Good morning readers, today’s blog will be about the African American racial group. Through this reading we will answer many questions. Like, what have been the experiences of this racial group throughout history? What have been political, social, and cultural issues and concerns throughout American history? What legislation meant to constrain race within prejudicial boundaries? How did the group fight this legislation? Finally, what legislation meant to alleviate prejudicial boundaries has been enacted? How did the group promote this legislation?
Most African Americans are descendants of slaves. Many of these slaves were sold into slavery as P. O. W. s by other African states. The others were kidnapped by their own people or many others like European or American slave traders. This was due in part to the ever growing need of free labor in the “New World”. The first of Africans were brought to Jamestown, VA in 1619. They were not brought over as slaves, but as indentured servants and were released after so many years. By the 1700s there were 25,000 black slaves in the American colonies, which was about 10% of the population.
By the late 1700s many people were noting the apparent hypocrisies of slavery and demanded freedom for slaves. Through the Constitutional Convention of 1787 ideas of freedom and equality were set forth, but still provided the continuation of the institution of slavery. The rights of free blacks were also restricted in many places, and many of them were denied the right to vote and were excluded from public school. Then in 1790 there were more than 59,000 free blacks in America and by 1810 the number had risen to 186,446.
By the 1830s there were more than 319,000 free Blacks in America. With the Supreme Court’s “Dred Scott” decision blacks were not considered citizens nor could they ever be citizens. With the issuance of the Emancipation Proclamation slaves were free in the southern states. It was the 13th Amendment that outlawed slavery in America, and the 14th Amendment that granted full U. S. citizenship to African-Americans. The 15th Amendment extended the right to vote to black males. With the Jim Crow laws state and local laws mandated De Jure segregation in all public facilities through 1965.
For black throughout history we see many political, social, and cultural issues and concerns. We see that there were many laws that were set in place to discriminate against black slave and later on free black slaves. Even when they were freed, slaves found it hard to live a normal social life in America. The rest of white America still saw them as slaves and unequal to the rest of the citizens of America, because they were yet to be citizens themselves. They also mainly faced cultural issues when they were first brought to American.
This is because they were faced to learn English, get English names, and some were not allowed to practice their own religion. Legislation was also made to constrain race and enforce prejudicial boundaries. State and local laws known as Jim Crow laws were enacted between 1876 and 1965. They made de jure racial segregation in all public facilities of Southern states. It started in 1890 with "separate but equal" status for African Americans. Separate but equal led to conditions for blacks that tended to be inferior to the ones provided for whites.
These De jure segregations were mainly in the Southern states. In 1955 Rosa Parks refused to give up her seat on a bus to a white man. Do to this action she was arrested and charged with civil disobedience. This action and the many other demonstrations which it started would lead to a series of legislative decisions that contributed to undoing the Jim Crow system. Blacks also took part in the Montgomery Bus Boycott which was led by Rev. Martin Luther King, Jr. earlier demonstrations like the one led by K.
Leroy Irvis of Pittsburgh's Urban League in 1947, was against employment discrimination by Pittsburgh's department stores. Finally, there was legislation made to alleviate prejudicial boundaries that had been enacted. In 1964 President Johnson signed the Civil Rights Act of 1964. This act outlawed discrimination in public places. The Voting Rights Act of 1965 ended the legally sanctioned state barriers of voting in all federal, state, and local elections. This was promoted by blacks that would go out and vote in federal, state, and local polls.
