Jim+Crow+Life




 * To set the stage for the civil rights movement, you must first understand the environment of segregation in the United States in the first half of the 20th century. What was life like in Jim Crow America? Cut and paste this information into a new page in your Unit 8 Online Notebook. You (and your partner, if you have one) are African Americans who have lived through the era of Jim Crow in America. Using the links provided in this activity, respond to the “oral history questions” in first person . You can do this in Word by copying this document onto a new document , completing it using the resources below, and cutting and pasting it into a new page on your notebook. Make sure your responses are in first person! **


 * 1) Right after the Civil War, the 14th Amendment was ratified. What did the 14th Amendment provide for African Americans? What does “due process” and “equal protection of the laws” mean?  [|14th LINK] **
 * This great amendment "gave" us African Americans citizenship to protect my civil liberties. States couldn't deny my "due process" and we would get them "equal protection of laws". It means that the government gotta judge me fairly and within the law which is great. The only problem was that they never did. **


 * 2) Unfortunately, your equal rights were challenged by the Supreme Court in the case of Plessy v. Ferguson. What do you remember about the facts, decision, and impact of this case?  [|Plessy LINK] **
 * Well it happened on June 7, 1892 and Mr. Plessy was put in jail for sitting in a "White" car on a railroad in Eastern Louisiana. Why would he do that? Well Mr. Plessy was protestin the Separate Car Act, which separated the "Colored" people from the "Whites". The Supreme Court said that they could be separated as long as they were equal, and the government are using that "separate but equal" thing for everything now. **


 * 3) The laws developed in the South became known as Jim Crow laws. Who was this Jim Crow fellow? Did he write the laws? [|Jim Crow LINK] **
 * Jim Crow was no real person. He came from a song by "Daddy" Rice. Now Rice was an actor and became the face of Jim Crow, a very stereotypical black man. Jim Crow didn't write them laws, but they used his names to describe them segregation laws, rules and them customs they came around in 1877 until the 1960s. **

= **[|Jim Crow Laws LINK 1]  / [|Jim Crow Laws LINK 2] / <span style="background-color: initial; color: #001ee6; font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">[|Jim Crow Laws LINK 3] / ****[|Jim Crow Laws Link 4]** =
 * <span style="background-color: #ffffff; font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">4) What are some specific examples of the Jim Crow laws from southern states? How did the laws affect you? Which on edo you feel is the worst? **
 * Jim Crow laws were everywhere, it seemed to me that there were more laws than there were blacks. Separate bathrooms, separate drinking fountains, separate libraries, separate sections to sit on a train, car, or bus! That is not even a glimpse of the laws that restricted us blacks. These laws affected every aspect of life, and always reminded me that I was different and inferior. I think it is absolutely ridiculous that blacks always have to sit on the back of the bus. How does that show that we are more inferior? I am the exact same as a white man besides my color, but it is that which limits my life. **
 * <span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">5) What did Jim Crow America look like in the 1900s? What are some images that can help explain the realities of the time? <span style="color: #6e1a7e; font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">[|Jim Crow Images LINK 1] <span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">/ <span style="background-color: initial; color: #001ee6; font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">[|Jim Crow Images LINK 2] **
 * I'll tell ya from first hand experience, Jim Crow America was very rough and these pictures will enforce that. **




 * <span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">6) What happened in the Scottsboro Case? How did it make you feel as an African American in the South? <span style="background-color: initial; color: #001ee6; font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;"> [|Scottsboro LINK] **
 * Well the Scottsboro case involved 9 black boys who were falsely accused of raping two white women in Alabama. It all started when these boys got in a fight with a group of white kids. Them white kids ran away and reported the incident, and the police found the Scottsboro boys along with two white women hiding, but who were completely not connected with the fight. The boys were charged for rape and were all killed except a 12 year old. How could they do this to these young Americans? **


 * <span style="background-color: #ffffff; font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">7) Why should anyone care about your life during Jim Crow America? [|Why should I care? Link] **

It showed that I was quarantined and discriminated against for something that wasn’t something I could change or pick, but for something that I was born into. Whites kept making things “Black” or “White” when the only thing that differentiated us was how we looked. They didn’t discriminate pretty versus ugly, but black versus white. The power whites have to control my life is ridiculous. My life is treacherous with these Jim Crow laws above my head. The only thing us African-Americans could do to this is to resist. Through combative or nonviolent resistance, single or in a mass, political, economic, or intellectual, resistance came in many forms.