Civil Rights Act & Plessy v. Ferguson
The Reconstruction Era was the beginning of a very slow start towards African American liberation with many changes in their rights and social status. Attempting to exercise their newly acquired liberties, African Americans were faced with several impediments. Previous slave owners and other southerners were not accustomed to this new change and saw this as an opportunity to establish white authority by converging together and imposing restrictions on the newly freed African Americans [8]. Milestones such as the Fourteenth and Fifteenth Amendment were ratified, giving African Americans citizenship and the right to vote. Despite the newly imposed laws and regulations meant to establish equality among blacks and whites, resistance from the white community was still imminent and would slowly make its influence on the American government.
Civil Rights Act
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Plessy v. Ferguson
African Americans. Tourgee fought in Plessy’s defense for a month after his arrest and argued that Plessy’s civil rights under the Thirteenth and Fourtheenth Amendment of the Constitution had been violated [9]. After being reviewed by the U.S. Supreme Court, the decision was ruled against Plessy in an 8-1 vote upholding the Louisiana law that segregated facilities did not discriminate as long as they were “separate but equal” [3]. The landmark decision was made and the Supreme Court enabled the development for states to have separate accommodations for blacks and whites as long as they were “separate but equal”. The states took this decision as an opportunity to pass laws that mandated racial segregation in many aspects of life for southern people, such as schools, restrooms, hotels, restaurants, cemeteries, and many other public spaces. |
In 1892, Homer Plessy marked the beginning of the landmark decision in Plessy v. Ferguson. Homer Plessy was a 30-year old shoemaker and although being only one-eighth black and seven-eighths white, Plessy was considered to be black under Louisiana law [7]. In 1890, the Separate Car Act was passed by the state of Louisiana, which required that railroad companies have separate cars or sections for black and white passengers. Through a Citizens Committee of black residents of New Orleans, Plessy set out to challenge the law and create a test case by refusing a conductor’s order to move to the “colored only” section of the railroad car and was then arrested. The Citizens Committee then hired Albion W. Tourgee, a judge in North Carolina who had waged a courageous battle against the Ku Klux Klan during the Reconstruction, to argue their case before the Supreme Court [3]. At the time, Tourgee was a New York attorney who previously worked on various civil rights cases for
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