Many of these facilities were, education, healthcare, transport, cinemas, restaurants and churches and even housing and estates were segregated. This shows the extent white went to separate them from the ‘inferior’ race. Jim Crow laws limited black Americans from having a better way of life as they were made poorer, didn’t have the opportunity to managerial roles as they were only allowed the low paying jobs and weren’t equal to white people increasing poor conditions, also, led to unequal or no voting rights in coloured communities. Under the Fifteenth Amendment black people had legal rights to vote across America. However, many southern states found ways around the laws to disenfranchise the black populations.
These laws denied black Americans the equal rights of white citizens which re-imposed white supremacy and meant they remained as second-class citizens. It wasn’t only the Jim Crow laws but under the Fifteenth Amendment, black people had the legal right to vote throughout America. Nonetheless, the southern states found devious ways to disenfranchise the local black population. For example, some states introduced a grandfather clause, which meant that people could only vote if their grandfathers had been able to vote. Other states introduced literacy tests as criteria for voting.
The suffragette movement gained strength in America after black men got the vote (though most southern black men were effectively disenfranchised by literacy laws, the poll tax, threats and intimidation etc). Just as, in the UK, the movement grew when working class men got the vote. In both countries there was great resentment amongst upper class women that men of inferior social status could vote, when they couldn't. It spurred them on to greater efforts. The abolition movement was the movement to abolish slavery.
Nothing back then was black and white for former slaves and the white Southerners. The answers took time to get to each and every one of those citizens. Those answers came in the form of more blood being spilt and discrimination running rampant throughout the South. Over this course of time, civility finally became the norm through these struggles you are about to read about. Race Relations after the Civil War 3 The way white Southerners made it difficult on former slaves in the South was to create what was called “Black Codes”.
In the South segregation was supported by the Jim Crow laws that made it legal. All public institutions in the South were separated according to skin colour, the ones for blacks being inferior in quality. In the north, where segregation wasn’t imposed by law, the blacks were forced to move into ghettos, because of discrimination by the whites. As well as that, there was also economic inequality. It was much harder for blacks to get a job, and there employment position could be described as ‘the last to be hired, the first to be fired’.
Although the end of the American civil war marked the end of slavery for African Americans, it did not mark their acceptance and equality with white people. Many southern states resented losing their slaves and were determined to keep African Americans as second class citizens. In 1950 segregation was in full force, meaning African Americans had separate churches, public transport, theatres, schools, hotels, swimming pools and many other facilities to white people. Segregation also applied to where people lived, so African Americans could only live in certain areas separate from white people, with these areas being much worse than the white suburbs, despite the separate but equal principle. Even when this was challenged in the Plessy vs Ferguson Supreme Court case the separate but equal principle was found to be constitutional.
• Southern school for blacks were poor standards which resulted in black people not being educated enough to vote or work for a living. • Southerners and northerners refused to work alongside one another due to the stress and havoc of the Civil War • The plantation southern belle’s morals and beliefs had all changed so the social class fell. • Racism continued to increase in the southern rather than decrease causing backlash amongst the black citizens. • Black people began to blend in with social classes as they were not trapped anymore and were ‘free’. • Even though slavery was illegal, sly and unofficial slavery took place in order for black people to survive and live in both the south and north of America.
Throughout history, African Americans have faced a great deal of adversity. They endured many years of slavery where they were forced into positions of servitude to the whites. After slavery had been abolished, African Americans were forced to deal with additional controversial matters such as the Jim Crow laws. These laws mandated the racial segregation in all public facilities in the southern states of the United States. These laws also created environments for African Americans that had a tendency to be inferior to those provided for white Americans.
However, even after its abolishment, blacks were still kept in slavery and were treated poorly and unequal to other, white Americans. This abuse was much more common in the Southern states due to the more racist nature of the white people who lived there and the fact that the Southern states had originally fought to keep Black Slavery legal. Soon after the Civil War was won by the Northern States, the 13th, 14th and 15th amendment were brought into congress. The thirteenth amendment stated that all Slavery must end in America; the fourteenth amendment stated that everyone living on American soil should gain citizenship and the fifteenth amendment stated that all citizens should gain the right to vote. These amendments could be considered as vital moves towards black equalities, if they had worked.
c.) The varying interpretations indicate the use of “presentism” throughout the periods in which the affair has been analyzed. During the civil rights movement, use of the term “blacks” to describe the slave population was seen as one of the main points of insensitivity, because African Americans of the time had such little cultural footing in America. After the 60s, students began to reflect on Jefferson’s unwillingness to see integration as an option, because African Americans were still struggling to integrate after the civil rights movements. Modern day, the concern lies in Jefferson’s blatant stereotyping of slaves as lesser and even as “musical”. These all reflect the current ideals of the time in