Segregation laws and prejudice

Question 1

What was the name of the laws that segregated African Americans in everyday facilities such as parks, buses and schools?

Answer 1

Jim Crow Laws

Question 2

In which areas were these segregation laws enforced more?

Answer 2

Southern states and border states

Question 3

TRUE or FALSE - African Americans were officially allowed to vote in 1950s America.

Answer 3

True

Question 4

How were African Americans prevented from voting?

Answer 4

• mainly the threat of violence and intimidation
• refused by white government officials in charge of registering voters (often refused by failing a complicated literacy or knowledge test)

Question 5

What percentage of the African-American population in Mississippi had the vote in the 1950s?

Answer 5

5%

Question 6

Why was it so difficult to prosecute any racist attacks?

Answer 6

• police often racist and either let attacks take place or even participated themselves
• white male juries would acquit whites accused of killing African-Americans

Question 7

Which other areas would African-Americans face discrimination?

Answer 7

• education (school and universities)

- employment

Question 8

In the South in the 1950s, how much more did white teachers earn over African-American teachers?

Answer 8

30%

Question 9

What happened to an African American teacher (Clemson King) in 1958 when he applied to the University of Mississippi?

Answer 9

Committed to a mental asylum

Question 10

TRUE or FALSE - it was legal for states in the USA in the 1950s to have separate schools for African Americans and white children.

Answer 10

True - states argued that separate schools didn’t mean unequal but African American schools were less well equipped