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Effects of the Jim Crow law
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Slavery was abolished by the Fourteenth Amendment in 1868 and the court decision of Plessy v. Ferguson in 1896 ruled that “separate but equal” was constitutional, however African Americans living in the Southern United States continued to face racial segregation and injustice for over sixty years (Head). While the law required segregated facilities to be equal, utilities designated for “colored people” were instead vastly inferior. Sadly, African-Americans were forced to endure this segregation in nearly every part of their daily life. Additionally, severe prejudice was directed to the people by whites - the worst of which was done by members of the Ku Klux Klan who often lynched and hanged innocent African-Americans. After sixty years …show more content…
“The bus traveled downtown alone, then pulled into an oddly quiet Greyhound terminal...Passengers began to disembark...Dozens, hundreds, soon more than 1,000 enraged people swarmed the area” (Bausum). Unfortunately, the defenseless Riders were beaten with baseball bats, metal pipes, lengths of rubber hose, and worse; additionally, state troopers and even local police (due to an arrangement with the KKK) did not intervene until much later. Also, there was strategy to the violence, with newscasters and reporters being attacked first, followed by two hours of rampaging and the refusal of admittance of several injured Riders at hospitals. However, the violence that was intended to end the Riders once and for all just focused the spotlight on their cause, as seen especially by a broadcast that night: “That evening citizens...tuned into their nightly news and watched as Jim Zwerg, [the single white Rider], bruised and battered, lying flattened on his hospital bed, delivered a stunning statement: 'Segregation must be stopped. It must be broken down. We're going on to New Orleans no matter what. We're dedicated to this. We'll take hitting. We'll take beating. We're willing to accept death'" (Bausum). It seemed as if Zwerg’s words were a call to action as hundreds of people of all kinds became Riders, travelling into the deep South to try and end segregation. Finally, on September 22, 1961, the Interstate Commerce Commission abolished all segregation from bus travel throughout the nation, and the official Rides stopped at the end of 1962. After facing seemingly insurmountable obstacles of racism, violence, and persecution, the Freedom Riders’ goal had been achieved at last: desegregated buses and bus terminals all throughout the United
Throughout history, segregation has always been a part of United States history. This is showed through the relationships between the blacks and whites, the whites had a master-slave relationship and the blacks had a slave-master relationship. And this is also true after the civil war, when the blacks attained rights! Even though they had obtained rights the whites were always one step above them and lead superiority over them continuously. This is true in the Supreme court case “Plessy v. Ferguson”. The Court case ruled that blacks and whites had to have separate facilities and it was only constitutional if the facilities were equal. this means that they also constituted that this was not a violation of the 13th and 14th amendment because they weren 't considered slaves and had “equal” facilities even though they were separate. Even if the Supreme court case “Plessy v. Ferguson” set the precedent that separate but equal was correct, I would disagree with that precedent, because they interpreted
In 1860-1960 there was lynching in the United States. When the confederates (south) lost the civil war the slaves got freedom and got rights of human beings. This was just to say because segregation wasn 't over in the South and didn 't go away for over 100 years. Any black person in the South accused but not convicted of any crime of looking at a white woman, whistling at a white woman, touching a white woman, talking back to a white person, refusing to step into the gutter when a white person passed on the sidewalk, or in some way upsetting the local people was liable to be dragged from their house or jail cell by lots of people crowds, mutilated in a terrible
Homer Plessy vs. the Honorable John H. Ferguson ignited the spark in our nation that ultimately led to the desegregation of our schools, which is shown in the equality of education that is given to all races across the country today. “The Plessy decision set the precedent that ‘separate’ facilities for blacks and whites were constitutional as long as they were ‘equal’” (“The Rise and Fall of Jim Crow”). The case of Plessy vs. Ferguson not only illuminated the racial inequality within our education system, but also brought to light how the standard of ‘separate but equal’ affected every aspect of African American lives.
Black liberation was stalled once again in 1961 and 1962, as white savagery reared its head again and black people were forced to deal with the reality that success was not inevitable, yet. Still more "sit-ins", "shoe- ins" were led to combat segregation in public places which were met with violent responses from some white people. These responses ranged from burning down a bus with black people to assaulting black passengers on a train car in Anniston. These racist white people also targeted other white people who were deemed as sympathizers to black struggle or "nigger lovers". Police refused to arrest the white aggressors and in some cases also refused to protect the black people. The Freedom Rides resulted in both losses and gains in the civil rights movement. People came to the realization that justice will not be won through merely trying to persuade Southern whites with peaceful protest but only "when
In 1896 the case of Plessy v. Ferguson occurred and has been viewed by may people, including myself, to be very important in history. Homer Plessy, the plaintiff in this case, was a light skinned black man, who was arrested for violating the Separate Car Act when he entered a car specifically designated for white passengers on the East Louisiana Railroad in New Orleans (Hartman 99). Judge John H. Ferguson was the presiding judge of the Louisiana Criminal District Court. Why was it that states can constitutionally enact legislation to require separate accommodations in interstate commerce based off of a person’s race? This was the issue of the case. The Louisiana Statute under review in Plessy required railway companies carrying passengers in their coaches in that state to provide equal but separate accommodations for the white, and colored races and no persons were permitted to occupy seats in coaches other than the ones assigned to them based on race. If passengers failed to obey these rules...
After the end of American Civil War in 1865, The Thirteenth Amendment was added to the constitution of the United States that stated “Neither slavery or involuntary servitude, except as a punishment for crime whereof the party shall have duly convicted, shall exist in the United States, nor any place subject to their jurisdiction.” By this no black people could be owned by the whites. In spite of this, blacks were severely segregated in the South. This resulted in the formation of anti-radical movement in the South called Ku Klux Klan organization which represented white supremacy by whipping ...
to sit in a Jim Crow car, which was a car reserved for blacks only. Though Plessy was
Toward the end of the Progressive Era American social inequality had stripped African Americans of their rights on a local and national level. In the 1896 Supreme Court case of Plessey vs. Ferguson, the Supreme Court sided with a Louisiana state law declaring segregation constitutional as long as facilities remain separate but equal. Segregation increased as legal discriminatory laws became enacted by each state but segregated facilities for whites were far superior to those provided for blacks; especially prevalent in the South were discriminatory laws known as Jim Crow laws which surged after the ruling. Such laws allowed for segregation in places such as restaurants, hospitals, parks, recreational areas, bathrooms, schools, transportation, housing, hotels, etc. Measures were taken to disenfranchise African Americans by using intimidation, violence, putting poll taxes, and literacy tests. This nearly eliminated the black vote and its political interests as 90% of the nine million blacks in America lived in the South and 1/3 were illiterate as shown in Ray Stannard Baker’s Following the Color Line (Bailey 667). For example, in Louisiana 130,334 black voters registered in 1896 but that number drastically decreased to a mere 1,342 in 1904—a 99 percent decline (Newman ). Other laws prevented black...
In 1865, the 13th amendment had implemented which made slavery illegal in the United States. And in 1896, Plessy v. Ferguson — a Supreme Court decision which upheld the constitutionality requiring racial segregation in public facilities under the doctrine of “separate but equal”. Although the Declaration of Independence stated that “All men are created equal” and it seems that the U.S had made an effort to advocate equality through various acts, African Americans were treated differently than the Whites, especially in the South. Jim Crow Law was enforced until 1965 which decreed segregation of public schools, public transportation and public facilities. Although the African Americans felt that they were treated unequally, it was not until
Lopsided destitution, and a framework that was furiously separate and anything other than equivalent, consigned the lion's share of southern Black Americans to the rank of peasant. Losing faith in regards to continually understanding the guarantee of genuine opportunity, millions would in the long run join in a Great Migration toward the north. Here there would be occupations and open door for training and accomplishment, however they would clash with a to a great extent white migrant populace, likewise willing to work for survival compensation.
Bob Marley once stated, “Better to die fighting for freedom then be a prisoner all the days of your life.” He is trying to say that it is better to sacrifice your life in order to gain freedom than be a slave for the rest of your life. Before America was considered the “land of the free,” the United States faced problems like the black codes, ratification of the thirteenth, fourteenth, and fifteenth amendments, the Civil War, and segregation caused by the Plessy v. Ferguson debate. America became the “land of the free” after it failed several political and social struggles.
The end of the Civil War in 1865 ended slavery and made African Americans “free and equal”. However, many of the Africans Americans were still not satisfied with America; because they were supposed to be free, but they were not treated equally in the 20th century. This was due to segregation which said that African Americans were separate from whites but equal. Unfortunely, for the African Americans segregation was unconstitutional, because the facilities that were given by white Americans to the Negro were considerably worse than what the whites had. African Americans were outraged at the decision of the Supreme Court Case, Plessey v. Ferguson (1896), where it was deemed that segregation was constitutional. The harsh treatment of the African
On May 14, 1961, just outside of Anniston, Alabama, a Greyhound bus full of Freedom Riders was run off the rode, where a mob of hostile southerners attacked the bus with stones and firebombs. The passengers barely managed to escape the burning vehicle. On that very day, many Freedom riders who arrived at the Trailways bus depot in Birmingham, Alabama suffered savage and bloody assaults. Among several beaten by the Klu Klux Klan was 61 year-old Walter Bergman, a college professor from Detroit, Michigan. Undaunted, he urged others to join the cause and “strike while the iron is hot.” His fellow rider, Reverent B. Elton Cox, an outspoken minister from North Carolina, also remained defiant, saying he “[preferred] death to segregation” (B. Elton Cox).
The tragedy took place during a very vulnerable time when the racial injustice was on high and the African-American population was fighting to stop racial inequality. The incident occurred soon after the Civil Rights Act was passed on July 2, 1964 which “ended” the segregation. Although the legislation was passed, people were still hesitant to accept African-Americans as equal. Under the Civil Rights Act of 1964, the Jim Crow laws, considered segregation constitutional, were concluded unconstitutional. The Jim Crow law had blossomed under the Plessey v. Ferguson case, where the court coined the “separate but equal” and dubbed it constitutional under the 14th
On May 14th, many “Freedom Riders” were injured due to attacks on Greyhound buses. The busses were on their way to Birmingham, Alabama in hopes of spreading the word of integrated busses. Victims of this attack was transported to the hospital.