By: Maya Marshall
Like most historical narratives of Black Americans, the story of Black land ownership in this country is one of deprivation and resiliency. Following the Civil War, newly freed slaves and their descendants accumulated nearly 20 million acres of land[i] and primarily used it as farmland.[ii] However, over the last century, this community has been stripped of millions of acreages, resulting in hundreds of billions of dollars in lost wealth.[iii] A number of things contributed to the loss of Black-owned land. To explain, most land loss is attributed to heirs’ property, [iv] racial acts of terror and manipulation against Black farmers,[v] and decades of discrimination directed at the behest of the United States Department of Agriculture (USDA).[vi]
Around the 1920s, the Ku Klux Klan and other vigilante groups terrorized Black farmers in an effort to drive them off of their property. [vii] Concurrent to the incitement of these terroristic acts was the federal government’s implementation of a number of discriminatory practices that intentionally deprived Black farmers of similar opportunities seized by their White counterparts. The USDA systematically excluded Black farmers from government farm support programs,[viii] conspired with banks and land developers to steal Black farmers’ property, and denied Black farmers loans that many White farmers were able to secure with ease.[ix] Setting aside all other acts of racism and discrimination, these practices alone devastated the Black community and have yet to be adequately addressed.
In recent years, however, scholars, Congressional members, and several non-profit organizations have launched a grassroots movement to rectify the impact of this forced loss of land. In 2010, the Uniform Law Commission promulgated the Uniform Partition of Heirs Property Act (UPHPA),[x] which aimed at redrafting property laws to stabilize tenancy-in-common ownership for disadvantaged families.[xi] Despite its dramatic impact on the rules surrounding inheritance in marginalized communities, only thirteen states have adopted the UPHPA. Most recently, Congress passed a 2019 Farm Bill that contained provisions designed to provide access to farming-based government assistance programs and help heirs’ property owners better maintain ownership of their property.[xii] Although the UPHPA successfully addresses the partition laws that negatively impact families with heirs’ property holdings and the 2019 Farm Bill provides first-time access to government assistance programs, these policies only serve as a modest start in rectifying the social and economic harms Black farmers experienced. Tailored and directed investment is needed.
Although these legislative enactments are imperative to the future of Black farming, they do not directly address land restoration.[xiii] In February 2021, six members of Congress reintroduced the Justice for Black Farmers Act.[xiv]One of this proposed Act’s features is to restore the land base lost by Black farmers due to discriminatory practices within the American agricultural institution.[xv] Legislative policies directing the federal government to prioritize land distribution to Black farmers are needed “to undo the racist legacy of land theft.”[xvi] Despite the glaring wealth disparities and racial discrepancies seen within the farming industry, some individuals do not believe focused investment in the Black community is needed or just.[xvii]
Over the last five years, all farmers involved in the small-scale farming industry have faced substantial hardship due to increasing industrialization and consolidation.[xviii] These trends, coupled with the growth of agri-businesses, have led to a decline in the farming profession,[xix] a significant increase in Chapter 12 farm bankruptcies[xx] and an alarming surge in farmer suicide rates.[xxi] Although the adversities experienced by the entire small-scale farming industry must undoubtedly be addressed, overlooking the disparities between black and white small-scale farmers only exacerbates the racial caste system seen within this institution and creates more problems for the industry.
Greater financial investment in Black farmers does not negate the plight of White farmers; it simply serves as an avenue for redress for the decades of federally mandated discrimination and deprivation of opportunity. The USDA’s long and evidenced history of willful discrimination, exclusion, and inequitable treatment severely impacted generations of Black Americans. Over the course of 90 years, there was a 98% decrease in the number of Black farmers and a 90% loss in land.[xxii] Today, Black farmers account for less than 2% of all U.S. farmers[xxiii] and represent only .04% of all farm acreage.[xxiv] The trend of these statistics, when combined with an understanding of the role land plays in our nation’s history of wealth accumulation, highlights the origins of the racial wealth gap. Racism has shaped the American farming landscape, and prioritized investment in Black farmers levels the playing field.
Direct investment in Black farmers serves as “an equitable balancing of the scales after decades of systematic racism within the USDA that disadvantaged Black farmers, excluded them from loans and other programs, [and] prevented them from holding on to their land.”[xxv] Creating policies and programs that provide a larger investment in Black farmers fulfills a “societal obligation”[xxvi] to a group that has been historically and systematically discriminated against. When a series of wrongs are committed by the federal government, equitable structural and institutional responses are required. To advance and succeed as a nation, we must address and reconcile with the wrongs of our past because the “true measure of our character is how we treat the poor, the disfavored, the accused, the incarcerated, and the condemned.”[xxvii]
[i] What is Heirs Property?, Heirs Prop. Coal. (last visited Feb. 16, 2021), http://hprc.southerncoalition.org/?q=node/5.
[ii] Leah Douglas, African Americans Have Lost Untold Acres of Land Over the Last Century, The Nation (Jun. 26, 2017), https://www.thenation.com/article/archive/african-americans-have-lost-acres/.
[iii] Addressing Discrimination and Ensuring Equity for Farmers of Color, Warren Democrats (last visited Feb. 16, 2021), https://elizabethwarren.com/plans/equity-farmers-of-color.
[iv] Heirs Property Coalition, supra note 1.
[v] Scott Faber, The Real Farm Subsidy Scandal? USDA’s Legacy of Racial Discrimination, AgMag (Mar. 20, 2017), https://www.ewg.org/agmag/2017/03/real-farm-subsidy-scandal-usda-s-legacy-racial-discrimination.
[vi] Heirs Property Coalition, supra note 1.
[vii] Tom Philpott, White People Own 98 Percent of Rural Land. Young Black Farmers Want to Reclaim Their Share, Mother Jones (Jun 27, 2020), https://www.motherjones.com/food/2020/06/black-farmers-soul-fire-farm-reparations-african-legacy-agriculture/.
[viii] Abril Castro & Zoe Willingham, Progressive Governance Can Turn the Tide for Black Farmers, Ctr. for Am. Progress (Apr. 3, 2019), https://www.americanprogress.org/issues/economy/reports/2019/04/03/467892/progressive-governance-can-turn-tide-black-farmers/.
[ix] Nathan Rosenberg & Bryce Wilson Stucki, How USDA distorted data to conceal decades of discrimination against Black farmers, The Counter (Jun. 26, 2019), https://thecounter.org/usda-black-farmers-discrimination-tom-vilsack-reparations-civil-rights/.
[x]Restoring Hope for Heirs Property Owners: The Uniform Partition of Heirs Property Act, A.B.A. (Oct. 1, 2016), https://www.americanbar.org/groups/state_local_government/publications/state_local_law_news/2016-17/fall/restoring_hope_heirs_property_owners_uniform_partition_heirs_property_act/.
[xi] Id.
[xii] Farm Bill advances reform of heirs’ property law, Dairy Bus. (Jan. 7, 2019), https://www.dairybusiness.com/farm-bill-advances-reform-of-heirs-property-law/.
[xiii] See id.; Dairy Bus., supra note 12.
[xiv] Chuck Abbott, Justice for Black Farmers Bill Introduced In Senate, Successful Farming (Feb. 9, 2020), https://www.agriculture.com/news/business/justice-for-black-farmers-bill-introduced-in-senate.
[xv] Mackenzie Jeter, How the Justice for Black Farmers Act Levels the Playing Field, Nat’l Farmers Union (Dec. 22, 2020), https://nfu.org/2020/12/22/how-the-justice-for-black-farmers-act-levels-the-playing-field/.
[xvi] Philpott, supra note 7.
[xvii] See Laurie Kellman, McConnell on Reparations for slavery: Not a ‘good idea’, Associated Press (Jun. 18, 2019), https://apnews.com/article/e79abc3b64e7400ea961f2fe99a73dc6.
[xviii] Megan Horst, How Racism Has Shaped the American Farming Landscape, Eater (Jan. 25, 2019), https://www.eater.com/2019/1/25/18197352/american-farming-racism-us-agriculture-history.
[xix] Id.
[xx] Alana Semuels, ‘They’re Trying to Wipe Us Off the Map.’ Small American Farmers Are Nearing Extinction, Time(Nov. 27, 2019), https://time.com/5736789/small-american-farmers-debt-crisis-extinction/.
[xxi] Id.
[xxii] Rosenberg & Stucki, supra note 9.
[xxiii] Emily Moon, African-American Farmers Make Up Less Than 2 Percent of All U.S. Farmers, Pacific Standard(Apr. 5, 2019), https://psmag.com/news/african-american-farmers-make-up-less-than-2-percent-of-all-us-farmers.
[xxiv] Castro & Willingham, supra note 8.
[xxv] Tom Philpott, Black Farmers Have Been Robbed of Land. A New Bill Would Give Them a “Quantum Leap” Toward Justice., Mother Jones (Nov. 19, 2020), https://www.motherjones.com/food/2020/11/black-farmers-have-been-robbed-of-land-a-new-bill-would-give-them-a-quantum-leap-toward-justice/.
[xxvi] Nikole Hannah-Jones, What is Owed, N.Y. Times(Jun. 30, 2020), https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2020/06/24/magazine/reparations-slavery.html.
[xxvii] Bryan Stevenson, Just Mercy: A Story of Justice and Redemption (Spiegel & Grau, 2015).