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.Such wasnot the case for low-income Blacks, however, who had come to occupy the42 / RACE, CLASS, AND ACTI VI SMTable 2 Los Angeles County population by race/ethnicity, 1970Racial/Ethnic Group Population % of Total PopulationWhite 7,083,500 73.7Hispanic 1,399,600 14.6African American 781,000 8.1Asian American 256,200 2.6Middle Eastern 52,400 0.5American Indian 20,500 0.2Other 15,800 0.2Total 9,609,000 99.9Source: Adapted from Georges Sabagh and Mehdi Bozorgmehr,  Population Change: Immi-gration and Ethnic Transformation, in Ethnic Los Angeles, ed.Roger Waldinger and MehdiBozorgmehr (New York: Russell Sage Foundation, 1996), table 3.2,  Population of SpecificEthnic Groups by Nativity, Los Angeles Region, 1970 1990, pp.95 96.©1996 Russell SageFoundation.lowest rung in the racial hierarchy.This was clearly a shift from earlier dayswhen Asian and Mexican Americans were the targets of racist hysteria, asseen in the zoot-suit riots, the Sleepy Lagoon murder case, Mexican repa-triation, countless Asian exclusions, and, of course, the internment.21 Blacksearlier relatively privileged position was due not only to their relativelysmall numbers but more importantly to their distinct experiences in theregion.Although the first Spanish expedition to arrive in Los Angelesincluded Blacks, any distinctive history and culture were soon dwarfed bythe overwhelming Spanish, Mexican, indigenous, and Anglo presence.Forexample, Mexican Blacks were subsumed under Hispanic culture.That cul-ture, while certainly racist, did not rest on a Black/white racial binary, likeAnglo-American culture, but instead featured a racial ideology predicatedon a range of racial categories, color gradations, and class.As a result, formuch of Los Angeles s early history, Blacks were located in a Hispanic racialorder, in which they were one of many subjugated groups.In addition, because of their relatively small numbers and marginalization,African Americans did not pose a significant political-economic threat.Almaguer has shown how in nineteenth-century California whites struggledwith Indians over land, with Asians over labor, and with Mexicans over bothland and labor but not with Blacks.Even in the late 1930s, evidence from aHome Owners Loan Corporation survey suggests that as long as Blacks  kepttheir place and were relatively few they were not considered to be a problem.DI FFERENTI AL RACI ALI ZATI ON I N SOUTHERN CALI FORNI A / 43Negroes do not constitute a racial problem.for although they toohave been increasing rapidly in number, their ratio to the total countypopulation has remained constant since 1890.The Negro race is fairlywell confined to a few sections within the county.They occupy onelarger area southwest of the business district.Although BeverlyHills shows a larger than average number of Negroes, these are madeup entirely of servants and they do not own property in the commu-nity.The major racial problem existing in Los Angeles, and onewhich is not revealed by the census data, is that created by the largenumbers of Mexicans, who are classed as Whites by the CensusBureau.While many of the Mexican race are of high caliber anddescended from the Spanish grandees who formerly owned all the terri-tory in southern California, the large majority of Mexican people are adefinite problem locally and their importation in the years gone by towork the agricultural crops has now been recognized as a mistake.22Clearly, as long as Blacks remained spatially and socially subordinated, theywere not considered a threat, as their numbers and actions did not intrudeon the acquisition of white property, wealth, and status.This all changed with World War II, however, as Southern California sracial hierarchy came to more closely reflect the national one.The redefin-ition of race along Black and white lines required a change in status forMexican and Asian Americans.This was partly achieved by simply ignoringboth groups and allowing them to become less prominent in the racial hier-archy, but also by granting them some movement toward whiteness.Thisshift is attributable to several events [ Pobierz caÅ‚ość w formacie PDF ]