Jim Crow Era Research Paper

During the 1600s people with skin tones darker than the norm were looked to as different. These “different” people or black people, were controlled, used, beaten and mistreated as workers in the fields of white homeowners and as the help inside of these homes. This was the norm for Americans from the 1600s to the late 1800s, the harsh treatment of black people were what white Americans were used to. White landowners felt a need of keeping black people as slaves. Being a slave was the only purpose for the black people within farmlands owned by the white people. During the late 1800’s the United States of America was going major changes that some of its citizens could not come to terms with, specifically white southerners. After President Lincoln …show more content…
During the era known as the Jim Crow era, black citizens were to act and behave as if they were inferior to a white citizen in any way. This era occurred for almost one hundred years where black citizens must be respectful to all white citizens while the whites still continued to mistreat blacks. Thus, the black community was forced to stay at the bottom of the racial hierarchy because no white man could bear to see his former slave as being a respected man in their own country. Due to these harsh behaviors of white citizens, there were many civil rights activists, one including W.E.B. Du Bois, who became famously known to make change.
Years from the 1600s to the 1800s was a very long excruciating time for black people, all they could want for themselves was freedom. Being free meant no more long hours on the farmlands, no more starvation, low wages, beatings and an unimaginable amount of other painful exertions they had to endure while being captive in America. During the Civil War of 1863, President Lincoln signed the Emancipation Proclamation where it stated, “All persons …show more content…
During this era the terror of black citizens never stopped. Jim Crow was the era known for segregation, there were places whites could go that colored people couldn’t. There were schools, restaurants, and even water fountains for white people and for colored people. There were rules in place that made it difficult for colored people to live normal equal lives. Jim Crow laws touched just about every imaginable aspect of everyday life, meaning that there was a law in place of anything a black citizen could do. If a black citizen were to violate any Jim Crow law there was to be a horrible punishment to be placed for the law breaking citizen. The relations between white and black citizens were harsh. During the era of segregation many African American activists were born, it was this time where America needed change and these activists were going to make it happen. During this time W.E.B. Du Bois had become famously known. As the first African American Harvard graduate with a PhD, Du Bois wanted legal change during this time, so in 1905 he led a civil rights movement called the Niagara Movement where the principles of this movement were known as the “Declaration of Principles”. There were nineteen principles in the declaration, and each had a significance to how African Americans were still being treated in the United States. For example in his declaration, Du Bois

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