The Color of Law Rothdas book review RSS
3.0 Stars
6-5-2022

Fine? Fine. The book is about the effects of racism in housing in America over the last century, with a focus on the legal & governmental policies that resulted in segregated housing. It is aimed more at the academic or legal reader rather than the general interest reader, and it tends to make its points in exhaustive & minute detail. So even though the book is short, it is also a bit of slog, and many chapters seem like just a simple transform of the citations into verbiage. This would be fine for proving a legal case, but it is perhaps not the most effective format for talking to an interested layman. This is doubly true since I think most of us already know the outlines of these events from general cultural osmosis, and don't necessarily need every point explained in great detail. E.g. we've all seen Lovecraft Country, so we're all familiar with idea of white mobs, abetted by the police, trying to drive out black families that have moved in to a neighborhood.

The things I did learn from the book were not so much about the events themselves, as about the magnitude, directness, & recentness of events:

- E.g. 50 fire bombings, in a single city, in a single month, over attempts to integrate several neighborhoods
- E.g. racist housing policies after WWI, not surprising. Racist housing policies in 1970, much more yikes - E.g. one of the main points of the book is that many these problems emanated from the very top, since FDR's Federal Housing Administration refused to insure mortgages to black people or even to integrated neighborhoods. This in turn made it impossible for them to get mortgages, and led to a whole series of down-stream evils & inequalities in housing.
- E.g. the police/legal system did nothing against vigilante violence; the usual result of the legal system getting involved was to jail or demote anyone attempting integration, and to let rioters, snipers, and bombers off without investigation. Some of those who work forces, and it is very literal & documented in this case