A STRONG OR WEAK STATE - RACE AND THE US FEDERAL-GOVERNMENT IN THE 1920S

In the decades between 1896 and the mid-1960s it was unusual for the f ederal government to act to defend or advance Black Americans' interes ts. In this article two such rare instances are analysed. Both occurre d in the 1920s, a decade with a distinctive political complexion. In 1 923 Black Americans called upon the federal government's Veterans Bure au [VB] to make good its assurance that African Americans would staff a newly opened hospital in Tuskegee, Alabama, for blacks. At the end o f the decade, the Superintendent of Prisons was petitioned to abrogate the new practice at the federal penitentiary in Atlanta, Georgia, of leasing out exclusively Black American prisoners to local governments for contract work. Each case was formulated and justified within the p rejudicial framework of segregated race relations, but Black Americans sought fair treatment within its unsalubrious confines. The cases dem onstrate the capacity of the federal government to act on racial issue s when political circumstances permitted.