When Abraham Lincoln signed the emancipation proclamation on January 1, 1863, Emancipation Proclamation states that African-Americans “Shall be the, henceforward and forever free.” However in the southern states of America the majorly profits were made from cotton farms. These cotton farms were maintained by African-American slaves, that worked for a little or no pay and endured horrible working conditions. Due to the fact that the slaves were making the white's source of income the Emancipation Proclamation did not free a single slave. This triggered a civil war in between the Northern States of America and Southern States of America. This gruesome battle was won by the northern states in 1861. After a civil war came a change in the legislation. In 1868, the 14th Amendment was added to the Constitution gave blacks equal protection …show more content…
While the African Americans were overjoyed to be free and American citizens the white were not. In 1870, the 15th Amendment granted blacks the right to vote. Still, many whites, especially those in the South, were unhappy that people they’d once enslaved were now on a more-or-less equal playing field. To keep the blacks separated the whites the whites started “Jim Crow” Laws, this erased all the progress the previous legislation had done. The “Jim Crow” laws were laws that prevented blacks from using the same public facilities as the whites, this included bathrooms, schools, and restaurants to name a