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Racism In America Essay

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I n the 1960’s racism was alive and well continuously gaining traction in both Australia and America, people of colour had to fight for their rights and equal education. Lucky times have changed… right?
Before the American Civil War, according to the 1860 census, there was a staggering 3,950,528 slaves in the US. However, thanks to the Union of States, the Civil War was won. This allowed the government to pass various acts of legislation allowing African-American people the right to work and quite frankly to exist as free people.
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However, although they had ‘fundamental rights,’ unfortunately the Jim Crow laws were widespread throughout the southern states of the United States. This resulted in, public facilities, public transport and …show more content…

Convicted and facing execution, the case of the ‘Scottsboro Boys’ sparked international demonstrations which succeeded in both highlighting the racism of the American legal system and in overturning the conviction. This (word missing) inspired Harper Lee to begin writing. the perfect time for Harper Lee’s internationally acclaimed novel; To Kill A Mockingbird to be released. Unlike laws, novels have the power to change attitudes.
Few novels have had such a sustained impact on society’s views of education, identity and racism. The novel has sparked international debates, at its time of release.
In 1960, when To Kill a Mockingbird was published, much of white America viewed the coming together of the races as immoral, dangerous, and even ungodly. This was because during that time there were still many people in both the North and the South who, though sympathetic to the cause, found it difficult to relate to the struggle and understand it. For many people in the rural areas of the south, exposure to African American people was very limited, and this meant ignorance and misunderstanding, which in turn led to stereotypes slowly seeping into the minds of people who would under any other circumstances make friends with someone of any other race and not form such stereotypes.
This novel had such a profound effect on people that Reverend Martin Luther King Jr., no less, would write in Why We Can’t Wait, how “To the

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