A History of the Civil Rights Movement

HOW THE MOVEMENT BEGAN

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Rights Act of 1875 was passed. The law said that “all persons within the jurisdiction of the United States shall be entitled to the full and equal and enjoyment of the accommodations, advantages, facilities, and privileges of inns, public [transportation] on land or water, theaters, and other places of public amusement.” THE RISE OF JIM CROW Unfortunately, the period of African-American political empowerment under Reconstruction was brief. In 1876, the U.S. presidential elections led to a bitter dispute. Democrat Samuel Tilden and Republican Rutherford B. Hayes both claimed victory. Early in 1877, the Democratic and Republican parties struck a deal to resolve the dispute. The Democrats agreed to accept Hayes as president. In return, the Republicans promised to withdraw all federal troops from the South and end Reconstruction policies. The southern states quickly began passing and enforcing Jim Crow laws. Forbidding African Americans from using the same trains, hotels,

and other public facilities as whites seemed like a clear violation of the Civil Rights Act of 1875. But in 1883, the Supreme Court of the United States—the final authority on

This illustration on the cover of Harper’s Weekly , a popular magazine of the 1860s and 1870s, shows a line of African-American men preparing to cast ballots in an election. The first man is dressed as a laborer, the second is dressed as a businessman, the third is wearing a Union army uniform, and the fourth appears to be dressed as a farmer. The Fifteenth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution, ratified in 1870, made it illegal to deny a citizen the right to vote based on that person’s “race, color, or previous condi tion of servitude.” However, during the 1880s and 1890s states in the South began passing Jim Crow laws that effectively prevented blacks from voting.