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The Bureau of the Census announces statistics regarding the distribution of the Black population in the U.S.
1971 (Mar 3)
The Bureau of the Census announced that, contrary to earlier reports, the rate of Black migration from the South to the North during the 1960s had remained unchanged from the pace of the two previous decades. Earlier statistics had indicated that the number of Southern Blacks moving North had dropped sharply during the 1960s to about half the levels of the prior twenty years. The new figures from the 1970 census showed that the migration pace through the 1960s was nearly the same as the high levels of the 1940s and 1950s. According to the Bureau's analysts, more than three-fourths of the 1.4 million Blacks who left the South during the decade settled in five large industrial centers. New York had a Southern Black influx of 396,000; California, 272,000; New Jersey, Michigan, and Illinois each gained about 120,000. The analysts said there were indications that the migration rate would continue to be high and might increase in the 1970s. The Bureau also reported an increased movement of whites to the South. This dual movement of Blacks to the North and whites to the South was reportedly a continuation of a long-term trend toward distribution of the Black population throughout the United States. According to the Bureau's report, the South still contained 53 percent of the nation's Blacks, compared to 77 percent in 1940. Since 1940, the percentage of Blacks in the Northeast and North Central states had risen from about 11 percent to 20 percent. Bureau analysts said that each of the eleven states of the Confederacy had lost residents. Mississippi and Alabama led with 279,000 and 231,000 respectively. Secretary of Commerce Maurice H. Stans speculated that the continued Black Northern migration was due in part to the higher welfare benefits of the Northern states. He added, however, that he assumed that greater job opportunities in the North would be the primary motivating factor. The Bureau statistics showed that there were about 22,672,570 Blacks in the United States or about 11.2 percent of the population. In 1960, the figures were 18,871,831 or about 10.6 percent.
References:
- • Hornsby, Alton. Chronology of African-American History: Significant Events and People from 1619 to the Present. Detroit: Gale Research, 1995.