Charles Hamilton Houston
Charles Hamilton Houston (September 3, 1895 – April 22, 1950) was a prominent
African-American lawyer, Dean of Howard University Law School, and NAACP Litigation
Director who played a significant role in dismantling the Jim Crow laws.
He is also well known for having trained future Supreme Court Justice Thurgood Marshall.
Charles Hamilton Houston was the chief attorney for the National Association of Colored
People (NAACP). Houston was born in Washington, D.C., where his father was a lawyer. An outstanding student, Houston graduated as one of six valedictorians from Amherst College in
Massachusetts in 1915. He was later appointed as a second lieutenant in field artillery and served in France and Germany during
African-Americans began to play baseball with white people in the late 1800s on military teams, college teams, and company team (nlbm.com). Unfortunately the Jim Crow laws and racism would prevent them from continuing to play with white people. Therefor African Americans were fronted with a problem, either not play or play alone. They decided to form their own league called the Negro baseball Leagues. The first Negro League ever created was referred to as the National Colored Baseball League it was formed in 1887 and it was just the beginning. The golden age for the Negro Leagues was in 1920 when there was seven successful leagues.
In The New Jim Crow, Michelle Alexander develops a compelling analogy on how mass incarceration is similar to the Jim Crow era, and is a “race-making institution.” She begins her work with the question, “Where have all the black men gone?” (Alexander, 178) She demonstrates how the media and Obama have failed to give an honest answer to this question, that the large majority of them or in prison. She argues that in order to address this problem, we must be honest about the fact that this is happening, and the discrimination with the African American communities that is putting them there.
Have you ever heard of Samuel Hugh Dillin? Not many young people have. Samuel Hugh Dillin was an instrumental part of desegregation of public schools in Indiana during the civil rights movement.
Prior to the 1950s, very little research had been done on the history and nature of the United States’ policies toward and relationships with African Americans, particularly in the South. To most historians, white domination and unequal treatment of Negroes were assumed to be constants of the political and social landscapes since the nation’s conception. Prominent Southern historian C. Vann Woodward, however, permanently changed history’s naïve understanding of race in America through his book entitled The Strange Career of Jim Crow. His provocative thesis explored evidence that had previously been overlooked by historians and gave a fresh foundation for more research on the topic of
C. Vann Woodward wrote The Strange Career of Jim Crow for a purpose. His purpose was to enlighten people about the history of the Jim Crow laws in the South. Martin Luther King Jr. called Woodward’s book, “the historical Bible of the civil rights movement.” (221) Martin Luther King Jr.’s quote revealed the true importance of Woodward’s book. Woodard’s book significance was based on it revealing the strange, forgotten facets of the Jim Crow laws. Assumptions about the Jim Crow’s career have existed since its creation. Woodward tried to eliminate the false theories as he attempted to uncover the truths. Woodward argued the strangest aspects of Jim Crow’s career were, it was a recent innovation and not created in the South
C. Vann Woodward’s book, The Strange Career of Jim Crow, has been hailed as a book which shaped our views of the history of the Civil Rights Movement and of the American South. Martin Luther King, Jr. described the book as “the historical Bible of the civil rights movement.” The argument presented in The Strange Career of Jim Crow is that the Jim Crow laws were relatively new introductions to the South that occurred towards the turn of the century rather than immediately after the end of Reconstruction after the Civil War. Woodward examines personal accounts, opinions, and editorials from the eras as well as the laws in place at the times. He examines the political history behind the emergence of
In the field of history, it is rare that an author actually comes to shape the events discussed in their writing. However, this was the case for C. Vann Woodward and his book, The Strange Career of Jim Crow. First published in 1955, it discusses this history of race relations in America, more specifically the Jim Crow laws he equates with the segregation of races. Woodward argues that segregation itself was a fairly new development within the South, and did not begin until after Reconstruction ended. He further argues that since the South has seen so much change, citing the Civil War, Reconstruction, and the development of the Jim Crow laws, it is possible for more changes to
Before there were players such as Hank Aaron, Willie Mays, and Barry Bonds, Major League Baseball was strictly white players only. The color line of Major League Baseball excluded black players until the late 40’s. This didn’t stop the colored men of America from playing the beloved American sport. The creation of the Negro Leagues in 1920 by Rube Foster gave colored men a chance to play in their own professional league, similar to the Major Leagues, but for African-American men. The creation of the Negro Leagues was a result of the Jim Crow Laws, state and local laws enforcing racial segregation in the Southern United States. Enacted after the Reconstruction period in the U.S., these laws continued in force until 1965. These laws created
The Jim Crow laws were local and state laws that were supposedly “separate but equal,” but instead blacks were inferior to the whites due that to the social, educational, and economical disadvantages that they caused. In Woodward’s greatly influential book, The Strange Career of Jim Crow, he shows supporters of segregation that this was not the way that it had always been, but instead segregation took time to develop after the Civil war and that the acceptance of the Jim Crow laws was not just because of race, but also included politic aspects. Woodward proves his thesis by showing how the state between the two races was right after the race the war and how slavery required interaction between blacks and whites. Woodward continues to
In a progressive society like the United States, looking to the past is common, to learn from our mistakes but some undeniable issues of the past repeat and are omitted from our society because of their unpleasant nature, a great example of this is the Jim-Crow Era. In this paper, I will be discussing the main events of the Jim-Crow era, its initiation, the new style of slavery in the south, and the way it re-shaped the lives of African Americans all across the country, its re-enforcement in the beginning of the twentieth century, its major supporters, like the Ku Klux Klan. Confederate state leaders, and its major oppositions like the rise of the Civil Rights Movement, and the idea of the United States setting a global example of
Some critics say that C. V. Woodward’s novel “The Strange Career of Jim Crow” was simply a book about racism. Other critics also attack his style of writing in this very popular novel. However, I believe that Woodward’s novel is not just a book about racism. It is a book about history. I believe it is a book about race relations, not racism. Woodward shatters the stereotypical view of segregation through chronicling the history of America from reconstruction through the late 1960’s.
Sam Houston was born on March 2nd, 1793 in Virginia. His father, Samuel, was a war veteran of the American Revolutionary war. After his father died his family moved to Tennessee. He briefly worked at his brother’s store. He was dissatisfied by this so he ran away at the age of sixteen. He ended up living with the Cherokee, and
The laws of Jim Crow had interfered with black people having the same rights as someone who was white. For people like Clyde Ross and his family, everyday was a struggle for equality and life. More hangings and lynchings of people of color happened more in 1920s Mississippi than in any other state during that time. Black people could find no place where they could be safe from the unjust law that faced them each and every day. Especially when senators were proud members of the Ku Klux Klan. Debt enslavement kept the Ross family in Mississippi and they had to work in order to support one another. With this the family had to work farms beholden to landowners, and these very same landowners could change his workers payment without their consent and face no criminal charges. Clyde Ross was part of a huge family, he had 12 other siblings, with him being the middle of the 13 children. Growing Mr. Ross had a very poor childhood, so poor he owned one thing a horse, that was later taken away from him. Clyde Ross decided to enlist in the army and fight during WWII. When he returned home from war he went to Chicago, instead of back home to Mississippi because home had become an even worse place than from when he left.
This “war on drugs,” which all subsequent presidents have embraced, has created a behemoth of courts, jails, and prisons that have done little to decrease the use of drugs while doing much to create confusion and hardship in families of color and urban communities.1,2Since 1972, the number of people incarcerated has increased 5-fold without a comparable decrease in crime or drug use.1,3 In fact, the decreased costs of opiates and stimulants and the increased potency of cannabis might lead one to an opposing conclusion.4 Given the politics of the war on drugs, skyrocketing incarceration rates are deemed a sign of success, not failure. I don’t totally agree with the book (I think linking crime and black struggle is even older than she does, for instance) but I think The New Jim Crow pursues the right line of questioning. “The prison boom is not the main cause of inequality between blacks and whites in America, but it did foreclose upward mobility
Phil Robertson the patriarch of Duck Dynasty has little to no knowledge about the events that happen in the Jim Crow era. To see how wrong he is lets take a look at the Jim Crow era. First Jim Crow was the name of the racial class method which operated mainly, but not purely in the south, between eighteen seventy-seven and the nineteen sixty. Jim Crow was more than a series of severe anti black laws. It was a way of life to african americans. Under Jim Crow, African Americans were relegated to the status of second class citizens. Jim Crow represented the legitimization of anti-black racism. Many Christian ministers and theologians taught that caucasian were the Chosen people, african americans were cursed to be servants, and God