the love of one's "home place" meant to those who had lived close to the soil.
The years in Sumter immediately prior to the birth of Richard Arrington, Jr., in October 1934, were filled with hardship and suffering. Like other citizens across the country, Alabamians struggled to understand the terrible calamity that came with the disastrous crash of 1929, and they fought to eke out a precarious existence from a rural economy that had stubbornly defied economic diversification. Their anticipation of building a new society that included both a balanced agriculture and industry had gone unrealized, despite admonitions from some southern leaders for more than half a century. Although possessed with great courage, these descendants of Sumter families who had helped clear the forest and work the soil of the state found it difficult to endure the deep fear and the economic and psychological pain of the depression. In reality there was more to fear than fear itself. There was the matter of survival.
Sumter County had long depended upon agriculture for its livelihood, and it symbolized the dependence upon a one-crop, cotton economy. Some people, however, saw cotton as a burden to the region. The notices of foreclosures in Livingston's Our Southern Home told an ugly tale not only of national economic tragedy but of the burdensome weight of cotton upon an entire southern region. Much like their pre–Civil War brethren, some Sumter residents contended that their troubles grew from northern exploitation. A critic wrote in 1944, for example, that, "if some means could be devised to keep ... the net profits made by northern and eastern corporations in this state," Alabama would soon become "one of the wealthiest states in the nation." The argument sounded a familiar note, but it hardly addressed the central issues that had kept the region economically backward and that had made the South the nation's number-one economic problem, before the depression caused even greater trouble.
Optimism, however, continued to exist among Alabamians, despite difficult economic times. A Livingston resident echoed the spirit of hope that prevailed among many citizens when she wrote, "Here in Alabama we can carry two crops in a year, and sometimes three, and we can work out-of-doors nearly everyday in the twelve months." Self-reliance would lift them from their desperate condition. She challenged her neighbors to greater industry, encouraging them to grow vegetables and fruits. Alabamians could whip the depression if they "quit being down-hearted" and worked fervently to bring the state back to prosperity. The depression, however, had root causes that went deep, and it would take more than optimism and a determined spirit to bring about a new, vibrant economic order.
Blacks in Sumter had been deeply mired in poverty long before the 1929 catastrophe. They had come to the county with white settlers in the early nineteenth century, and they had been part of the institution of chattel slavery in the Old South that created fortunes for a few planters in Alabama's Black Belt. Certainly, the depression struck blacks and whites throughout the South with devastating force, but its impact upon blacks only served to make them more economically subservient. The hope of giving blacks their own land during an earlier period of American history had died on the altar of party politics and the eventual failure of Reconstruction during the 1870s. "Forty acres and a mule" had remained part of the wishful thinking of those blacks, who recognized that no real emancipation could come without a solid economic foundation. Ironically, southern blacks did work and live on the land for many years, but it trapped them in a terrible net of poverty.
By the 1930s, law and custom had clearly fixed the place of black people in Alabama society. Since the 1896 Plessy Supreme Court decision, legalized segregation had kept blacks and whites separated in social relations and in public accommodations. Significantly, Plessy reinforced long-held racial attitudes about blacks, for it inscribed the notion of inferiority. The decree itself was direct in its pronouncement of a social principle, though it was hardly in line with democratic tenets. Given racial thought in the latter part of the nineteenth century, the Court's stance mirrored the beliefs of most whites in the North and the South and in many other parts of the world.
Law alone, however, has never been the sole guide to behavior in American society. Indeed, custom often proves a more important influence than statutes. Southern lawmakers passed numerous segregation ordinances that forced whites and blacks to "stay in their place," and out of fear of the tragic consequences for disobeying existing custom, most people respected them. Truly, each generation of southerners needed no laws to direct their behavior. Conversation at the dinner table, at picnics and baseball games, and at other activities helped to teach children the mores and folkways that told black and white people of their opportunities and their limitations. Although signs appeared in Livingston and throughout the South with the designation "white" and "colored," in most cases they were unnecessary, except for people generally unfamiliar with the region.
While on rare occasions blacks and whites did meet together at special events, a rigid standard of behavior controlled these contacts. Even in such settings whites did not act in a manner that conveyed to blacks the notion of racial equality. Significantly, most blacks, including community leaders, soft-pedaled the idea of "social equality," although they may have been determined advocates of racial justice and fair play. White southerners viewed social equality as anathema, for it evoked notions of racial intermingling and intermarriage, which to them spelled "mongrelization." The southern way of life, built upon the assumed supremacy of white people, called for racial purity, and that requirement demanded the continued separation of the races. Few white southerners saw any glaring inconsistency between their way of life, democratic principles, and a Judeo-Christian ethic that prided the ideal of brotherhood. With each passing year whites developed more of a sentimental and psychological attachment to the system, and many had a considerable economic stake in its maintenance. Little wonder that some southerners were willing to kill to defend the region's belief and to keep the advantages society gave to them. Blacks, of course, did not passively accept this system, and in many subtle ways a number of them protested the unequal treatment and injustice that existed.
Ernestine Bell and Richard Arrington, Sr., grew up in the old southern system. They felt the restrictions imposed by a segregated society, but racial oppression did not crush their pride and self-esteem. Both their families had lived in rural Sumter County for a period that stretched back to slavery, but they were also the product of many of the agrarian values that molded white Livingstonites. But their striking difference in opinion on racism and Jim Crow radically separated them from those of white Livingston residents. An appreciation for the land, hard work, and a belief in an orthodox Christian faith composed central features of Sumter County life; and both the Bells and Arringtons reflected those qualities readily associated with white southerners.
The Bell household never knew grinding poverty although existence on a small, family farm often proved difficult. Ernestine's father, Ernest F. Bell, worked thirty or forty acres as a tenant; like most farmers, he grew cotton, but he also reserved some land for garden crops. Contrary to a popular notion about southern farms, cotton did not grow "up to the door of the Bell house." Corn, sweet potatoes, peanuts, and vegetables provided food for the table and for canning. Three Bell children — Ernestine, Eloise, and Clyde — learned about farming by working in the fields; and getting up early in the morning to "beat the sun" became a ritual for young Ernestine as she went to chop cotton in the late spring and early summer. And at harvesttime she worked late into the afternoon to pick the fleecy, white staple so closely identified with the South and the economy of the region.
A close family life of discipline, order, and religious faith characterized the Bell home. The two sisters and their brother enjoyed a happy childhood, but their parents expected strict adherence to Christian principles. Since the Bells were devout Baptists, the children had to participate in church activities, especially Sunday morning services. Although their father had a quiet demeanor, he was a strong authority figure who tolerated "no back talk." The children's mother, Cleopatra Bell, an extroverted woman with a big, infectious smile, was no less concerned about discipline, but she spent most of her time taking care of the family and explaining the "facts of life" to her offspring. With a tenth-grade education she could have qualified to teach in the black schools of the state during that period, but she never applied for a teaching certificate.
Sumter County had limited educational opportunities for black children. Yet, there existed an almost fanatical desire among some black parents for formal education that would improve the lot of their children and black people generally. The Bells, much like their neighbors, had a profound faith in learning, and the family had developed a tradition of education long before Ernestine's birth in October 1914. As a child, the young girl had regularly gone to school with a great aunt who resided in the Bell house and who taught in the black schools of Livingston. Indeed, Ernestine's grandfather, D. S. Jones, had been the first black to graduate from Selma University, later earning distinction as an educator in the Alabama schools.
The background of Richard Arrington, Sr., did not provide a striking contrast to that of Ernestine Bell's. Much like the parents of the woman he would later marry, his family farmed seventy-five acres near York, Alabama, a small town in Sumter County, ten miles from Livingston. A large household of fourteen people taxed the resources and the ingenuity of the Arringtons, but vegetables from the garden and some cows, hogs, and chickens kept the family supplied with food. In his youth, Richard plowed the fields along with his father, Matthew, attended the stock, gathered fuel, and worked as a blacksmith, a job he continued to hold for many years. Although the Arringtons had a high regard for learning, they did not have the educational tradition of the Bells. Richard's formal sixth-grade training, however, belied his native intelligence and a wide range of skills. Despite having only a modest farm income, Matthew and his wife, Barbara, taught the Arrington children the middle-class virtues of industry, self-respect, and pride.
The families of Ernestine Bell and Richard Arrington, Sr., had lived within a few miles of each other in Sumter, but the two did not meet until Richard's brother suggested it in the latter part of 1929. Upon returning from Birmingham, where he had been working, Richard attended a school-closing concert held in a country church outside Livingston. And it was here, with Ernestine's father close by in his Model T, that the two met. Impressed with their first contact, the young man borrowed his father's car and visited Ernestine again on the Sunday following the concert. Since she was still attending boarding school in Livingston, it was possible to see her only on Wednesday nights or Sundays. A courtship of two years gave the young lovers ample time to explore each other's values and to discuss plans for the future; and it also gave Ernestine time to finish her high-school work before embarking upon married life.
Tragedy, however, visited the Bell family and temporarily altered future plans. When he was not busy farming, Ernestine's father cut logs for a living and performed other odd jobs for additional income. In December 1933, while cutting timber, a tree fell on Ernest Bell, killing him instantly. Just five months earlier his wife had succumbed to illness. Ernestine faced not only sorrow but full responsibility for her younger brother and sister and the household. Grief made preparation for marriage more difficult, at a time when more immediate problems stared her in the face. Ultimately Ernestine had to make a decision about her wedding and whether to remain on the land that her family had worked for many years, a farm that had become known as "Bell's Place," although her father had never really owned it.
The love Richard and Ernestine had for each other created its own special joy and they decided to marry. The death of Ernestine's mother and father had been hard to accept, and it was impossible to hold her wedding in the church of her parents' funeral. Therefore, she and Richard joined hands at the Bell place. When the Reverend R. F. Thomas accepted their vows on 19 December 1933 to remain loyal to each other, he sealed a marriage that has continued for over a half century.
Life posed considerable hardships for the Arringtons in those trying years of the Great Depression, but they managed to survive off the land. Following their marriage, they lived on the Bell farm with Ernestine's sister and brother as part of the household. Richard willingly shouldered his new responsibilities, acting as both husband and father. With implements left by Ernestine's father, the family did what it knew best — farm — and with resourcefulness provided food and shelter and a limited amount of comfort for their household.
Living expenses exhausted practically all of the income of the youthful Arringtons. Rental of the land on the Bell place came to fifty dollars a year, not an exorbitant figure at that time for both acreage and the use of a house. Seed, fertilizer, tools, and other necessary items, however, proved very expensive. With cotton selling for forty-five to fifty dollars a bale during the depression, the return from the Arringtons' few acres was indeed small. They did most of their shopping for basic foodstuffs at the country store owned by Tom Mellon, their Livingston landlord. While prices were "kind of high," they were probably no more expensive than at similar stores that dotted the southern landscape. Indeed, the Arringtons believed that Mellon dealt fairly with them in the rent he charged and by permitting them to remain on the Bell farm. Like most cash tenants in the South, the Arringtons fared much better than the large number of sharecroppers who found themselves perpetually in debt to the country store and unable to move because of special state or local laws.
The New Deal farm programs of the 1930s did not significantly affect the Arringtons' lives as farm tenants. However, they responded positively to the admonitition of Franklin Delano Roosevelt and his call for courage in defeating the economic depression. Like other blacks, they had reason to hope that the dawning of a better day would come with the institution of new government policies. The Agricultural Adjustment Act, one of many alphabetic agencies established during the New Deal, aimed to raise prices of reducing agricultural production. The Arringtons indirectly participated in the program, but it netted them little. Unfortunately, the measure hardly achieved its objective, and in time it ran afoul of the United States Supreme Court, which ruled it unconstitutional.
Prior to the passage of the AAA, the family farmed about twenty-seven acres, but the landlord, a participant in the New Deal program, reduced that amount to five acres. And since the Arringtons received only a small price for their cotton, this change drastically reduced their income. However, they were not subjected to the harsh treatment and outright thievery that characterized the relationship between some landowners and tenants. In parts of the South, landlords denied tenants income from the government and callously drove them off the land. Others permitted farm workers to remain but charged them high rents and even higher prices for goods and services provided them. Responsive to southern votes and attitudes, Roosevelt and the New Dealers did not bring maximum pressure upon landowners to obey the law.
(Continues…)
Excerpted from "Back to Birmingham"
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