waiting for the book to clear things up

It seems like Amazon had me running around in circles for awhile too trying to pay, but in the end I did get a confirmation email from them.

I remember the blockbusting.  I think that was going on before the marches but in neighborhoods closer to the ghetto.  It seems to me that when a house went up for sale the neighbors would discreetly question the seller to determine that he was going to sell it to a white person.  Good government types would send a white couple out to inquire about a house for sale and afterwards they would send a black couple who would be told that it wasn't for sale.  I don't think the sellers got in any big trouble for that. 

There was some kind of insurance program going on.  Homeowners would pay to join and that money would guarantee that they would always be able to get at least so much for their house.  I think it had two results, one was that it guaranteed that no house would ever sell cheap so that black people could buy it, and that if that should happen, there wouldn't be a panic to sell because everybody knew they were going to get at least so much.  I don't whether the aim of it was to keep black people out or to keep the neighborhood stable if they did. 

And I don't think it ever got off the ground.  Also there was some priest involved in the struggle, he was head of some neighborhood committee, but I don't remember which side he was on.  I hope there is material on these subjects in the book.

Oak Park had some program to allow black people to move in and keep the surrounding whites from moving out.  It was widely lauded for that and it was successful. 

It doesn't seem to be a problem anymore.  The main problem was the way the whites fled, but this was more because they were afraid of losing money than living next to a black person. And even the hardest core racist would probably rather live next to a black person than take a big money hit on his property.  Like you said you can't pass a law to make people love other people but you can pass a law to make them behave.

Blacks and Hispanics still live in their own neighborhoods because they are generally poorer and the neighborhoods are poor.  The north side near the lake is predominantly white, but maybe ten percent minority and nobody makes a fuss if minorities move in.  I think that is generally the case in the white neighborhoods on the far northwest and southwest sides.

The answer to your question would be that black people are a whole lot better off since affirmative action than they were before it.