1. Describe Plessy v. Ferguson (1896) landmark Supreme Court case. After the Civil War, black people were not allowed in places reserved for white people. Homer Plessy was mostly white but was somewhat mixed black. He got on a white-only railroad car, and was arrested when he refused to leave.
Plessy, who was a man who was one-eighth black and how he was jailed for sitting in a railroad cart that was designated for whites only. This case set a precedent for the creation of 'separate but equal' laws. This source is perfect for providing background knowledge about the roots of the Civil Rights
Louisiana’s policy requiring that blacks sit in separate railcars from whites was challenged and upheld in the Supreme Court case Plessy v. Ferguson (1896). The Court held that there was nothing inherently unequal—nor anything unconstitutional—about separate accommodations for races. In the twentieth century, the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) began a litigation campaign designed to bring an end to statemandated segregation, calling attention to the shabby accommodations provided for blacks, as well as arguing the damaging psychological effects that segregation had on black school children. One case was brought on behalf of Linda Brown, a third-grader from Topeka, Kansas. Several additional school segregation cases were combined into one, known as Brown v. Board of Education.
In the South it became known as the "one-drop rule,'' meaning that a single drop of "black blood" makes a person a black. Courts have also called it the "one black ancestor rule," or the "traceable amount rule," meaning that racially mixed persons are assigned the status of the subordinate group. [1] The term “mulatto” and “colored” were often used because whites needed to distinguish blacks from each other during slavery. Although the root meaning of mulatto, in Spanish, is "hybrid," "mulatto" came to include the children of unions between whites and so-called "mixed Negroes." For example, Booker T. Washington and Frederick Douglass, with slave mothers and white fathers, were referred to as mulattoes.
Europeans started bringing African-Americans to America back in the mid -1500s. Two and a half centuries of slavery and segregation stop black men and women from exercising their rights. They were denied the right to vote and if they tried to vote they were either beaten or even killed for trying to do so. The National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP), was formed in 1909. It’s sole purpose was to try to abolish segregation and discrimination in housing, education, employment, voting, and transportation and securing for African Americans their constitutional rights.
For nearly a century, the United States was occupied by the racial segregation of black and white people. The constitutionality of this “separation of humans into racial or other ethnic groups in daily life” had not been decided until a deliberate provocation to the law was made. The goal of this test was to have a mulatto, someone of mixed blood, defy the segregated train car law and raise a dispute on the fairness of being categorized as colored or not. This test went down in history as Plessy v. Ferguson, a planned challenge to the law during a period ruled by Jim Crow laws and the idea of “separate but equal” without equality for African Americans. This challenge forced the Supreme Court to rule on the constitutionality of segregation, and in result of the case, caused the nation to have split opinions of support and
According to Bowles, 2011, American History 1865 to present End of Isolation, The Black Codes codified some of these feelings into law when in 1865 southern state governments created legislation that restricted and controlled the lives of the ex-slaves. These differed among states, but the Black Codes all shared some general provisions. African Americans could marry, but they outlawed intermarriage between the races. State governments prohibited African Americans from carrying guns, and they could not engage in work other than farming. Some of the codes restricted their travel.
Plessy v Ferguson was the landmark case decision on May 18, 1896 in which it was upheld by Supreme Court ruling to reinforce the Louisiana law that enforced the segregation of railroad facilities. It was determined that segregation was not considered a form of discrimination so long as the races were ‘equally’ accommodated. This became also known as the ‘separate but equal’ doctrine because it was well known that the conditions were certainly not equal. The overall outcome of this case set the equal rights movement back 100 years until Brown v Board of Education of Topeka overthrew this doctrine in 1954. This ruling was forever change the future of the school system for native born Black Americans and immigrants alike.
In the article, Plessy v. Ferguson, the Supreme ruled that Louisiana law made it so that blacks and whites were separate but under equal accommodations. This decision justified many of the following actions that were performed by the states and the different local governments. The separation of blacks and whites was a law that was mandatory throughout every state. 2. Following the Civil War, the legislatures of the southern states passed some laws that limited civil rights of each African Americans.
They mandated de jure racial segregation in all public facilities in Southern states of the former Confederacy, with, starting in 1890, a "separate but equal" status for African Americans. A couple examples of Jim Crow laws in state of Pennsylvania and in the city of Pittsburgh were, 1869: Education [Statute] Black children prohibited from attending Pittsburgh schools and 1956: Adoption [Statute] Petition must state race or color of adopting parents. It is also important to know that it is also illegal to discriminate against someone because they have opposed illegal discrimination, filed a complaint, or assisted in an investigation. This is called retaliation, and the law protects those who oppose illegal