Emancipation from Segregation free essay sample

Emancipation from Segregation By Don Moore (2010) The physical chains of slavery were broken by the Emancipation Proclamation passed by President Lincoln in the 1860s. Ten years later the African American people faced a second form of slavery. In the South, right after the Civil War, in the 1870s, anti-African American laws were passed which were called the Jim Crow laws. According to David Pilgrim, Professor of Sociology, the Jim Crow laws mandated that African Americans were not to go to white movie theaters, white restaurants, white bars, and white public restrooms. African Americans were also not allowed to ride in trains, cars, or buses with whites. Blacks were not allowed to marry whites. Even mulattos were treated with the same indignity as blacks. The tyrant of segregation is rooted in the Jim Crow laws. In 1896, the Supreme Court ruled that segregation was constitutional as long as there were separate but equal places to live for both whites and blacks. A gentleman named Homer Plessey was caught riding on a train for whites only. Homer Plessey took his case to the Supreme Court and lost. In 1896, the Supreme Court made its decision to legitimize both the Jim Crow laws and the Jim Crow lifestyle (Pilgrim). For many years the African American had to be reminded of segregation by reading the â€Å"Colored Only† signs on public restrooms. Also the public drinking fountains had the signs â€Å"Colored Only† above them. The African American students had to attend schools for blacks only. Black students could never attend white schools. The black students had to be bused in separate buses for blacks while the white students rode on buses for whites (Pilgrim).The second form of slavery was segregation or alienating African Americans from white society. Segregation forced many African American families into states of poverty and oppression. The period from the 1870s until the mid 1960s was a period of despair for the African American people. The heavy burden of segregation forced the heart of the African American to cry out a freedom dream. The cries of frustration were communicated very well in both the music and the literature of pre Civil Rights Movement times.Many African American families had to go through a â€Å"battle royal† of emotional turmoil, spiritual growth, physical pain, poverty, and poor living conditions. The heavy burden of slavery dictated by the segregationists had to be lifted. Then a need for a revolution to abolish the slavery of segregation became top priority. The need for civil disobedience against segregation became a reality. According to an article in â€Å"A Dictionary of Contemporary History†, the 1954 case of Brown versus the Topeka Board of Education was the start of dissolving segregation in public schools.The Supreme Court overturned the 1896 Plessey case ruling and then mandated that segregation in public school violated the U. S. Constitution. The African American voice became the protagonist in mid 20th century black history. The voice of the Civil Rights Movement cried loud like a new fog horn of the new lighthouse of hope. Their antagonist white voice roared loud like a lion desiring to consume the prey of integration. Blacks wanted integration while the whites wanted segregation. Blacks wanted integration while the whites wanted segregation.The Civil Rights Movement Revolution was sparked by one woman named Rosa Parks who refused to sit at the back of a bus. The message behind the Civil Rights Movement is that blacks desire to be treated equally with whites. Blacks shall not be treated as second class citizens. Blacks deserve the same inalienable rights as whites. The Civil Rights Movement began its infancy in 1955. The Civil Rights Movement infant grew stronger rapidly. In the late 1950s, the Civil Rights Movement grew up to be a strong proud man like a weight lifter.America was faced with one of the most important issues of all time, the Civil Rights Movement decade. In the essay â€Å"Civil Rights Movement† by Duncan Townson, it states: â€Å"The struggle of massive, non-violent civil disobedience campaigns was pioneered by Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. , who led the successful Montgomery bus boycott in Alabama in 1955-6. This was followed in 1960 by sit-ins, which were started by black students at Greensboro, North Carolina who were refused service at a whites-only lunch counter. Sit-ins spread to seven other Southern states within a month and succeeded in ending segregation in many public facilities.They were followed by Freedom Rides, in which white students joined blacks in breaking down segregation at bus terminals. The Meredith incident (1962), when a black student sought admission to the University of Mississippi, the Birmingham demonstrations (1963), during which Martin Luther King made his ‘I have a dream’ speech to over 200,000 people, all kept the pressure on the Kennedy and Johnson administrations† (A Dictionary of Contemporary History). According to an article, ‘We Shall Overcome. ’†Government, Politics, and Protest, â€Å" many demonstrators during the Civil Rights Movement freedom marches were killed.The Catholic churches, the Jewish synagogues, a nd President John F. Kennedy supported the Civil Rights Movement of the 1960s. Then during President Lyndon B. Johnson’s administration, two major pieces of legislation were signed into law. Congress passed the Civil Rights Act of 1964. One year later, Congress passed the Voting Rights Act of 1965 where African Americans were allowed to vote. The Civil Rights Movement became the wise old sage encouraging America to pass legislation to break the chains of segregation. The giant like Goliath named segregation was slain by the Civil Rights Movement, a wise King David. In 1951, a voice against segregation was evident in African American literature. The Civil Rights Movement dream began with the message of the Langston Hughes poem â€Å"Dream Boogie. † The underlying message from the poem â€Å"Dream Boogie† is the dream for racial equality must be heard. Comedy is incorporated in the poem â€Å"Dream Boogie†. â€Å"You think/It’s a happy beat? †(lines eight and nine) The boogie-woogie pianist is not stomping out a happy beat. The beat of the poem is an unhappy beat that wants to stomp out the fire of racial inequality fueled by segregationThe poem ends with an eternal hope for the four girls. â€Å"Four little girls/Might be awakened someday soon/By songs upon the breeze/As yet unfelt among the magnolia trees. †(lines 24-27). The four girls died for a great cause, the Civil Rights Movement. The four innocent souls will wake up in a far safer place where there is sweet music and no more violence. There is eternal hope for the innocent girls who were walking to Sunday school on that tragic day. All of the tragedies from the Civil Rights Movement do not compare with the glory of its success.According to Wil Haygood’s Art Review, there is the legacy of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. that is portrayed in some of the art work that is shown at the International Gallery in the Smithsonian’s S. Dillon Ripley Center. One piece of artwork is a collage of photographs of the civil rights leader; the collage is called â€Å"In the Spirit of Martin: The Living Legacy of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. † A John Wilson charcoal and pastel portrait shows Dr. King’s head tilted to the left with tired eyes. The Civil Rights Movement fallen heroes are shown in a Norman Rockwell oil painting. Rockwell’s oil painting â€Å"Murder in Mississippi† shows one black civil rights activist shot dead and rests in the arms of one of the white men. The painting shows another black civil rights activist shot dead and lying on the floor in the pool of his own blood. Rockwell’s imagery reminds everyone that the Civil Rights Movement was expensive as a lot of blood was spilled in the name of racial equality. The segregationists had a more expensive price to pay. The move toward integration bound the feet that beat out the rhythm of segregation.The music during the Civil Rights Movement had both black and white influences. The music during the 1960s was music that was integrated. According to Ashley Kahn’s article â€Å"Songs of the Civil Rights Era,† the folk singer Bob Dylan wrote â€Å"A Hard Rain’s Gonna Fall† and Stephen Stills wrote â€Å"For What It’s Worth. † The song writing of Bob Dylan influenced Mavis Staples’ father. Mavis Staples was a member of the Staple Singers which became one of the first black singing groups to work with both Bob Dylan and Stephen Stills. Bob Dylan’s folk songs encouraged the Staple Singers to write freedom march songs.The freedom march song â€Å"March up Freedom’s Highway† written by the Staple Singers was sung on the Alabama march. The next song written by the Staple Singers was â€Å"Long Walk to D. C. † which was sung on the Washington march. The Staple Singers song â€Å"Why Am I Treated So Bad† was written to be sung before Dr. King’s speech. Dr. King’s favorite freedom song was â€Å"Why Am I Treated So Bad. † The Civil Rights Movement freedom songs were songs of victory and hope. The Civil Rights Movement reminds us about the brotherhood of human kind. Americans are to treat every person as an equal.There is nothing that can create a barrier between people working together. There is no law of segregation anymore to divide the cultures of America. Every culture is an equally important piece of the American apple pie. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. said: I say to you today, my friends, that in spite of the difficulties and frustrations of the moment, I still have a dream. It is a dream deeply rooted in the American dream. I have a dream that one day this nation will rise up and live out the true meaning of its creed: ‘We hold these truths to be self-evident that all men are created equal. †¦ I have a dream that my four children will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin but by the content of their character. I have a dream today. I have a dream that one day the state of Alabama, whose governor’s lips are presently dripping with the words of interposition and nullification, will be transformed into a situation where little black boys and black girls will be able to join hands with little white boys and white girls and walk together as sisters and brothers. I have a dream today. (An excerpt from the Address at the March on Washington, Rosa Parks teaches Americans never to give in to being tolerant of the injustice done to others. If another person sees injustice is carried out on another person, the witness needs to advocate for the victim. When personal injustice is carried out, self advocacy is very important. According to an article titled â€Å"Rosa Parks† written by Malcolm West, Rosa Parks paid the same amount of bus fare as the white passengers did. Rosa’s money was just as much legal tender as the white man’s money. The white bus driver told Rosa Parks to pick a seat in the back of the bus.Rosa Parks refused to receive any injustice that the white bus driver was dishing out. â€Å"People always say that I didn’t give up my seat because I was tired, but that wasn’t true. I was not tired physically, or no more tired than I usually was at the end of a working day. I was not old, although some people have an image of me as being old then. I was forty-two. No, the only tired I was, was tired of giving in,† stated Rosa Parks. The bus driver James Blake demanded that Rosa Parks stand up. Rosa Parks emphatically said, â€Å"No. † The bus driver replied, â€Å"Well I’m going to have you arrested,† Rosa Parks said, â€Å"You may do that. Rosa Parks was arrested for violating the unfair laws of segregation. There was hope for Rosa Parks as she made her bail and went back to her home. The act of defiance by Rosa Parks sparked the one-day boycott of the city bus system on December 5, 1955 in which the local Women’s Political Council lead. The self advocacy of Rosa Parks sparked the huge revolution of anti segregation called the Civil Rights Movement. It sometimes takes just one person who is defiant against social injustice to create a revolution that can change the world in many ways.Any social change begins with one person acting on behalf of the welfare of others. The dream of social justice is built on the solid foundation of hope. A dream should never be deferred because of giving into defeat. All human beings were designed to live out any dream that is integrated with victory. The key ingredients that abolished the slavery of segregation were the African American activists, the development of the Civil Rights Movement, the racial equality poetry, the freedom march songs, the freedom marches, the Civil Rights Act of 1964, and the Voting Rights Act of 1965.The power behind the Civil Rights Movement shattered the chains of segregation. No society should enforce laws that oppress its people through segregation. Every person who is a member of society should have the same rights, live in the same neighborhoods, work in the same companies, attend the same colleges, and become successful like anyone else. The walls of color have been torn down just like the Berlin Wall that segregated East Germany from West Germany. The United States is a country united as one integrated society. America has become a â€Å"melting pot† of many cultures.Each culture has an opportunity to contribute equally to society. Our country is a mural painted with many beautiful colors that God created. God is the painter, our country is the canvas, and the people are the paints used to create a wonderful masterpiece. The Civil Rights Movement is forever allowing more color to be added to our national painting. The emancipation from segregation is the Civil Rights Movement.