Adhara123’s Blog

have wanted to have a full description and explanation of The Segregated Origins

scientists, social workers, and students of policymaking a detailed reading of

primary sources by those men and women instrumental in shaping and enacting

the first four programs of the 1935 Social Security Act-Grants to States for Old

Age Assistance (Title I), Federal Old-Age Benefits (Title II), Grants to States for

Unemployment Compensation Administration (Title III), and Grants to States

for Aid to Dependent Children (Title IV).

“African Americans were not denied the benefits of Social Security because

of the machinations of southern congressional leadership, as is assumed,” Poole

argues. “The Act was made discriminatory through a shifting web of alliances of

white policymakers that crossed regional and political parties … who genuinely

sought to build a fairer and better world, and devoted their waking hours to that

challenge, but whose vision was steeped in racial privilege” (p. 6).