Field Trip to Maycomb

Supplemental Notes

13th Amendment

• Passed in 1865• Outlawed slavery and involuntary

servitude (except as punishment for a convicted crime)

14th Amendment

• Passed in 1868• “all persons born or naturalized in the

United States are citizens of the United States”

• States cannot deny citizenship, equal protection or life, liberty or property to anyone (without the due process of law)

Plessy v. Ferguson• Supreme Court ruling decided in 1896• Began in Louisiana in 1892 when Homer Plessy,

a biracial man (1/8 African American), refused to leave a “whites only” train car

• Court ruled in favor of segregation, saying that it was constitutional for states to make laws based on prejudice

• “God almighty drew the color line and it cannot be obliterated”

Jim Crow Laws

• Laws passed in southern states beginning in 1877 through the 1960s

• Laws that legalized segregation and failed to protect the civil rights of African Americans

• Justified by the “separate but equal” doctrine, but ultimately ruled unconstitutional

Separate, but equal?

• JimCrowSegregated.jpg

Brown v. The Board of Education of Topeka, Kansas

• Supreme Court ruling decided in 1954• Linda Brown denied access to a school

closer to her home because of her race• Racial segregation in public schools

deemed UNCONSTITUTIONAL because segregation violates the 14th Amendment

• “Doll Tests” used as evidence (African-American children attending segregated schools had negative self-perception)

LynchingWHAT IS IT?

• A form of mob violence • Murder by hanging, shooting, and/or

extreme torture: burning at the stake, mutilation, dismemberment, castration

• A means of social control through fear

LynchingWHO WERE THE VICTIMS?

• People accused of—but not necessarily guilty of—crimes or “insults”

• Murdered and tortured without having been convicted, without due process under the law

• Mostly African-American men (though women and whites were also victims)

• On the average, a black man, woman or child was murdered once a week, every week, between 1882 and 1930 by a hate-driven white mob

LynchingWHO WERE THE PERPETRATORS?

• The only states where lynching has NOT occurred: Massachusetts, Rhode Island, New Hampshire, Vermont

• Most prevalent in: Mississippi, Georgia, Texas, Louisiana, Alabama

• Considered a form of amusement • Committed mostly in smaller towns and rural

communities by people who were undereducated and economically disadvantaged

Have you ever …• Acted suspiciously?• Argued with a white man?• Frightened a white woman?• Demanded respect?• Been seen as unpopular?• Tried to vote?• Used obscene language?• Spread disease?• Been obnoxious?• Peeped in a window?

What do all the behaviors on the previous slide have in common?

• They were all reasons given for lynching a person

• Without Sanctuary

Poverty Rates, 2008-2009

White Black Hispanic Other0%

5%

10%

15%

20%

25%

30%

35%

40%

Alabama

Alabama

Poverty Rates, 2008-2009

White Black Hispanic Other0%

5%

10%

15%

20%

25%

30%

35%

Washington

Washington

Incarceration RatesRate per 100,000 (2005)

White Black Hispanic0

500

1000

1500

2000

2500

3000

ALWAU.S.

Youth Dropout Rates, 2005• In 2005, Hispanics accounted for 41% of all current high school

dropouts, but only made up 17% of the total youth population

Youth Dropout Rates

WhiteBlackHispanicAll Races