1866
The Civil Rights Act of 1866
The Great Migration
The Great Migration begins. Over six million African Americans relocate from the segregationist South to the North, Midwest, and West over a nearly 55-year period. African Americans confront discrimination as they seek new homes, resulting in widespread housing segregation.
FAIR HOUSING T MELINE
1916
1933-1934 New Deal Initiatives
New Deal initiatives like the Home Owners’ Loan Corporation boost homeownership for white Americans during the Great Depression. But the federal government’s refusal to insure mortgages in and near Black neighborhoods, known as “redlining” because of the federal maps color-coding “neighborhood quality”, severely limits the ability of Black Americans to own homes or invest in their neighborhoods and fosters widespread housing segregation.
1933
The Civil Rights Act of 1866, enacted after the Civil War, bans discrimination in the sale, transfer, lease, or use of property. The law is rarely enforced.
GI Bill
The GI Bill provides federal aid for returning white World War II veterans to buy homes, obtain jobs, and pursue education, but benefits are limited or outright denied to Black veterans.
1944
Federal Government Funds Construction of Whites-Only Suburbs
Levittown, the first mass-produced suburb, is constructed — with federal government financial backing — to help house returning WWII veterans. However, the Federal Housing Administration only grants builders loans on the condition that racially restrictive covenants, barring sale to Black homebuyers, are written into the deeds. Federally-subsidized suburban developments make home-ownership affordable, and help convert a majority of white Americans from renters to homeowners. The value of these suburban homes soar, and white Americans pocket the wealth. But locked-out Black families could not build home equity in the decades following the war, effects
that are still felt today.
1947
Shelley v. Kraemer
In Shelley v. Kraemer, the United States Supreme Court strikes down the racially restrictive covenants that prevent selling or renting of homes to “non-Caucasians.” However, in many places, they remain in effect for decades.
1948
Executive Order 11063
President Kennedy issues Executive Order 11063 to prohibit discrimination in the sale or rental of property owned by the federal government, maneuvering around congressional committees controlled by pro-segregation legislators. However, the mostly symbolic order still leaves housing authorities and agencies to police themselves, largely resulting in non-enforcement.
1962
The Voting Rights Act
August 6, 1965: The Voting Rights Act
bans racially discriminatory voting practices, including those enacted by many southern states and localities to disenfranchise Black voters after passage of the Fifteenth Amendment.
MLK Assassination
April 4, 1968: King is assassinated in Memphis, Tennessee. As protests swell across the country, President Lyndon Johnson increases pressure on Congress to pass fair housing legislation, which Congress had been debating
for years without success.
Fair Housing Act of 1968
April 11, 1968: The Fair Housing Act
of 1968, passed seven days after King’s assassination, prohibits discrimination in the sale or rental of housing, making it illegal for the first time for individuals or banks to deny loans or housing because of a person’s race, color, religion, or national origin. The Act’s sponsors explicitly recognize the
role federal policies played in created a segregated America, and the law calls on the federal government to "affirmatively further fair housing”
to proactively undo the harm.
Open Communities
HUD Secretary George Romney starts Open Communities, an initiative that enforces the Fair Housing Act’s “affirmatively furthering fair housing” provision by withholding federal funding from jurisdictions with policies that foster residential segregation. A few years later, President Nixon dismantles the initiative and forces Romney out of his role.
1970
The Housing and Community Development Act of 1974
The Housing and Community Development Act of 1974 adds sex as a prohibited basis of discrimination to the Fair Housing Act.
The Fair Housing
Amendments Act of 1988
The Fair Housing Amendments Act of 1988 expands the Fair Housing Act to prohibit discrimination based on disability or familial status.
1988
The Community Reinvestment Act (CRA) of 1977
The Community Reinvestment Act (CRA) of 1977 bans redlining, requiring banks to apply the same lending criteria to all communities. The act authorizes federal regulatory agencies to assess and score banks on their CRA implementation.
1977
The Equal Credit
Opportunity Act of 1974
The Equal Credit Opportunity Act of 1974 outlaws discrimination in lending.
Financial Crisis of 2008
A financial crisis, precipitated by years of subprime mortgage lending that targeted Blacks and Latinos, many of whom would have qualified for prime loans, intensifies the racial homeownership gap. In 2006, 53% and 46% of home purchase loans to Black and Latino borrowers, respectively, were subprime, compared to 18% for white borrowers. The financial crisis results in enormous losses of wealth for Black and Latino families and an overall economic loss of 15% (or $4.6 trillion) of the American GDP.
2008
Supreme Court Reaffirms Disparate Impact Under
the Fair Housing Act
June 2015: The Supreme Court affirms that the Fair Housing Act allows plaintiffs to challenge policies and practices that have a discriminatory effect on different groups, if the defendant cannot show a legitimate business purpose for the policy.
The court upholds a claim by the Dallas civil rights group, the
Inclusive Communities Project,
which sued the state of Texas for perpetuating housing segregation through its housing credits system
by placing Black residents in
high poverty zones
Affirmatively Furthering
Fair Housing
August 2015: The Obama administration institutes the Affirmatively Furthering Fair Housing (AFFH) rule to tie the receipt of federal funding to efforts to desegregate communities, as Secretary Romney similarly attempted in the 1970s. The
AFFH rule requires jurisdictions that receive federal funding to design a strategy to address discrimination using newly-provided data and analytical tools.
Black Homeownership
Reaches Record Low
The Black homeownership rate reaches a record low of 40.6%, declining to the lowest level since
at least 1970 — when the United States Census Bureau started keeping reliable data.
2019
COVID-19 Pandemic
The COVID-19 pandemic takes a significant toll on Americans’ socioeconomic welfare, further entrenching already-dampened prospects for homeownership.
If current policies and practices continue, experts project that the overall homeownership rate
will decline from 65% in 2020
to 62% in 2040
2020
The Civil Rights Act of 1964
1964
Chicago Freedom Movement
Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. takes his campaign North, leading the Chicago Freedom Movement, advocating for open housing. During the over year-long campaign, King leads marches throughout the city and its suburbs, often encountering violence and malice in white neighborhoods that he describes as more hostile and hateful than the violence he endured in the South while advocating for civil rights. The Freedom Marchers won modest concessions from Chicago Mayor Richard Daley, but King’s attempt to desegregate Chicago was considered a failure and illustrated the need for a national fair housing policy.
1965
The Civil Rights Act of 1964 ends segregation in public spaces and bans employment discrimination.
It also bars any federally-funded agency from discriminating based
on race, color, or national origin.
1968
1974
2015
Trump Undoes AFFH
September 2020: The Trump administration undoes the 2015 AFFH rule, defining fair housing more loosely and getting rid of federal mandates designed to diminish housing discrimination.
Biden's Executive Memo
January 2021: President Biden issues an executive memo that recognizes the government’s role in creating housing policies that have a racially discriminatory impact, calls for HUD to review Trump-era rules, and commits to carrying out the Fair Housing Act’s mandate.
2021
