Saturday, September 24, 2011

Well, obviously.

Jim Crow laws. 1880s through the 1960s.

They make perfect sense to me.

Clearly, colored people in this time period were deemed 'inferior' for good reason. Though that reason is kind of unclear to me, it must have been excellent, because of all the laws that limited African Americans.


Textbooks: Books shall not be interchangeable between the white and colored schools, but shall be continued to be used by the race first using them.
Oh of course. This should be a no-brainer. Obviously children in grade school should not only be split up because of skin color, go to different schools, but their textbooks should carefully be kept within their own race.

But wait, what if a child is half-white and half-black? What does that child do?

No worries, no worries, the Jim Crow laws took care of that too!


Intermarriage: The marriage of a person of Caucasian blood with a Negro, Mongolian, Malay, or Hindu shall be null and void. (Arizona)

Intermarriage: All marriages between a white person and a Negro person or between a white person and a person of Negro descent to the fourth generation inclusive, are hereby forever prohibited. (Florida)


Intermarriage: It shall be unlawful for a white person to marry anyone except a white person. Any marriage in violation of this section shall be void.


Intermarriage: All marriages between . white persons and Negroes or white persons and Mongolians... are prohibited and declared absolutely void... . No person having one-eighth part or more of Negro blood shall be permitted to marry any white person, nor shall any white person be permitted to marry any Negro or person having one-eighth part or more of Negro blood. (Missouri)


Intermarriage: All marriages of white persons with Negroes, Mulattos, Mongolians, or Malaya hereafter contracted in the state of Wyoming are and shall be illegal and void. (Wyoming)
I'm glad they decided to be extremely specific, and to go as far to say if one has "one-eighth part or more of Negro blood" that that marriage will be null and void. Does that mean if a person has one-sixteenth Negro blood, that marriage would be accepted? Also...would anyone even be able to tell if someone is one-eighth black? Hm. Interesting thought.


Circus Tickets: All circuses, shows and tent exhibitions, to which the attendance of.more than one race is invited or expected to attend shall provide for the convenience of its patrons not less than two ticket offices with individual sellers, and not less than two entrances to the said performance, with individual ticket takers and receivers, and in the case of outside or tent performances, the said ticket offices shall not be less than twenty-five feet (25) apart. (Louisiana)
This law is my personal favorite. Circus tickets? Wow. Whoever made up these rules was very clearly thoughtful. I can just see a stuffy, wrinkly old man in horn rimmed glasses hunched over his paper. He's tapping his chin and furrowing his brow, thinking "Did I miss anything?" And he thinks, oh! I forgot to mention circuses. He also remembers to mention theaters, baseball, and juvenile delinquents. How very thoughtful.


Obviously, these laws aren't enforced nowadays. It's too bad, right? After all that time and effort they put in to restrict many, many people from having basic human rights? Too bad...

1 comment:

  1. Wonderfully put, Fatima. I totally agree. I think I'm going to change my MoPro topic to whether the Jim Crow Laws should be re-implimented or not. Of course, it will be difficult, as there is a lot of evidence for why they should be, and hardly any information on why they should not. Why did we get rid of these, in the first place? Abe Lincoln is my least favorite president.

    ReplyDelete