The Roots Of Planning And Zoning
Built on racism before it ever became systemic, the bureaucrats rushed in to create rent seeking, and segregation all in the name of Property Values, and as always, control.
Passing Laws To Keep Blacks Out Of White Neighborhoods And The Start Of Zoning In America.
Institutional tools, such as zoning, and racially restricted covenants, or Deeds were used as a way to stop the spread of African Americans moving into white neighborhoods. But it was not only racially used exclusively against blacks, but the intended use also was and still is to control all groups of Americans, and today it has become the Tip of the Spear for Agenda 21.
In 1880, San Francisco passed a law requiring licensing for laundries in wooden buildings. That might have been a good idea because of the potential fire hazard, but those bureaucrats enforcing the law singled out the Chinese.
All white-owned laundries received licenses, and all Chinese were denied them. Mr. Yick Wo refused to shut his place down and was arrested, confined to jail, and fought the city. The case went all the way to the Supreme Court where Mr. Wo Prevailed
The GI bill allowed many veterans to become homeowners, however, mortgages and loans were not provided by the United States Department of Veterans Affairs but by private mortgage lenders who often discriminated through redlining, another racist trick in their toolbox.
Levittown Nassau County, Long Island for example was a neighborhood built to provide affordable housing for returning veterans from World War II, but the developer refused to allow people of color to live there through the use of racially-restricted deeds.
A Road Paved With Good Intentions
Politics is the only position where you can get it wrong 99% of the time and still keep your job.
In their hast to control people, politicians often end up doing more harm than good, Baltimore adopted zoning laws in 1910, that were openly drawn to keep African Americans and whites separated by law.
Baltimore’s Mayor Mahool at the time said,
Blacks…should be quarantined in isolated slums in order to reduce the incidents of civil disturbance, to prevent the spread of communicable disease into the nearby White neighborhoods, and to protect property values among the White majority.
Also in 1916, Harland Bartholomew was a consultant for many city planning departments, he saw blacks as a burden on society. Bartholomew understood he couldn’t prohibit outright segregation, so he worked to find a way around it.
Eventually, in St. Louis, he managed to relocate over 65,000 blacks, most were never compensated. Losing financially they also ended up leaving behind family and friends, adding to the strains their families had to endure.
The land left behind remain vacant for over twenty years, the federal government seized it and built a defense plant during WWII. After the war, GM used the plant to build auto parts, and today the property is only used to sell old machinery.
How had this bureaucrat’s scheme affected the value of the nearby property? We will never know, but the city of Euclid erected a memorial on the site with no mention made about the racist damage to the community and families nor the costs to the public caused by one man’s zoning regulations.
While most of us tend to think that the design of our metropolis is unique, in reality, a small group of city planning consultants like Bartholomew has had a hand in designing many of today’s failing cities.
Health and Safety is the New Racism
People might also believe that zoning laws are here to protect the value of their homes, or maybe keep us safe from the boogeyman, maybe healthier by removing a slaughterhouse, or even more virtuous by outlawing a Gentalman’s Club.
But in a free society, we may do as we choose and allow Nuisance Laws to keep these matters in check, it is not a City’s job to raise property values, keep a specific color of families out, make us more Godly, or even create jobs.
The proper job of the government is to protect our rights, they are duty-bound, and took an oath to do so.
When they are allowed to take or control our Private Property, they will continue to usurp ungiven authority and do the same with all of our other rights.
My purpose is not to cause contention with people of any color, but to inform people of every color, that what we must do is fight,
FIGHT as Mr. Wo did.
We must start to understand that our City Planners are not people of principle with strong moral character, or of any constitutional understanding, but simple-minded bureaucrats with an agenda. In the past, it was called Property Value, in today's world that is no longer their reason, today it is called Public Health and Safety.
These self-righteous, unelected planners used Restricted Deeds, and Zoning laws to falsely make housing too expensive for poorer families regardless of color, creating a self-fulfilling situation. They then pointed to that outcome to prove their benevolence because property values had gone up, but only because the codes forced builders to build houses on Bigger Lots and more amenities driving up the cost.
Would property values have gone up without these zoning laws, of course, property owners and developers would build for their market or niche, it is simple supply and demand. Walmart would never fill their Stores with products priced for a boutique on Rodeo Drive, and it goes without saying Shopowners on Rodeo Drive would never consider those items from a Walmart, in any of their Shops.
Social Planning has been an abject and absolute failure since the beginning of time, and when we allow someone that is unelected, and in most cases has no “Skin in the Game”, we lose all sovereignty over our lives and property.
Cities that will not fight for your Property Rights must be taken to the Wood-Shed so to speak and taught the error of their ways. Unfortunately, we have learned from history that most cities could care less about our rights, but, will always tilt towards power and control.
As our history in America is being erased, isn’t it time that we look at some of the real reasons that caused our systemic racism in the first place?
Is it possible to even consider the fact that much of the hate was, and is due to the fact that we look the other way as bureaucracies destroy our moral compasses?