The Black Towns

From Appomattox to World War I, Black Americans continued their quest for a secure position in the American system. The problem was how to be both black and American—how to find acceptance, or even toleration, in a society in which the boundaries of normative behavior, the values, and the very definition of what it meant to be an American were determined and enforced by whites. A few Black leaders proposed self-segregation inside the United States within the protective confines of an all-Bl...