Ava DuVernay, a movie director and screenwriter, produced the film 13th to inform her audience how the 13th amendment has affected America’s criminal justice system.Taking a serious approach, DuVernay covers historical events, such as slavery, to present day events that have played a key role in the creation of America’s criminal justice system. This visual presentation demonstrates how corrupt the system is through the interviews, the background music and statistics. She utilizes interviewees from both the White and African American community in order to receive both perspectives. The source is organized by a timeline. She begins by doing a brief overview of slavery and the passing of the 13th amendments. Then, she discusses how these events…
Initial thought of the 13th amendment is freedom, a freedom that was given to those forced into slavery. So if it was written to bring good to those affected; why is it that, it can be used to do more harm than good. Upon being written, the drafters set themselves up with an extremely credulous loophole, a clause that can go on simply missed by its definition. That same very clause which can be used as a method to legally make business out of slavery and to just as legally make enslavement a punishment for those who are incarcerated. Which is exactly what the Netflix Documentary, 13th, is all about, more specifically on how the American system of incarceration affects people of color. The film follows the chronological term of events in America’s…
The 13th amendment was passed by congress In 1865. This amendment allowed the slaves to become freedmen. This time of great celebration in the beginning was called the Reconstruction period. Just like all good times the joy usually passes and turns into something far scarier. Reconstruction failed due to people exploiting the freedmen.…
The 13th Amendment is the constitutional amendment that abolished slavery after the Civil War, which was passed by the Congress on January 31st, 1865. While the 14th Amendment was to officially make the former slaves citizens of the United States after the Civil War, which enforce the absolute equality of the two races.…
Supreme Court discussed the conditions surrounding the implementation of the Fourteenth Amendment in 1868. It argued about the past practices of racial segregation and views of the proponents and opponents of the Amendment when drafted by Congress were rather different therefore, the question presented before the Court should not be determined by the circumstances in which it was adopted. Furthermore, the Court asserted that the status of public education has changed from the time the Amendment was written. At the time, in the South, the movement supporting free education had not been initiated. White children were mostly educated in privately while education in the African American community was absent.…
Due to the Civil War, the South was not what it use to be, so in order to build the South back up, and for the South to become back in the Union, the Reconstruction was formed (Schultz, 2013).While many were not fans of the Reconstruction, there were a few positive outcomes of the Reconstruction. Because of the Reconstruction, there were a couple of new constitutional amendments develop such as the Nation’s first civil rights law as well as the abolition of slavery. (Schultz, 2013). These new Amendments included the 13th; this amendment was to abolish slavery (Carolina Public Humanities, 2017). The 14th amendment was to birth citizenship, due process and to have equal protection under the law, as well as the 15th Amendment, which was to…
In order to understand the cases that brought about the drastic change in the interpretation of the 14th Amendment, the three clauses of the 14th Amendment must be understood. These clauses help define what it means to be a U.S. citizen. The privileges or immunities clause was first written in Article IV section two. It was then written again in the 14th Amendment after slavery was abolished in order for equal protection guarantee. The federal government wanted to insure that states respected the rights and freedoms of former slaves. In the first section of the 14th Amendment it states, “no state shall make or enforce any law which shall abridge the privileges or immunities of citizens of the United states.” This clause was written so that…
The Civil War was an extremely messy and complicated event in American History. While there are several factors that led to the Southern states to secede from the Union, it is historically impossible to pinpoint the last bullet fired. Moreover, in academia there is a barrage of opinions on what was the deciding factor for the Civil War; one thing it is evident is that there was animosity between both sides since the inception of the United States. Additionally, one has to examine the proposed amendments to the Constitution before the Civil War to notice that the jargon used never used the word ‘slavery.’ For instance, in February 1861, Representative Thomas Corwin proposed his and amendment that barred his last name to the 36th Congress that guaranteed the seceding states that the federal government would not intervene with the particular domestic institutions; however, the word slavery was never used in the document. Stipulating that the amendment had passed, the 13th Amendment to the Constitution would have been unconstitutional, and the banning of slavery would never have occurred.…
In 1865, Amendment Thirteen of the United States was ratified. The article states that all slaves residing in the nation or any of its corresponding territories are deemed emancipated. (Document A) Though the article does publicly mandate emancipation, it fails in successfully granting freedom to previous slaves. Southern states imposed “black codes” upon the newly freedmen. These diminishing codes restricted various activities and behaviors of the black community. Many included the prevention of interracial marriage, black testaments against whites in court of law, and jobs outside of agriculture. Clearly, the Thirteenth Amendment was not strictly imposed upon the once rebellious southern states. Three years later, congress decided to enact another article that would annul the previously mandated Dred Scott Decision of 1957, which states that blacks could not be legal citizens. This newly established document was titled the Fourteenth Amendment. The amendment itself stated that all persons born or naturalized in the…
The Fourteenth Amendment was a direct outgrowth of the national debate over slavery1, and the subsequent emancipation of the slaves during the Civil War. In the aftermath of that war, Congress confronted a number of thorny issues: what would be done about the rebel leaders? Would the defeated states contribute to paying off the Union’s debts? Would slave owners be compensated for the loss of their property? What measures would be required of the defeated states as a condition of their full re-admittance to the Union? Two cases that took place before the creation of the Fourteenth Amendment are particularly important, considering that in a way or another they would help shape this Amendment: Barron vs. Baltimore and Dred Scott vs. Sanford.…
The Bill of rights, the constitution and the amendments of the constitution are the national foundation of freedom. The 14th amendment has become one of the most important parts of the constitution. The 14th amendment is divided into four sections. The 14th Amendment was designed in 1868 to stamp out lawless tyranny. Section one is to make former slaves citizens. The 14th amendment states, “All persons born or naturalized in the United States are citizens of the United States and of the state wherein they reside. Nor shall any state deprive any person of liberty or property without due process of law”. However, since the 14th…
From all this that was going on, this came create and enforce the Civil Rights Act of 1866. Which states that every citizens will have the rights that the whites had. So the equal protection clause was the reason for the 14th amendment to extend civil rights.…
While the Thirteenth Amendment is a blessing for the wealthiest people of this nation, it is a curse for the rest of the American population because it led to the hatred of minorities.…
African Americans received harsh treatment throughout the history of the US with the discriminating practice of slavery. After the ratification of the Thirteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution in 1865, this outlawed slavery and involuntary servitude, followed by the Fourteenth Amendment in 1868, this guarantees equal protection of the law to all citizens of the US. The excerpt of the Fourteenth Amendment states: “Section 1. All persons born or naturalized in the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the United States and of the State wherein they reside. No State shall make or enforce any law which shall abridge the privileges or immunities of…
The ratification of the Fourteenth Amendment, also known as the "Reconstruction Amendment", occurred after the Civil War. The purpose of the law was to protect the rights of former slaves, but it also inadvertently armed the Women's Rights Movement with a valid case. Section One of the Fourteenth Amendment, commonly referred to as the Equal Protection Clause, says that states shall not "deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws". While it does not specifically mention gender, it clearly establishes a legal basis for defense of equal rights, thus causing the ERA to become…