Impact Of Equal Rights On African Americans

In the history of the United States, African Americans have always been discriminated against. When Africans first came to America, they were taken against their will and forced to work as laborers. They became slaves to the rich, greedy, lazy Americans. They were given no pay and often badly whipped and beaten. African Americans fought for their freedom, and up until the Civil War it was never given to them. When the Civil War began, they wanted to take part in fighting to free all slaves. Their opportunity to be soldiers and fight along side white men equally did not come easily, but eventually African Americans proved themselves able to withstand the heat of battle and fight as true American heroes.

After the Compromise of 1877, southern states were given back state control of the government. Consequently, white violence heightened in the south. In an article by Ida B. Wells, she discusses the unjust lynching of African Americans by white men. Wells continues in her article that the white men were not prosecuted for their actions due to their supposed need to oppress Africa Americas as result of “Negro Domination” during the Reconstruction Era (Documents in History I, 53-57). Not only was white violence a problem but so was segregation.

history, African Americans were given the right to vote. African American voice for equal rights was finally

Because the northern military troops were taken out of the South, there was less supervision of the region. African-Americans as grateful Republicans saw the troops as protectors from the rest of the racist south. When Hayes removed the troops, it demonstrated the Republican party backing away from their commitment to racial equality. Once the troops were gone, more lynchings occurred to deal with African-Americans who violated the South’s racial code of conduct. The first few years after the Compromise, more whites than blacks were lynched (1882 - 64 whites to 49 blacks; 1885 - 110 whites to 74 blacks); however, in less than twenty years, the lynchings of blacks spiked to 113 in 1895 and 106 in 1900. African-Americans had no way to defend themselves after their defenders, the northern troops, left them essentially for dead.

The reconstruction amendments established in the 19th century made many believe that African Americans would finally reach equality. However, the abolishment never changed society’s view on African Americans and instead, barriers such as oppression and segregation came out of it. Despite the ceaseless barriers faced by African Americans in the South, they were able to utilize methods in which gave the movement strength in the 1950s and ultimately, led to their gained civil rights.

Before 1863, African Americans were slaves with no rights of their own. This is well illustrated in the 1857 Supreme Court case Dred Scott v. Stanford, where the court ruled that “a negro, whose ancestors were imported into [the U.S] and sold as slaves, whether enslaved or free, could not be an American citizen and therefore had no standing to sue in federal court…” (Schmidt, Shelley & Barder, 2014-2015, p. 93). Eventually, the 13th amendment was passed, but even after slavery was officially abolished within the United States, African Americans were still not viewed or treated as “equal” to white citizens. Moreover, because they had prior to never been allowed to go to school, or read or write, they were limited to low-wage, manual labor tasks

Before and during the Civil Rights Movement, African Americans were severely discriminated against. Black people did not have equal rights as white people; this included the right to vote, schooling, employment, or the right to go to certain public places (Nguyen, n.d.). “Everything they did was limited and controlled,” states Amanda Nguyen in her article, Racism in North America, Then and Now (n.d.). Now though, all blacks have the same rights as whites do. They can vote, receive an education, get a job, and more. There are even organizations and laws that have been formed to work against discrimination against, and unequal treatment of, people of color (Nguyen, n.d.). According to Nguyen in Racism in North America, Then and Now, The Charter of Rights and Freedoms, Human Rights legislation, and hate laws are all evidence of this change

As many people are aware, African Americans struggled a lot when trying to receive equal rights. Even though the Civil War that took place from 1861 to 1865 had accomplished to abolish slavery in 1865, African Americans were still being treated poorly and weren’t receiving civil rights. “Civil Rights are the rights of all Americans to equal protection under the law, as provided by the Fourteenth Amendment to the Constitution” (Bardes, Schmidt, Shelley 92).

The United States of America was founded upon five founding ideals: liberty, opportunity, rights, democracy, and equality. All five of these ideals have shaped what kind of country the United States has become and what it stands for. By definition, equality is “the state of being of being equal, especially in status, rights, and opportunities.” The United States has always been changing the availability of equality, depending on the time period. Compared to the founding period, every American has the same rights and same opportunities. This was not always so, however, and some groups of Americans had less rights and opportunities than others. One group in particular that had different levels of equality throughout history was African Americans. While African Americans do have equality nowadays, this was not always the case. It had taken centuries before African Americans could have the same rights and opportunities as other groups of Americans. Fortunately, this has led to equality amongst all Americans.

In the years following the Civil War, a majority of white Americans still continued to support white supremacy which lead to African Americans being denied of power, wealth and position (Gillette 191). Denial of equality for African Americans led to an improvement in government intervention. The Civil Rights Act of 1860 was enacted but failed to address big civil rights issues, such as segregation, for African Americans (Gillette 197). The main reason that the government failed in its efforts was due to the peoples unwavering feelings towards African Americans. People’s racist sentiments questioned if it was

African Americans have been struggling for equality for many decades. It only seems that during the 1960?s is when there were actual significant advances made. This was about the same time that civil rights came into the political scene. Throughout the South, Blacks were still in the majority, but had no political power what so ever. The Civil Rights Movement gave African Americans a voice and a chance to make a difference. The 1960's helped open up hope and expectations for Black Americans.

One of the biggest problems Africans Americans faced in America is Segregation, discrimination, racism, prejudice, rebellion, religion, resistance, and protest. These problems have helped shape the Black struggle for justice. Their fight for justice marks a long sequence of events towards their freedom. Provisions of the Constitution affect the operation of government agencies and/or the latitude chief executives and legislatures in the creation and implementation of policies today. The rights and passage of Amendments granted to African Americans in the Constitution serve as a source of “first principles” governing the actions and policies of elected and appointed public servants across the United States. The 15th Amendment Equal Rights: Rights

The United States is a immigrant country, which faces varieties of problems. The African American problem is one of the most serious one. Racial segregation is a deep-rooted social problem, which reflects in every field in the United States. For example, education, labor market and criminal justice system. In the aspect of education, most of black children were not permitted to enter the school, because the white children studied there. In the aspect of labor market, the black people 's average wages were lower than the whites. They did the manual work. In the aspect of criminal justice system, the blacks were easily in jail. Badly, their sentences were also more serious than the whites. In general, the blacks live in the bottom of the American society. Martin Luther King delivered the famous speech I Have a Dream, ' ' I have a dream that my four little children will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin but by the content of their character. ' ' (1) However, it was difficult for African American to get the freedom. The 1776 Declaration of Independence announced that everyone are equal and freedom.But black slavery still occurred in the southern states of America. Then the Civil War broke out, African American kept struggling for land and political rights.

The role of African American has changed over the centuries. They were treated differently because of their skin color. They were treated like property for others uses however change happened. It was not a easy matter to change but one of the main reason it did change was because Martin Luther King and his speech “I have a Dream”.

Although African Americans continued to fight for equal rights into the 1960’s and in some parts of America are still fighting today. This movement was sparked in the 1950’s and stands as the most significant event of that time.