Jim Crow Narrative Compare and Contrast His 221/Assignment 2 Jason Black June/12/2016 We have all heard of the segregation laws or should I say the isolation laws that are formerly known as "Jim Crow" in some people’s eyes symbolized a proper, way to show an entire race how they should be submissive to whites. The Jim Crow laws were statewide as well as local within the southern states of the United States they were implemented and supported between 1876 and 1965. Taking place about the first 100 years after the Civil War, Jim Crow laws, or segregation laws, spread greatly. These laws were applied to kept authority in the hands of whites, at the same time keeping black Americans from being …show more content…
able to get the equivalent benefits of people as their neighbors. These rules basically have an effect on nearly all facets on a daily basis affecting black life. These laws mandated that schools be separated, public parks be separated, restrooms, restaurants, drinking fountains, buses and trains. Anything that was used publicly and was used by whites, blacks had to have and use their own. Black people weren’t even allowed to use the front door in most establishments; they had to use the back entrances. The Jim Crow system was upheld by local government officials and was reinforced by acts of terror carried out by Vigilantes.
In 1896, the Supreme Court established the policy of separate but equal in Plessy v. Ferguson, after a black man in New Orleans attempted to sit in a whites-only railway car. Some whites may have thought that is too much power for any black person to have the same privileges as whites. So we have to make them separate from us and still make sure they are of the lesser and do not meet our standards. No matter what, blacks were never equal enough in the eyes of some white people that truly abided by the Jim Crow laws that were established. In a lot of the areas of the United States there would be a multitude of "Whites Only" and "Colored" signs on everything. They were always there as continuous reminders of the forced cultural arrangement. (King, …show more content…
1995) In legal theory, blacks received "separate but equal" treatment under the law. To some people this law was actually how they thought blacks should live. How is it possible that you can think we are equal but, in actuality you look down on people who are different from you? Especially, when blacks were taken from their familiar territory by the white man. Now, since it seems they can’t be controlled over your rule. No longer seen as a slave and have control over anymore you look at them as less than. Some whites actual thought they were doing the blacks a favor by bringing them to this new land. Truth be told, they were already kings and queens in their own native land. Something the white man could not stand. Now since the Jim Crow laws have been implemented they thought that would be a way to contain blacks and still have some control over them¬¬¬¬¬. During this time public facilities for blacks were nearly always inferior to those for whites, when they existed at all. In addition, blacks were steadily deprived of the right to vote in most of the rural South through the discriminating purpose of literacy tests and other ethnically provoked criteria. One of the narratives I chose to write about was about Minnie Jackson Mckee who grew up right outside Charlotte, North Carolina, Mecklenburg County.
She was born a free woman in 1912, during the Jim Crow era. Growing up she stated she lived in a rural area where it was friendly and everyone knew everyone in her town. She explained how her and her friends grew up with a pretty good childhood with working parents. She also stated during the interview she did see very few black people that were doctors and educators and had other careers, but it was very little in her town that held those jobs. She stated they had no cars and everyone had to walk everywhere in her town and when she went to an all black elementary and high school. She even attended college at an historically black university. Minnie stated that it wasn’t until she was older and married when she started to really experience firsthand segregation because she was so sheltered growing up very rarely did she ever have to interact with white people. Once she married she and her husband were both into their careers and she became an educator herself. Both became philanthropist for local universities and well known within their
community. The other narrative that I chose to write about Delores Twille Woods and Thelma Woods Nash. These women were sisters and were born and raised in Forest City, Arkansas. They grew up in a black community as well but. Did experience some segregation at an early age, they had to use separate water fountains when they went into the city, schools were separate, also if they were picking up food they had to go to the side and wait for it to be handed to them outside the door. These two indicate they had to endure a lot of things that we find to be okay for different people to use equally, that they had to be separated for the littlest thing. They also stated in their community that black women were not allowed to where short in the city, white women could but not blacks. They also touched on that blacks were not permitted in certain areas after a certain time. In those areas blacks had to be gone by sundown. Unlike Minnie, these two sisters did have a different experience growing up however they still were able to overcome and become successful. Both of these narratives were both able to see their people work to try to end the Jim Crow segregation laws and actually help to see all their hard work pay off and the Jim Crow laws become extinct.
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
There were a set of laws about segregation and discrimination called Jim Crow Laws. Jim Crow laws were state and local laws that enforced racial segregation in the South. The reasoning for the making of these laws are to keep African Americans and Caucasians “separate but equal”. Some prime examples of Jim Crow Laws are: “It shall be unlawful for a negro and white person to play together or in company with each other in any game of cards or dice, dominoes or checkers”(n.d.). “It shall be unlawful for any white prisoner to be handcuffed or otherwise chained or tied to a negro prisoner”(n.d.). “No colored barber shall serve as a barber to white women or girls”(n.d.).These may seem cruel and unusual and indeed they were. That was there intent. Fortunately, these laws have ceased and no longer remain thanks to the Civil Right
Jim Crow laws were a formal, codified system of racial apartheid that dominated the American South for three quarters of a century beginning in the 1890s. (Jim Crow Laws, PBS). Jim Crow laws had the same ideals that slave codes had. At this time slavery had been abolished, but because of Jim Crow, the newly freed black people were still looked at as inferior. One of the similarities between slave codes and Jim Crow laws was that both sets of laws did not allow equal education opportunities. The schools were separated, of course, which cause the white schools to be richer and more advanced in education than black schools. This relates to slave codes because slaves were not allowed to read which hindered their learning of when they were able to read and write. Another similarity is alcohol. In the Jim Crow era persons who sold beer or wine were not allowed to serve both white and colored people, so they had to sell to either one or the other. This is similar to slave codes because in most states slaves were not allowed to purchase whiskey at all, unless they had permission from their owners. Slaves did not eat with their white owners. In the Jim Crow era whites and blacks could not eat together at all, and if there was some odd circumstance that whites and blacks did eat together then the white person was served first and there was usually something in between them. This relates to slave codes because
The Jim Crow era was a racial status system used primarily in the south between the years of 1877 and the mid 1960’s. Jim Crow was a series of anti-black rules and conditions that were never right. The social conditions and legal discrimination of the Jim Crow era denied African Americans democratic rights and freedoms frequently. There were numerous ways in which African Americans were denied social and political equality under Jim Crow. Along with that, lynching occurred quite frequently, thousands being done over the era.
The term Jim Crow was a “colloquialism whites and blacks routinely used for the complex system of laws and customs separating races in the south” (Edmonds, Jim Crow: Shorthand for Separation). In other words, it was a set of laws and customs that people used that separated white people from the colored. The Jim Crow laws and practices deprived American citizens of the rights to vote, buses, and “life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness.” First, though, a little background on Jim Crow is in order.
In 1863 to 1877 Reconstruction brought an end to slavery, it paved the way for the former slaves to become citizens. The African Americans wanted complete freedom. However, that right became a setback and were seen as second class citizens. Before the end of the Reconstruction, a legislation was passed called the Jim Crow law. The law enforced the segregation of people of African descent. The legislation was a system to ensure the exclusion of racial groups in the Southern States. For example, separate transportation law, school division, different waiting rooms both at the bus terminals and hospitals, separate accommodations, marriage law and voting rights. The Jim Crow law was supposed to help in racial segregation in the South. Instead,
“The ‘Jim Crow’ laws got their name from one of the stock characters in the minstrel shows that were a mainstay of popular entertainment throughout the nineteenth century. Such shows popularized and reinforced the pervasive stereotypes of blacks as lazy, stupid, somehow less human, and inferior to whites” (Annenberg, 2014). These laws exalted the superiority of the whites over the blacks. Although equally created, and affirmed by the Supreme Court, and because of the Civil War officially free, African Americans were still treated with less respect than many household pets. The notorious Jim Crow laws mandated segregation and provided for severe legal retribution for consortium between races (National, 2014). Richard Wright writes about this, his life.
Thesis Statement: With Jim Crow laws in effect, they have guaranteed African-Americans discrimination based on the color of their skin, ignorance of their given rights, and lack of acknowledgement for their successes.
Separate but Equal doctrine existed long before the Supreme Court accepted it into law, and on multiple occasions it arose as an issue before then. In 1865, southern states passed laws called “Black Codes,” which created restrictions on the freed African Americans in the South. This became the start of legal segregation as juries couldn’t have African Americans, public schools became segregated, and African Americans had restrictions on testifying against majorities. In 1887, Jim Crow Laws started to arise, and segregation becomes rooted into the way of life of southerners (“Timeline”). Then in 1890, Louisiana passed the “Separate Car Act.” This forced rail companies to provide separate rail cars for minorities and majorities. If a minority sat in the wrong car, it cost them $25 or 20 days in jail. Because of this, an enraged group of African American citizens had Homer Plessy, a man who only had one eighth African American heritage, purchase a ticket and sit in a “White only” c...
Blacks were discriminated almost every aspect of life. The Jim Crow laws helped in this discrimination. The Jim Crow laws were laws using racial segregation from 1876 – 1965 at both a social and at a state level.
“Jim Crow was more than a series of rigid anti-black laws. It was a way of life.” (“What was Jim Crow?”). The laws created a divided America and made the United States a cruel place for over 70 years. The Jim Crow Laws caused segregation in the education system, social segregation, and limited job opportunities for African Americans.
Jim Crow, a series of laws put into place after slavery by rich white Americans used in order to continue to subordinate African-Americans has existed for many years and continues to exist today in a different form, mass incarceration. Jim Crow laws when initially implemented were a series of anti-black laws that help segregate blacks from whites and kept blacks in a lower social, political, and economic status. In modern day, the term Jim Crow is used as a way to explain the mass incarcerations of blacks since Jim Crow laws were retracted. Through mass incarceration, blacks are continuously disenfranchised and subordinated by factors such as not being able to obtain housing, stoppage of income, and many other factors. Both generations of Jim Crow have been implemented through legal laws or ways that the government which helps to justify the implementation of this unjust treatment of blacks.
Even though the Declaration of Independence stated that "All men are created equal’’ this hasn’t always been the case. In 1865, the Thirteenth Amendment was ratified and finally put an end to slavery. In addition, the Fourteenth Amendment (1868) strengthened the legal rights of newly freed slaves by stating that no state shall deprive anyone of either "due process of law" or of the "equal protection of the law." And finally, the Fifteenth Amendment (1870) further strengthened the legal rights of newly freed slaves by prohibiting states from denying anyone the right to vote due to race. Despite these Amendments, African Americans were still treated differently than whites in many parts of the country, especially in the South. In 1954 the Warren Court ruled that separate educational facilities for whites and blacks are unequal, and don’t follow the 14th amendment, which is the right of “equal protection under the law”. This resulted in the Brown v. Board of education case, which stated that publ...
The laws known as “Jim Crow” were laws presented to basically establish racial apartheid in the United States. These laws were more than in effect for “for three centuries of a century beginning in the 1800s” according to a Jim Crow Law article on PBS. Many try to say these laws didn’t have that big of an effect on African American lives but in affected almost everything in their daily life from segregation of things: such as schools, parks, restrooms, libraries, bus seatings, and also restaurants. The government got away with this because of the legal theory “separate but equal” but none of the blacks establishments were to the same standards of the whites. Signs that read “Whites Only” and “Colored” were seen at places all arounds cities.
They were put in place to fully separate blacks from whites. “All major societal institutions reflected and supported the oppression of blacks” (“The Origins of Jim Crow”). It became normal to believe that whites were superior and that blacks were to be kept at the bottom of the racial rankings. Blacks were prohibited from anything that implied social equality and were forced to follow or face violence. “Jim Crow states passed statutes severely regulating social interactions between the races” (“The Origins of Jim Crow”). Signs were placed above doors, bathrooms, and any public facility. They were refused the right to vote or make any political decision. Separate prisons, hospitals, schools, beaches, churches and even cemeteries were created. Black facilities also were usually run down and less taken care of. Everything was kept apart, but there were some fighting