Jim Crow Laws - Separate Is Not Equal “Marriages are void when one party is a white person and the other is possessed of one-eighth or more negro, Japanese, or Chinese blood.” —Nebraska, 1911 “Separate free schools shall be established for the education of children of African descent; and it shall be unlawful for any colored child to attend any white school, or any white child to attend a colored school.” —Missouri, 1929 “All railroads carrying passengers in the state (other than street railroads) shall provide equal but separate accommodations for the white and colored races, by providing two or more passenger cars for each passenger train, or by dividing the cars by a partition, so as to secure separate accommodations.” —Tennessee, 1891 See more Jim Crow laws Restricted real-estate covenant In communities across the country, property owners signed agreements called restrictive covenants.
List of Jim Crow law examples by State A Black American drinks from a segregated water cooler in 1939 at a streetcar terminal in Oklahoma City. This is a list of examples of Jim Crow laws, which were state and local laws in the United States enacted between 1876 and 1965. Jim Crow laws existed mainly in the South and originated from the Black Codes that were enforced from 1865 to 1866 and from prewar segregation on railroad cars in northern cities. The laws sprouted up in the late 19th century after Reconstruction and lasted until the 1960s.[1] They mandated de jure segregation in all public facilities, with a supposedly "separate but equal" status for black Americans. In reality, this led to treatment that was usually inferior to those provided for white Americans, systematizing a number of economic, educational and social disadvantages.[2] State-sponsored school segregation was declared unconstitutional by the Supreme Court of the United States in 1954 in Brown v. Arizona[edit] California[edit] Colorado[edit] Connecticut[edit]
Jim Crow Museum: Origins of Jim Crow 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. Jim Crow was more than a series of rigid anti-black laws. It was a way of life. Under Jim Crow, African Americans were relegated to the status of second class citizens. The Jim Crow system was undergirded by the following beliefs or rationalizations: whites were superior to blacks in all important ways, including but not limited to intelligence, morality, and civilized behavior; sexual relations between blacks and whites would produce a mongrel race which would destroy America; treating blacks as equals would encourage interracial sexual unions; any activity which suggested social equality encouraged interracial sexual relations; if necessary, violence must be used to keep blacks at the bottom of the racial hierarchy. A black male could not offer his hand (to shake hands) with a white male because it implied being socially equal.
Remembering Jim Crow : Presented by American RadioWorks Jim Crow laws robbed African Americans of basic rights. Danger, Violence, Exploitation Blacks in the Jim Crow South faced lynchings, insults and thievery at the hands of whites. Communities "Behind the Veil"African Americans built vital social institutions to fight segregation and uplift the race. Keeping the PastBlack families used oral storytelling and photography to pass along their memories of slavery and Reconstruction. ResistanceMany African Americans found subtle ways to combat the humiliation and economic hardship imposed by Jim Crow. Whites Remember Jim Crow In the southwestern Louisiana town of New Iberia, older whites say race relations were more peaceful during Jim Crow than they are now. Jim Crow LawsA sampling of repressive Jim Crow laws. Resources Informants, documentary audio and transcript, links, and books.
Examples of Jim Crow Laws "It shall be unlawful for a negro and white person to play together or in company with each other at any game of pool or billiards." This selection is an example of a Jim Crow law that was effective in the state of Alabama from the late 19th century to the early 20th century. Jim Crow laws functioned to keep black and white people separated, particularly in social settings and social institutions such as marriage. More Jim Crow Laws These hateful laws worked to enforce segregation amongst the races, which ultimately led to civil rights actions starting in the 1950s, led by individuals such as Martin Luther King Jr. and Rosa Parks. Examples of laws that caused these extreme tensions in the country included the following: Marriage - "All marriages between a white person and a negro, or between a white person and a person of negro descent to the fourth generation inclusive, are hereby forever prohibited." Reasons for Jim Crow
Harper Lee's To Kill a Mockingbird: Profiles in Courage Activity 1. History and cultural milieu of the deep South in 1930s America—an Introduction Use of the Internet, an LCD player, and speakers will be useful. Before beginning the novel, the students should read in class The Need for Change section of the EDSITEment-recommended We Shall Overcome: Historic Places of the Civil Rights Movement for general background information on what life was like for an African American living in the south under Jim Crow laws. In addition to this site, the class should also examine Remembering Jim Crow from the Edsitement approved History Matters website History Matters. Both Remembering Jim Crow and We Shall Overcome will help students get a sense of the world Harper Lee describes in To Kill A Mockingbird. Questions to Consider During Class Discussion: Define Jim Crow. Activity 2. Students should use dictionary.com, a resource available through EDSITEment-reviewed Internet Public Library, to look up both "moral" and “courage.” Activity 3. Activity 4.
Jim Crow Laws - Martin Luther King Jr National Historic Site From the 1880s into the 1960s, a majority of American states enforced segregation through "Jim Crow" laws (so called after a black character in minstrel shows). From Delaware to California, and from North Dakota to Texas, many states (and cities, too) could impose legal punishments on people for consorting with members of another race. The most common types of laws forbade intermarriage and ordered business owners and public institutions to keep their black and white clientele separated. Here is a sampling of laws from various states. Nurses: No person or corporation shall require any white female nurse to nurse in wards or rooms in hospitals, either public or private, in which negro men are placed. Buses: All passenger stations in this state operated by any motor transportation company shall have separate waiting rooms or space and separate ticket windows for the white and colored races. Intermarriage: It shall be unlawful for a white person to marry anyone except a white person.
I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings: Plot Overview In I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings, Maya Angelou describes her coming of age as a precocious but insecure black girl in the American South during the 1930s and subsequently in California during the 1940s. Maya’s parents divorce when she is only three years old and ship Maya and her older brother, Bailey, to live with their paternal grandmother, Annie Henderson, in rural Stamps, Arkansas. Annie, whom they call Momma, runs the only store in the black section of Stamps and becomes the central moral figure in Maya’s childhood. As young children, Maya and Bailey struggle with the pain of having been rejected and abandoned by their parents. Maya also finds herself tormented by the belief that she is an ugly child who will never measure up to genteel, white girls. She does not feel equal to other black children. Growing up in Stamps, Maya faces a deep-seated southern racism manifested in wearying daily indignities and terrifying lynch mobs.
I Know Why The Caged Bird Sings by Maya Angelou The free bird leaps on the back of the wind and floats downstream till the current ends and dips his wings in the orange sun rays and dares to claim the sky. But a bird that stalks down his narrow cage can seldom see through his bars of rage his wings are clipped and his feet are tied so he opens his throat to sing. The caged bird sings with fearful trill of the things unknown but longed for still and his tune is heard on the distant hill for the caged bird sings of freedom The free bird thinks of another breeze and the trade winds soft through the sighing trees and the fat worms waiting on a dawn-bright lawn and he names the sky his own. But a caged bird stands on the grave of dreams his shadow shouts on a nightmare scream his wings are clipped and his feet are tied so he opens his throat to sing The caged bird sings with a fearful trill of things unknown but longed for still and his tune is heard on the distant hill for the caged bird sings of freedom. © by owner.
FREE I Know Why The Caged Bird Sings Plot Summary Marguerite, or Maya, Johnson is a young black girl growing up in the racist town of Stamps, Arkansas. She and her brother Bailey (her only friend in the world) were sent to Arkansas by their parents when she was three and he four: they now live with their father's mother, Momma. Momma is strictly religious, and she owns a general store where the children are expected to work. They are both very intelligent, and spend much of their time reading because there is little else to do in Stamps. Maya's life continues with a series of episodes that affect her in different ways-some positive, some negative-but all of them teach her something. In California, Maya at first lives with her grandmother, then her mother.
I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings by Maya Angelou – review | Books The caged bird "sings of freedom", writes Maya Angelou in her poem "Caged Bird" – a poignant recurring image throughout her work, as she eloquently explores the struggle to become liberated from the shackles of racism and misogyny. This evocative first volume of her six books of autobiography, originally published in 1969 (1984 in the UK), vividly depicts Angelou's "tender years" from the ages of three to 16, partly in the American south during the depression-wracked 1930s, while also offering timeless insights into the empowering quality of books. The painful sense of being unwanted haunts her early childhood, for when Maya (then known as Marguerite) is three and her brother Bailey four they are sent to the "musty little town" of segregated Stamps, Arkansas wearing tags on their wrists addressed to "To whom it may concern", dispatched by their parents in California who had decided to end their "calamitous marriage".