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{"id":29276,"date":"2024-05-30T14:00:14","date_gmt":"2024-05-30T18:00:14","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/circulatingnow.nlm.nih.gov\/?p=29276"},"modified":"2024-10-21T10:57:10","modified_gmt":"2024-10-21T14:57:10","slug":"st-johns-court-is-no-more-code-enforcement-and-the-baltimore-plan-for-housing","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/circulatingnow.nlm.nih.gov\/2024\/05\/30\/st-johns-court-is-no-more-code-enforcement-and-the-baltimore-plan-for-housing\/","title":{"rendered":"\u201cSt. John\u2019s Court Is No More\u201d: Code Enforcement and The Baltimore Plan for Housing"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><em>By Daniel G. Cumming ~<\/em><\/p>\n<p>It was an unusual commute. In the late 1930s, Dr. Huntington Williams, commissioner of the Baltimore City Health Department, and Thomas J.S. Waxter, head of the Welfare Department, often shared a ride from their suburban neighborhoods to their downtown offices. The two officials must have enjoyed each other\u2019s company as well as the opportunity to discuss their work. Since the depression, the Welfare Department had struggled to support an underemployed workforce in a city of nearly 900,000 people. The Health Department, too, grappled with the consequences of roughly 50,000 substandard homes and one of the highest rates of tuberculosis in the country.<\/p>\n<p>Along their route, a common enemy began to come into focus: so-called \u201cblighted housing,\u201d a ring of dilapidated neighborhoods surrounding the downtown core. As Waxter recalled, the two officials took detours to survey the alarming conditions. <a href=\"https:\/\/archivesspace.ubalt.edu\/repositories\/2\/archival_objects\/76904\">One experience<\/a> in particular \u201cbrought Williams and me deeper into housing than we had ever been before.\u201d Williams also described his growing conviction that health departments must become part of the solution: \u201conly the barest approach has been made in most American communities so far.\u201d Over the ensuing decades, Williams and Waxter would help coordinate a full-scale assault on \u201cBaltimore\u2019s worst slums.\u201d Their efforts ultimately reshaped federal housing policy, including transformative <a href=\"https:\/\/dsl.richmond.edu\/panorama\/renewal\/#view=0\/0\/1&viz=cartogram\">urban renewal<\/a> programs beginning in the 1950s.<\/p>\n<p>Such shifts in national policy often have a local address. Adjacent the Baltimore City Jail sat St. John\u2019s Court at 876-878 Homewood Avenue, a \u201csmall, dilapidated group of houses in an alley,\u201d and ground zero for the city\u2019s postwar housing programs. Historians rarely discuss St. John\u2019s Court. Instead, large-scale initiatives that followed typically receive more attention, such as the <a href=\"https:\/\/www.tandfonline.com\/doi\/full\/10.1080\/02665433.2017.1325774\">Hygiene of Housing Ordinance<\/a> (1941), <a href=\"https:\/\/www.cambridge.org\/core\/journals\/urban-history\/article\/baltimore-plan-casestudy-from-the-prehistory-of-urban-rehabilitation\/BB4280653DDE7FC101BE615D98E6C247\">The Baltimore Plan<\/a> (1945), and <a href=\"https:\/\/lccn.loc.gov\/2019043863\">U.S. Housing Acts<\/a> (1949, 1954). This makes sense. But in returning to the original scene, we can sometimes uncover an underappreciated piece to the larger puzzle. Officials\u2019 efforts at St. John\u2019s led to a new housing code that granted unprecedented condemnation authority to the Health Department, powers the commissioner leveraged in future renewal projects. First though, Williams had to target a small block in East Baltimore, then in the name of public safety, wipe it clear off the map.<\/p>\n<figure id=\"attachment_29300\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-29300\" style=\"width: 840px\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\"><a href=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/circulatingnow.nlm.nih.gov\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/05\/Image-1.png?ssl=1\"><img data-recalc-dims=\"1\" loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" data-attachment-id=\"29300\" data-permalink=\"https:\/\/circulatingnow.nlm.nih.gov\/2024\/05\/30\/st-johns-court-is-no-more-code-enforcement-and-the-baltimore-plan-for-housing\/image-1-3\/\" data-orig-file=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/circulatingnow.nlm.nih.gov\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/05\/Image-1.png?fit=1152%2C1220&ssl=1\" data-orig-size=\"1152,1220\" data-comments-opened=\"1\" data-image-meta=\"{"aperture":"0","credit":"","camera":"","caption":"","created_timestamp":"0","copyright":"","focal_length":"0","iso":"0","shutter_speed":"0","title":"","orientation":"0"}\" data-image-title=\"“St. John’s Court Is No More”\" data-image-description=\"<p>St. John’s Court That Was. Probably Baltimore’s Worst Slum.<br \/>\nUnited States Housing Photograph.<\/p>\n\" data-image-caption=\"<p>“St. John’s Court Is No More” in Baltimore Health News XVII, no. 3, March 1940<br \/>\nNational Library of Medicine #22620200R<\/p>\n\" data-medium-file=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/circulatingnow.nlm.nih.gov\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/05\/Image-1.png?fit=283%2C300&ssl=1\" data-large-file=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/circulatingnow.nlm.nih.gov\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/05\/Image-1.png?fit=840%2C890&ssl=1\" class=\"size-large wp-image-29300\" src=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/circulatingnow.nlm.nih.gov\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/05\/Image-1.png?resize=840%2C890&ssl=1\" alt=\"A newspaper photograph of an urban alley with a shed, basket and carts and a Black man reclining on a chair.\" width=\"840\" height=\"890\" srcset=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/circulatingnow.nlm.nih.gov\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/05\/Image-1.png?resize=967%2C1024&ssl=1 967w, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/circulatingnow.nlm.nih.gov\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/05\/Image-1.png?resize=283%2C300&ssl=1 283w, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/circulatingnow.nlm.nih.gov\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/05\/Image-1.png?resize=768%2C813&ssl=1 768w, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/circulatingnow.nlm.nih.gov\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/05\/Image-1.png?resize=840%2C890&ssl=1 840w, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/circulatingnow.nlm.nih.gov\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/05\/Image-1.png?w=1152&ssl=1 1152w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 840px) 100vw, 840px\" \/><\/a><figcaption id=\"caption-attachment-29300\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">“St. John’s Court Is No More” in <em>Baltimore Health News<\/em> XVII, no. 3, March 1940<br \/><a href=\"https:\/\/catalog.nlm.nih.gov\/permalink\/01NLM_INST\/1o1phhn\/alma992300763406676\"><em>National Library of Medicine #22620200R<\/em><\/a><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<blockquote><p>Baltimore had long been concerned with poor housing\u2019s effect on public health, or \u201cthe question of the slums,\u201d as posed in the <a href=\"https:\/\/catalog.nlm.nih.gov\/permalink\/01NLM_INST\/1o1phhn\/alma991979763406676\"><em>Maryland Medical Journal<\/em><\/a> (1901). Health experts influenced the city\u2019s earliest slum clearance projects, such as Preston Gardens (1914\u20131919) and the infamous \u201cLung Block\u201d (1929\u20131930). By the mid 1930s, moreover, the city\u2019s Bureau of Building Inspection was already condemning buildings for demolition. The Health Department, however, had yet to define its official role in slum clearance. St. John\u2019s Court was an unprecedented and consequential step in that direction.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n<figure id=\"attachment_29305\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-29305\" style=\"width: 675px\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\"><a href=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/circulatingnow.nlm.nih.gov\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/05\/Image2_22620200R.jpg?ssl=1\"><img data-recalc-dims=\"1\" loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" data-attachment-id=\"29305\" data-permalink=\"https:\/\/circulatingnow.nlm.nih.gov\/2024\/05\/30\/st-johns-court-is-no-more-code-enforcement-and-the-baltimore-plan-for-housing\/screenshot-3\/\" data-orig-file=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/circulatingnow.nlm.nih.gov\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/05\/Image2_22620200R.jpg?fit=791%2C1200&ssl=1\" data-orig-size=\"791,1200\" data-comments-opened=\"1\" data-image-meta=\"{"aperture":"0","credit":"","camera":"","caption":"Screenshot","created_timestamp":"0","copyright":"","focal_length":"0","iso":"0","shutter_speed":"0","title":"Screenshot","orientation":"1"}\" data-image-title=\"“St. John’s Court Is No More”\" data-image-description=\"<p>Baltimore City Housing Authority Photograph<\/p>\n\" data-image-caption=\"<p>“A “House” Of 2 Rooms, With Front Entrance On An Alley 3 Feet Wide And Facing A Blank Wall” in Baltimore Health News XVII, no. 3, March 1940<br \/>\nNational Library of Medicine #22620200R<\/p>\n\" data-medium-file=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/circulatingnow.nlm.nih.gov\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/05\/Image2_22620200R.jpg?fit=198%2C300&ssl=1\" data-large-file=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/circulatingnow.nlm.nih.gov\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/05\/Image2_22620200R.jpg?fit=675%2C1024&ssl=1\" class=\"size-large wp-image-29305\" src=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/circulatingnow.nlm.nih.gov\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/05\/Image2_22620200R.jpg?resize=675%2C1024&ssl=1\" alt=\"A newspaper photograph of a doorway in a narrow brick alley with carts parked our front.\" width=\"675\" height=\"1024\" srcset=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/circulatingnow.nlm.nih.gov\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/05\/Image2_22620200R.jpg?resize=675%2C1024&ssl=1 675w, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/circulatingnow.nlm.nih.gov\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/05\/Image2_22620200R.jpg?resize=198%2C300&ssl=1 198w, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/circulatingnow.nlm.nih.gov\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/05\/Image2_22620200R.jpg?resize=768%2C1165&ssl=1 768w, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/circulatingnow.nlm.nih.gov\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/05\/Image2_22620200R.jpg?w=791&ssl=1 791w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 675px) 100vw, 675px\" \/><\/a><figcaption id=\"caption-attachment-29305\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">“A “House” Of 2 Rooms, With Front Entrance On An Alley 3 Feet Wide And Facing A Blank Wall” in <em>Baltimore Health News<\/em> XVII, no. 3, March 1940<br \/><a href=\"https:\/\/catalog.nlm.nih.gov\/permalink\/01NLM_INST\/1o1phhn\/alma992300763406676\"><em>National Library of Medicine #22620200R<\/em><\/a><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<p>This blog post\u2014a dispatch from the National Library of Medicine (NLM)\u2014can only begin to crack open a much larger history on housing and health in the postwar era. As the above suggests, one way this story can be told is through local policymakers finding common cause in New Deal administration. What St. John\u2019s offers us, though, is a glimpse into how these mutual interests were fused together though officials\u2019 interpretations of specific neighborhoods, especially those deemed threats. By exploring the NLM\u2019s collection of <em>Baltimore City Health News<\/em>, a monthly report published by the Health Department, we can piece together how a single block came to play such an outsized role in shaping local then national policies. More specifically, we can see how local officials sharpened the idea that code enforcement could be an effective weapon against \u201cblight,\u201d a means to eliminate problems \u201cin the interest of public safety.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>The Housing Authority of Baltimore City (HABC) discovered St. John\u2019s when it surveyed the area after the Housing Act of 1937. Hidden by a narrow passageway that opened into a cramped courtyard, St. John\u2019s rented 23 rooms with no running water and one outdoor toilet to eight families, all poor and working-class African Americans. A discovery for some, a home for others.<\/p>\n<p>From HABC\u2019s perspective, St. John\u2019s was a target for clearance, an example of tenements \u201cunfit for human habitation,\u201d and an obstacle to the future Latrobe Homes, a public housing project planned for construction across the street.<\/p>\n<figure id=\"attachment_29306\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-29306\" style=\"width: 665px\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\"><a href=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/circulatingnow.nlm.nih.gov\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/05\/Image3_22620200R.jpg?ssl=1\"><img data-recalc-dims=\"1\" loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" data-attachment-id=\"29306\" data-permalink=\"https:\/\/circulatingnow.nlm.nih.gov\/2024\/05\/30\/st-johns-court-is-no-more-code-enforcement-and-the-baltimore-plan-for-housing\/screenshot-4\/\" data-orig-file=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/circulatingnow.nlm.nih.gov\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/05\/Image3_22620200R.jpg?fit=779%2C1200&ssl=1\" data-orig-size=\"779,1200\" data-comments-opened=\"1\" data-image-meta=\"{"aperture":"0","credit":"","camera":"","caption":"Screenshot","created_timestamp":"0","copyright":"","focal_length":"0","iso":"0","shutter_speed":"0","title":"Screenshot","orientation":"1"}\" data-image-title=\"“St. John’s Court Is No More”\" data-image-description=\"<p>Baltimore City Housing Authority Photograph<\/p>\n\" data-image-caption=\"<p>“St. Johns Court\u2014Looking out” in Baltimore Health News XVII, no. 3, March 1940<br \/>\nNational Library of Medicine #22620200R<\/p>\n\" data-medium-file=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/circulatingnow.nlm.nih.gov\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/05\/Image3_22620200R.jpg?fit=195%2C300&ssl=1\" data-large-file=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/circulatingnow.nlm.nih.gov\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/05\/Image3_22620200R.jpg?fit=665%2C1024&ssl=1\" class=\"size-large wp-image-29306\" src=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/circulatingnow.nlm.nih.gov\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/05\/Image3_22620200R.jpg?resize=665%2C1024&ssl=1\" alt=\"A newspaper photograph of a narrow alley between brick buildings with a ladder lying on the ground.\" width=\"665\" height=\"1024\" srcset=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/circulatingnow.nlm.nih.gov\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/05\/Image3_22620200R.jpg?resize=665%2C1024&ssl=1 665w, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/circulatingnow.nlm.nih.gov\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/05\/Image3_22620200R.jpg?resize=195%2C300&ssl=1 195w, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/circulatingnow.nlm.nih.gov\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/05\/Image3_22620200R.jpg?resize=768%2C1183&ssl=1 768w, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/circulatingnow.nlm.nih.gov\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/05\/Image3_22620200R.jpg?w=779&ssl=1 779w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 665px) 100vw, 665px\" \/><\/a><figcaption id=\"caption-attachment-29306\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">“St. Johns Court\u2014Looking out” in <em>Baltimore Health News<\/em> XVII, no. 3, March 1940<br \/><a href=\"https:\/\/catalog.nlm.nih.gov\/permalink\/01NLM_INST\/1o1phhn\/alma992300763406676\"><em>National Library of Medicine #22620200R<\/em><\/a><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<p>Homewood Avenue, however, was just beyond HABC\u2019s project area. Housing Director C.D. Loomis turned to Williams for help. Worried about backlash but encouraged by Waxter, Williams decided to enlist the Health Department in 1939.<a href=\"#_ftn1\" name=\"_ftnref1\"><\/a> According to a front-page article in <em>Health News<\/em>, St. John\u2019s was \u201ca rock-bottom slum,\u201d one of the worst in the city. Derelict housing, moreover, risked exposing the public to infectious disease, especially tuberculosis which was a longstanding fear among city officials.<\/p>\n<p>While true that tuberculosis festered in poor neighborhoods, spread easily in areas that lacked sanitary infrastructure, <a href=\"https:\/\/catalog.nlm.nih.gov\/discovery\/fulldisplay?context=L&vid=01NLM_INST:01NLM_INST&search_scope=MyInstitution&tab=LibraryCatalog&docid=alma9914871193406676\"><em>fears<\/em> of tuberculosis<\/a> in Jim Crow Baltimore unfurled through the racialization of low-income tenants and corresponding notions of \u201cblight.\u201d Health experts helped tether fears of contagion to renter-majority districts, predominately African American neighborhoods where the <em>Health News<\/em> reasoned that people \u201cdeveloped tuberculosis because of living in a blighted area.\u201d At the same time, decades of housing policies fixated on protecting public health, property values, and racial order, <a href=\"https:\/\/muse.jhu.edu\/article\/195869\/pdf\">mutually reinforcing notions<\/a> infused with white supremacy. <a href=\"https:\/\/digitalcommons.law.umaryland.edu\/mlr\/vol42\/iss2\/4\/\">Apartheid<\/a> thus reshaped the urban geography of \u201cblight\u201d\u2014and white homeowners hardened its borders. For example, HABC designed the 701-unit Latrobe Homes for whites only, a barrier against Black Baltimoreans who attempted to move north of Eager Street. Housing officials then encouraged white homeowners to reinforce the boundary with racially restrictive covenants codified in property deeds.<\/p>\n<blockquote><p>Baltimore was already a national leader in segregationist housing policies. The\u00a0 Segregation Ordinances of 1910\u20131913 were the first racial zoning laws in the U.S., and local developers helped spread its influence across the country until the Supreme Court ruled against the practice in <em>Buchanan v. Warley<\/em> (1917).<\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p>By 1938, HABC officials had already decided on the locations for public housing by revising a city survey of \u201cblighted areas\u201d undertaken four years earlier. When HABC \u201c<a href=\"https:\/\/archivesspace.ubalt.edu\/repositories\/2\/archival_objects\/76904\">superimposed maps of urban problems<\/a>,\u201d including racial, sociological, economic, and environmental, <em>on top<\/em> of the original survey, officials layered racialized anxieties into their operative category of \u201cblight,\u201d revealing the internal mechanisms of apartheid policymaking in the process. Conferring with HABC, if not using its maps directly, Williams identified St. John\u2019s as \u201cdangerous\u201d to \u201cpublic safety.\u201d The Health Department then condemned the property under Baltimore\u2019s 1927 City Code, making St. John\u2019s the first time the department had \u201cproceeded under ordinance in the manner of slum clearance.\u201d After an absentee owner forfeited his claim, officials evicted St. John\u2019s tenants and razed its buildings to the ground.<\/p>\n<figure id=\"attachment_29307\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-29307\" style=\"width: 840px\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\"><a href=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/circulatingnow.nlm.nih.gov\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/05\/Image4_22620200R.jpg?ssl=1\"><img data-recalc-dims=\"1\" loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" data-attachment-id=\"29307\" data-permalink=\"https:\/\/circulatingnow.nlm.nih.gov\/2024\/05\/30\/st-johns-court-is-no-more-code-enforcement-and-the-baltimore-plan-for-housing\/screenshot-5\/\" data-orig-file=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/circulatingnow.nlm.nih.gov\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/05\/Image4_22620200R.jpg?fit=1440%2C1200&ssl=1\" data-orig-size=\"1440,1200\" data-comments-opened=\"1\" data-image-meta=\"{"aperture":"0","credit":"","camera":"","caption":"Screenshot","created_timestamp":"0","copyright":"","focal_length":"0","iso":"0","shutter_speed":"0","title":"Screenshot","orientation":"1"}\" data-image-title=\"“St. John’s Court Is No More”\" data-image-description=\"\" data-image-caption=\"<p>“The Finale. One of the Last Truckloads Pulls Away” in Baltimore Health News XVII, no. 3, March 1940<br \/>\nNational Library of Medicine #22620200R<\/p>\n\" data-medium-file=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/circulatingnow.nlm.nih.gov\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/05\/Image4_22620200R.jpg?fit=300%2C250&ssl=1\" data-large-file=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/circulatingnow.nlm.nih.gov\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/05\/Image4_22620200R.jpg?fit=840%2C700&ssl=1\" class=\"size-large wp-image-29307\" src=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/circulatingnow.nlm.nih.gov\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/05\/Image4_22620200R.jpg?resize=840%2C700&ssl=1\" alt=\"A newspaper photograph of an urban block of brick buildings with a demolished space.\" width=\"840\" height=\"700\" srcset=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/circulatingnow.nlm.nih.gov\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/05\/Image4_22620200R.jpg?resize=1024%2C853&ssl=1 1024w, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/circulatingnow.nlm.nih.gov\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/05\/Image4_22620200R.jpg?resize=300%2C250&ssl=1 300w, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/circulatingnow.nlm.nih.gov\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/05\/Image4_22620200R.jpg?resize=768%2C640&ssl=1 768w, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/circulatingnow.nlm.nih.gov\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/05\/Image4_22620200R.jpg?resize=1200%2C1000&ssl=1 1200w, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/circulatingnow.nlm.nih.gov\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/05\/Image4_22620200R.jpg?resize=840%2C700&ssl=1 840w, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/circulatingnow.nlm.nih.gov\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/05\/Image4_22620200R.jpg?w=1440&ssl=1 1440w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 840px) 100vw, 840px\" \/><\/a><figcaption id=\"caption-attachment-29307\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">“The Finale. One of the Last Truckloads Pulls Away” in <em>Baltimore Health News<\/em> XVII, no. 3, March 1940<br \/><a href=\"https:\/\/catalog.nlm.nih.gov\/permalink\/01NLM_INST\/1o1phhn\/alma992300763406676\"><em>National Library of Medicine #22620200R<\/em><\/a><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<p>Code enforcement opened the door for the Health Department to engage in slum clearance. Alongside Waxter and Loomis, Williams plus a \u201cgroup of city officials who constituted a team with authority,\u201d as he put it, began lobbying the City Council to expand the department\u2019s condemnation powers. Health inspectors fanned across the city, issuing fines and hauling landlords to court. In the cases that followed, judges ruled in favor of the city\u2019s growing appetite for slum clearance. With full legal backing, the City Council passed the landmark Ordinance on Hygiene of Housing in 1941, setting a new precedent in housing reform. Policymakers across the country soon flooded the department with requests for information, and Williams began publishing widely, including an article in the <em>American Journal of Public Health<\/em> titled \u201c<a href=\"https:\/\/pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov\/18015665\/\">Housing as a Health Officer\u2019s Opportunity<\/a>.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Baltimore emerged a national leader in housing policy, and the Health Department appeared poised to finally destroy its \u201cring of blight.\u201d In 1947, the country\u2019s first housing court was established, and a new division of beat cops, building inspectors, and health officers, called the Sanitarians, patrolled neighborhoods issuing tickets and court summons to tenants and landlords alike. The Baltimore Plan for Housing Law Enforcement, as the multi-pronged campaign became known, was celebrated widely. Even landlords welcomed the program as fines seemed a better deal than slum clearance and public projects threatening their monopoly on low-income housing.<\/p>\n<p>The Baltimore Plan, however, was designed as a complement, not alternative, to <a href=\"https:\/\/lccn.loc.gov\/2003023137\">public housing<\/a>. Indeed, code enforcement helped clear the path for public projects. As St. John\u2019s revealed, HABC recruited the Health Department to the work of condemnation, extending its reach beyond its designated area. A collaborative effort, the all-white Latrobe Homes displaced 589 households, and HABC ignored federal \u201ccomposition rules\u201d that insisted public projects reflect a neighborhood\u2019s racial demographics. Instead, HABC forced Black residents (65 percent of the original area) deeper into East Baltimore, limiting their options to a long waitlist for segregated housing or subdivided apartments in a predatory rental market. Indeed, the new powers of the Health Department provided justification\u2014and legal cover\u2014to help bulldoze diverse neighborhoods and erect lasting monuments to apartheid.<\/p>\n<p>After St. John\u2019s was leveled, authorities scaled up from single buildings to entire blocks. The success of The Baltimore Plan launched local officials into the <a href=\"https:\/\/www.presidency.ucsb.edu\/documents\/statement-the-president-upon-signing-the-housing-act-1954\">Eisenhower administration<\/a> where they helped write the <a href=\"https:\/\/www.hud.gov\/sites\/documents\/LEGS_CHRON_JUNE2014.PDF\">Housing Act of 1954<\/a>. A return to the original scene, however, reminds us how local dynamics shaped national legislation. Williams and Waxter, from their morning commute to their policy collaborations, targeted a specific address to recast threats to public safety, rewrite the authority of public agencies, and even reshape notions of the public itself when deciding whose interests were worth protecting. Over time, their accomplishments outlasted their uncertain initial steps. <em>Health News<\/em> offers a window into the origins of Baltimore\u2019s code enforcement program. Revisiting the articles on St. John\u2019s and its aftermath, scholars can reexamine a controversial moment when local ordinances, federal programs, and national legislation were still years, if not decades, away. Exploring the entangled policies of health and housing in the late 1930s, moreover, we can begin to pull at the roots of a postwar apartheid system, one seeded by municipal codes, appointed officials, and expansions of public authority.<\/p>\n<p><em><a href=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/circulatingnow.nlm.nih.gov\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/05\/Daniel_Cumming.jpg?ssl=1\"><img data-recalc-dims=\"1\" loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" data-attachment-id=\"29292\" data-permalink=\"https:\/\/circulatingnow.nlm.nih.gov\/2024\/05\/30\/st-johns-court-is-no-more-code-enforcement-and-the-baltimore-plan-for-housing\/daniel_cumming\/\" data-orig-file=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/circulatingnow.nlm.nih.gov\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/05\/Daniel_Cumming.jpg?fit=520%2C780&ssl=1\" data-orig-size=\"520,780\" data-comments-opened=\"1\" data-image-meta=\"{"aperture":"0","credit":"","camera":"","caption":"","created_timestamp":"0","copyright":"","focal_length":"0","iso":"0","shutter_speed":"0","title":"","orientation":"0"}\" data-image-title=\"Daniel Cumming\" data-image-description=\"\" data-image-caption=\"\" data-medium-file=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/circulatingnow.nlm.nih.gov\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/05\/Daniel_Cumming.jpg?fit=200%2C300&ssl=1\" data-large-file=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/circulatingnow.nlm.nih.gov\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/05\/Daniel_Cumming.jpg?fit=520%2C780&ssl=1\" class=\"alignleft wp-image-29292\" title=\"Daniel Cumming\" src=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/circulatingnow.nlm.nih.gov\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/05\/Daniel_Cumming.jpg?resize=100%2C150&ssl=1\" alt=\"A man in a collared shirt and glasses outdoors.\" width=\"100\" height=\"150\" srcset=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/circulatingnow.nlm.nih.gov\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/05\/Daniel_Cumming.jpg?resize=200%2C300&ssl=1 200w, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/circulatingnow.nlm.nih.gov\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/05\/Daniel_Cumming.jpg?w=520&ssl=1 520w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 100px) 100vw, 100px\" \/><\/a>Daniel G. Cumming, PhD, is a Postdoctoral Fellow in the Chloe Center for the Critical Study of Racism, Immigration, and Colonialism at Johns Hopkins University. He holds a joint appointment with an affiliated public-facing project, \u201cInheritance Baltimore: Humanities and Arts Education for Black Liberation.\u201d He is a 2020 <a href=\"https:\/\/www.nlm.nih.gov\/hmd\/get-involved\/debakey-fellowship.html\">NLM Michael E. DeBakey Fellow in the History of Medicine<\/a>.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>By Daniel G. Cumming ~ It was an unusual commute. In the late 1930s, Dr. Huntington Williams, commissioner of the<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":19605840,"featured_media":29316,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_coblocks_attr":"","_coblocks_dimensions":"","_coblocks_responsive_height":"","_coblocks_accordion_ie_support":"","advanced_seo_description":"","jetpack_seo_html_title":"","jetpack_seo_noindex":false,"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[14520,42333869,12763,51014],"tags":[24739,24741,168941,2290,55607,5563,678875978,58980,28006,678875950,260460,678875977],"class_list":["post-29276","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-about-us","category-archives-manuscripts","category-collections","category-guests","tag-1930s","tag-1950s","tag-african-american-history","tag-architecture","tag-baltimore","tag-legislation","tag-maryland","tag-fellowship","tag-public-health","tag-race","tag-tuberculosis","tag-urban"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/circulatingnow.nlm.nih.gov\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/05\/Image4_22620200R_feature.jpg?fit=900%2C400&ssl=1","jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p3xcDk-7Cc","jetpack-related-posts":[],"amp_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/circulatingnow.nlm.nih.gov\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/29276","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/circulatingnow.nlm.nih.gov\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/circulatingnow.nlm.nih.gov\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/circulatingnow.nlm.nih.gov\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/19605840"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/circulatingnow.nlm.nih.gov\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=29276"}],"version-history":[{"count":31,"href":"https:\/\/circulatingnow.nlm.nih.gov\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/29276\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":29341,"href":"https:\/\/circulatingnow.nlm.nih.gov\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/29276\/revisions\/29341"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/circulatingnow.nlm.nih.gov\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/29316"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/circulatingnow.nlm.nih.gov\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=29276"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/circulatingnow.nlm.nih.gov\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=29276"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/circulatingnow.nlm.nih.gov\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=29276"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}} |