Can you imagine being forced to use different, but identical facilities due to your skin color? Take this situation except the supposedly identical resources were significantly worse for those with colored skin and it accurately represents the state of the United States for the century following the Civil War. Due to long standing discrimination towards blacks as a result of slavery, many efforts were made by political figures to disrupt and halt the ability of blacks to integrate seamlessly into society. One of the key methods in which this was achieved was through the separation of education between whites and blacks. While whites would have better funding, blacks would receive far less funding and overall an unsatisfactory education. Some
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This intolerance was often encouraged and supported, as evidenced by the passing of Jim Crow Laws in 1877. Jim Crow laws affirmed the racism towards blacks and consisted of many laws pertaining to segregation and labelling blacks as inherently inferior. Some of these laws even included rules that disallowed blacks from acting more intelligent than whites in any way (Pilgrim). The concept of “separate but equal” was reinforced by the decision of the Supreme Court in Plessy v. Ferguson where it was decided that a man, Homer Plessy, who was one-eighth black could not sit in the white car of a train (Stewart). This discrimination was emphasized in schooling, where the distribution of funds was controlled by white-controlled state governments. In fact, the difference in spending was so great that “Alabama spent $37 on each white child in 1930 and just $7 on those who were black; in Georgia the figures were $32 and $7, in Mississippi they were $31 and $6, and those in South Carolina were $53 and $5, a disparity of more than 10-to-one” (Irons). Some other hindrances included poor busing options and less experienced teachers. These discrepancies in spending and facilities were a product of the fear that black people would become educated and start to take the jobs of …show more content…
Among these cases was Brown v. Board of Education of Topeka. The case involved a man whose daughter had to walk 21 blocks to her school, while the far more prosperous white school was only 7 blocks away. On May 17th, 1954, the Supreme Court decided that equality should be preserved in regards to education and outlawed segregation in schools (C N Trueman). This landmark case decision was arguably the most important of all the efforts to remove segregation and promote equality. However, this was not enough to end discrimination and there was still sustaining opposition and barriers to blacks. For example, while blacks had the right to vote, there were laws implementing poll taxes or literacy tests to impend the ability of blacks to vote as a fewer amount of blacks were educated in comparison to whites as a consequence of the segregation in education (History.com). After these events, prominent civil rights activists such as Rosa Parks and Martin Luther King Jr. came into the picture. Rosa Park’s actions which sparked the Montgomery Bus boycotts where many blacks would get on buses and refuse to give up their seats for whites along with the nonviolent protests led by Martin Luther King Jr. brought large amounts of attention to the cause for desegregation. Following yet another long struggle, their efforts culminated in the Civil Rights Act
This intolerance was often encouraged and supported, as evidenced by the passing of Jim Crow Laws in 1877. Jim Crow laws affirmed the racism towards blacks and consisted of many laws pertaining to segregation and labelling blacks as inherently inferior. Some of these laws even included rules that disallowed blacks from acting more intelligent than whites in any way (Pilgrim). The concept of “separate but equal” was reinforced by the decision of the Supreme Court in Plessy v. Ferguson where it was decided that a man, Homer Plessy, who was one-eighth black could not sit in the white car of a train (Stewart). This discrimination was emphasized in schooling, where the distribution of funds was controlled by white-controlled state governments. In fact, the difference in spending was so great that “Alabama spent $37 on each white child in 1930 and just $7 on those who were black; in Georgia the figures were $32 and $7, in Mississippi they were $31 and $6, and those in South Carolina were $53 and $5, a disparity of more than 10-to-one” (Irons). Some other hindrances included poor busing options and less experienced teachers. These discrepancies in spending and facilities were a product of the fear that black people would become educated and start to take the jobs of …show more content…
Among these cases was Brown v. Board of Education of Topeka. The case involved a man whose daughter had to walk 21 blocks to her school, while the far more prosperous white school was only 7 blocks away. On May 17th, 1954, the Supreme Court decided that equality should be preserved in regards to education and outlawed segregation in schools (C N Trueman). This landmark case decision was arguably the most important of all the efforts to remove segregation and promote equality. However, this was not enough to end discrimination and there was still sustaining opposition and barriers to blacks. For example, while blacks had the right to vote, there were laws implementing poll taxes or literacy tests to impend the ability of blacks to vote as a fewer amount of blacks were educated in comparison to whites as a consequence of the segregation in education (History.com). After these events, prominent civil rights activists such as Rosa Parks and Martin Luther King Jr. came into the picture. Rosa Park’s actions which sparked the Montgomery Bus boycotts where many blacks would get on buses and refuse to give up their seats for whites along with the nonviolent protests led by Martin Luther King Jr. brought large amounts of attention to the cause for desegregation. Following yet another long struggle, their efforts culminated in the Civil Rights Act