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Dbq Essay On African American Equality

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The road to equality for African Americans has always been a bumpy one and still continues to this day. Using hindsight, historians determined that the Civil War and Reconstruction were vital to the fight for equality in the United States, despite the steps that the states took to keep African Americans segregated from society through Black Codes and Jim Crow laws. With the Thirteenth, Fourteenth, and Fifteenth Amendments being written into the Constitution during the Reconstruction period as a result of the Civil War, slaves were finally seen as people rather than property. Though the Reconstruction after the Civil War did not create a society where Black people weren't oppressed, this period in time still made significant progress toward creating a more equal society. The Thirteenth, Fourteenth, and Fifteenth Amendments made significant progress toward equality. The Thirteenth Amendment …show more content…

Black Codes and Jim Crow laws were created using loopholes in the Amendments. For example, the Thirteenth Amendment states that slavery is abolished "except as a punishment for crime" ("Constitution of the United States," art. 13, sec 1). As a result, laws were passed to enforce segregation and limit the freedom of African Americans. Breaking these laws resulted in forced labor, basically reinstating parts of the slavery system. Also, the right to vote was taken away from many African Americans. Poll taxes and literacy tests were instated, targeted at newly freed slaves because they did not have either the money or education to meet new guidelines. Poor and illiterate White Americans were not subjected to the same guidelines because they were protected by grandfather clauses. Black Codes and Jim Crow laws were a setback to a more equal society because they stripped African Americans of the rights they were just granted during

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