From Slavery to Freedom
When the United States abolished chattel slavery in 1865, it created the potential for a new economic reality for millions of African-American slaves and their former masters. For some (especially elderly slaves), the situation did not change at all--the new free citizens continued to work for those who were their masters during the slavery era. Most of those who did escape slavery found themselves without security, resources, connections, job prospects, and (sometimes) basic civil rights. But others adapted immediately to their newfound freedom--and thrived.
- Read more: Jourdon Anderson's Letter to His Old Master
Lynchings and the White Supremacist Movement
Some whites, upset by the abolition of slavery and the defeat of the Confederacy, created new posses and organizations--such as the Ku Klux Klan and the White League--to maintain whites' privileged social status, and to violently punish African Americans who did not fully submit to the old social order.
- Read more: The Ku Klux Klan (KKK)
The Black Codes
After the war, several Southern states immediately took measures to see to it that African Americans were still subjected to their masters (now called "employers"), who could still have them jailed for disobedience, arrested if they tried to escape, and so forth. Newly freed slaves also faced other drastic civil rights violations. Laws creating segregation and otherwise limiting the rights of African Americans soon became known as "Jim Crow laws."
- Read more: The Black Codes of 1865
The Fourteenth Amendment
The federal government responded to the Black Codes with the Fourteenth Amendment, which would have banned all forms of prejudicial discrimination if the Supreme Court had actually enforced it.
- Read more: The Fourteenth Amendment
A Worthless Supreme Court
In the midst of these discriminatory laws, practices, and traditions, the U.S. Supreme Court consistently refused to protect the rights of African Americans. In 1883, it even struck down the federal Civil Rights of 1875--which, if enforced, would have ended Jim Crow 89 years early.
- Read more: Top 10 Racist Supreme Court Rulings
The Jim Crow Years
For a half century after the American Civil War, Jim Crow laws ruled the American South--but they would not rule forever. Beginning with a crucial Supreme Court ruling, Guinn v. United States (1915), the Supreme Court began to chip away at segregation laws.
- Read more: Creation of the Jim Crow South