Jim Crow laws were segregation laws about racism. These laws were enacted in the Southern United States of America after the time of reconstruction. The Jim Crow laws lead to the racial segregation in most public facilities. The Jim Crow laws officially segregated the Americans by race. The narratives from the people who lived during Jim Crow’s time can be used to describe the segregation institutions and how Jim Crow’s laws were practiced in the society. Two narratives, one from the state of Florida and another from the state of Georgia can be used to discuss the laws of Jim Crow in the society and to describe the institution of segregation.
In the State of Florida, the laws of Jim Crow affected first the education sector. The African American children especially in those that were from the North Central Florida during the Jim Crow era experienced racialization and even racial violence. They went to different schools from those that the White children went to. At some point, the African American schools were even shut down. Relationships were also affected as no Black man, and a White woman were allowed to sleep in the same room at night. Those who were found were imprisoned or fined.
Also experienced in the state of Florida was the segregation of public facilities. Two types of segregation were experienced, the de facto segregation and the de jure segregation. These segregations lead to insight of cultural politics that lead to racial segregation of people even in the public spaces. The African Americans were forced to navigate in certain unfriendly ways in cultural and geographic spaces. The allocation of infrastructure and public works in major towns such as in the North Central Florida were based on how one viewed the different races and what his or her take on racism was.
The African Americans in the State of Florida were not happy with the act of racism and most cases had to fight back on it. The African Americans repelled racial indignities and fought for their rights to access the public resources in which most were segregated to the Whites. The African American parents in order to reduce the stigma of racism on their children they went to the extent of even giving them to the buffet anti-black racial stereotypes. This helped the African American parents to promote black identities positively. Also, a connection was made between the civil rights activism and the St. Augustine movement in Gainesville.
The “separate but equal” ruling of the US government was ineffective in the provision of career and educational opportunities in the state of Florida. In Juvenile Delinquents, white boys were separated from black boys by buildings of more than a quarter mile apart.
In Georgia State, on the other hand, the Jim Crow laws were even worse than in Florida. Armature white baseball teams were not allowed to play baseball at any point, which was two blocks within the playground devoted to the race of the Negro. This law of segregation applied to all the vacant lots and or any baseball diamond, which was located two blocks close to where the Negro race played their baseball. Also in Georgia no colored barber was allowed to serve as a barber to either a white girl or woman. The white women and girls were to be served by fellow white men or women when it comes to salons or barbershops.
Also in the state of Georgia, the officers who were in charge of burials were not allowed to conduct burials of whites and blacks in the same cemetery. The Whites were to be buried next to the Whites and the Black Americans to be buried next to their fellow Black Americans. This lead to high levels of segregation and different races were forced to build their different cemeteries during the Jim Crow’s era.
Another law in Georgia that lead to the inevitable segregation between the Whites and the Black Americans was the law that started that no White man was allowed to marry a black lady. If a White man married a black lady, their marriage was considered void. This is similar to the case of Florida where the marriage between a white person and a black man or a descendant of a Black person to the fourth generation was prohibited. The people of Georgia were; as a result, denied their right to marriage and a lot of marriages and relationships broke in the process.
Also, in the mental hospitals of Georgia, the Control Boards had distinct apartments for the Negroes and the White people. Mixing of Negroes and the White people was considered against Jim Crow’s laws. Also, the all restaurant owners only served exclusively white people or exclusively black people and not both of them. Also, parks were divided between the Whites and the Black Americans. This heightened segregation of the Whites and Black Americans and lead to more racism experienced between the two groups of people.
In conclusion, from the narratives we can see that the Jim Crow’s laws when applied to the society increased the level of racism. More ways of segregation were come up wit to ensure no interaction between the White Americans and the Black Americans. There were different laws for different states but some were similar in the states such as the education laws, the Juvenile laws and the marriage laws in both Florida and Georgia. The rest may have been different but still were aimed at segregating the White Americans from the Black Americans.
Works Cited
Duke University Libraries. Digital Collections. Interviews from Different States. Retrieved http://library.duke.edu/digitalcollections/behindtheveil/
