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The Jim Crow Era

By supersamkishy

  • A Virginia law made it illegal for black and white children to attend the same schools.

    This law went into effect at the start of 1870

  • Congress passed The Civil Rights Act of 1875

    This act prohibited discrimination in public accommodations, including inns, theaters, public conveyances on land or water, and "other places of public amusement."

  • Rutherford B. Hayes was elected President

    Rutherford B. Hayes was elected President by the Electoral College after a deal was worked out with leading southern Democrats. The withdrawal of all remaining federal troops from the South marked the effective end of Reconstruction.

  • The Exodus of 1879

    Thousands of southern blacks frustrated with discrimination and poverty in the South emigrated to the West.

  • The Civil Rights Act of 1875 was declared unconstitutional

    The United States Supreme Court ruled in Civil Rights Cases of 1883 that the Civil Rights Act of 1875 was unconstitutional. The Court ruled that the 14th Amendment prohibited states, but not citizens, from discriminating.
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    Southern states adopted new constitutions and voting laws designed to disenfranchise black voters.

  • "Separate but Equal Doctrine"

    In Plessy v. Ferguson, the United States Supreme Court established the "Separate but Equal Doctrine," holding that legal racial segregation does not violate the equal protection clause of the 14th Amendment.
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    Woodrow Wilson institutionalized segregation in the federal civil service.

    By the end of World War I, the District of Columbia was thoroughly segregated as well.

  • Every southern state and many northern cities had Jim Crow laws that discriminated against black Americans.

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    The Great Migration

    Rural southern blacks moved to northern cities, to the West, and to southern cities. Between 1915 and 1920, 500,000 to 1 million moved to the North; another 700,000 to 1 million moved to the North and West in the 1920s.

  • The movie, Birth of a Nation, was released.

    Birth of a Nation, based on Thomas Dixon's 'The Clansman', popularized many anti-black caricatures, especially the Brute. The movie also glorified the Ku Klux Klan (KKK) and helped lead to its resurgence.

  • A riot in East St. Louis, Illinois occured.

    At least forty blacks were attacked and killed during the riot.

  • 10,000 blacks participated in a silent march down Fifth Avenue in New York City.

    The purpose of the march was to protest racial oppression, especially riots directed against black communities.

  • The 19th Amendment was ratified.

    This amendment gave women the right to vote.

  • Oscar DePriest, a Chicago Republican, was the first African American elected to Congress from a district north of the Mason-Dixon Line.

  • President Franklin D. Roosevelt issued Executive Order 8802

    This eliminated hiring discrimination in the defense industry and established the Fair Employment Practices Commission.

  • The Congress of Racial Equality (CORE) was founded in Chicago.

    (Not exact date. Founded in March of 1942)

  • World War II ended.

  • The Maryland legislature passed a law that imprisoned any white woman who birthed a mixed-race child.

    The white woman would be incarcerated up to five years.
    (Not exact date, but correct year)

  • Rosa Parks refused to give up her seat on a bus to a white man.

  • The Virginia legislature voted to close any school that enrolled both black and white students.

  • An Arkansas law required all state buses to designate whites-only seating areas.

  • Martin Luther King Jr. recited his famous 'I Have A Dream Speech' at the Lincoln Memorial.

  • President Lyndon Johnson signed The Civil Rights Act of 1964.

    The Civil Rights Act of 1964 outlawed racial discrimination in public accommodations.