A Few Red Drops: Chapters 12–16

One foundry worker laid out his goals: “I’m an expert now...I can quit any time I want to, but the longer I work the more money it is for me.... I am planning to educate my girl with the best of them, buy a home before I’m too old, and make life comfortable for my family.”

They were engaged in “loud talking and objectionable deportment...in public places.”

They were engaged in “loud talking and objectionable deportment...in public places.”

The walk toward assimilation progressed, a little at a time.

But one commented that the children had “no sticking qualities” and another opined that blacks quickly reached “the limit of [their] mental ability.”

In the face of this systemic disrespect, blacks were encouraged by their leaders to hold their heads high.

Big Bill, whom the Defender called “the spectacular, nervy Mayor of Chicago,” publicly spoke out against the slights that blacks found so demeaning, and made a great show of celebrating their successes.

Union leaders John Fitzpatrick and William Z. Foster were galvanized by the golden opportunity for a big union win if they could just bring all the workers together before the bosses divided them.

If the union could bring all workers together, it would be a powerful force to contend with.

Keep blacks out was the mantra of the Chicago Real Estate Board as blacks continued to pour into the city and push the boundaries of the Black Belt into white neighborhoods.

He took charge, stripping away the right to strike and appointing Judge Samuel Alschuler as federal administrator to arbitrate all disputes between the packers and the union.

Incensed immigrant workers lashed out at blacks with racial taunts.

Blacks responded with profanities and ethnic slurs.

At venues where blacks regularly outnumbered whites, facilities were unofficially redesignated for black use.

Throughout 1918, property owners’ associations stepped up their rhetoric to stop the invasion.

Mobs frequently assembled outside the homes of black families who had ventured beyond the Black Belt, smashing up the buildings with bats, rocks, and bricks.

In mid-March, A. L. Jackson explained to a group of white businessmen the new mindset of the returned black soldier: “[He] is coming back with a consciousness of power hitherto unrealized, a sense of manhood, and a belief in his ability to carry responsibility. He believes that his strength is the same as that of other men."

In March, the banker and real estate mogul Jesse Binga was the target of two bombs, one at his real estate office, one at a property on his listings.

They were also threatened by his dedication to black causes to the detriment of their own.

Anderson used his power to earmark municipal funds to clean up the Black Belt’s crumbling sewers and streets.

Anderson used his power to earmark municipal funds to clean up the Black Belt’s crumbling sewers and streets.

Middle-class progressives, disgusted by the corrupt politics of both Thompson and Sweitzer, threw their weight behind an independent reformer.

By the end of election night, it was clear that although he had garnered less than 38 percent of the vote, Thompson had been elected.

The Wabash YMCA leader A. L. Jackson pleaded with Louis Swift and the other packers, disparaging returning immigrant soldiers, referring to them as “hyphenated”—Irish-Americans, German-Americans, and the like—and talking up native-born American black workers: “These [black] boys are all good Americans. There are no slackers, no hyphens among them.”

On May 5, a property owners’ association convened a raucous meeting, exhorting white residents to hold the line against the threatening wave moving toward them out of the Black Belt.

On May 5, a property owners’ association convened a raucous meeting, exhorting white residents to hold the line against the threatening wave moving toward them out of the Black Belt.

On May 5, a property owners’ association convened a raucous meeting, exhorting white residents to hold the line against the threatening wave moving toward them out of the Black Belt.

Now taking her more seriously, police were dispatched to keep watch.

Twice, a delegation of black ministers tried to file a complaint about the bombings but was not allowed to see the mayor.

The Defender reflected frustrations in the community: “The value of human life is cheaply held in these turbulent times...and the authorities constituted to preserve law and order seem helpless to cope with the situation. Chicago...is having a reign of this terror.”

In early June, John Kikulski spoke to an interracial group, saying, “Polish, Irish, Lithuanian, and in fact every race, color, creed, and nationality is to be included.... While there will be varied differences in our physical makeup and thoughts, there is one thing which we all hold in common, and that is our right to a living wage, and our rights in the pursuit of happiness as American citizens.”

Throughout the month of June, the union wooed workers, setting up a band on a flatbed outside the Great Gate of the Union Stock Yard, greeting workers with lively tunes.

Using their clout with the downtown police department, they posted three hundred mounted police in the Stock Yard to break up union gatherings.

The union planned a culminating interracial parade for July 6.

The interracial crowd exuded optimism.