A Nation Under Our Feet: Black Political Struggles in the Rural South from Slavery to the Great Migration Chapter Summary & Analysis - Epilogue Up, You Mighty Race Summary

Epilogue Up, You Mighty Race Summary

The Great Northern Migration between 1915 and 1930 for African Americans brought a new era in black political life. Not only did this change African American lives and communities, but it changed the nation as a whole. This migration served to open up new political arenas and expanded the networks and communities that had developed during the nineteenth century in the South. Migrating African Americans carried with them their political developments and knowledge about their goals, the world, and how to mobilize.

The Great Migration is commonly understood as a product of its time: a special set of circumstances, events, and ideologies. The main factor behind it was the First World War, which created a huge labor shortage in the Northeast and Midwest. Employment beckoned for African Americans living in the South. "Like the emigrationism of the 1870s and 1880s, the Great Migration reflected collective sensibilities, social networks, organizational activism,...
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