What Caused the Post-WW2 Decline of Urban America? Part 2 – Dropping the Hammer, by Steve Penfield - The Unz Review

 

The Shelley’s home in St. Louis was ground zero for the 1948 ruling that struck down neighborhood Freedom of Association. That year, a weaponized Supreme Court invented a “right” of forced entry that a more sober and diverse Supreme Court had unanimously rejected in 1926. Urban chaos exploded when the Court got it wrong.

As detailed in Part 1, dozens of major U.S. cities experienced a cooling of growth in the 1930s and then suffered huge losses after WW2, reversing over a century of previous expansion and prosperity. Two big factors in that decline were the unprecedented federal assaults on the historical work/save/invest ethic via nationalizing home mortgages (instant bank credit) in the 1930s and the 1935 nationalization of unions triggering the downfall of urban manufacturing that froze millions of middle-class jobs.

A third and more devastating federal action was inventing the “right” of forced entry by blacks (or anyone else) into previously peaceful English, German, Irish, Polish, Italian and other diverse ethnic communities. This final act of reckless social engineering permanently chased away millions of established urban residents and replaced them with a new class of predominantly poor, rural, uneducated people who often had little or no experience with the rigors of owning and maintaining property.

The federal imposition that chased people out of stable urban communities was the Supreme Court’s 1948 Shelley vs. Kraemer decision that abolished Freedom of Association in American neighborhoods. This radical decision reversed the 1926 Corrigan vs. Buckley ruling that had unanimously protected those community rights in a very similar case. Unfortunately, both rulings have been largely forgotten in today’s climate of extreme aversion to anything branded “racism.” That reflexive avoidance has left enormous gaps in the public record.

War Fever Comes Home, Race Militants Target American Neighborhoods

In the post-war glow of moral supremacy (having spent most of the 1930s to 1945 denouncing “Nazis” and “fascists” while increasingly embracing Nation Socialism at home) stone-throwing Pharisees and other political extremists needed new demons to slay. With Germany and Japan now obliterated and the Soviet Union officially declared the new source of global terror, the next targets were variably “communism” or white Christian “racism,” depending on the situation. And the grandstanding displays of social piety were again stacking up.

With any mention of Communism or Socialism, I feel obliged to note that America was moving in a collectivist direction since Herbert Hoover’s panic after the stock market correction in 1929 (when almost no one owned stocks). When FDR took office in 1933, he immediately reneged on campaign promises to make the government smaller and went hog wild to initiate or extend federal control over agriculture (AAA), banking (gold seizure, FDIC), broadcasting (FCC), college, energy, housing, retirement, unions and wage controls—none of which were legally authorized in the Constitution.

After World War 2, America could have returned some of those “emergency” powers back to states and individuals. But Truman and Eisenhower decided to plow ahead with more central planning, particularly in areas of racial revenge. The 1948 Shelley decision to strike down freewill in local community housing arrangements fit well into this trend.....

https://www.unz.com/article/what-caused-the-post-ww2-decline-of-urban-america-part-2-dropping-the-hammer/ 

....Conclusion

Following our hollow “victory” of World War 2, dozens of major U.S. cities that had previously enjoyed peace and prosperity for generations suddenly stopped growing and soon declined. Many of them like Detroit, Chicago, Philadelphia, St. Louis, Baltimore, Buffalo, Cleveland, Newark, Pittsburgh, and Washington D.C. entered death spirals in the 1950s that drove millions of residents away, never to return.

Reckless federal interference in the housing market since the early 1930s gradually killed the longstanding Western ethic of working, saving and investing for a home; easy credit soon moved in for anyone with a pulse and a penchant to Buy Now, Pay Later. Additional interference of nationalizing unions in 1935 immediately led to a spike in labor unrest and lawless behavior that eventually choked America’s manufacturing base. Then the vengeful 1948 Shelley decision revoked neighborhood Freedom of Association, opening the floodgates to anyone coveting a lifestyle they did nothing to build. All three radical impositions were unprecedented in U.S. history at the time. Viewed as a whole, these measures were all designed for catering to predatory fiat bankers, corporate cartels, union militants and other powerful interests, while simultaneously pandering to mob voting passions. The ensuing chaos was no accident.

Despite tens of trillions spent on federal welfare programs since the 1960s, largely targeted on the urban poor, most cities never regained anything like their former glory of the circa 1800 to 1950 era. And the sprawling suburban flight from urban decay wasted tens of trillions more.

Along with the failed intrusion into college and exploding healthcare costs immediately following World War 2 (explored in a previous essay last year), the housing, labor and racial interferences of the 1930s and 40s created a New America that would have been unrecognizable to anyone living here from the 1600s to the 1920s. Once again, the illusion of post-WW2 allied “success” fades into a political charade that should be questioned by everyone.

Email: spenfieldNY@gmail.com