HR0449 101ST GENERAL ASSEMBLY

HR0449 LRB101 12731 MST 61510 r

HOUSE RESOLUTION

WHEREAS, "Black Wall Street" was a prospering African-American neighborhood in Tulsa, Oklahoma, that went up in flames 98 years ago; incredibly, most Americans have never heard of the shameful events of June 1, 1921, when whites firebombed the neighborhood and an estimated 300 African-Americans were murdered; and

WHEREAS, During the course of 18 hours on May 31 and June 1, 1921, more than 1,000 homes and businesses in Tulsa, Oklahoma were destroyed and estimates of 50 to 300 people were killed during the race bombing; and

WHEREAS, By early 1921, Tulsa, Oklahoma was a modern city with a population of more than 100,000; most of the city's 10,000 African-American residents lived in the Greenwood District, a vibrant neighborhood that was home to two newspapers, several churches, a library branch, and scores of black-owned businesses; and

WHEREAS, On May 30, 1921, an incident involving Dick Rowland, an African-American shoe shiner, and Sarah Page, a white elevator operator, in the Drexel Building in Tulsa would rapidly escalate into one of the single worst incidents of racial violence in American history; the most common explanation is that Rowland stepped on Page's foot as he entered the elevator, causing her to scream, and Rowland was arrested by the police; and

WHEREAS, On May 30, 1921, the Tulsa Tribune, the city's afternoon daily newspaper, reported that Rowland had attempted to rape Page; by 7:30 P.M., hundreds of whites had gathered outside the Tulsa County Courthouse demanding that the authorities hand over Rowland, but the sheriff refused; at around 9 P.M., after reports of the dire conditions downtown reached Greenwood, a group of approximately 25 armed African-American men, many of them World War I veterans, went down to the courthouse and offered their services to the authorities to help protect Rowland but were rebuffed by the sheriff; at around 10 P.M., a false rumor hit Greenwood that whites were storming the courthouse, prompting a second contingent of African-American men to go back to the courthouse and offer their services to the authorities, who were once again turned away; as the group was leaving, a white man tried to disarm a black veteran and a shot was fired, an incident that became the start of the race bombing; and

WHEREAS, Over the next 6 hours, Tulsa was plunged into chaos as angry whites, frustrated over the failed lynching, began to vent their rage at African-Americans in general; furious fighting erupted along the Frisco railroad tracks, where black defenders were able to hold off members of the white mob; an unarmed African-American man was murdered inside a downtown movie theater, while carloads of armed whites began making "drive-by" shootings in black residential neighborhoods; by midnight, fires had been set along the edge of the African-American commercial district; in some of the city's all-night cafes, whites began to organize for a dawn invasion of Greenwood; and

WHEREAS, During the early hours of the race bombing, local authorities did little to stem the growing crisis, and Tulsa police officers had deputized former members of the lynch mob; local units of the National Guard were mobilized, but they spent most of the night protecting a white neighborhood from a nonexistent black counterattack; and

WHEREAS, Shortly before dawn on June 1, 1921, thousands of armed whites had gathered along the fringes of Greenwood; after daybreak, they poured into the African-American district, looting homes and businesses and setting them on fire; numerous atrocities occurred, including the murder of A. C. Jackson, a renowned black surgeon, who was shot after he surrendered to a group of whites; at least one machine gun was utilized by the invading whites, and some have claimed that airplanes were used in the attack; black Tulsans fought hard to protect their homes and businesses, with particularly sharp fighting occurring off of Standpipe Hill, but were outgunned and outnumbered in the end; and

WHEREAS, Following the race bombing, a brief period of martial law was followed by various legal maneuvers; even though Dick Rowland was exonerated, an all-white grand jury blamed black Tulsans for the events that transpired; despite overwhelming evidence, no whites were ever sent to prison for the murders and arson that had occurred; and

WHEREAS, The vast majority of Tulsa's African-American population had been made homeless by the race bombing; despite efforts by the white establishment to force the relocation of the black community, black Tulsans had already begun the long and arduous process of rebuilding Greenwood within days; thousands were forced to spend the winter of 1921-1922 living in tents; and

WHEREAS, The deep scars left by the race bombing remained visible for years, and it became a taboo subject, particularly in Tulsa, for many years; in 1997, a state commission was formed to investigate the race bombing; the commission recommended that reparations be paid to the remaining survivors, while a team of scientists and historians uncovered evidence supporting long-held beliefs that unidentified victims had been buried in unmarked grave sites; and

WHEREAS, It is important that the people of the State of Illinois and the nation do not forget this terrible tragedy; therefore, be it

RESOLVED, BY THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES OF THE ONE HUNDRED FIRST GENERAL ASSEMBLY OF THE STATE OF ILLINOIS, that we mourn the loss of life and the loss of the black economy of Tulsa, Oklahoma that took place on May 31 and June 1, 1921.