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January 18, 2021

Martin Luther King Day

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Why do we celebrate?

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Who was Dr. King, and why was he important?

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When did he live?

How did he die?

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Why does it matter?

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Civil Rights

MLK Jr

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What was the Civil Rights Movement?

When did it happen?

Why was it necessary?

What resulted from it?

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Jim Crow: what was it?

Jim Crow Laws were statutes and ordinances established between 1874 and 1975 to separate the white and black races in the American South. In theory, it was to create "separate but equal" treatment, but in practice Jim Crow Laws condemned black citizens to inferior treatment and facilities. Education was segregated as were public facilities such as hotels and restaurants under Jim Crow Laws. In fact, the United States military was segregated until integrated by Harry S. Truman after World War II.

The term "Jim Crow" originally referred to a black character in an old song, and was the name of a popular dance in the 1820s. Around 1828, Thomas "Daddy" Rice developed a routine in which he blacked his face, dressed in old clothes, and sang and danced in imitation of an old and decrepit black man. Rice published the words to the song, "Jump, Jim Crow," in 1830.

Beginning in the 1880s, the term "Jim Crow" saw wide usage as a reference to practices, laws or institutions that arise from or sanction, the physical separation of black people from white people.

from:http://www.u-s-history.com

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Southern Journey

By Emanuel H. Demby, '36

The Magpie, January 1936, v. 37, n. 1, p. 36.

"Man," shouted one of the salesmen of the Alabama Mercantile Co. of Birmingham, Alabama, "what did you say you did?"

"I just switched the drinking dippers; the one labeled 'White' is on the 'Negro' hook," I replied.

The salesman's face paled. He rushed to the back of the store, where the dippers hung, tripping over some tarpaulins on the way.

"Lord, Emanuel! Haven't you any sense? You know you shouldn't do such things; this isn't a laughing maker!" he lectured as I almost doubled over with laughter.

In less than an hour, everyone who had been at the store earlier in the day knew about the great catastrophe which Abe Berman, herosalesman of the Alabama Mercantile Co., had partially prevented. The southerner then realized that a northerner could be just "dumb" enough to switch the Negro and white dippers.

That was my introduction to the south; one of my hopes for a tolerant, progressive South, to which I had looked forward, when I left New York in June, had been shattered, but there was still a long list of ideals that awaited confirmation . . . or destruction.

My first contact with Southern "tolerance" of "Yankee" ideas came after a heated argument with an Alabama counterpart of the Georgia "Cracker" who had been one of the victims of the dipper prank.

"Boy," he said, "if we didn't like you, you'd be going out of town on a pole."

from: http://newdeal.feri.org/magpie/docs/3601p36.htm

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practices

The postwar Republican governments in the South could not have existed without the presence and active support of the U.S. Army, which occupied the area as a conquered territory. The Republican regimes were a mixture of good and bad, altruistic and mercenary. Heedless of any positive motivations on the parts of the scalawags and carpetbaggers, Southern traditionalists fought back in several ways:

Secret societies — organizations such as the Ku Klux Klan and the Knights of the White Camellia (mostly in Louisiana) used intimidation and violence to frighten Republican officeholders and black voters; these societies died out in the 1870s because of federal force and public revulsion
Public paramilitary organizations — groups such as the Red Shirts in South Carolina went to the polls on election day, en masse and fully armed; this open intimidation discouraged blacks and Republicans from voting
Legal means — Southern states adopted legal strategies to reduce or eliminate black votes, including the poll tax and later the grandfather clause
Economic blackmail — given that whites controlled the land, banks and major businesses, they could often manipulate the black vote by threatening to withhold jobs or economic assistance.

As time passed, Northern attitudes began to change. It became obvious that the problems of the South were not being solved by harsh laws and continuing rancor against former Confederates. In May 1872, Congress passed a general Amnesty Act, restoring full political rights to all but about 500 Confederate sympathizers. Gradually, Southern states began to elect Democratic Party members into office. As part of the solution to the disputed Election of 1876, Rutherford B. Hayes pledged to end Reconstruction. In 1877, he carried out his promise and removed the last of the occupation forces from the South, leaving the region firmly in Democratic hands.

from:http://www.u-s-history.com

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continued...

The South remained a region devastated by war, burdened by debt caused by misgovernment and demoralized by a decade of racial strife. Unfortunately, the pendulum of national racial policy swung from one extreme to the other. Whereas formerly the policy had supported harsh penalties against Southern white leaders, it now tolerated new and humiliating versions of discrimination against blacks. The last quarter of the 19th century saw a profusion of Jim Crow laws that segregated Southern society. In effect, the 14th and 15th Amendments had been nullified in the South.

from:http://www.u-s-history.com

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laws

In 1865 and 1866, state governments in the South enacted laws designed to regulate the lives of the former slaves. These measures, differing from state to state, were actually revisions of the earlier slave codes that had regulated that institution.

Some common elements appeared in many of the Codes:

Race was defined by blood; the presence of any amount of black blood made one black
Employment was required of all freedmen; violators faced vagrancy charges
Freedmen could not assemble without the presence of a white person
Freedmen were assumed to be agricultural workers and their duties and hours were tightly regulated
Freedmen were not to be taught to read or write
Public facilities were segregated
Violators of these laws were subject to being whipped or branded.

Existence of the black codes was taken as evidence by many Northerners (especially the Radical Republicans) that the South had not really been subdued. Slavery had simply taken a new form.

The Freedmen’s Bureau worked to halt enforcement of many of these laws and the Republican state governments (imposed by the North) repealed the measures.

When Reconstruction was over, many of the Black Code elements would reappear in Jim Crow legislation.

from:http://www.u-s-history.com

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Examples of laws

Intermarriage The marriage of a white person with a negro or mulatto or person who shall have one-eighth or more of negro blood, shall be unlawful and void. Mississippi

Intermarriage All marriages between a white person and a negro, or between a white person and a person of negro descent, to the third generation, inclusive, or between a white person and a member of the Malay race; or between the negro and a member of the Malay race; or between a person of Negro descent, to the third generation, inclusive, and a member of the Malay race, are forever prohibited, and shall be void. Maryland

Intermarriage All marriages of white persons with Negroes, Mulattos, Mongolians, or Malaya hereafter contracted in the State of Wyoming are and shall be illegal and void. Wyoming

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Fishing, Boating, and Bathing The [Conservation] Commission shall have the right to make segregation of the white and colored races as to the exercise of rights of fishing, boating and bathing. Oklahoma

Mining The baths and lockers for the negroes shall be separate from the white race, but may be in the same building. Oklahoma

Telephone Booths The Corporation Commission is hereby vested with power and authority to require telephone companies...to maintain separate booths for white and colored patrons when there is a demand for such separate booths. That the Corporation Commission shall determine the necessity for said separate booths only upon complaint of the people in the town and vicinity to be served after due hearing as now provided by law in other complaints filed with the Corporation Commission. Oklahoma

Lunch Counters No persons, firms, or corporations, who or which furnish meals to passengers at station restaurants or station eating houses, in times limited by common carriers of said passengers, shall furnish said meals to white and colored passengers in the same room, or at the same table, or at the same counter. South Carolina

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Education Separate rooms [shall] be provided for the teaching of pupils of African descent, and [when] said rooms are so provided, such pupils may not be admitted to the school rooms occupied and used by pupils of Caucasian or other descent. New Mexico

Textbooks Books shall not be interchangeable between the white and colored schools, but shall continue to be used by the race first using them.North Carolina

Libraries The state librarian is directed to fit up and maintain a separate place for the use of the colored people who may come to the library for the purpose of reading books or periodicals. North Carolina