Jim Crow is “the systematic practice of promoting the segregation of the Negro peoples” (North by South). “Jim Crow was the name of the racial caste system which operated primarily, but not exclusively in southern and border states, between 1877 and the mid-1960s” (Pilgrim). The Jim Crow Movement was a prominent factor that led to the control of the black population in America. It was a system used to obstruct basic rights for African-Americans. Jim Crow was a way of life, not just a set of unjust laws.
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.
Martin Luther King Jr’s main perspective during the fight on racism was equality. At the time in which he fought the crisis of racial inequality a main concern was to address that "white America must assume the guilt for the black man's inferior status" (King, 9) as stated in the reading Racism and the White Backlash. Also Dr. Martin Luther King from my understanding believes reparation in this nation at that time was not the top priority. He could not stress enough about how essential racial equality was for the nation to become solve mainstream crisis during the peak of
They were deemed radical by subsequent historians because they insisted that blacks be protected in their new found rights. When white southerner’s intransigence followed the nation’s first civil rights act, Congress passed the Ku Klux Klan act. This gave federal authorities jurisdiction over both states and individuals who tried to deprive Freedmen and women of their new found rights. Never before had the federal intervened so force fully and directly on behalf of its citizens, let alone it’s most constellated and impoverished minority. Yet even
It is unquestionably accepted that the African Diaspora of the United States has clearly been disadvantage by slavery and long standing oppression from white supremacy. However, it is not as unequivocally understood that whites are not the sole perpetrators of colorism in the United States. Color bias is also widely apparent among African Americans. Therefore, we can define colorism as inter-and interracial discriminations based on skin color stratification (Hunter, 2005). The context of colorism is complex and nuanced in many respects: it is not just simply a question of noticeably brown skin (phenotypically African) versus noticeably whiter skin (phenotypically European).
Starting in the late 18th century, the process of naturalization and racial equality has plagued America. In 1790 congress decided to extend citizenship only to free whites in the Naturalization Act of 1790. That standard changed after the War when citizenship was also granted to people of African descent but that change did not mean equal treatment or equal rights. Although blacks and minorities were indeed citizens, they were stripped of many basic rights and privileges such as unhindered ability to vote, access to facilities, restaurants and businesses, and housing. Black codes, passed in 1866, restricted African Americans’ economic potential by ensuring that blacks remained a cheap labor force.
The Civil War only ended the slavery, not racism. Though the Thirteenth Amendment and the Fourteenth Amendment were passed, they were mostly pushed by federal government. One of the most famous case in that period, Plessy v. Ferguson, involved a Louisiana law that required separate seating arrangements for the races on railroads. In the case, the petition stated that this act conflicts the Thirteenth and Fourteen Amendment which give black equality. While the court held that separate accommodations did not deprive blacks of equal rights if the accommodations were equal; in the nature of things it could not have been intended to abolish distinctions based upon color, or to enforce social, as distinguished from political; legislation is powerless to eradicate racial instincts, or to abolish distinctions based upon physical differences, and the attempt to do so can only result in accentuating the difficulties of the present situation.
With the era of discrimination as a setting, Kate Chopin (the author), uses characterization of Armand Aubigny, parallel characters, and irony in “Desiree’s Baby” to convey the theme of how racial prejudice in any form will result in negative outcomes such as broken families. Armand Aubigny’s environment and childhood influences his lifestyle and beliefs to accept racial discrimination as common. By owning a family name that represents a boastful heritage “[that is the] oldest and proudest in Louisiana,” and a place in society as a plantation owner, Aubigny has superiority over the blacks (Chopin par. 2). Therefore, Aubigny, “confident that he is a white, a male, and a master… in control” (Peel par.
It is not rational to believe that being "color-blind" aids racism and our country is in a post racial space. "For example, critical multi- cultural education brings the significance of race to the fore in its analysis of social relations (Ladson-Billings, 1997), whereas liberal discourses tend to disguise racial inequality by employing the rhetoric of equal opportunity and fair treatment. Looking at race critically is the only way to closely analyze the way it effects American society. Talking about race liberally does nothing more than avoid the real problem. Recent tragedies rooted in racism, such as school shootings, mass incarceration of blacks, and the widening gap of income inequality prove that America is far from post racial attitudes.
Discrimination has been seen throughout American history. Up until the passing Thirteenth Amendment in 1865 African American people were seen merely as property to the white man. It took a visionary and a leader to persuade the people that slavery was immoral. Abraham Lincoln was hated