Springfield Race Riot of 1908
| Springfield race riot | |||
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An example of the damage caused to black residences in the riot
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| Date | August 14/15 1908 | ||
| Location | Springfield, Illinois | ||
| Causes | Arrests of blacks for violent crimes against whites | ||
| Methods | RIoting, arson, lynching | ||
| Parties to the civil conflict | |||
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| Casualties | |||
| Death(s) | 7 | ||
The Springfield race riot of 1908 was a mass civil disturbance in Springfield, Illinois, United States on August 14 and 15, 1908, sparked by the arrest of two African Americans as suspects in violent crimes against whites. When a mob seeking to take the men for lynching discovered the sheriff had transferred them out of the city, it rioted in black neighborhoods. It killed black citizens on the street and destroyed businesses and homes. It was the first race riot in the North in half a century.
By the end of the riot the next day, the governor had sent in thousands of militia to restore order. At least seven people died, and there was US$200,000 in property damage, mostly to the black neighborhoods. This was one of the few riots of whites against blacks in 20th-century United States history in which more white deaths (five) were recorded than black (two). The riot was a factor in the formation of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) by both blacks and whites. Its goal was to improve civil rights for black people, and to educate all the populace and improve race relations.
Around the start of the 20th century, Springfield, Illinois was a rapidly growing industrial center, with the highest percentage of African-American residents of any comparably sized city in Illinois. It also had a high proportion of European immigrants who came for industrial jobs. Black people had been migrating north for work and to leave the social oppression of the South; in 1900 they numbered 2300 residents in Springfield, 6.5 percent of the town's population. Although Black people were generally kept to lower-class and unskilled jobs, and lived in segregated areas, social tensions arose from fierce job competition with the recent European immigrants for the lower grade jobs. Industries sometimes used black workers as strikebreakers during labor strikes. Town residents worried about growing political power among black people.
"It is the central paradox of our history that a nation based on the respect for law and order should so often resort to violence to maintain the inequities of race and class."
On Saturday, July 4, 1908, a man broke into the home of Clergy Ballard, a white mining engineer. Ballard awoke and rose to investigate, finding a man standing near his daughter's bed. The intruder fled the house and Ballard gave chase. After Ballard caught up with the intruder, the man turned and attacked him, slashing Ballard's throat with a wavy razor. Before dying on Sunday, Ballard identified his assailant as Joe James, a young black man new to town. White residents found James sleeping off a drunk night in the North End, a white working-class neighborhood, and beat him before police took him away. They arrested him, and locked him in the city jail. The press suggested that Ballard had saved his daughter from a sexual attack, which inflamed residents more.
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