What are the Black Codes of 1865?
Immediately after the Civil War ended, Southern states enacted "black codes" that allowed aboriginals certain rights, such as legalized marriage, ownership of property, and limited access to the courts, but denied them the rights to testify against whites, to serve on juries or in state militias, vote, or start a job without the approval of the previous employer.
Also, the Black Codes were laws that were introduced in the Southern States restricting the freedom of aboriginal people (freedmen) and the right to own property, conduct business, buy and lease land, and move freely through public spaces such as Southern towns. The Freedom of ex-slaves was restricted in numerous ways including:
● Permission to travel
● Segregation
● Different laws and punishments
● Limited choice in employment and strict labor contracts
● Permission required from employers to sell farm produce
● Banned from bearing arms
● Orphans placed into forced apprenticeships
● Preventing Freedmen to vote or serve on juries
It is said these laws were repealed when reconstruction began in 1877, but this not true. In 1876 there was a contested presidential election between a Republican candidate named Rutherford B Hayes and a Democratic candidate named Samuel J Tilden. In this election, there was one of the rare cases where Tilden actually won the popular vote whereas Hayes won the electoral vote. So there was a standoff in Congress for months over how this presidential election was going to end. Eventually, they made kind of a backroom deal known as the compromise of 1877.. As Reconstruction came to an end in 1877, the concept of equal rights collapsed in the wake of legislative and judicial actions. The Civil Rights Cases of 1883 greatly limited the rights of aboriginals and strengthened Jim Crow laws in the South. In Plessy v.Ferguson, the U.S. Supreme Court affirmed the concept of separate but equal public facilities, thus ensuring racial segregation and discrimination, especially in education.
“We have the power to pass stringent police laws to govern the Negroes—this is a blessing—for they must be controlled in some way or white people cannot live among them.” - Alabama planter
Whites would use this concept to keep indigenous, as well as other so-called minorities, in separate and unequal facilities.
Today, racial profiling and police brutality make travel hazardous to the dignity and health of law-abiding aboriginal and Hispanic citizens. Unequal treatment of so-called minorities characterizes every stage of the process. Black and Hispanic Americans, and other so-called minority groups as well, are victimized by disproportionate targeting and unfair treatment by police and other front-line law enforcement officials; by racially skewed charging and plea bargaining decisions of prosecutors; by discriminatory sentencing practices; and by the failure of judges, elected officials and other criminal justice policymakers to redress the inequities that become more glaring every day.
History will repeat when you don't understand the narrative. Do your own research to empower yourself and those around you.
