The Grassroots Organizing of Black Women in the North before 1954

This post is part of our online roundtable on Hettie V. Williams’s The Georgia of the North.

Dr. Hettie V. Williams’s exhaustive, investigative research on Black women’s contributions and participation in the civil rights movement in New Jersey stems not just from her professional focus and expertise as an historian on Black life, but also from her personal experience as a child in an activist family steeped in the movement. This historical narrative takes the reader on a journey that offers new insights into the role that Black women played in shaping movement activity in the State of New Jersey from the Great Migration to 1954. Understanding the significance of this timeframe is key to developing an appreciation for this new work.

At first glance, one would expect that Dr. Williams’s work would focus on the modern-day civil rights era, with many historians and academic scholars using the 1954 Supreme Court decision in Brown v. Board of Education as its starting point. However, Williams’s work ends in 1954. Thus, Williams’s book might more aptly be titled, The Georgia of the North: Black Women and the Pre-Civil Rights Movement in New Jersey. The book offers the reader an unprecedented look into the lives and activities of Black female leaders in New Jersey–from the end of the 19th century to the first half of the 20th century–that had a profound impact on the fight for equality, freedom, and civil rights in the state. Moreover, it offers a compelling argument for the need to further document the untold stories of the grassroots, community-led initiatives organized by Black women before and after the civil rights era.

Williams does an exceptional job in laying the groundwork to help the reader understand the expansion of the Black population and the development of sizable Black communities in the state during the pre-civil rights era, which is also explained within the context of the impact of mass migration on urban areas in the North and the Midwest. A familiar process to many scholars of African American history are the formation of all-Black towns in the state, such as Lawnside, Whitesboro, Timbuctoo, and Jordantown, as well as communities with large populations of Black residents like Newark, Asbury Park, Trenton, and Atlantic City. The growth and expansion of these Black communities led to the establishment of a multilayered social system to support community members. And while thousands were fleeing from the harshness of de jure Jim Crow segregation in the South, they faced an equally discriminatory form of de facto segregation in the North.

Segregation existed in public services, employment opportunities, residential communities, and civic and social organizations. Black Americans were denied equal access to social resources that would contribute to the growth and stability of their families and communities.

The Black community responded by creating their own independent Black organizations and institutions but were continuously engaged in an ongoing struggle for basic human and civil rights, which oftentimes included a push for integration through interracial partnerships and coalitions with majority group members. This movement, Williams argues, resulted from the presence of a progressive Black intellectual professional class–many of whom were women. This certainly was the case with the activism occurring in the State of New Jersey during the pre-civil rights era. Williams’s primary contention is correct–her work offers evidence that the foundation of social organizing and civil rights activism during the modern-day movement was not limited to the South. The founding of National Association of Colored Women’s Clubs (NACWC) in 1896, the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) in 1909, and the National Urban League (NUL) in 1920 resulted in the proliferation of local chapters throughout the nation. And wherever these chapters flourished, civil rights organizing and social activism were the bedrock of their existence.

As indicated in her work, some documentation exists about the contributions of Black male activists in the state, but far less about Black women. This is a frequent occurrence in historical and literary canons as deftly indicated in the 1982 publication All the Women Are White, All the Blacks Are Men, But Some of Us Are Brave. Williams’s research and her conclusions about the contributions of Black women activists like Anna Arnold Hedgeman, Sara Spencer Washington, Florence Spearing Randolph, and Marion Thompson Wright are grounded in the impressive and extensive use of primary and secondary sources. Scholars are, for the most part, unfamiliar with the visionary and pioneering work of these women and others who were at the forefront in the fight to desegregate public school systems in New Jersey beginning in the early 1920s and leading up to the groundbreaking triumph of the 1944 school segregation case, Hedgepeth and Williams v. Trenton Board of Education. According to Williams, the successful outcome of the case served as the model for the NAACP’s case a decade later in Brown. She concludes that New Jersey, with its courageous Black female activists, was a leader in civil rights reform.

Williams’s goal was to demonstrate the statewide impact of Black women’s organizing efforts. The work does offer some evidence of this success. However, the starting point of engaging in civil rights activism remains grounded in local, community-level grassroots organizing. Connecting with state and national organizations and initiatives appears later as the stories of these remarkable women would seem to indicate.

Assuming a leadership role in the numerous Black women-led organizations like the National Association of Colored Women (NACW), Black sororities, civic and social organizations, and auxiliary Black church organizations and committees were the expected norm for Black women. But of special note is the analysis Williams provides on how Black women negotiated their roles as leaders within male-dominated and white female-dominated leadership in organizations like the NAACP, NUL, and the Young Women’s Christian Association (YWCA). For example, in recounting the challenges faced by Anna Arnold Hedgeman, who she describes as a “pluralist-interracialist, Black woman feminist,” Williams notes, “Hedgeman knew that white women, especially those she encountered in the YWCA movement, were oftentimes disingenuous about advancing Black freedom claims,” (88). But she, like others, found a pathway to success. The strategies they used to help achieve some of the goals of the movement are detailed in the text.

The Georgia of the North: Black Women and the Civil Rights Movement in New Jersey–rigorously researched, documented, and thoughtfully analyzed–is a significant contribution to scholarship. The bibliographic list offers a wealth of rich historical materials for students and scholars in the fields of Africana and African Diaspora Studies, History, Sociology, Gender and Sexuality Studies, and it is likely to encourage further research in this area.