Causes of the New York City Draft Riots of 1863

We hear multiple people weigh in on the court case and give their opinions and expose the cultural issues that are occurring. Reverend Sykes for instances tells us that he has “ never seen a jury of white people favor on the side of a colored man” and we also hear from Dolphus Raymond talks about that "the hell white people give coloured folks, without even stopping to think that they're people too." This shows that many people are very aware of what is going on in this time period but either choose to ignore it or tend to join in on the hazing and racism. As sad as it is to say, that is very similar to the culture that happens today. We typically ignore the issues that are occurring today or with some people tend to join in on the attack and the racism or other cultural issues that go on.

The Great depression caused many problems for black people and they were greatly affected by it. Problems of the Great Depression affected every American, however, African Americans were the most affected. By 1932 half of Black Americans were out of work. In some Northern cities, blacks were fired so that a white person could take their job. But yet again, racial violence became more common, especially in the South. Even when President Roosevelt was trying to end the Great Depression there was still a conflict between the blacks and whites in the New Deal Housing and employment projects. This just goes to show that once everything has been set in motion that it can't really become a non-normal thing. Everyone was mostly worrying about themselves and their own people that they didn't bother

Whites was stuck in their traditional Southern ways and wasn’t about to let blacks change that. When blacks tried to protest non-violently, the whites was ready to start a riot but the blacks were the ones arrested for “inciting a riot”. Some blacks even lost hope because they felt they were fighting a losing battle. But the fight continued and some blacks such as C. K. Steele wasn’t going to stop fighting until total integration was achieved.

People watched as “Men, both colored and white, were murdered within two blocks of us, some being hung to the nearest lamp post, and others shot”. This carnage was predominantly sparked by the ratification of the Conscription Act and the mobility of freed slaves due to the Emancipation Proclamation. The Irish-Americans and African-Americans were competing for jobs; resulting in the biggest civil protest during war times in American history. The New York City Draft Riots of 1863, as stated by Albon P. Man Jr’s journal article, “Labor Competition and the New York Draft Riots of 1863”, left 1,200 to 1,500 dead from white rioters, though the number of victims by the lynch mobs that were taken away by the water onto either side of Manhattan are

By the outset of 1864, after three years of war, the Union had mobilized its resources for the ongoing struggle on a massive scale. The government had overseen the construction of new railroad lines and for the first time used standardized rail tracks that allowed the North to move men and materials with greater ease. The North’s economy had shifted to a wartime model. The Confederacy also mobilized, perhaps to a greater degree than the Union, its efforts to secure independence and maintain slavery. Yet the Confederacy experienced ever-greater hardships after years of war. Without the population of the North, it faced a shortage of manpower. The lack of industry, compared to the North, undercut the ability to sustain and wage war. Rampant inflation as well as food shortages in the South lowered morale.

This paper explains a very important moment in the history of our government that took place in Illinois in 1917. As World War I was beginning for the United States things were heating up in East St. Louis, Illinois. Anti-black riots killed or injured over one hundred black civilians. Then a Silent Parade of over ten thousand black citizens from New York broke out. Civil rights have always been an issue in our government, and according to www.kidzworld.com, after these anti black riots, things eventually led to the development of the The National Association for the Advancement of Colored People, and from that, Rosa Parks did not give up her seat on the bus. The creation of the NAACP also influenced the Little Rock, Arkansas incident, Martin L. King’s “I Have a Dream” Speech, and many other things which eventually led to equal rights for everyone with the Civil Rights Act of 1964. This paper will explain the riots and how it shaped our government into providing equal jobs for all races.

During these years of radical reconstruction, the African Americans were going through some very tough times. The laws that were put on them were harsh and unreasonable. All they wanted to do was becomes socially and economically apart of the United States. Groups like the KKK were unfair towards the blacks and made their lives miserable by holding rallies and killing them. As a result of reconstruction, the blacks were not given social or economic equality because of laws like the black codes and Jim Crow laws, and the rebellious whites in the south. These African Americans struggled just to support themselves, but whites eventually accepted them at the end of the

Another victim of white on black rape was Betty Jean Owens, she was kidnapped from a school dance and taken into the woods and was gang raped by four white different men. Betty was so hurt from this rape she was sent to the hospital. When the students from the school she attended in Tallahassee, Florida had heard about the rape they were enraged, “Early the next day more than a thousand students gathered in the university’s grassy quadrangle with signs, hymns, and prayers aimed at the national news media, which sent stories of the attack across the country” (McGuire 136). These students were no longer going to sit back and watch the women they love and care about get raped and treated as though they aren’t human. They were letting the world

This affected the economy because they could not meet the demands of the country. Although as a whole all men and women had their problems the people facing the most conflict were the Afro-Americans. During this time the Jim Crow Laws were taken in action. It was said that everything was to be separate but equal. In theory this seemed as a good idea at the time but in reality it was not. The African American people had their own schools, churches and even bathrooms but they were not the same. The school did not have enough supplies or even space for the amount of students they

The South still had a disliking for blacks and the South began to form Black Codes. Black codes were restrictions put on blacks in the South. “Black codes denied blacks the right to vote, the right to own guns, the right to serve on juries, and some even forced them to work on plantations if they did not have a job” (Radical Reconstruction. youtube.com). Black codes unfairly restricted the rights of African Americans and they were morally wrong. There was much variation of the Black Codes depending on which state of the South. Some states did not even allow blacks to own property. “The Black Codes partially reverted the South into slavery” (Radical Reconstruction. youtube.com). Once the government realized what was happening they decided that reconstruction had to be enforced. “Congress sent the military creating radical regimes throughout sectionalist states” (Sparknotes.com). At this time in history the south was divided into five military districts and there was a United States general put in place for each. There were many disobedient white Southerners

Any notification of a minority being successful led to a white revolt. Jealousy towards blacks among the white population became an epidemic. The white argued that the black community did not deserve to climb high in the economic ranks.

To this point, Leslie M. Harris writes, In the shadow of Slavery states, "The Democratic party had warned New York Irish and German residents to prepare for the emancipation of slaves and the resultant labor competition when southern blacks...flee." This is significant because the Irish were already poor and treat similar to how slaves were. The emancipation freed thousands of slaves causing a competition for jobs between the two. Soon afterward the draft occurs, either forcing you to go to war or pay a large fee to avoid being drafted. Blacks, who were not considered citizens, were excused from the draft. The Irish were forced to fight in a war for the freedom of black slaves, while the Irish themselves were treated like slaves. The result caused the 1863 draft riots, the Irish viewed this as the "rich man's war and a poor man's fight" because the rich paid off the fee, while the ones that can't afford to had to

At the time there was a large amount of racial tension going on. In 1943 many people came north in hope of escaping prejudice in the south. All they found were the exact same situations they thought they were escaping from, if not worse. Though prejudice wasn't directly only towards negroes, they were the ones who seemed to have it worst. While everyone was allowed to live in most places, black people were only allowed to live in the Brewster projects. The homes weren't all that great. Many lived in homes without indoor plumbing, yet they paid rent two to three times higher than families in white districts (Baulch and Zacharias 2). Black people were treated differently by police and weren't able to go to many places because negroes weren't allowed to be in many places. As the years went by things got worse, people from other countries began to take it upon themselves to start trouble against blacks as the Polish people did. Situations began to get worse at work places also as many workers began to protest working with black people or even using the same facilities as a black person. Black people began to form their own organizations such as the Black Legion.

The Detroit riots occurred in the summer of 1967. The riot initially started because of race when poor African Americans got kicked out of their houses. They started living on 12th street in Detroit. The riot started there because African Americans were fed up with the way that they were being treated. Many years prior to the riot there were already racial issues. The government made it hard for African Americans to buy houses in the 1950s. During that time, white people were resisting African Americans from moving into Detroit. They were gathering outside of houses owned by African Americans until they would leave. According to Stanford, “I was blissfully unaware of the pervasive racism and resentment that was simmering in my city” (28).

were finally able to voice their opinions and tell their side of the story to balance out the usually