12th Street riot

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The 12th Street Riot in Detroit began in the early morning hours of Sunday, July 23, 1967. Vice squad officers executed a raid at a blind pig on the corner of 12th Street and Clairmount on the city's near westside. The confrontation with the patrons there evolved into one of the deadliest and most destructive riots in modern U.S. history, lasting five days and far surpassing the 1943 riot the city endured. Before the end, the state and federal governments, under order of then President Lyndon B. Johnson, sent in National Guard and U.S. Army troops and the result was forty-three dead, 467 injured, over 7,200 arrests and more than 2,000 buildings burned down. The scope of the riot was eclipsed in scale only by the 1992 Los Angeles riots. Detroit has never fully recovered from the after-effects of the riot and the negative domestic and international media coverage. The riot was prominently featured in the news media, with live television coverage, extensive newspaper reporting, and an extensive cover stories in Time magazine and Life (magazine) on August 4, 1967.

Contents 1 Background 2 Chronology 3 The toll 4 The aftermath 5 See also 6 Notes 7 External links

[edit] Background

The seeds of the 12th Street riot were planted in the extraordinary growth of the auto industry that placed the city at the industrial center of the nation. The availability of high-paying and unskilled work in auto plants attracted many from the south, both black and white, who brought their often conflicting cultures into the community. In 1943, racial tensions between blacks and whites broke out into open riot as each competed for wartime jobs and limited housing. An estimated 10,000 participated, with an estimated 100,000 gathering to watch. Thirty-six hours of rioting later, 43 were dead, 33 of them black, 17 of those by police action. More than 7,200 were arrested, mostly black.

By 1967, black residents lacked adequate housing due to lending practices, misguided urban renewal, and deed restrictions. Detroit had the highest home ownership rate among black people in the nation, but urban renewal projects bulldozed some black neighborhoods to make way for freeway construction. In order to construct Interstate 75, "Black Bottom" (Paradise Valley) was demolished, displacing most residents to high-rise low-income project housing or already-crowded neighborhoods. Black Bottom was the focus of the black community, and its loss resulted in racial tensions due to the loss of community as well as housing. Lending practices by banks, such as redlining, in addition to deed restrictions in local communities, denied blacks the ability to move to many neighborhoods, including most of the Detroit suburbs. Many homes that were privately owned were bought on land contract at high interest rates and very short foreclosure schedules. Blacks were trapped and confined to areas (often undesirable) that were not sufficient to hold the displaced population, and by 1967, the neighborhood around 12th Street had a population density that was twice the city average. Black schools in the city were overcrowded as well as underfunded.

In the 1960s, Detroit's total population was dropping due to white and business flight although the black population was still increasing rapidly due to continued immigration from the South. Detroit was losing over 20,000 residents a year by 1966, most of them white, who left for new jobs, better housing, better city services and schools in the suburbs. Partially in response to Detroit taxes, Detroit lost 134,000 jobs from 1947 to 1963. Between 1946 and 1956, GM spent $3.4 billion on new plants, Ford $2.5 billion, Chrysler $700 million, opening a total of 25 auto plants, all in Detroit's suburbs. Detroit lost around 240,000 residents between 1950 and 1970. By 1967 the city government was in deep financial trouble as the property tax base dropped. Whites could escape the problems of Detroit, but blacks were denied loans and, in some cases, purchases in the suburbs.

In 1967, the Detroit Police Department was predominantly white with only 8% black. Its Big 4 or Tac Squads, each made up of four police officers, had a reputation among the black residents of Detroit for harassment and brutality. Officers verbally degraded youths, and those that could not produce proper identification were often arrested or worse. Several questionable shootings and beatings of blacks by officers were reported by the local press in the years before 1967. After the riot, a Detroit Free Press survey showed that residents reported police brutality as the number one problem they faced in the period leading up to the riot.

In 1963, Martin Luther King Jr. came to Detroit for a march to protest segregation and racism. In his speech, he said prophetically, "...We must come to see that de facto segregation in the North is just as injurious as the actual segregation in the South."^[1] But by 1967, the mainstream civil rights movement was in decline, making space for the emerging, high-profile Black Power Movement and its more militant approach to combating racism and increasing the life chances of black people. Detroit mayor Jerome Cavanagh had been elected less than two years previously with promises of progressive reforms and an end to the cronyism that had marked his predecessor's tenure. The federal government, at Cavanagh's prodding, pumped money into the city's urban renewal and Head Start programs. However, unemployment among black men was more than double that of white men in Detroit. Blacks were less educated than whites, and when they did have the same education, they were generally paid less than their white counterparts.

Twelve days before the raid on the blind pig, Newark, New Jersey had suffered through six days of rioting, ending less than five days before the Detroit riot began. Conditions in Newark were much worse for blacks than conditions were in Detroit. Detroit's rate of black homeownership was the highest in the nation; Newark's was much lower.

[edit] Chronology

In the early hours of Sunday, July 23, 1967, Detroit police officers expected to find only a handful of individuals in the blind pig, but instead there were 82 people celebrating the return of two local veterans from the war in Vietnam. Despite the large number, police decided to arrest everyone present. A crowd soon gathered around the establishment, protesting as patrons were led away.

After the last police car left, a group of angry black males, who had observed the incident, began breaking the windows of the adjacent clothing store. Shortly thereafter, full-scale rioting began throughout the neighborhood, which continued into Monday, July 24, 1967, and for the next few days. Despite a conscious effort by the local news media to avoid reporting on it so as not to inspire copy-cat violence, the mayhem expanded to other parts of the city with theft and destruction beyond the 12th Street/Clairmount Avenue vicinity.

Michigan Governor George Romney and President Lyndon Johnson initially disagreed about the legality of sending in federal troops. Johnson said he could not send federal troops in without Romney declaring a "state of insurrection". Romney was reluctant to make that declaration for fear that doing so would relieve insurance companies of their obligations to reimburse policyholders for the damage being done.

The violence escalated throughout Monday, July 24, resulting in some 483 fires, 231 incidents reported per hour, and 1800 arrests. Looting and arson were widespread. Snipers took shots at firefighters who were attempting to fight the fires, possibly with some with the 2,498 rifles and 38 handguns that were stolen from local stores. It was obvious that the Detroit and Michigan forces were unable to keep the peace.

On Monday, U.S. Representative John Conyers (D-Michigan), who was against Federal troop deployment, attempted to ease tensions but was unsuccessful. Reportedly, Conyers stood on the hood of the car and shouted through a bullhorn, "We're with you! But, please! This is not the way to do things! Please go back to your homes!" But the crowd refused to listen. One civil rights activist (whom Conyers had once defended in a trial) allegedly responded, "Why are you defending the cops and the establishment? You're just as bad as they are!" Conyers' car was pelted with rocks and bottles, one of them hitting a nearby cop. According to reports, as Conyers climbed down from the hood of the car, he remarked to a reporter in disgust, "You try to talk to those people and they'll knock you into the middle of next year."^[2]

Likewise, Detroit Tigers left-fielder Willie Horton, a black Detroit resident who grew up not far from the blind pig, drove to the riot area after his game and stood on a car in the middle of the crowd while he was still wearing his uniform. However, despite his impassioned pleas, he could not calm the angry mob.

Shortly before midnight on Monday, July 24, President Johnson authorized use of Federal troops by using a law from 1795, which stated that the President may call in armed forces whenever there is an insurrection in any state against the government.^[3] The 82nd Airborne had earlier been positioned at nearby Selfridge Air Force Base in suburban Macomb County, along with National Guard troops who were federalized at that time. Starting at 1:30 AM Tuesday July 25, some 8,000 National Guardsmen were deployed to quell the disorder. Later their number would be augmented with 4,700 paratroopers from the 82nd Airborne, and 360 Michigan State Police.

There is some discussion that the deployment of troops incited more violence, although the riot ended within 48 hours of their deployment. National Guard troops were engaged in firefights with locals, resulting in deaths both to locals and the troops. Tanks and machine guns were used in the effort to keep the peace. Film footage and photos shown internationally were of a city on fire, with tanks and combat troops in firefights in the streets, sealing Detroit's reputation for decades to come.

By Thursday, July 27, order had returned to the city to the point where ammunition was taken from the National Guardsmen stationed in the riot area, and bayonets ordered sheathed. Troop withdrawal began on Friday, July 28, the day of the last major fire in the riot. The Army troops were completely withdrawn by Saturday, July 29.

The Detroit riot ignited similar problems elsewhere. National Guardsmen or state police were deployed in five other cities: Pontiac, Flint, Saginaw, Grand Rapids, and Toledo, Ohio. Disturbances were also reported in more than two dozen cities.

[edit] The toll

Over the period of five days, forty-three people died, of whom 33 were black. The other damages were calculated as follows:

• 467 injured: 182 civilians, 167 Detroit police officers, 83 Detroit firefighters, 17 National Guard troops, 16 State Police officers, 3 U.S. Army soldiers.
• 7,231 arrested: 6,528 adults, 703 juveniles; 6,407 blacks, 824 whites. The youngest, 4; the oldest, 82. Half of those arrested had no criminal record. Three percent of those arrested went to trial; half of them were acquitted.
• 2,509 stores looted or burned, 388 families homeless or displaced and 412 buildings burned or damaged enough to be demolished. Dollar losses from arson and looting ranged from $40 million to $80 million.^[4]

The dead included: