The thing about Jim Crow laws regarding economic activity that many forget is that the segregation was supposed to be a voluntary system. It was expected that white business owners would self segregate, especially prior to the ousting of northern politicians from Southern office.

Some of the more, shall we say, capitalist business owners viewed the money that African Americans had as more important than their race, and served all men somewhat equally. This put those businesses that discriminated at a disadvantage and this partly led the states to enact the Jim Crow laws regarding economic activity, which required discrimination and segregation by all businesses.

Instances of businesses skirting this law existed but after the implementation of the discriminatory slate of Jim Crow laws, most businesses simply modified their practices to meet the law, the Alabama law for example below.

“It shall be unlawful to conduct a restaurant or other place for the serving of food in the city, at which white and colored people are served in the same room, unless such white and colored persons are effectually separated by a solid partition extending from the door upward to a distance of seven feet or higher, and unless a separate entrance from the street is provided for each compartment.”

None of this is to say that the political and social barriers produced by Jim Crow to prevent African Americans from gaining political, economic or social power were a result of anything but bigotry. The discriminatory poll taxes, literacy tests, lynch mobs, the KKK and other institutional barriers prevented African Americans from gaining any meaningful representation or basic recognition of their humanity. But in terms of economic activity, some Southern White business owners were willing to set aside their racism in the pursuit of money, at least until the Jim Crow laws were enacted. These laws created penalties, both legal and social, that severely discouraged this practice but like all prohibitions, it was unable to entirely stamp out economic activity conducted without regard for race.

References

Boskin, J. (1976). Urban racial violence in the twentieth century. Beverly Hills, CA: Glencoe Press.

Butler, P. (2010) One Hundred Years of Race and Crime, 100 J. Crim. L. & Criminology 1043

Wormser, R. (2014) "Rise and Fall of Jim Crow." St. Martins Press.