The Political Economy of Segregation: The Case of Segregated Streetcars
Author:
- 1 September 1986
- journal article
- research article
- Published by Cambridge University Press (CUP) in The Journal of Economic History
- Vol. 46 (4) , 893-917
Abstract
The introduction of segregation laws for municipal streetcars is examined. The economics of private and public segregation is analyzed first, taking note of the particular features of the streetcar industry, followed by a discussion of the contemporary debates on streetcar segregation laws in a number of southern cities. The evidence presented suggests that segregation laws were binding constraints and not simply the codification of customary practice. Furthermore, the streetcar companies were not the initiators of segregation and sometimes actively resisted it. These findings are related to several major interpretations of the origins of segregation.Keywords
This publication has 4 references indexed in Scilit:
- The Highest Stage of White Supremacy1982
- The Boycott Movement Against Jim Crow Streetcars in the South, 1900-1906Journal of American History, 1969
- Racial Violence and Social Reform-Origins of the Atlanta Riot of 1906The Journal of Negro History, 1968
- Negro Employment in Southern IndustryJournal of Political Economy, 1952