“The Same Slow Pace”: Nelson Rockefeller and Resistance to Open Housing in New York
By Marsha E. Barrett
When Nelson Rockefeller prepared to seek the Republican gubernatorial nomination in New York in 1958, he identified housing discrimination as an issue that could help unite the bipartisan, multiracial, and cross-class constituency that he believed was essential to his victory as a moderate Republican. Rockefeller, who was also a racial liberal, was to the left of most Republicans, but moderates and liberals like himself had a strong record of winning statewide office in New York despite opposition from many conservatives. By advocating for open housing, Rockefeller aimed to respond to a major concern of African Americans and other racial and ethnic minorities in New York who struggled to find housing and reaffirm the state’s commitment to its record of passing first-in-the-nation antidiscrimination legislation. Yet, his ambition to use the universality of housing to unite his voting base and tackle well-documented social inequalities ran afoul of conservatives in his state party and a majority white electorate that resisted redistributive housing policies.
An official portrait of New York Governor Nelson Rockefeller (1959-1973) dated March 1, 1961. Courtesy of The New York State Archives Digital Collections, Governor. Public information photographs, 1910-1992, Series 13703-83, Box 3, Thayer, Mar1961, https://digitalcollections.archives.nysed.gov/index.php/Detail/objects/10068.
Despite New York’s postwar reputation of combating discrimination, housing segregation pervaded the state in the 1950s. A 1957 study commissioned by the Senate Committee on Public Health found pervasive housing discrimination across New York state. The study, which examined the upstate communities of Plattsburgh and Rochester, Poughkeepsie in Dutchess County, the Westchester County community of Greenburgh, and Long Island’s Village of Freeport, found that African Americans and other minority groups were denied “equal status in the procurement of housing.” [2] The senate’s findings were supported by the New York State Committee on Discrimination in Housing’s 1958 conclusion that, “residential segregation is actually on the increase, and racial ghettoes are appearing in some of New York’s cities for the first time.” [3] Despite the advocacy of activists and state agencies, the state had failed to pass fair housing legislation such as New York City’s 1958 ban on discrimination in private housing. Meanwhile, the State Commission Against Discrimination (SCAD), created in 1945 to enforce the state’s antidiscrimination laws, had a limited scope and poor record of enforcement. SCAD, which was unable to launch its own investigations, relied on complainants to report abuses and then sought to use persuasion to get entities to rectify the grievance. In 1957, less than one percent of complaints received a formal hearing. [4]
Beginning in 1938, New York passed a series of laws intended to counteract racial and religious discrimination in public and private employment, labor unions, education, government assisted public and private housing, and public accommodations. While Governor Thomas Dewey (1943-1955), a moderate Republican, was in office, New York Republicans took a leadership role in shaping an antidiscrimination record that made New York a forerunner in the nation. For example, the state prohibited discrimination in public accommodations in 1952, but Republicans receded from that leadership role once Dewey left office. By the time Rockefeller was considering his candidacy, the Republican-majority legislature had prevented the state from passing new laws that would improve the enforcement apparatus of its groundbreaking antidiscrimination laws. Several Republican legislators argued that New York no longer had a discrimination problem. As the Republican gubernatorial nominee, Rockefeller labored to advocate for antidiscrimination housing laws, but he was careful to frame his arguments in ways that did not draw attention to his party’s increasing resistance to antidiscrimination initiatives. [5]
Nelson Rockefeller (Executive Secretary Roy Wilkins is to Rockefeller’s left) greeting attendees of the fiftieth annual convention of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) in New York City’s Coliseum on July 13, 1959. Used by permission of the Rockefeller Archive Center.
During Rockefeller’s first legislative session as governor in 1959, a bipartisan housing bill failed to pass due to conservative Republican opposition. Rockefeller had supported it in principle but did not make it a major legislative initiative. After this, the governor announced that he would recommend a bill to outlaw discrimination in private housing in New York during the next legislative session while speaking at the fiftieth annual convention of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) in New York City’s Coliseum. NAACP delegates welcomed Rockefeller’s pronouncement with a standing ovation. Loud applause also rang through the coliseum as he assured the audience: “I want to be counted in the forefront of this crusade for full equality and civil rights for every citizen.” [6] Shortly after the convention, representatives from the NAACP’s Department of Housing, upon Rockefeller’s request, met with SCAD to assist in the drafting of a fair housing proposal that he would recommend to the legislature. Rockefeller ended the summer by joining the NAACP as a life member, becoming the fourth governor nationwide to make such a commitment. [7]
Despite opposition in his party, Rockefeller notified legislators in 1960 that he would recommend an anti-discrimination housing bill to enable the state to achieve “equal, full and fair, opportunity for all.” [8] Upstate Republican legislators were disappointed by Rockefeller’s pronouncement. “Rockefeller touched some Republican nerve ends,” reported the Daily News, while the Post wrote that upstate Republicans, who had prioritized “tax cuts, school aid and welfare restrictions—in that order—” were displeased. [9] The anti-bias housing bill Rockefeller proposed was not as sweeping as the housing bill that had languished in the legislature for the previous three years, however. The new proposal aimed to ban discrimination in the rental, sale, or financing of privately-owned buildings containing multiple dwelling units of three or more and developments of ten or more housing units. Rockefeller’s bill was unique because it also pertained to the sale or lease of commercial spaces and applied to real estate agents, landlords, brokers, builders, and financial institutions who lent money for the sale or repair of housing. The previous bill considered by the legislation only applied to landlords and agents and did not include commercial spaces, but it applied to a larger percentage of housing, particularly outside of New York City. Algernon Black, the chair of SCAD, praised Rockefeller, but expressed disappointment because the bill would “exclude 80 per cent of the state’s private housing market even though [its] coverage of real estate brokers and financial institutions may open some new areas of housing.” By comparison, the previous bill would have applied to 40 percent of the housing outside of New York City. [10] By limiting the bill’s scope, Rockefeller hoped to increase Republican support and avoid the embarrassment of passing the bill with primarily Democratic support.
Nelson Rockefeller delivering his first annual message in the State Assembly chambers on January 7, 1959. Courtesy of The New York State Archives Digital Collections, Governor, Public information photographs, 1910-1992, Series 13703-83, Box 3, Number 7_9573_1, https://digitalcollections.archives.nysed.gov/index.php/Detail/objects/10063.
Rockefeller conceded that the housing bill was “controversial,” but he also said that support of such a bill fit within “the traditional position of the Republican.” [11] The same day that Rockefeller defended his bill as fitting within traditional Republicanism, a Republican State Senator offered a counterpoint. Austin W. Erwin, Chair of the Finance Committee, who hailed from Geneseo in the Finger Lakes region of upstate New York, after reviewing the antidiscrimination laws regarding employment, public accommodations, and publicly-assisted housing, stated: “This bill would take away the last vestige of right from the private citizen to do what he wants with his own land. There are still a few people who feel that they have a right to do with their own property what they see fit.” The New York Times reported that Erwin “voiced the views that appear to dominate the thinking among upstate [Republican] legislators.” [12]
Ultimately, the 1960 legislation failed, but Rockefeller found success the next year after proposing a new housing bill that applied to fewer homes. The NAACP, however, refused to support the bill because it did not outlaw discrimination in the sale or lease of one- and two-family homes nor ban discrimination by state-licensed brokers and financial institutions regardless of housing type. [13] According to the civil rights organization, the final legislation, which did not equal the original Metcalf-Baker Bill, Rockefeller’s 1960 proposal, or New York City’s private housing law failed to meet the urgent needs of the African American community. Eugene T. Reed, President of the NAACP New York State Conference, concluded, “After 100 years of patience and gradualism, Negro residents of this State will not be content to see their struggle for freedom continued at the same slow pace.” [14]
Rockefeller spent considerable time navigating a maze of Republican opposition in the legislature, but voters posed equally formidable opposition to his integration efforts. In February 1962, Rockefeller proposed a series of bills intended to increase access to middle-income housing in New York. The most contentious idea was a pilot program, entitled, the Low-Income Financing Experiment or “LIFE” program. It was developed by Housing and Community Renewal Commissioner James Gaynor, who would reallocate $3 million that were earmarked for public housing to subsidize the rents of low-income families who would move into middle-income housing developments. If enacted, the program would allow 5,000 families to relocate and subsidize their rent until their income reached the standard minimum for the state’s middle-income housing. Rockefeller argued that the current low-rent public housing program, which the state began in 1939, had “fostered the stratification and segregation of low-income families from the remainder of the community.” LIFE stood out from the remaining four middle-income housing bills Rockefeller proposed because it was associated with Black and Puerto Rican New Yorkers who constituted a large percentage of the tenants in low-income public housing and it required voters’ approval. [15] The legislature passed all five of Rockefeller’s bills, but the LIFE program was contingent upon voter approval because it would rely upon money that had been earmarked for use in the traditional low-income public housing program. [16]
Rockefeller’s argument that the program would provide cost-savings while addressing economic and racial segregation failed resoundingly. When asked, “Should the state subsidize low-income tenants to enable them to live in middle-income housing projects?,” New Yorkers rejected Proposition No. 2 in a lopsided vote of 1,584,118 to 900,662. [17] The majority of voters in every county outside of Manhattan, except Washington County, voted no. Manhattan voters passed it by a slim majority. Some upstate counties voted down the measure, which primarily applied to New York City, by a margin of 5 to 1. While the program applied to the entire state, 80 percent of New York’s low-rent public housing was in New York City, while 90 percent of the middle-income housing was also in New York City. The Chamber of Commerce, who opposed the initiative, said the rent subsidies would only aid “a privileged few” and were unnecessary because it had found no evidence of people in that income bracket needing assistance. Similarly, the New York AFL-CIO opposed the measure, “on the grounds that such subsidization of certain families would be discriminatory.” [18]
The previous spring, when Rockefeller discussed his latest housing proposals with members of the NAACP, Rockefeller expressed optimism about programs such as LIFE. He also spoke candidly, however, about the persistence of discrimination in New York. “It is no simple task,” observed Rockefeller, “to educate our communities, not so much as not to practice discrimination, but actually to practice and to accept integration. I assure you, however, that I accept this challenge.” [19] Rockefeller attempted to teach those lessons to varying degrees and with limited success for most of his fifteen years as governor of New York. Despite his continued interest in housing policy and urban renewal programs, integration proved to be a stumbling block that Rockefeller could not overcome. It was an especially difficult issue for Rockefeller because he relied heavily on suburban voters who, as the 1960s progressed, became more organized and vocal in their opposition to housing integration and state efforts to promote equality. Rather than bring diverse New Yorkers together, issues such as housing demonstrated the limitations of Rockefeller’s original approach to coalition building and a fundamental weakness to his brand of pro-government moderate Republicanism.
Adapted from Nelson Rockefeller's Dilemma: The Fight to Save Moderate Republicanism, by Marsha E. Barrett, a Three Hills book published by Cornell University Press. Copyright (c) 2024 by Marsha E. Barrett. Used by permission of the publisher.
Marsha E. Barrett is an Assistant Professor of History at University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign.
[1] Eugene T. Reed to Governor Rockefeller, April 19, 1961, New York State Conference, January-April 1961, Papers of the NAACP, Proquest History Vault, https://congressional.proquest.com/histvault?q=001504-007-0442&accountid=14553, accessed on July 20, 2020.
[2] “Albany Report Cites Housing Bias on LI,” Newsday, March 3, 1960; Layhmond Robinson, “‘Vast’ Bias Throughout State Cited in Albany Housing Study,” New York Times, March 4, 1960.
[3] “Westchester Talks on Housing Bias Set,” New York Times, February 19, 1961. “1959 Metcalf-Baker Bill,” February 1958, folder 3601, 34 Diane Van Wie, Nelson A. Rockefeller Papers (NAR), Rockefeller Archive Center (RAC).
[4] Brian Purnell, “Desegregating the Jim Crow North: Racial Discrimination in the postwar Bronx and the Fight to Integrate the Castle Hill Beach Club (1953-1973),” Afro-Americans in New York Life and History, 33:2 (July 2009), 47-78; A. Scott Henderson, Housing and the Democratic Ideal: The Life and Thought of Charles Abrams (New York: Columbia University Press, 2000), 161-163.
[5] “Anti-Bias Measure Signed by Dewey,” New York Times, March 30, 1952; Memorandum on Anti-Discrimination Measures in New York State, April 23, 1958, folder 138, 17 Issue Books, NAR, RAC; “State G.O.P. Asks Bureau on Rights,” New York Times, February 27, 1957; “Abrams, NAACP Hit New Right Bureau,” New York Amsterdam News, March 9, 1957.
[6] New York, Governor, and Nelson A. Rockefeller. Public Papers of Nelson A. Rockefeller. [Albany, N.Y.]: [State of New York], 1959; “Rocky Pledges Housing Bill,” New York Amsterdam News, July 18, 1959; James Booker, “Criticism of Rocky Gets Jackie’s Backing,” New York Amsterdam News, March 14, 1959.
[7] The other governors who had become life members included three former governors: Democrat Chester Bowles of Connecticut, Republican Goodwin J. Knight of California, and Democrat Averell Harriman of New York. Rockefeller also joined Javits, who was already a life member. "Minutes of the Meetings of the Board of Directors, 1959." National Association for the Advancement of Colored People papers (2012). “Rockefeller Now NAACP Life Member,” Philadelphia Tribune, September 8, 1959.
[8] Text of Rockefeller’s Message Opening the 1960 Session of the State Legislature,” New York Times, January 7, 1960.
[9] James Desmond, “Rock Goes Route as Joint Session Sits on Its Hands,” New York Daily News, January 7, 1960; Arthur Massolo, “Albany Lukewarm on Rocky’s Plans,” New York Post, January 7, 1960.
[10] Leo Egan, “Governor Offers a Broad Measure on Bias in Housing,” New York Times, February 24, 1960; New York, Governor, and Nelson A. Rockefeller. Public Papers of Nelson A. Rockefeller. [Albany, N.Y.]: [State of New York], 1960; New York State Committee on Discrimination in Housing 1960 Fair Housing Practices Memo #5, February 29, 1960, New York State Committee on Discrimination in Housing, 1956-1963, Papers of the NAACP, Proquest History Vault, https://congressional.proquest.com/histvault?q=000004-011-0452&accountid=1455, accessed on July 22, 2020.
[11] Walter MacDonald, “Governor Holds Line On Unpopular Issues,” World-Telegram & Sun, March 8, 1960.
[12] Douglas Dales, “Housing Bias Bill Believed Doomed,” New York Times, March 9, 1960; Austin W. Erwin, Ex-State Senator,” New York Times, August 15, 1965; James H. Scheuer, “Housing Our Minorities,” New York Times, March 16, 1956.
[13] Open Letter to Nelson Rockefeller, January 7, 1961, New York State Conference, January-April 1961, Papers of the NAACP, Proquest History Vault, https://congressional.proquest.com/histvault?q=001504-007-0442&accountid=14553, accessed on July 20, 2020; “NAACP Raps Gov’s Housing Proposal,” New York Amsterdam News, January 21, 1961.
[14] Eugene T. Reed to Governor Rockefeller, April 19, 1961, New York State Conference, January-April 1961, Papers of the NAACP, Proquest History Vault, https://congressional.proquest.com/histvault?q=001504-007-0442&accountid=14553, accessed on July 20, 2020.
[15] New York State, Governor, Public Papers (1962), 135-138, 1215-1216.
[16] New York State, Governor, Public Papers (1962), 464-468; Layhmond Robinson, “Rockefeller Signs 5 Bills to Expand Housing in State,” New York Times, April 30, 1962.
[17] Walter Lister, Jr., “Republicans Cheered,” New York Herald Tribune, November 8, 1962; Leo Egan, “Rockefeller Edge Spurs ’64 Hopes,” New York Times, November 8, 1962.
[18] Warren, Weaver, Jr., “Governor Urges Housing Subsidy,” New York Times, March 1, 1962; “State to Vote on Articles to Trim Constitution,” New York Times, April 8, 1962; “Amendments: What Voters Must Decide,” New York Herald Tribune, November 5, 1962; Charles Grutzner, “State Voters Reject Subsidy Plan on Low-Income Family Housing,” New York Times, November 7, 1962; “Housing Subsidies Head for Defeat,” New York Herald Tribune, November 7, 1962.
[19] New York State, Governor, Public Papers (1962), 756-758, 1077, 1215-1216.