Early Attempts To Break Jim Crow
The Civil Rights Act of 1875, introduced by Charles Sumner and Benjamin F. Butler, stipulated a guarantee that everyone, regardless of race, color, or previous condition of servitude, was entitled to the same treatment in public accommodations, such as inns, public transportation, theaters, and other places of recreation. This Act had little effect. An 1883 Supreme Court decision ruled that the act was unconstitutional in some respects, saying Congress was not afforded control over private persons or corporations. With white southern Democrats forming a solid voting bloc in Congress, with power out of proportion to the percentage of population they represented, Congress did not pass another civil rights law until 1957.
In 1887 Rev. W. H. Heard lodged a complaint with the Inter-State Commerce Commission against the Georgia Railroad company for discrimination, citing its provision of different cars for white and black/colored passengers. The company successfully appealed for relief on the grounds it offered separate but equal accommodation.
In 1890, Louisiana passed a law requiring separate accommodations for colored and white passengers on railroads. Louisiana law distinguished between "white", "black" and "colored" (that is, people of mixed European and African ancestry). The law already specified that blacks could not ride with white people, but colored people could ride with whites before 1890. A group of concerned black, colored and white citizens in New Orleans formed an association dedicated to rescinding the law. The group persuaded Homer Plessy, who was one-eighth "Negro" and of fair complexion, to test it.
In 1892, Plessy bought a first-class ticket from New Orleans on the East Louisiana Railway. Once he had boarded the train, he informed the train conductor of his racial lineage and took a seat in the whites-only car. He was directed to leave that car and sit instead in the "coloreds only" car. Plessy refused and was immediately arrested. The Citizens Committee of New Orleans fought the case all the way to the Supreme Court of the United States. They lost in Plessy v. Ferguson (1896), in which the Court ruled that "separate but equal" facilities were constitutional. The finding contributed to 58 more years of legalized discrimination against black and colored people in the United States.
In 1908 Congress defeated an attempt to introduce segregated streetcars into the capital itself.
Read more about this topic: Jim Crow Laws
Famous quotes containing the words early, attempts, break and/or crow:
“Early rising is no pleasure; early drinking’s just the measure.”
—François Rabelais (1494–1553)
“Bankruptcy is a sacred state, a condition beyond conditions, as theologians might say, and attempts to investigate it are necessarily obscene, like spiritualism. One knows only that he has passed into it and lives beyond us, in a condition not ours.”
—John Updike (b. 1932)
“What breaks capitalism, all that will ever break capitalism, is capitalists. The faster they run the more strain on their heart.”
—Raymond Williams (1921–1988)
“Only brooms
Know the devil
Still exists,
That the snow grows whiter
After a crow has flown over it,”
—Charles Simic (b. 1938)