Includes bibliographical references and index.

"Andrew Kahrl's enraging national assessment of legal and financial dispossession proves that African Americans property owners have long been beset by racist practices, invisible obstacles, and hidden traps that leave them vulnerable to economic predation. Kahrl focuses specially on how property taxes have been used to swindle African Americans out of their land, with the cooperation of public officials and courts. These racist regimes fund and reinforce inequity, with blacks paying more in taxes than whites as they lose tremendous inheritable wealth to whites. There is something more fundamental than the "forty acres" of settlement lore: the taxes on them"--,Provided by publisher.