Jim Crow and the Segregation of Schools
The Jim Crow era lasted from after the Civil War, i.e., roughly around the late 19th century, to the mid-20th century in the United States. It was characterized by a series of policies at the state and local laws enforcing racial segregation, particularly in the Southern states. One of the most significant and pernicious aspects of this era was the segregation of schools, a policy that was a symbol and expression of the overall system of institutionalized forms of racism and inequality in the country.
The main responsibility for the segregation of schools lay with state and local governments. Following the end of Reconstruction in 1877, Southern states began to pass laws mandating separate schools for black and white students. These laws were part of a set of Jim Crow laws that segregated public spaces and accommodations (Sandoval-Strausz). State and local governments were responsible for seeing to it that white students attended white schools and black students attended black schools. It was basically a form of apartheid in education, but it was par for the course in America at the time, where diners were segregated, bus seating was segregated, bathrooms were segregated and so on.
The U.S. Supreme Court played a big role in cementing school segregation. In the landmark case Plessy v....
…was a policy that was very entwined in the legal and political systems of the United States. It was actively enforced by state and local governments and was supported, or at least unchallenged, by the federal government for decades. The dismantling of this system required a change of mind from the Supreme Court, shifts in public opinion, and federal intervention. Thus, with everyone pulling together, the policy was finally overturned.Works Cited
Driver, Justin.The schoolhouse gate: Public education, the Supreme Court, and the battle for the
American mind. Pantheon, 2018.
PBS. Jim Crow. The Rise and Fall of Jim Crow | PBS (thirteen.org)
Sandoval-Strausz, Andrew K. "Travelers, strangers, and Jim Crow: Law, public
accommodations, and civil rights in America."Law…
Supreme Court and Public Opinion The Supreme Court of the United States was established in 1789 as part of the basic three sections of the American governmental system: Executive (President and Staff), Legislative (Congress), and Judicial (Supreme Court System). Each U.S. State also has a supreme court, which is the highest law for interpreting cases that move into that jurisdiction. Essentially, the Supreme Court has the ultimate jurisdiction over all federal
While the decision has hung over states as one national standard, it infringes the essential principles of federalism and separation of powers that are rooted in the country's constitutional system (Silversten, 2011). During the time that the Supreme Court made this ruling, the state of Georgia basically had the same position on punishment for the crime of rape with many states. Actually, very few states permitted the executions or enforcement
Supreme Court Case Supreme Court Decision in Re Waterman, 910 2D (N.H. 2006) The Case The case addressed in this section of the report is that of Supreme Court case In Re Waterman, 910 A.2d 1175 (N.H. 2006). In this case, Tracy Waterman, working as a trooper for the New Hampshire State Policy was informed on August 29, 3003 that Vicky Lemere, the wife of one of Waterman's fellow troopers, informed Lieutenant Nedeau,
Jim Crow Laws: The Segregation of the African-American in the United States of the 19th Century Perhaps one of the most discussed events of the history of the United States is undoubtedly the situation of African-American individuals during the 19th and the first half of the 20th century. From the moment the first black slaves arrived to Virginia in the first part of the 17th century, racism and unjustified violence and
One of the major components of these Jim Crow laws was disenfranchisement which was "largely the work of rural and urban white elites who sought to reassure" whites in the south that white supremacy was the law of the land. As a result, lynching and other forms of violence against blacks were endorsed, encouraged and rationalized in the minds of most southern whites (Rabinowitz, 168). A prominent spokesman against African-American
E.B. DuBois arose as a prominent voice calling for more direct civil confrontation. It is impossible to judge who was right given the context in which the two sides were working, but an analysis of how history played out reveals both the wisdom and the shortcomings of Washington's approach to equality. Given that it took half a century following Washington's death for the passage of the Civil Rights Act, especially when
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