There were many ways the Southern states tried to deny equal rights to African Americans. For example, the Jim Crow Laws were created in the 1890s by such southern states as Alabama, Georgia, North Carolina,and Florida, segregating the races in such places such as railroads, restaurants, education, and libraries. An amendment that should have prevented the Jim Crow Laws was the 14th Amendment because it stated “equal protection of the laws” for every citizen. Another example how the South tried to restrict the African Americans was the creation of the Black Codes, which allowed white employers to give African Americans very low wages or to arrest jobless African American; these codes were justly viewed as another form of slavery. The 13th
One of the Jim Crow laws states that “A black male could not offer any part of his body to a White woman because he risked being accused of rape”(a). Tom Robinson would know of this rule and would not even shake hands with Mayella, let alone kiss her. He would know that if anyone saw him going into her house he could be accused of rape. However, if he didn’t enter her house when she asked, he would be accused of not showing “superiority to blacks in all important ways”, another Jim Crow law. Since, Tom knows of these rules he makes the decision to enter her house and show respect, but when he see’s Mr. Ewell approaching her house he runs in fear of being accused of rape.
In the United States, African Ameericans were governed under dehumanized tatics called the Jim Crow laws. These laws, from about 1890-1965, segerated African Americans from white Americans by law and made them second class citizens,
Jim Crow laws were laws in the Southern United States that were state and local laws. These laws enforced racial segregation typically towards the blacks starting late in the 19th century. This was after the Reconstruction period, and were forced all the way until 1965. All public facilities were forced to be segregated in the states of the former Confederate States of America, which started back in 1896 with blacks having a “separate but equal” status. Segregation in public school was a thing all the way back to when it first established in most south after the Civil War.
In To Kill A Mockingbird by Harper Lee, Maycomb is a town built on Jim Crow Laws. Regardless, Mrs. Gates, a teacher, thinks that Maycomb was “a democracy,” or a place where there are “‘Equal rights for all, [and] special privileges for none’” (Lee 249). However, the court trial of Tom Robinson proved Mrs. Gates wrong, as Tom is falsely accused of rape because he was of African American descent. A few minutes later, Mrs. Gates expresses that she is not prejudiced toward anyone.
This was a part of her campaign to teach… [her] to be a lady” (Lee 229). At the parties Scout wears a dress and sits with the ladies while listening to them gossip (Lee 228, 229-234). The ways Aunt Alexandra tries to eliminate the improper lady in Scout and tries to make her more like a proper Southern lady points to the motivation of Lee to write her novel involving similar events that she may have experienced herself. During this period, women were thought to be very weak and fragile. They suffered from lower paying jobs and people thought they needed to stay at home and not work.
The Jim Crow laws are very prevalent in To Kill a Mockingbird and are shown in almost every aspect of the book. The first of these connections is the fact that black communities often struggled, and had facilities of a poorer quality than that of white people’s. The article states that although these communities were intended to be separate and equal, that was not often the case. One example of this is shown when Jem and Scout visit the First Purchase church. Unlike their own church, this church did not have any hymn books for the attendants and they would often have to repeat the hymns after the lines were announced out loud.
An anonymous person once said, “Not all wounds are so obvious. Walk gently in the lives of others”. Every single person on this earth has a different story. Every person has something unique and special to bring to the table. No matter what color of skin you have, what religion you follow, or what country your from, everyone should be treated equally and not be discriminated from others.
“Many Blacks resisted…indignities… and, far too often, they paid for their bravery with their lives” (Pilgrim). The novel To Kill a Mockingbird, by Harper Lee, utilized many historical events in order to provide life to the narration. There are accounts relating to the Jim Crow laws, mob mentality, and racial dilemmas of the Great Depression Era. To start, one connection of between the novel and American history is the Jim Crow laws. These were a set of rules that limited the respect blacks received in society.
In the United States racism played a major part in our nation’s history from slavery to severe oppression. About 388,000 Africans were shipped to North America; imagine being one of those people, taken from your home never to see it again (Gates, Henry, Jr, How Many Slaves Landed in the U.S.). Harper Lee uses events from our history as inspiration for the book she wrote To Kill a Mockingbird. There are connections from United States history in her book with the Jim Crow Laws, mob mentality, and issues of racism within that time period. To start with, the Jim Crow Laws appeared several times within the novel, To Kill a Mockingbird.
Slavery ended in 1865, not "300 years ago". Slavery was allowed and defended by the law up until that date. As soon as the war was over, Jim Crow laws and the KKK prevented black people from advancing economically. Redlining was legal. All of this legally protected economic explotiation of black people has resulted in centuries of theft of labor from people over their skin color.
Jim Crow Laws are laws that segregated blacks from the whites and it also took a lot of rights from the blacks. After the reconstruction the whites were afraid of the blacks taking over, so they created these laws. After these laws took place the blacks were disrespected and limited rights. The whites wanted these laws so the blacks couldn’t take over the world.
In The Help, Stockett accurately portrays how Jim Crow Laws affected society during the 1960’s. Jim Crow Laws were laws that affected almost every aspect of daily life, segregation in public places was all over the place. There were signs placed all over cities with postings of where blacks and whites could stand. The phrase “Separate but equal,” was developed and although it said blacks and whites were equal; blacks were never treated in the same ways whites were (PBS.org Staff). In The Help, Skeeter gets ahold of a book that states some of the Jim Crow Laws and she has to keep it a secret that she was looking into them, otherwise the women of Jackson would judge her.
In the period of reconstruction, there was a lack of racial equality and racism towards blacks. The 13th amendment abolished slavery, with the exception of allowing it as a punishment for a crime (“Thirteenth Amendment” 19). Although it abolished slavery, there was still a lack of equality towards blacks. The Black Codes were state laws in the south, that were implemented in 1866. These laws limited the rights of African Americans and were
The Jim Crow Laws are a set of laws that were put in place to separate different races, such as african americans and caucasians. The name Jim Crow was often heard as a black, minstrel show character (Castleman, Tammy). These laws were put in place around 1875 following the easing of reconstruction, to make sure african americans use different public facilities than whites. After slavery was abolished, whites weren 't quite sure why african americans existed, because most whites figured blacks were put on earth to work. Along with new laws, came new problems that people didn 't know how to deal with.
The first influence on Harper Lee’s To Kill A Mockingbird are the Jim Crow laws. The Jim Crow laws were cruel to colored people. “Jim Crow laws were an official effort to keep African Americans separate from Whites in the southern United States for many years” (“Jim Crow Laws”1). The Jim Crow laws were put in place to keep Blacks below Whites. People thought that they needed theses laws because they did not believe that there where equal to them.