ABSTRACT
The intellectual basis of black politics rested in part on the political memoirs and reminiscences of black officeholders and compilations of political speeches and essays, as well as the pamphlets of black political activists like Frederick Douglass in the Reconstruction and post-Reconstruction eras. The black political leadership studies tended to concentrate on a single individual, a collection of individuals, or black politicos. Chicago, both historically and currently, has captured the attention of vast segments of the American populace in general and the academic community in particular when it comes to black politics in the big cities. Reflecting back, then, on the pioneering works in black politics in the formative years, 1903–1965, a small beginning was made, but the work was basically ignored by the academic community. Black urban politics and black political ideology, each had two books, for a total of 4.4 percent.
