African American History

Discussion 1

Revolutionary ideas of African-American towards freedom and independence

            The enlightenment of America plays an important role in determining the aspects of current colonial America. Without the ideas of enlightenment, America would have been a different country. Declaration of independence is based upon the enlightenment ideologies. Enlightenment affected all the aspects of religion and life. People like Thomas Jefferson from American history were very influenced by the enlightenment. It showcased the power of democracy and the role of people in shaping the government and this was also one of the ideologies of African-Americans to have equal power or the balance of power. The enlightenment movement also helped Americans to oppose the extra taxes enforced upon them by British government same as what African-Americans thought when they were treated as slaves and were asked to pay extra taxes to government. Enlightenment also had a major influence of religion and many colonies shaped due to religion. Now people were free to choose the church they need membership for and were not at all forced to do so. This ideology of freedom and free will was also one of the most important ideologies which African-Americans had to get the freedom and live their life on their own terms (May, 2010).

The 19^th century Abolition movement

            Slavery was very common in colonial era, in that era some of the Americans opposed the slavery and also protested against it. This movement was termed as ‘Abolition movement’. This movement was one of the reasons which led to American Civil war. Soon after Abolition movement started, it became the important and key element in American politics. In 1856, the Republican Party candidate Abraham Lincoln became the president of United States as the party was against the slavery. People like Frederick Douglass, Harriet Tubman, and Harriet Beecher Stove were very leading in this movement and helped people to create an anti-slavery society. This movement changed the fate of all the slaves after Abraham Lincoln was declared as President of United states as issued Emancipation Proclamation to free all the slaves (Upchurch, 2011).

Discussion 2

The Role of Blacks in Civil war

            African-Americans or Blacks  served Civil war from both the sides i.e. The Union and the Confederate. Many times, the Civil war is represented as White Northerners were fighting with the White Southerners and blacks waiting for their fate to be decided. But it is not true because around 1.8 million African-Americans served around 160 units of the Union army. Only one percent of blacks resided in North. In 1865, freedman and slaves started serving Confederate troops. The African-American on both the sides served in multiple roles like nurses, cooks etc. during the war. The blacks in southern army were used to build fortifications and also perform camp duties. In northern army they served as guardians of bridges and railroads and were also assigned some non-combat duties. The main reason for this was that the southerners refused to give arms to the blacks and northern officers were having a belief that blacks would not fight. These people also served as scouts and spies in Union army and the data gathered by these spies was very helpful as it has information about the plans of Confederate armies (Gordon, 2000).

Discussion 3

Factions of Reconstruction under Lincoln, Johnson, and the Radical Republicans

            A faction under Andrew Johnson and Abraham Lincoln was in favor mild ways to bring back South America to normal mode, but the other faction, Radical Republicans lead by Benjamin Wade, Thaddeus Stevens and Charles Sumner wanted to adopt harsh policies and upgrade the rights to freedom. The President Abraham Lincoln was shot by the associates of south as he and his party were opposing slavery. All the measures taken by the government were opposed by the southerner’s white and increased racial issue. Southerners started hating northerners for the radical policies and so north hated south for their white supremacy beliefs. The benefits of all the efforts was that the reconstruction was less brutal than it could have and also redistribution of assets/property helped each and every individual in south (Billington, 1988).

Resurgence and increase in white racism

            After reconstruction as well south was having a war between the whites and the blacks. Blacks were still treated as inferior and it was shown in the behavior and act of whites. Whites always took measures to decrease the influence of blacks from politics. White through various acts like grandfather clause, poll tax, literacy taxes tried to vanish the legalization of black voters. Apart from this many Jim Crow segregation laws were created for the use of public transportation and facilities.

            Black tried many efforts to protest against the new rules through protesting, filing legal cases and even boycotts but all of them were in vain. Whites, to enforce the new laws, aimed blacks who tried to compete politically or economically. To overcome these situations African-Americans left south. Due to decrease in black population and new rules, whites became more powerful and were having command of justice system. As soon as the command of justice system was in hands of white again they punished blacks for a crime more harshly than the whites and often refusing to punish whites.

            In 1920s, scholars described black’s inferiors in their theories and films like “The Birth of a Nation” portraying blacks as criminal and stupid were trending. KKK, the Ku Klux Klan emerged as a highly influential political group as they included Jews, immigrants along with the black in the list of hatred groups. NAACP continued to work for the welfare of blacks and get rid of racial discrimination from political and social system. (Pooler, 2013)

Discussion 4

Relationship between the Great Depression, and President Roosevelt’s New Deal, and World War II

It was October 29 of the year 1929, which gave rise to the Great Depression. This was the Tuesday, which is considered as “Black Tuesday” in American history due to great crash in the stock market. The nation’s economic condition started deteriorating. The employment market was heavily affected leading high rate of unemployment and inflation. In order to revive the economic stability, the American president Franklin Roosevelt, initiated several programs which are commonly as New Deal. Moreover, the beginning of World War II in 1939, had made the economic condition more critical due to due to distortion of foreign trade. It is the Franklin Roosevelt’s New Deal and participation of America in 1941 which helped the country regenerate the economic prosperity (Trotter, 2004).

Effects on the African American

During the period of Great Depression and World War II, the rate unemployment among African Americans increased tremendously. In the southern part they were ill-treated and misbehaved at the work place due to this, they were forced to move to western part and work in the cotton fields. Black women were exploited by the payment of starvation wages and were treated as slaves. Moreover, the President Roosevelt’s New Deal had further infused more discrimination among blacks and whites. The main reason for this was to get support of southern democrats to pass the regulations of New Deal. They unwillingly forced to do so. The discrimination against African Americans was noticed in every policy of New Deal such as the National Recovery Administration (NRA), the Federal Housing Authority (FHA), the Civilian Conservation Corps (CCC), Agricultural Adjustment Administration (AAA), National Youth Administration (NYA), etc. African Americans were deprived of several rights and their life miserably during these events. They were liable to get social security benefits (Rosati, & Scott, 2010).

Discussion 5

Role of radical groups, individuals, and organizations in the Civil Rights Movement 1965-1980

In the American history, the word ‘black’ was used to describe enslaved Africans. Negro was the alternative term used for them. Their struggles to get racial justice empowered them to initiate the self-destructive Black Power Movement. Their violent acts, grandiloquence, misogyny have been reasons for their demonization. The Black Power movement had taken place during the final phase of the Civil Rights Movement to get political powers and rights. Violence was used as a tool in this movement in the United States (Neal, n.d.).

Malcolm X laid the foundation of Black Power movement by challenging the Civil Rights movement and ideologies of non-violence and integration advocated by Martin Luther King Jr. The Civil Rights movement was challenged as no improvements were noticed in racial discrimination. He advocate by the use of violence or any necessary means for self-defence and physical retaliation. After his assassination, the BLACK PANTHER PARTY was formed by HUEY NEWTON and BOBBY SEALE. They encouraged the formation and joining of black political parties to acquire challenging political power that lead to their social and economic development.  The Black Arts Movement was an innovative form of movement to whereby artists and students were calling for the liberty of blacks by making use of artistic sources such as music, fine-art, and literature. In this movement, the use of art was done to communicate African Americans’ aspiration for self-determination and civil rights. The promotion of black separatism was the main agenda of this movement. This movement started in 1965, when Le roi Jones set up the Black Arts Repertory Theatre/School (BARTS). The Black student movement is divided into the two stages. In the first stage which began in 1960s, the protests and demonstrations were by SNCC and CORE to increase the registration of black voters. However, during the second stage, white colleges were forced by black students to increase number of classes to provide education of black history and culture. Black students started forming the Black Student Union (Joseph, 2009).

References

Billington, R., A. (1988). American History before 1877. Lanham: Rowman & Littlefield.

Gordon, J., U. (2000). Black Leadership for Social Change. Westport: Greenwood Publishing Group.

Joseph, P. E. (2009). The Black Power Movement: A State of the Field. The Journal of American History: 751-776.

May, C. (2010). Evangelism and Resistance in the Black Atlantic, 1760-1835. Athens: University of Georgia Press.

Neal, L. (n.d.).The Black Arts Movement. Summer 1968. Retrieved February 27, 2016, from http://nationalhumanitiescenter.org/pds/maai3/community/text8/blackartsmovement.pdf

Pooler, N. (2013). Chapter 17: African Americans and the 1920’s: The Harle. Retrieved February 26, 2016, from http://wps.prenhall.com/wps/media/objects/228/233995/im_ch17_1.pdf

Rosati, J., A., & Scott, J., M. (2010). The Politics of United States Foreign Policy. Boston: Cengage Learning.

Trotter, J., W. (2004). African Americans, Impact of the Great Depression on the Great Depression. Macmillan Reference USA (1): 8-17.

Upchurch, T., A. (2011). Abolition Movement. Santa Barbara: ABC-CLIO.