civil rights to 1941 - COMPLETE Flashcards
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legal impediments and the separate but equal decision
when did the civil war start?
1861
when did president lincoln sign the emancipation proclamation?
january 1 1863
when did the south surrender?
1865
what happened to former slaves after the civil war?
many stayed with their owners to avoid discrimination, but those who did not were essentially abandoned
where did the term “jim crow” originate from?
in 1828 thomas dartmouth rice performed in blackface as “jim crow”
he portrayed black people as lazy, stupid and unreliable
when were the majority of jim crow laws passed and why?
between 1870 and 1900
to keep control of black people after the banning of slavery
name 3 examples of jim crow laws
separate eating facilities (alabama)
interracial marriage banned (florida)
textbooks given to black schools after whites were done with them (north carolina)
when did the supreme court make jim crow laws fully legal?
1896 with the separate but equal decision
describe the separate but equal case
homer plessey, a 1/8 black (under state law) man, challenged a 2 year old streetcar segregation law in louisiana and took the case to the supreme court.
plessey argued that treating races unequally broke the 14th amendment, which the supreme court agreed with. they argued though that segregation did not mean one race was superior and ruled that it was fine so long as equal facilities are provided for each race.
what effect did this ruling have?
state governments had been given the greenlight to introduce and enforce jim crow laws
black facilities did not improve and were nowhere near the same standard as white facilities
give a quote related to segregation
president wilson told black protestors that segregation is “not a humiliation and is a benefit for you black gentlemen”
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lack of political influence
what did the 15th amendment do and when was it written?
gave black american adult males the right to vote (1870)
despite the 15th amendment what did voters need to do in order to actually vote?
pay the poll tax - many black people could not afford this
in mississippi, prove they’d lived there for the last 2 years - this affected black tenant farmers who moved often to find work
the grandfather clause said illiterates could vote if their fathers or grandfathers could vote on jan 1 1867 - most black peoples parents and grandparents had been slaves and therefore unable to vote
pass literacy tests - black people were given difficult documents to read aloud to white listeners
the understanding clause was a loophole for illiterate whites - they could qualify by showing they merely understood the constitution, despite being unable to read it. this is an example of institutionalised fraud
general test - some states only allowed black people to register to vote if they could answer a serious of (ridiculous) questions, such as how many bubbles does a bar of soap make?
what often happened to black people who did qualify to vote?
they were threatened with violence or even attacked
what was the result of these voting restrictions?
in louisiana in 1896, over 130,000 black people were registered to vote
in 1900 only 5320 remained
in alabama in 1900, 180,000 were registered
in 1902 there were only 3000
by 1915 almost every southern state had voting qualifications meaning only 3% of black people could vote
what did president woodrow wilson think of segregation and racism?
practiced it in the white house
praised the kkk
believed the south had “nothing to apologise for”, not even slavery
and herbert hoover?
wanted to remove black people from the GOP to get white southern democrats to vote for them
replaced many black republican leaders with whites
nominated john j parker for supreme court who disagreed entirely with black people having voting rights
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KKK
