Michelle Alexander's Separate But Equal

The original Jim Crow was a racial caste system that segregated blacks from whites. With these Jim Crow Laws in act, whites were the ones who were privileged and viewed as the chosen ones while African Americans were taught to be the minority in America and used as servants between the 1870’s and the 1960’s. Under these laws, which were legalized further by the Plessy v. Ferguson court case, black citizens were made out to be second class in all forms of intellectual and social life. Members of the black community were segregated to unequal and separate establishments, and they were also suppressed by both the legal system as well as the white members found within their communities. The purpose of these laws were to support white supremacy

This system definitely upheld its saying, “Separate but Equal.” In 1964 the Civil Rights Act was passed to outlaw discrimination due to one's color of skin. Although this act was passed, we still continue to live in a society where discrimination is quite relevant but systemized. It is especially seen in the system of incarceration. Throughout Michelle Alexander's book, we can understand her argument that there is a new yet evolving form of legal discrimination, although there are laws that state that discriminating an individual because of their race is illegal. I find it to be extremely ironic that we have laws that claim discrimination to be illegal, yet other laws only lead to discriminatory acts that the public tends to be blind towards. Michelle explains that there is a current mass incarceration among black men in the United States and the rates of these men continue to increase over time. The use of, possession of, or selling of drugs is illegal, but it has been systematically created that laws make it impossible to do so. She claims that the criminal justice system uses the war on drugs in our country as a way to discriminate and repress the black men who live in our country. Her theory is based primarily

Both Alexander and Katznelson help us understand how racial caste systems are not incidents of the past, but an issue we still struggle to acknowledge today. Within Katznelson’s novel, readers are given factual content and historical justification as to why the government should still keep affirmative action alive. Katznelson's main principle focuses on bases of the historical social programs of both Franklin Roosevelt's New Deal and Harry Truman's Fair Deal from the 1930's and from the 1940's. Even though African Americans benefited from what came after these deals, Katznelson shows us that blacks often received far less help that the white Americans who were also helped out as well. He asserts that these programs are not only discriminating against blacks, but actually contribute to expanding the gap between black and white Americans, which is judged in terms of the quality of jobs, educational achievement, and equal pay. As Katznelson argues for the necessity and the importance of affirmative action in the present world, he urges readers that policy makers from then and now have failed to consider how unjust and how unfairly blacks had been treated by the government before any movements or revolutions became normalized in the