of Illinois.174 Falls and the commission resumed pressuring the mayor about the school board, but Cermak was shot on 15 February while shaking hands with President Franklin D. Roosevelt and died on 6 March.175
On 3 April 1933, the commission met with the new mayor, Edward J. Kelly, but in May, Kelly appointed five white men who had no experience in education, with the obvious intention of pleasing his financial backers.176 In January 1938, Falls and the Interracial Commission were still asking the mayor to appoint an African American to the school board.177 It would not happen until late October 1939, when Dr. Midian O. Bousfield, a black physician, was appointed to the Chicago School Board by Mayor Kelly, although the exact reasoning and timing for the appointment are unclear.178
As the head of the Interracial Commission, Falls helped with the formation of an interracial group for the residents of Morgan Park and Beverly Hills. These were two adjacent areas of Chicago, with Morgan Park being almost completely black and Beverly Hills being completely white except for servants who lived there. Certain white residents in Beverly Hills were “disturbed” by the obvious segregation and asked the Interracial Commission to help them make some positive steps toward breaking down racial prejudice. In May 1932, Falls met with some of the residents to begin planning how best to organize such an association. Falls recommended waiting until October for a formal gathering, with smaller groups meeting in their respective communities in the interim. These groups were given a reading list that placed heavy emphasis on understanding the black experience through the social sciences.179
In October, at Bethany Union Church, Falls explained that the entire group would meet for the next six weeks to hear speakers on various race issues, with plenty of time for discussion. As chair of the Interracial Commission, he was in contact with various organizations, which he utilized in obtaining a number of expert speakers. Based on responses from the audience, he noted that between the first and last sessions, the attitude of many white people about blacks had undergone “some modification,” while blacks “still had [a] very deep-seated distrust” of whites.180
The following August, when Falls’s brother Leo moved into his Morgan Park home, the house was stoned. Falls used this as an opportunity to call a special meeting of the Morgan Park–Beverly Hills Interracial Group, to hold “very frank discussions which resulted in the organization taking a determined stand in terms of equal opportunities for all people.”181
As chair of the Interracial Commission, Falls performed a similar function in helping to form the Lower North Interracial Group on the Lower North Side of Chicago, where there was “increasing friction between Italian and Colored boys.”182 This situation was different from that between Beverly Hills and Morgan Park because the Italian and African American residents were not segregated. Beginning in December 1932, Falls arranged with the residents to have a number of speakers come and talk to them on race relations. In addition, a survey indicated that larger recreational facilities were needed so that the Italian and black children would not feel compelled to fight over the current resources, which were very limited.183
Within the context of forming and sustaining each of these interracial groups, Falls strongly emphasized teaching and listening. His two-pronged approach of assessing each group’s needs while communicating the latest scientific information on race undoubtedly had its source in Lillian with her expert knowledge of the social sciences.
Taking advantage of the Chicago World’s Fair, the Interracial Commission held a national conference on 20 June 1933 in the Illinois Host Building of the fairgrounds. Falls viewed this conference, which brought together experts in the field of race relations from all over the country, as “an outstanding success.”184 Noted personalities at the conference included Eugene Kinckle Jones (1885–1954) from New York, who was the first executive secretary of the National Urban League, and Mary McLeod Bethune (1875–1955) of Florida, a prominent educator and businesswoman who founded the National Council of Negro Women in 1932.185
On 15 July 1934, Falls decided to observe how the police would react to an organized interracial group of swimmers at Jackson Park Beach. A week before, the police had arrested eighteen swimmers at the beach who were promoting integration. This time, the police marched toward the interracial group in double columns and arrested eleven of the white swimmers. Falls believed that the intention of the police was to enforce segregation and scare interracial groups from attempting another event at the beach. The Interracial Commission met with the superintendent of the South Park System and a representative of the South Park police. After a two-hour discussion, the police agreed to change their tactics of enforcing segregation. They did in fact stop harassing interracial swimming groups, and there were no more disturbances at Chicago beaches that year.186
By May 1935, the commission had developed affiliations with about one hundred organizations and thousands of individuals.187 Nonetheless, it appears that after 1936, Falls involvement with the Urban League lessened, though he would carry the spirit of active struggle that was present in the league to his activities in the Catholic Worker movement.188 Unfortunately, Falls was not often forthcoming about his declining participation with any group. A plausible explanation in this case is that he thought the Catholic Worker would be a better avenue for racial integration and racial justice. Even though his involvement with the Chicago Urban League would be minimal by the late 1930s, he did rejoin its board of directors for a short period during the second half of the1940s.189
Federated Colored Catholics
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