Of all the large cities in the United States, only three have a larger absolute Negro population than Philadelphia: Washington, New Orleans and Baltimore. We seldom realize that none of the great Southern cities, except the three mentioned, have a colored population approaching that of Philadelphia:
Colored* Population of Large Southern Cities.
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Cities. Colored Inhabitants. Cities. Colored Inhabitants.
Washington, D. C. 75,697
New Orleans, La. 64,663
Philadelphia, Pa. 40,374*
Richmond Va. 32,354.
Charleston, S. C. 31,036
Nashville, Tenn. 29,395
Memphis, Tenn. 28,729
Louisville, Ky. 28,672
Atlanta, Ga. 28,117
Savannah, Ga. 22,978
*Includes Chinese, Japanese and civilized Indians, an insignificant number in these cases.
Taken by itself, the Negro population of Philadelphia is no insignificant group of men, as the foregoing diagrams show. (See page 52.)
In other words, we are studying a group of people the size of the capital of Pennsylvania in 1890, and as large as Philadelphia itself in 1800.
Scanning this population more carefully, the first thing that strikes one is the unusual excess of females. This fact, which is true of all Negro urban populations, has not often been noticed, and has not been given its true weight as a social phenomenon.[1] If we take the ten cities having the greatest Negro populations, we have this table:[2]
- ↑ My attention was first called to this fact by Professor Kelly Miller, of Howard University; cf. "Publications of American Negro Academy," No. 1. There is probably, in taking censuses, a larger percentage of omissions among males than among females; such omissions would, however, go but a small way toward explaining this excess of females.
- ↑ In a good many of the Eleventh Census tables, "Chinese, Japanese and civilized Indians," were very unwisely included in the total of the Colored, making an error to be allowed for when one studies the Negro. In most cases the discrepancy can be ignored. In this case this fact but serves to decrease the excess of females, as these other groups have an excess of males. The city of Philadelphia has 1003 Chinese, Japanese
