Key terms left out of the Trib’s redlining article: Capitalism and institutional racism

The article ‘What does ‘redlining’ in 1940s Chicago have to do with today’s Black exodus from the city? Plenty, new study suggests’, while informative, fails to place the near 90 year issue in its proper context.

That would be the nexus between capitalism and institutional racism in which government and business conspired to make enormous profits while destroying neighborhoods and relegating minorities to those destroyed communities.

The Residential Security Maps drawn up by the Home Owners Loan Corporation (HOLC) actually go back to a 1935 directive of the Federal Home Loan Bank Board (FHLBB) which directed the HOLC to draw up those maps in 1940.

Once federally mandated institutional racism was drawn up by the government, private banking and home loan institutions took their cue from the Fed, resulting in nine decades of disinvestment which turned Chicago’s South and West Sides into violent urban wastelands. Whites living there also took the Fed’s cue, moving west toward green and blue lined areas where housing loans were readily available to those with the right color.

American capitalism had a couple more surprises for the residents left behind. Virtually no jobs or vital community resources but unlimited guns. There’s no Constitutional Amendment guaranteeing employment, a decent food store or nearby hospital. Two good food giants, Aldi Foods and Whole Foods, just announced ‘outta here’ to food deprived folks on Chicago’s South Side.

But there is one allowing guns galore to flood into the hands of dispossessed youngsters and confirmed criminals to ignite a daily shooting gallery claiming over 2,000 annual dead or wounded victims in Chicago alone. The 2nd Amendment, originally written to allow white Southern militias to hunt down runaway slaves and suppress slave rebellions, is now used to turn minority communities into free fire zones.

All of us of good will must take note and act. Until we do, the destruction of the inner cities and the debasement of our entire culture will live on.