thorough and complete survey of the race situation that I have seen anywhere. While its field of study was necessarily limited to Chicago, the conditions there may be regarded as fairly typical of conditions in other large cities where there is a large colored population.
The report does not pretend to have discovered any new formula by which all race trouble will disappear. The subject is too complex for any such simple solution. It finds certain facts, however, the mere recognition of which will go a long way towards allaying race feeling. It finds that in that portion of Chicago in which colored persons have lived longest and in the largest numbers relatively there has been the minimum of friction. This is a fact of the first importance. For it tends to show that the presence of Negroes in large numbers in our great cities is not a menace in itself.
There is one recommendation (No. 31) to which I desire to call special attention: that a permanent local commission on race relations be created. When as Governor of Illinois I withdrew troops from Chicago after the riots, I was not at all persuaded that all danger of their recurrence was past. I kept observers from the Adjutant General's office on the ground to watch for any signs of fresh trouble. The Commission on Race Relations was appointed, and conditions at once began to improve. The activities of this Commission, composed of the best representatives of both races, were, as I believe, the principal cause for this improved condition.
Causes of friction, insignificant in themselves, but capable of leading to serious results, were discovered by the Commission and by its suggestion were removed in time to avoid grave consequences. Gross exaggerations of some fancied grievance by either the one race or the other were examined into and were found to rest upon nothing else than idle rumor or prejudice. In the light of truth which the Commission was able to throw upon the subject, these grievances disappeared. In other words, misunderstanding, which had been so prolific a source of trouble between the races, was greatly reduced.
The report contains recommendations, which, if acted upon, will make impossible, in my opinion, a repetition of the appalling tragedy which brought disgrace to Chicago in July of 1919.
Men may differ as to some of the conclusions reached, but all fair-minded men must admit, I think, that the report of the Commission on Race Relations is a most important contribution to this important subject.
Frank O. Lowden
INTRODUCTION
On Sunday, July 27, 1919, there was a clash of white people and Negroes at a bathing-beach in Chicago, which resulted in the drowning of a Negro boy. This led to a race riot in which thirty-eight lives were lost—twenty-three Negroes and fifteen whites—and 537 persons were injured. After three days of mob violence, affecting several sections of the city, the state militia was called out to assist the police in restoring order. It was not until August 6 that danger of further clashes was regarded as past.
To discuss this serious situation and means of preventing its recurrence, a group of eighty-one citizens, representing forty-eight social, civic, commercial, and professional organizations of Chicago, met on August 1, 1919, at the Union League Club. Mr. Charles W. Folds, president of the Club, presided. Brief addresses were made by Mr. H. H. Merrick, president of the Chicago Association of Commerce, Dr. Graham Taylor, Miss Harriet Vittum, Major John S. Bonner, Mr. Charles J. Boyd, and Rev. William C. Covert.
Resolutions were passed and given to the press, and the following letter to the Governor of Illinois was authorized:
To His Excellency, Frank O. Lowden Governor of Illinois
Dear Sir: A meeting was held today at the Union League Club to take up the matter of the present race riots.
This meeting was attended by 81 representatives of 48 prominent civic, professional and commercial organizations, such as Chicago Medical Association, Chicago Bar Association, Federation of Churches, Association of Commerce, Packing House Industries, Urban League, Woman's City Club, Chicago Woman's Club, Foreign Language Division, representing foreign-born population, etc.
A resolution was adopted unanimously, appointing the undersigned as a committee to wait upon you and ask that you appoint at your earliest convenience an emergency state committee to study the psychological, social and economic causes underlying the conditions resulting in the present race riot and to make such recommendations as will tend to prevent a recurrence of such conditions in the future.
The committee would welcome an opportunity to meet you at any time convenient to yourself and to talk over with you details and give you such information as has been gathered through these various organizations.
Respectfully,
Charles W. Folds
Graham Taylor
William C. Graves
Harriet E. Vittum
T. Arnold Hill
Felix J. Streyckmans
In response to this and other urgent requests by various citizens and organizations, and pursuant to his personal knowledge of the situation derived from investigations made by him in Chicago during the period of the riot, Governor Lowden announced on August 20, 1919, the appointment of a Commission on Race Relations, consisting of twelve members, six from each race, as follows—Mr. Bancroft being designated by him as chairman:
Representing the white people: Edgar A. Bancroft, William Scott Bond, Edward Osgood Brown, Harry Eugene Kelly, Victor F. Lawson, Julius Rosenwald.
Representing the Negro people: Robert S. Abbott, George Cleveland Hall, George H. Jackson, Edward H. Morris, Adelbert H. Roberts, Lacey Kirk Williams.[1]
In announcing the appointment of this Commission, Governor Lowden made public the following statement:
I have been requested by many citizens and by many civic organizations in Chicago to appoint a Commission to study and report upon the broad question of the relations between the two races. These riots were the work of the worst element of both races. They did not represent the great overwhelming majority of either race. The two are here and will remain here. The great majority of each realizes the necessity of their living upon terms of cordial good will and respect, each for the other. That condition must be brought about.
To say that we cannot solve this problem is to confess the failure of self-government. I offer no solution of the problem. I do know, however, that the question cannot be answered by mob violence. I do know that every time men, white or colored, take the law into their own hands, instead of helping they only postpone the settlement of the question. When we admit the existence of a problem and courageously face it, we have gone half-way toward its solution.
I have with the utmost care, in response to the requests above set forth, appointed a Commission to undertake this great work. I have sought only the most representative men of the two races. I have not even asked them whether they had views as to how the question could be met. I have asked them only to approach the difficult subject with an open mind, and in a spirit of fairness and justice to all. This is a tribunal that has been constituted to get the facts and interpret them and to find a way out. I believe that great good can come out of the work of this Commission.
I ask that our people, white and colored, give their fullest co-operation to the Commission. I ask, too, as I have a right to ask, that
