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Former prizefighter Bill Tate led a boycott of white merchants in Chicago in 1929 who refused to hire blacks, spearheading a strategy in the 1930s called “Don’t Buy Where You Can’t Work.” It grew out of the “Double Duty Dollar” doctrine that African American ministers preached from the pulpit; churches promoted the strategy in mass meetings and through the newsletters. The primary aim was to help black businesses financially and to advance the race economically and socially. It spread to cities in other states, including Atlanta, St. Louis, Baltimore, Cleveland, Los Angeles, and Washington, D.C. There were branches in Richmond, Boston, and Pittsburgh, as well as in smaller cities, such as Evanston, Illinois, and Alliance, Ohio. Don’t Buy was sustained from the 1930s to World War II.

The effort became variously known as the “Jobs for Negroes” movement, “Don’t Spend Where You Can’t Work” movement, and other titles. Organized mass meetings, trade pact agreements, boycotts, and block-by-block picketing advanced the purpose of the Don’t Buy strategy. One of the larger movements took place in Harlem around 1930, when leaders sought clerical jobs for blacks in white-owned stores. After Sufi Abdul Hamid tried to follow his successful movement in Chicago in which blacks were placed in 200 jobs in two months, he moved his efforts to Harlem. Hamid and his Negro Industrial Alliance became so disruptive in their efforts that they helped to cause the Harlem Riots of 1935. White merchants in Harlem and in Maryland were unsuccessful in their legal maneuvers to end the pickets and boycotts. The Harlem network involved churches, fraternal groups, women groups, and social and political organizations.

Nearly a decade would pass before Harlem’s black activists succeeded in their campaign to find jobs on a widespread basis. Adam Clayton Powell Jr. became a major player in Harlem’s efforts. He organized a Citywide Coordinating Committee to find jobs for blacks. The diverse background of local black merchants caused some disparity, and many felt that, if the strategy worked, they would lose black customers to white businesses. Women agitators worked through organizations such as the Harlem Housewives League and urged women to patronize only those black grocery stores that belonged to the Colored Merchants’ Association. The women also targeted the Atlantic and Pacific Tea Company (known as A&P). In time, the work of the women and Powell led to black employment in the New York Edison Electric Company, the New York Bus Company, the 1939 World’s Fair, and elsewhere. Nationally, however, the plan led to no more than 2,000 jobs for blacks, but it tested the black community’s economic strength. The effects of the strategy were seen during the Civil Rights Movement of the 1960s, when African Americans deployed an economic boycott against white merchants who practiced racial discrimination in their businesses. The economic boycotts were short-lived, as most of the merchants readily changed their racial practices.

Jessie Carney Smith