African American Civil Rights Research Paper

Words: 1436
Pages: 6

African Americans have a long history of problems including discrimination, racism, prejudices, and inequality. Civil rights are the rights people have today for equal treatment and opportunities no matter what race, gender, or religion. Traveling pastime, The United States made civil rights to all people to this day. Do you ever wonder how America agreed to those terms throughout the years? Africans were used as slaves and were owned as property. They didn’t get the same treatment and rights as others did because of their skin color. North America was in need of labor due to fast producing colonies, so they bought a cheap source of labor which were slaves. Sending it back to the 1600s, black people would work for white landowners, and they …show more content…
The civil war had ended slavery, but it didn’t quite end discrimination against black people. African Americans struggled with an abundant amount of prejudice and violence against them. During the reconstruction, blacks took on leadership roles like never before. They held public office, and seeked for legislative changes for equality, and the right to vote. In 1868, the 14th Amendment gave black people the equal protection. Then in 1850, the 15th Amendment gave black people the right to vote. Whites, especially from the south, were not satisfied that people who were once enslaved were on the better part of the playing field. To stop more trouble from that beef, black and whites were separated, and both erased the progress they made from the Reconstruction. In the late 19th century, “Jim Crow” laws were made. For example, black and whites were not allowed to go to the same school, bathroom, drinking fountains, and etcetera. Interracial marriage was also illegal, and most African Americans weren’t able to vote because they were unable to pass the voter literacy test. Jim Crow laws were not able to pass the northern states, but they were still a large amount of discrimination in the air. They would experience that whether it is at their work, trying to get an education, or even trying to buy a house. In 1896, the south segregation gained more of their territory, and declared to the Supreme Court that blacks and whites are separated but