Massive riots erupted in U.S. & foreign venues after the May 25/20 arrest death of a handcuffed Minneapolis African American GEORGE FLOYD.

With surveillance cameras everywhere & some incredible coincidence, there's lots to see online. And thousands went into the streets in this U.S. election year. see eg N.Y.Times analysis of the tapes on Youtube at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vksEJR9EPQ8 This wasn't Ole' Dixie !

BUT IRONICALLY as to the same good ole' Minneapolis, in 2016 a group of (semi-)retired academics had already begun to research the societal effects of RACIAL SEGREGATION COVENANTS registered onto MINNEAPOLIS PROPERTY TITLES BY DEVELOPERS starting before the 20th century.

The Mapping Prejudice Project https://www.mappingprejudice.org/ in the U.S.A. asserts society-wide long-lasting legacy effects of letting the development industry create racial segregation zones : “The project started in Minneapolis, where research revealed that the city was not always segregated. Covenants helped remake the racial landscape of the city. . . .”

Whites only covenants were registered to maximize rootdeed sale prices during the 50 YEARS before being declared constitutionally UNENFORCEABLE in 1948 by SCOTUS the Supreme Court of the United States. ( Nation-wide many such covenants have been left on U.S. titles albeit unenforceable. In Minneapolis whites-only bastions were described set up closest to parks & least vulnerable to factories, noise, odours etc. The covenants reportedly also tended to force non-whites into covenant-exempted ghettos. So called "red-lining" reportedly further penalized mortgage applications & home ownership levels outside white bastions even for loan guarantees from government sources. )

Anyway the 1948 landmark U.S. Supreme Court decision applied the 14th amendment etc in Shelley v. Kraemer 1948 334 US 1 (1948) https://supreme.justia.com/cases/federal/us/334/1/ It was more forceful than in Canada's later & obscure Beach of Pines Owners Association challenge ( 'White Gentiles Only' covenants were struck down on very narrow technical grounds as vague & "people-zoning" instead of 'land-use restricting' 1951 “Noble et al. v. Alley, [1951] SCR 64, 1950 CanLII 13” http://canlii.ca/t/1ttv5 )

The Mapping Project's outputs have included "What are Covenants ? " and “Why Covenants Matter” ( 2019 ) https://www.mappingprejudice.org/what-are-covenants/

Historical segregation by title-covenants may be far from the main component of present-day issues but it arguably at least slowed racial reconciliation.

One interesting prophesy from 1944 :

" . . . J.T. Wardlaw explained to the readers of the Minneapolis Star in a letter published on December 23, 1944.

The head of the Minneapolis Urban League expounded further, asserting that these practices pushed people of color into areas that were redlined, which made it almost impossible to acquire affordable financing to buy property. And once they identified a home, "the already inflated price is made higher for Negro prospects," Wardlaw wrote.

These "are the tools used to depress homeownership among Negroes," he explained. "These are the practices which during the past decade have come to be regarded as expedient and profitable.

These are also the practices which if endured for another decade will reap for Minneapolis a sorry harvest."

Wardlaw's declaration was prophetic. . . ." - unquote