The Elaine Riot of 1919: Race, Class, and Labor in the Arkansas Delta
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University of Wisconsin Milwaukee UWM Digital Commons Theses and Dissertations May 2019 The Elaine Riot of 1919: Race, Class, and Labor in the Arkansas Delta Steven Anthony University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee Follow this and additional works at: https://dc.uwm.edu/etd Part of the United States History Commons Recommended Citation Anthony, Steven, "The Elaine Riot of 1919: Race, Class, and Labor in the Arkansas Delta" (2019). Theses and Dissertations. 2154. https://dc.uwm.edu/etd/2154 This Dissertation is brought to you for free and open access by UWM Digital Commons. It has been accepted for inclusion in Theses and Dissertations by an authorized administrator of UWM Digital Commons. For more information, please contact [email protected]. THE ELAINE RIOT OF 1919: RACE, CLASS, AND LABOR IN THE ARKANSAS DELTA by Steven Anthony A Dissertation Submitted in Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements of the Degree of Doctor of Philosophy in History at The University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee May 2019 ABSTRACT THE ELAINE RIOT OF 1919: RACE, CLASS, AND LABOR IN THE ARKANSAS DELTA by Steven Anthony The University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee, 2019 Under the Supervision of Professor Gregory Carter This dissertation examines the racially motivated mob dominated violence that took place during the autumn of 1919 in rural Phillips County, Arkansas nearby Elaine. The efforts of white planters to supplant the loss of enslaved labor due to the abolition of American slavery played a crucial role in re-making the southern agrarian economy in the early twentieth century. My research explores how the conspicuous features of sharecropping, tenant farming, peonage, or other variations of debt servitude became a means for the re-enslavement of African Americans in the Arkansas Delta. However, as black sharecroppers faced economic, social, and political struggles rooted in racism and discrimination; they attempted to change their surroundings through activism and resistance. A point of interest in this work is World War I and how attitudes following the war shaped the ways in which sharecroppers in the Delta region of Arkansas engaged with race and the social order. The emergence of a labor movement became the catalyst for sharecroppers to form a labor union which represented a material threat to white hegemony. In general, this dissertation will explore the causal connections of the Elaine Riot of 1919 and the circumstances that eventually led to the landmark Supreme Court case Moore v. Dempsey (1923). ii © Copyright by Steven Anthony, 2019 All Rights Reserved iii TABLE OF CONTENTS PAGE List of Figures………………………………………………………………………….... v Acknowledgements……………………………………………………………………….vi Chapter INTRODUCTION ……………………………………………………………….......1 Background …………………………………………………………………………... 4 Historiography of the Elaine Riot of 1919 …………………………………………. .12 1. THE ORIGINS OF DISCONTENT IN THE ARKANSAS DELTA …………….25 The transition from enslaved to free labor ……………………………………………31 Race and the southern agrarian economy …………………………………………….40 The establishment of Jim Crow ………………………………………………………48 2. THE CONTOURS OF CONFLICT …………………………...…….……………...53 Struggle, coercion, and competition for socioeconomic interests …………………….58 The social, cultural, and political transformations from 1865 through 1919………….65 Explaining black activism as a response to the struggle for wages …………………...83 3. THE FORMATION OF A LABOR MOVEMENT ….……………………………86 Black organizing and white repression ..…………………………………………......89 Desperate measures for changes in the sharecropping system ……………………….97 The Progressive Farmers and Household Union of America ……………………….103 4. A DEADLY RESPONSE ………………………………………………………….107 Contact with white vigilantes, federal troops, and confrontation…………………...116 The wholesale violence and affirmation of white supremacy ……………………. .127 The Committee of Seven……………………………………………………………135 5. THE AFTERMATH……………………………………………………………….143 The fight for justice ..……………………………………………………………….153 Testing southern justice in the federal courts ………………………………………166 The implications of Moore v. Dempsey……………………………………………. 189 CONCLUSIONS ……………………………………………………………………...194 BIBLIOGRAPHY …………………………………………………………………….202 CURRICULUM VITAE ……………………………………………………………...214 iv LISTS OF FIGURES Figure 1. Topographic map of Arkansas…………………………………………………. ...24 Figure 2. Map of counties in eastern Arkansas……………………………………………...25 Figure 3. PFHUA blank membership card……………………………………………...…102 Figure 4. Ulysses S. Bratton, PFHUA attorney……………………………………………105 Figure 5. Charles H. Brough in Elaine, Arkansas………………………………………....123 Figure 6. Elaine Twelve defendants……………………………………………………….161 Figure 7. Scipio A. Jones, Elaine Twelve attorney……………………………………… 187 v ACKNOWLEDGMENTS A debt of gratitude is owed to many people for helping to make this dissertation a reality. Anyone who commits to writing the history of such a turbulent period can only successfully do so with the necessary assistance of others. For this support, I would like to extend appreciation to my Major Advisor, Dr. Gregory T. Carter at the University of Wisconsin at Milwaukee. During the last two years he has served as my guide and dissertation advisor and it has been a pleasure to work with him. A special thanks is extended to Dr. Robert S. Smith, now of Marquette University who was my advisor when I began the research journey. Dr. Smith, your dedication to uncovering the important legal aspects of African American history has been a valuable model for my own project. I would also like to thank each member of my dissertation committee, Dr. Joe Austin at the University of Wisconsin at Milwaukee and Dr. Joseph Rodriguez at the University of Wisconsin at Milwaukee, it has been my pleasure to have had the opportunity to work with each of you. My research and writing were enabled by the generous financial support of the University of Wisconsin at Milwaukee Graduate School and the UWM History Department through graduate fellowships and scholarships, most notably the Advance Opportunity Program (AOP) Fellowship, the Frederick I. Olson Scholarship in History, and the Chancellor’s Graduate Student Award. I sincerely thank the university and the department for the investment which made possible my contribution to academia and promoted inclusion. Not only did I benefit financially, but it was also a great privilege to be supported by the exceptional faculty and staff of the university and history department. I am also grateful for the substantial network of people and institutions of which I relied upon to conduct this research. This list includes the individuals based at the universities, vi archives, and libraries utilized such as the Arkansas State Archives in Little Rock, Arkansas; the University of Arkansas Special Collections Department in Fayetteville, Arkansas; the University of Arkansas at Little Rock Special Collections, William H. Bowen School of Law Library in Little Rock, Arkansas; the Butler Center for Arkansas Studies in Little Rock, Arkansas; the University of Wisconsin at Milwaukee Libraries in Milwaukee, Wisconsin; and the Wisconsin Historical Society in Madison, Wisconsin. This project was aided by a host of individuals affiliated with these institutions and I thank each of you for the personal attention provided. Finally, I cannot close without acknowledging my family. My wife, Virginia Kellie Anthony, has been my rock. Throughout this process she has been a strong and steady source of support. My son, Steven A. Anthony Jr., I thank him for being patient during the arduous research and writing schedule which took me away from some of his activities. My mother, Mary A. Flenory and sister, Donna N. Flenory, who have been blessings in my life. My mother- in-law, Constance Clark, who encouraged me to sprint to the finish line. And my loved ones who are no longer with us, Perry Anthony Jr. (father), I wish he were still alive to see this project; O.C. Willingham and Mary E. Willingham (grandparents); Perry Anthony Sr. and Edith Anthony (grandparents); and my unnamed ancestors on whose shoulders I stand. May you all rest in peace. vii INTRODUCTION The period from the collapse of Reconstruction through World War I represents a time of increasing racial prejudice and discrimination, particularly in the South. In order to establish white hegemony, southerners sought to dominate African Americans in several areas including through economic exploitation, politics, and racial segregation. Of these areas of domination, the economic exploitation of black labor was perhaps the most damaging. The prevailing issue for many white southerners was the fact that they had not accepted the terms of life in the region after the American Civil War. In this vein, many chose to forge ahead with the restoration of lost cause sentiments. The one question that especially concerned them was whether or not African Americans would work in the fields performing intense manual labor given an opportunity to seek other types of labor for a paid wage. A dilemma basic to the white southerner’s viewpoint was how to deal with African Americans who now had some bargaining power in determining the conditions under which they would work. The transition from a plantation system with un-free labor to a free market economy gave white southerners an antagonistic posture towards the world around him. The life of white land owning planters changed and his fears about access to a black labor supply were not entirely groundless. However, most historians identify poor white southerners as the primary drivers of