Black Farmers & Systemic Racism

In a prior posting, I discuss the devastating loss of American Indian allotment lands and valuable farmland. In some cases, valuable due to the mineral/oil and gas estate beneath the surface. It has been speculated the large loss of farmland over a relatively short period of time had an effect on the food production capabilities of the U.S. The 1929 Stock Market crash had a disproportionate impact on landless Indians who were unable to feed themselves and rendered destitute. The land is well known as a wealth builder between generations. The stealing and conversion of land occurred at the expense of the most vulnerable.

Black farmers were also subject to land - speculators and "entrepreneurs". After the abolishment of slavery, post-Civil War many of the freedmen were promised "40 acres and a mule" known as the General William T. Sherman's Special Field Order 15 issued on January 16, 1865. President Abraham Lincoln's assassination on April 15, 1865 left his Vice-President Andrew Johnson to become president. Andrew Johnson made no haste and revoked the Special Field Order during the Fall of 1865. The land from Confederate sources intended to provide the former slaves farmland and an economic means to survive was proclaimed by Johnson to remain in the hands of Confederate land owners who made presumably a "loyalty oath" to the Union. The proclamation ignored the fact that the confiscation of Confederate land was a form of war reparations under international law. Former slaves deserved equity that tillable land for farming would have provided after the abolishment of slavery and passage of the Thirteenth Amendment. It was a form of equity that was easy to implement. Therefore, the opportunity to immediately provide reparations was waived.

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Historical Context

Despite the lack of reparations, Black Americans were able to still acquire land. The Agricultural Census of 1910 showed that Black farmers owned about 16 million acres of land comprising about 30% of all farmers in the South. By 2017, the amount of farmland still in ownership by Black landowners had diminished to 4.7 million acres that today represents just 0.5% ownership interests in all U.S. farmland. It is the historical lack of equity, the Biden Administration and House Democrats made good on the promises and as required after the United States Department of Agriculture lost several significant lawsuits over its owning discriminatory practices. Under the American Rescue Plan (a monumental achievement) funding needed to address the loss of land was allocated. A lot of the loss of land is attributable to State courts that relied on often fraudulent partitionment actions used to force a land sale of an entire Estate to non-heirs. Unfortunately, this funding is held up by a lawsuit filed by White farmers that claim the funding to correct these injustices is a discriminatory act. Generational wealth and generational poverty are quite real. As a condition, it is often created through policies and even by the unwritten ones.

It is Martin Luther King Day and a national holiday in the United States.