Alabama

Migration

After 1814, Alabama was the mecca of a great migratory wave, mainly of whites of English and Scotch-Irish descent (some with their black slaves) from Virginia, Georgia, and the Carolinas. Since the Civil War, migration to Alabama has been slight. Many blacks left Alabama from World War I (1914–18) through the 1960s to seek employment in the East and Midwest, and the proportion of blacks in Alabama's population fell from 35% in 1940 to 26% in 1998, where it remained through mid-2002. Overall, Alabama may have lost as many as 944,000 residents through migration between 1940 and 1970, but enjoyed a net gain from migration of over 143,000 between 1970 and 1990, and an additional 114,000 in domestic and 13,000 in international migration between 1990 and 1998. In the period 1995–2000, 326,212 people moved into the state and 300,389 moved out, for a net gain of 25,823, 3,031 of whom were age 65 or over.