The Commission on Interracial Cooperation
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The Commission on Interracial Cooperation was started to try to curve the number of lynchings and violence occurring in the south post-WWI. The commission was formed in 1919 by a racially mixed group of people. One of their main objectives was to keep post war black soldiers from provoking bloodshed in the south. These soldiers fought for their country and were not mentally prepared to come back to a country that still called them “Nigger” and treated them as second class citizens. Will W. Alexander served as the first executive director. John J. Egan served as the first president. John Hope, President of Morehouse College, also served on the committee. The committee also had many lay members.
In 1924 many local offices were created and more socially applicable services were rendered. The Commission’s new focus:
- “Research, publicity, and education on the achievements of blacks and on the need for cooperation between the races. Programs were established to improve schools, health facilities, and general living conditions for African Americans, to provide legal aid, to eliminate lynching, and to study segregation in the South. The work of the CIC was supplemented by a copious publication program that distributed pamphlets, reports, periodicals, books, and press releases.”
In 1930 due to fiscal pressure from the onset of the Great Depression, the committee refocused itself. Many publications came from this refocus. Money from the Rosenwald Fund funded the Southern Commission to conduct research on the lynchings that occurred in 1930. The book that was written from the data gathered was The Tragedy of Lynching. Many other publications, organizations, and conferences came forth in association with the CIC:
- The Southern Regional Council
- Association of Southern Women for the Prevention of Lynching
- Conference on Educational and Race Relations
- The Southern Frontier
- The Collapse of Cotton Tenancy
- A Preface to Peasantry
The Council eventually found its formal end in 1944 when it merged with the Southern Regional Council.
