The Role Of African Americans During The Reconstruction Era

Ja'Mes Smith

4 March 2017

American Literature Honors

Mrs. Begick

The Loss of Basic Rights with Black Codes or Racial Segregation with Jim Crow?

The result of the Civil War in 1865 positively and negatively affected African Americans during the Reconstruction era. The positive outcome that came out of the victory of the Civil War was the freedom gained by millions of slaves from the South. Freeing the slaves, however negatively resulted in the creation of Black Codes, which were enforced by whites, to control the basic rights of African American people. When the Reconstruction Era came to an end in 1877, many laws from the Black Codes were passed and helped build the Jim Crow Laws that implemented racial segregation in the
Although sharing similar views of the identity of African Americans, they were created for two different reasons. "Jim Crow Laws were... established... to separate the white and black races in the American South... It was to create "separate but equal" treatment, but... condemned black citizens to inferior treatment and facilities" ("Jim"). Black Codes focused more on eliminating the rights of African Americans unlike Jim Crow Laws whose objective was to set whites and blacks apart in the Southern states . To keep blacks and whites from interacting with each one another, "'Whites only' and 'colored' signs were constant reminders of the enforced racial order... mandating segregation of schools, parks, libraries, drinking fountains, restrooms, buses, trains, and restaurants" (Jim Crow Laws. PBS."). Even though they were able to do things that Black Codes restricted, African Americans still had to live with unfair conditions that came from Jim Crow Laws. In most states where the laws of Jim Crow were enacted, whites usually had a better environment with cleaner bathrooms and drinkable fresher water than the environment of African American people. African Americans felt inferior to the white race as they always ended with the short end of the stick. For example, " A white person never had to stand on a Montgomery bus... it frequently occurred that blacks boarding the bus
Even though both the Black Codes and the Jim Crow Laws played a role in limiting African Americans of their rights and the use of public places, Black Codes unquestionably negatively impacted the lives of blacks more than the laws of Jim Crow. Firstly, the laws of Black Codes required anyone of the African American race to pay a fine based on their job title. " In South Carolina, a law prohibited blacks from holding any occupation other than farmer or servant unless they paid an annual tax of $10 to $100. This provision hit free blacks... and former slave artisans especially hard" ("Black"). White southerners did not allow African Americans to hold a job title equal to a white's without a paying a fee which resulted in many African Americans to go into farming or serving, due to the annual tax. Jobs for African Americans were difficult to find so many of them were homeless but that was another reason why Black Codes were hard on blacks. In states like Mississippi and South Carolina who were the first to enforced Black Codes, even being homeless was difficult. " Blacks were given heavy penalties for vagrancy, including plantation labor in some cases" ("Black"). Homeless African Americans were being fined because of their struggling situation. The laws of the Black Codes resulted in many homeless African Americans, and as a