How Did Jim Crow Laws Lead To The Failure Of The Civil Rights Movement

Following the Reconstruction era, there was a huge gap between the freedoms of black and white people. Many black were barred from voting because of poll taxes, literacy tests, and the grandfather clause. Schools were segregated and unequal. Blacks could not fully partake in the American Dream. Racism was a powder keg ready to explode. There was a lot of violence against black during this time. Both blacks and some whites demanded change for equality among blacks. Change happened slowly through civil disobedience and federal laws. The African American Civil Rights movement of the 1950s and 1960s was effective at addressing the failures of Reconstruction Era largely through the civil disobedience methods of martin Luther King Jr. rather than

Jim Crow laws were the philosophy of “separate but equal” (doc#1). The argument against Jim Crow laws was that “separate educational facilities are inherently unequal”(doc #1). The Case Brown V Board of Education (1954) declared that education had to be equal. This led to forced bussing where black students were bussed to white schools. This resulted in mixed success because kids were displaced from their home communities. Many white people did not like black people coming to their schools. There was protests and riots against forced bussing. “Mob rule cannot be allowed to override the decisions of our courts” (doc#2). President Eisenhower had to send troops to little rock Arkansas so that the students could attend school. The decree of law did not solve the problem of unequal schools. On paper it was a good idea but in reality it did not have public acceptance and did not help the blacks or win white

Blacks could not vote because of poll taxes literacy tests, and the grandfather clause. The poll tax is where blacks are charged a fee to vote which blacks could not pay. The Literacy test was an extremely confusing test that blacks had to take if they wanted to vote. The grandfather case said if your grandfather could vote than you could vote so whites could get out of the poll taxes and literacy test. All three of these laws were an unfair means of keeping blacks from voting. The march from Selma to Montgomery Alabama in 1965 was a protest against black injustice. In response to these protest President Johnson set the stage for the Voting Rights Act of 1965. The Voting Rights Act “struck down restriction to voting in all election (doc#6). This allowed blacks to vote. It enhanced democracy because more people could vote. Civil disobedience resulted in this law being enacted. In 1960 before the law was enacted the percent of total black registration in the south was “29.1%” (doc#7). In 1968 after the voting law was enacted the total rose to “62.0%”