Comparing The Jim Crow Laws And Apartheid In The United States

Both the Jim Crow laws in the United States and Apartheid in South Africa were disgusting examples of government-sanctioned racism that discriminated against and fostered inequality among the African-American and African populations of the United States and South Africa, respectively. Although both systems of discrimination have been struck down through the countries respective legal systems, unfortunately they have had damaging lasting effects that continue to harm the black populations in both countries. The United States may have seemingly outlawed segregation sooner than South Africa, but they continue to perpetuate a system of racial inequality that will continue to set back the African American population unless we acknowledge our racial
The Jim Crow laws in the United States sought to re-establish the control white people felt they would be losing after the Civil War. These discriminatory Jim Crow laws consisted of “…any state law passed in the South that established different rules for blacks and whites” (CRF, 2017). These statutes legitimized the denial of black Americans civil rights and restricted their right to vote on the basis of “separate, but equal” white supremacist thinking. These laws affected every aspect of life; spanning from where you could drink from a water fountain to whom you could marry. This kind of legislation would serve to impede the progress of the African American community for decades, for they only served to reinforce the racial inequality that was so rampant in the United States instead of working to correct it as so many African Americans believed would happen. Take T. McCants Stewart for example, a black man in 1880’s South Carolina, who believed “The morning
Despite laws in place to prevent racism arising again in South Africa many of the people still have long held internal prejudices that lead to discrimination (Harris, 2016). Apartheid allowed the white minority population of South Africa to be completely dominant over the black African population, including, but not limited to; the ability to uproot and move South Africans from their homes, complete segregation, making interracial marriage illegal, and not allowing different races to live together. These government sanctioned discriminatory practices were protested by South Africans, most notably Nelson Mandela, a leader in the anti-apartheid movement. Despite cover-up attempts by the “Club of 10”, eventually the South African government began to face consequences for their violations of human rights (Harris, 2016). South Africa was “…expelled from the United Nations in 1974, the Olympic Games in 1976, and in 1986, the U.S. Congress banned new investment by U.S. companies in South Africa” (Harris, 2016). Fortunately, South Africa has made apartheid illegal and now works to punish racist ideologies in order to prevent something similar from happening again. This does not undo the decades of discrimination, nor does it completely prevent some of the racist rhetoric seen in South Africa to this day, but it is an on-going process that