Racist public policy and its intended consequences

The law has never been blind. In fact, when it comes to race and segregation, the law has often done more harm to African American residential communities than racist customs and traditions have. And it has done so intentionally. Richard Rothstein, an expert on race, education, and social policy at the Economic Policy Institute, details what the African American community has al­ways known about residential segregation, shoddy housing and schools, and lack of meaningful job opportunities. He reveals how the consequences of residential segregation from the 1920s to today have been legal, intentional, and long-lasting.

In the preface, Rothstein refers to the riots in Ferguson and Baltimore and quickly disabuses readers of the idea that the causes are solely de facto segregation, meaning private practices like white flight and redlining. The segregation in these cities, he states, is not unintended. It’s the result of intentional government action, law, and policy—in other words, de jure segregation.

Public housing to ease the housing crisis for workers during World War II was unavailable to African American workers, who had to commute long distances to war industry jobs that paid them less than their white counterparts. In the decades after the war, lower- income white people moved up into the middle class and middle-class whites quickly outpaced African Americans, who were still struggling under Jim Crow. The suburbs laid down the welcome mat to white families—who built walls, burned crosses, and threw bricks through the windows of those African Americans foolish enough to think that the American Dream was meant for them.