Black rage in New Orleans : police brutality and African American activism from World War II to Hurricane Katrina / Leonard N. Moore.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Moore, Leonard N., 1971-

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

African Americans--Louisiana--New Orleans--Social conditions--20th century.

African Americans.

Police-community relations--Louisiana--New Orleans--History--20th century.

Police-community relations.

History.

Social conditions.

New Orleans (La.)--Race relations--History--20th century.

New Orleans (La.).

Louisiana--New Orleans.

Physical Description:

xiv, 302 pages, 8 unnumbered pages of plates : illustrations ; 24 cm

Place of Publication:

Baton Rouge : Louisiana State University Press, [2010]

Summary:

In Black Rage in New Orleans, Leonard N. Moore traces the shocking history of police corruption in the Crescent City from World War II to Hurricane Katrina and the concurrent rise of a large and energized black opposition to it. In New Orleans, crime, drug abuse, and murder were commonplace, and an underpaid, inadequately staffed, and poorly trained police force frequently resorted to brutality against African Americans. Endemic corruption among police officers increased as the city's crime rate soared, generating anger and frustration among New Orleans's black community. Rather than remain passive, African Americans in the city formed antibrutality organizations, staged marches, held sit-ins, waged boycotts, vocalized their concerns at city council meetings, and demanded equitable treatment. Moore explores a staggering array of NOPD abuses -- police homicides, sexual violence against women, racial profiling, and complicity in drug deals, prostitution rings, burglaries, protection schemes, and gun smuggling -- and the increasingly vociferous calls for reform by the city's black community. Documenting the police harassment of civil rights workers in the 1950s and 1960s, Moore then examines the aggressive policing techniques of the 1970s, and the attempts of Ernest "Dutch" Morial -- the first black mayor of New Orleans -- to reform the force in the late 1970s and early 1980s. Even when the department hired more African American officers as part of that reform effort, Moore reveals, the corruption and brutality continued unabated in the late 1980s and early 1990s. Dramatic changes in departmental leadership, together with aid from federal grants, finally helped professionalize the force and achieved long-sought improvements within the New Orleans Police Department. Community policing practices, increased training, better pay, and a raft of other reform measures for a time seemed to signal real change in the department. The book's epilogue, "Policing Katrina," however, looks at how the NOPD's ineffectiveness compromised its ability to handle the greatest natural disaster in American history, suggesting that the fruits of reform may have been more temporary than lasting. The first book-length study of police brutality and African American protest in a major American city, Black Rage in New Orleans will prove essential for anyone interested in race relations in America's urban centers.

Contents:

Introduction: police violence, New Orleans, and the postwar urban landscape

Negro police will aid in law and order: the fight for black police in the Crescent City

Or does it explode?: the black freedom struggle comes to New Orleans

"We want an end to police brutality": the Black Panthers, desire, and police repression

The politics of self-defense: Mark Essex, the soul patrol, and black vigilantism

The right to organize: the Black Organization of Police, mass protest, and the city council hearings

Black power politics: Ernest "Dutch" Morial and the limits of police reform

"We are living in a police state": the Algiers tragedy, the maturation of community protest, and the politics of a civilian review board

Black-on-black crime: the consequences of white flight, the war on drugs, and political indifference

"A new day in Babylon": the professionalization of the New Orleans Police Department and the claiming of urban public space.

Notes:

Includes bibliographical references and index.

ISBN:

9780807135907

0807135909

OCLC:

427704561