Pigford v. Glickman (1999) was a class action lawsuit against the United States Department of Agriculture (USDA), alleging that it had racially discriminated against African American farmers in its allocation of farm loans and assistance from 1981 to 1996. The lawsuit was settled on April 14, 1999, by Judge Paul L. Friedman of the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia. To date, almost $1 billion US dollars have been paid or credited to fewer than 20,000 farmers under the settlement's consent decree, under what is reportedly the largest civil rights settlement until that point. Due to delaying tactics by U.S. government officials, more than 70,000 farmers were treated as filing late and thus did not have their claims heard. The 2008 Farm Bill provided for additional claims to be heard. In December 2010, Congress appropriated $1.2 billion for what is called "Pigford II," settlement for the second part of the case.
History of African and African American agriculture in the U.S. Africans and African Americans have a long and rich agricultural history in the U.S. The Atlantic Slave Trade brought over crops such as yams and okra that became popular in American diets, and the farming practices to produce them. Enslaved people taught colonists and natives how to farm various African crops, which was fundamental for the establishment of New World societies. Many enslaved people in the Americas had the freedom and responsibility to control some of their diet by hunting, fishing, and farming. Some slaves were granted individual plots or provision grounds, and many grew food staples in the yards around their dwellings. Some slaves were able to earn cash and gain marginal economic autonomy while maintaining connections to their African culinary heritage. General William T. Sherman's Special Field Order 15, also referred to as "40 acres and a mule," granted approximately 400,000 acres of farm plots to newly freed Black families but this directive was overturned by President Johnson. Black farm land ownership steadily increased until its peak in 1910, when roughly 14% of all US farm operators were Black.
USDA discrimination against African American farmers Many white and African American farmers struggled to survive financially in the South throughout the 20th century. The USDA made loans to farmers but they were dependent on applicants' financial credit. Because African Americans were discriminated against, they had difficulty accessing and building credit. They had been disenfranchised by southern laws and policies since the turn of the century and excluded from the political system, a condition that was maintained for much of the 20th century. By the early 20th century, southern states had established one-party political rule by whites under the Democratic Party. In Mississippi, where black farmers made up 2/3 of the total of farmers in the Delta in the late 19th century, most lost their land by 1910 and had to go to sharecropping or tenant farming. Divested of political power, African Americans were even less able to gain credit. White planters used their wider political connections and power, and credit to gain monopolistic control of agricultural production. (Citation needed) White dominance of the Democratic Party in the South and their power on important Congressional committees meant that, during the Great Depression, African Americans were overlooked in many programs established to help struggling Americans. The New Deal programs effectively protected white farmers by shifting the risk to black tenants. Many black farmers lost their land by tax sales, eminent domain, and voluntary sales. The USDA has admitted to having discriminated against black farmers (citation needed). By 1992 the number of black farmers had declined by 98%, compared to a 94% decline among all groups. Studies in the late 20th century found that county and state USDA authorities, who were typically white in the South, had historically and routinely discriminated against African-American farmers on the basis of race. A USDA official might overtly deny an equipment loan, telling the black farmer that "all you need is a mule and a plow", or telling the black farmer that the disaster relief is "too much money for a nigger to receive." But more often, the USDA used paper-shuffling, delaying loans for black farmers until the end of planting season, approving only a fraction of black farmers' loan requests, and denying crop-disaster payments for black farmers, which white farmers were routinely granted. USDA carried out its operations through county organizations. In the USDA's Agricultural Stabilization and Conservation Service (ASCS) for instance, 3 to 5 committee members who were elected at the county level made the decisions to grant credit and benefits, and to approve or deny local farm loan applications. Even after African Americans regained the ability to vote in the late 1960s, the elected committee members were overwhelmingly white in many jurisdictions.
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