From the first colonial settlements through the Revolutionary War, Civil War and Reconstruction, policies at all levels of government have routinely and repeatedly sought to prevent Black, Indigenous, and other People of Color (BIPOC) from acquiring land and having access to certain neighborhoods and amenities. These policies not only denied BIPOC-led households opportunities for economic and social mobility, but reinforced prevailing white supremacist views regarding the inferiority and deservedness of BIPOC. It was on this foundation of state-sanctioned oppression and discrimination that later housing policies were developed.

Legend

  •   Hindered racial equality
  •   Mix of helped and hindered racial equality
  •   Helped advance racial equality
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    Early settlers secured land ownership from Native tribes by paying compensation to tribal authorities for ownership, tricking tribes into giving up their lands or simply seizing control through force. As more colonists arrived, demand for land increased, forcing the displacement of more Native people from their own settlements. Colonial governments also formed treaties with various tribes – often with unfair terms and little enforcement against European abuses – and imposed restrictions over the use, sale, and ownership of property among Native people.

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    As colonial settlement and authority over formerly Native lands grew, enslaved Africans were brought in to facilitate cultivation of those lands. Due to their labor, the plantation farming system took hold as the dominant form of land use and agricultural enterprise, especially in the Southern colonies. For slavery to take root, enslaved persons had to be viewed as exploitable and inferior to white colonists, and thus undeserving of any rights to own land and profit from their labor. This view transferred to free Black men and women as well, who often faced legal and prejudicial barriers to property ownership and wealth accumulation.

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    Following the Seven-Years war, England reorganized its colonial territories, designating most of the land between the Appalachian Mountains and the Mississippi River as under Native control, upon which further colonial settlement was not allowed. Additional rules were also placed over the rights of Native Americans to sell their land, ostensibly to prevent them from being swindled. Both policies, however, were rarely enforced by colonial authorities, who sought to gain power and wealth by allocating parcels to increasing numbers of European settlers, and were officially rescinded by the new United States government in 1789.

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    Several Native tribes claimed sovereignty over lands within the new United States, leading to conflicts over rights of access and settlement. The Indian Removal Act granted authority to the U.S. government to forcibly remove these tribes from their land and relocate them to designated territories further west, prompting the involuntary migration of approximately 60,000 Native Americans that became known as the ‘Trail of Tears’. The western expansion of white settlers in the decades that followed the Act, however, led to even more Native removals to smaller and less desirable land, eventually prescribed around a series of reservations.

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    The Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo transfers land from Mexico to become what is now the southwestern United States and grants all residents of this territory – including both Mexican nationals and members of Native tribes in the region – the opportunity to become U.S. citizens. It also allows existing landowners to retain their property rights, though this policy is lightly enforced. As more white settlers move into the region, they gradually appropriate the land for themselves, displacing and depriving local citizens of their rights and opportunities for wealth.

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    The 1862 Homestead Act granted land in Western territories for free to eligible citizens to facilitate territorial expansion and encourage individual property ownership. The grants were also intended to further minimize the rights and sovereignty of Native tribes, including several that had been relocated following the Indian Removal Act of 1830, and allow safe passage of trade routes to the Pacific Ocean. An amendment to the Act in 1866 explicitly permitted access to homestead grants for formerly enslaved Americans, providing them with the opportunity to build wealth and start new lives outside the South, though systemic barriers and individual discrimination limited the number of Black citizens able to benefit from this program.

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    While the victory of the Union over the Confederacy in the Civil War officially ended slavery, formerly enslaved Black residents were still denied many rights, including the freedom to choose where to live and to earn wealth from property ownership. A growing number of state and local policies explicitly restricted land ownership among certain racial and ethnic groups, while publicly-sanctioned violence and discrimination generally forced BIPOC to live in less desirable locations and be exploited for their labor (e.g. sharecropping).

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    The General Allotment Act facilitated the subdivision of Native reservations into individually-owned parcels to provide wealth building opportunities and encourage assimilation by Native tribes to white modes of property ownership. Most unallocated land, however, was reclaimed by the U.S. government and offered for sale to white settlers, reducing the amount of Native-controlled land by half.

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