The Omaha guide., 1935-05-04

able degree. The scheme, whatever
it's Negro sponsors may hope to the
contrary, becomes therefore only an
othsr excuse for their white superiors
maintaining a "do-nothing" policy
With regard to discrimination against
Negroes in the Public Works Admin
istration.
Long Term New Deal Policies Con-
denim Negroes To Ghettoes
The Negro has no pleasanter outlook
in the long term social planning ven
lures of the new administration. Plan
ming for subsistence homesteads for
industrially stranded workers has been
muddled enough even without consid-
GRAFTON of the problems of migrating
Negroes into such plans. Subsistence
homesteads projects are over burdened
With ~profiteering prices for the home
steads and foredoomed to failure by
the lack of planning for adequate and
permanent incomes for prospective
homesteaders.
In callous disregard of the interdic-
ION in the Constitution of the United
States against the use of federal funds
for projects which discriminate a.
gainst applicants solely on the ground
u color, subsistence homesteads have
been planned on a strictly "lily-white"
basis. The more than 200 applicants
Tor the first project at Arthurdale,
West Virginia were not even consid-
cred, Mr.. Bushrod Grimes ((then in
charge of the project) announcing that
the project was to be open only to
native white stock" AS far North
as Dayton, Ohio, where state laws
prohibit any type of segregation
against Negroes, the federal govern
ment has extended its "lily-white"
pol.dy. Recently it has established
two Jim-Crow projects for Negroes.
Thus the new administration seeks in
its program of social planning to per-
petuate ghettoes of Negroes for fifty
years to come.
An even more blatant example of
this policy of "Ely-white" reconstrue-
ton is apparent in the planning of the
model town of Norris, Tennessee, by
the Tennessee Valley Authority. This
town of 450 model homes is intended
for the permanent workers on Norris
Dam. The homes are rented by the
federal government, which at all times
maintains title to the land and dwell
lings and has complete control of the
town management. Yet officials at
IVA openly admit that no Negroes
are allowed at Norris.
IVA has other Objectionable feat
ures. While Negro employment now
approaches an equitable proportion of
total employment; the payroll of Ne
gro workers remains disproportion-
ately lower than that Of whites.
While the government has maintained
a trade school to train workers on the
project, no Negro trainees have been
admitted. Nor have any meaningful
plans matured for the future of the
several thousand Negro workers who
in another year or so will be left with
out employment, following completion
of work on the dam being built by
iva.
No one at IVA headquarters at
Knoxville seems to have the remotest
idea of how Negroes in the Tennessee
Valley will be able to buy the cheap
electricity which IVA is designed to
produce. The officials frankly admit
that standards Of living Of the Negro
population are low that the introduc-
tion of industry into the Valley is at
present only a nebulous dream, that
even if this eventuates there is no as
surance that Negro employment will
result. The fairest summary that can
be made of IVA is that for a year or
SO it has furnished bread to a few
thousand Negro workers. Beyond
that everything is conjecture; c~onjec-
ture which is most unpleasant be-
cause Of the utter planlessness Of
those in charge of the project.
Recovery legislation Of the present
session of Congress reveals the same
fatal flaws which have been noted in
the operation of previous recovery
ventures. Thus, for example, instead
of genuine unemployment insurance
we have an administration plan pro-
posing to exclude from any insurance
domestic and agricultural workers, in
which classes are to be found Is out
Of every % Negro workers. On ev-
cry hand the administration has used
New Deal" slogans for the same raw
deal.
Negro Masses Reacting to the Crisis
The sharpening of the crisis for Ne
groes has not found them unrespons-
i've. Two years Of increasing hard
ship has seen strange movement
among the masses. In Chicago, New