Redlining was a policy in which the federal government went city-by-city, neighborhood-by-neighborhood, producing maps such as this one of Philadelphia, which graded neighborhoods for investment-worthiness—primarily based on racial and ethnic composition. The higher the rate of “infiltration of undesirable racial elements,” the more “hazardous” a neighborhood would be graded (with green First Grade being the highest grade, and red Fourth Grade being the lowest). The standardized forms and associated comments (overlaid in this image) reveal the redliners’ intent: immigrant neighborhoods, communities of color—anything that had even a small population of what was not considered “white”—was officially “hazardous for investment.”

Redlining began in the 1930s and was a self-fulfilling prophecy. The areas deemed “hazardous” had their tax bases enervated as property values plummeted. Municipal services were cut back and physical decay began. After WWII, the white people living in these neighborhoods were given federal incentive to flee to the suburbs in the form of the GI Bill.

For the millions of soldiers returning from the war, the GI Bill provided generously-subsidized mortgages for single-family suburban homes. While black soldiers were technically eligible, the presence of “restrictive covenants” in virtually all new suburbs meant that realtors would sell to “members of the white race only” (as was written into the deed itself).*

Over the ensuing decades, whites fled to the suburbs while people of color were forced to stay in neighborhoods in which the government was actively and visibly disinvesting. In inner-cities across the county, previously vibrant and diverse neighborhoods—neighborhoods in which the dream of America’s “melting pot” perhaps came as close to fruition as it ever would—were purposefully left to decay.

After the 1956 Federal Highway Act, when the highway builders such as Edmund Bacon came along, they were able to claim economic prudence in routing their massive roads through these neighborhoods, which to their eyes had become “slums.” More info on redlining to come.

*Indeed, during this time the definition of “white” was evolving to encompass groups previously viewed as “non-white,” such as Irish, Italian, and other European immigrant groups.