State laws formerly pervasive throughout the South requiring public facilities and accommodations such as restaurants, swimming polls, restrooms, movie theaters, schools, water fountains, parks, and trains to be segregated by race were known as Jim Crow Laws. A method of control and subjugation of African Americans used after the end of slavery, eventually ruled unconstitutional, and now replaced by mass incarceration. Here is a list of official areas of segregation by state. In our popular representations, Jim Crow is little more than separate water fountains and segregated public facilities. In reality, Jim Crow was an authoritarian political and economic order, defined by state imposition of rigid social hierarchies, profound democratic backsliding (many whites were as effectively disenfranchised under Jim Crow, as were Blacks), oligarchical control of most institutions, a degraded public sphere and a highly stratified economy where most workers earned low wages and had fewer rights. And several Jim Crow states, such as Alabama and Mississippi, devoted state resources to the surveillance, harassment and intimidation of dissidents and political opponents. A homegrown American tradition of authoritarian governance. “Jim Crow” was a derisive slang term for a black man. It came to mean any state law passed in the South that established different rules for blacks and whites. Jim Crow laws were based on the theory of white supremacy and were a reaction to Reconstruction. In the depression-racked 1890s, racism appealed to whites who feared losing their jobs to blacks. Politicians abused blacks to win the votes of poor white “crackers.” In South Africa Jim Crow style segregation was called Apartheid.
What led to the eventual outlawing of Jim Crow laws outlawed?
Which part of Jim Crow do you think would have been the most unjust?
What would you say to somebody who says all this talk about history and injustice is a waste of time and not really all that big of a deal?
How did the federal government fight against Jim Crow?
In what way is Jim Crow still with us?
Remember!
Now, let’s commit this term to our long-term memory. On a scrap piece of paper, take 10 or 20 seconds to draw Jim Crow Laws! Draw with symbols or stick figures if you wish. Nothing fancy. Don’t expect a masterpiece. No one else will see this but you. Look at your drawing. That’s all - now it’s downloaded into your memory. Destroy the piece of paper in a most delightful way.
