In July 1964, after a white police officer shot and killed an African
American teenage boy, unrest broke out in Harlem and then
Bedford-Stuyvesant. Protests rose up to call for an end to police
brutality and the unequal treatment of Black people in a city that
viewed itself as liberal. A week of upheaval ensued, including
looting and property damage as well as widespread police violence, in
what would be the first of the 1960s urban uprisings.
Christopher Hayes
examines the causes and consequences of the uprisings, from the
city’s history of racial segregation in education, housing, and
employment to the ways in which the police both neglected and
exploited Black neighborhoods. While the national civil rights
movement was securing substantial victories in the 1950s and 1960s,
Black New Yorkers saw little or uneven progress. Faced with a lack of
economic opportunities, pervasive discrimination, and worsening
quality of life, they felt a growing sense of disenchantment with the
promises of city leaders. Turning to the aftermath of the uprising,
Hayes demonstrates that the city’s power structure continued its
refusal to address structural racism. In the most direct local
outcome, a broad, interracial coalition of activists called for
civilian review of complaints against the police. The NYPD’s rank
and file fought this demand bitterly, further inflaming racial
tensions. The story of the uprisings and what happened next reveals
the white backlash against civil rights in the north and crystallizes
the limits of liberalism.
Drawing on a range
of archives, this book provides a vivid portrait of postwar New York
City, a new perspective on the civil rights era, and a timely
analysis of deeply entrenched racial inequalities.