Effects Of Segregation On African Americans In The 1930's

During the Great Depression all Americans suffered economically, but the African Americans suffered disproportionately. If someone were to be fired from a company the African Americans were the first to be let go which caused an unemployment rate up to three times that of whites. Because of segregation they received less aid from charitable organizations. Overall they suffered economically and socially more than their white counterparts. The 1930's were a turbulent time for race relations in America.
For more than two hundred years before the Civil War, slavery existed in the United States. Before there was no need to separate whites and blacks because ninety five percent of blacks were slaves. After the Civil War things went from bad to worse for the blacks. The south thought they needed to take charge. Black codes were passed by the Southern states which severely limited the rights and opportunities of blacks and segregated them from the whites. They were segregated at schools, theaters, swimming pools and other public places. As we all know they had to ride in the back of the city buses. They weren’t allowed to eat at the same restaurants as whites or even drink from the same water fountains. They
simply did not mix; there were black neighborhoods and white neighborhoods. White people saw the African

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Americans as dirty, uneducated, and dangerous. African Americans were looked upon as not being equals.
The majority of African Americans during the 1930’s could only aspire to menial jobs.
Men usually found jobs in the country as a farmhand or if they were lucky a tenant worker. In the city most worked as janitors or cleaning men on construction sites. The women usually did housecleaning, laundry, or childcare to earn a living. Thousands of African Americans migrated to the Northern states in search of better paying jobs. The communities there weren’t as segregated as they were in the South. Kelly Miller, an African American sociologist at Howard University labeled the black worker during the Depression as “the surplus man.” African Americans were the first to be fired from jobs when the economy slowed, and they were the last to be hired once the economy
recovered.
During this time it was extremely difficult for African Americans to be able to vote. Southern legislatures feared that due to the large amount of African American population that they would vote for other African Americans and that the white people would be outvoted. White people feared that any power given to African Americans reduced their own power. When there are only a limited number of jobs like during the Great Depression people become increasingly territorial. When resources are scarce racial tensions increase.
In the book Of Mice and Men this mistreatment of African Americans is prominent. George and Lennie find themselves working on a ranch where some of the ranchers like to gang up and mock the black man who also works on the ranch, Crooks. Crooks would be called names, and he also was given the jobs nobody wanted. He was treated with no respect and often had to take the blame for something that didn’t even involve him. Due to this behavior that was shown to him, he would keep his distance from the white men. He was segregated from the other men with his own room, but in the book he described himself as lonely. The white ranchers
Donnelly 3 treated Crooks as he was unequal to them. John Steinbeck portrayed the mistreatment of Africans Americans in Of Mice and Men just as they were treated in the reality of the harsh 1930’s.