Segregation involved the cultural, political, and social separation of white and black communities in the United States.
Before the emancipation of African-American slaves at the close of the Civil War, there was little need for formal segregation in American society. In the South, the institution of slavery kept the white and black races separated from one another. At the close of the war, many
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Whites, mainly southerners, were not willing to fully integrate blacks into their society. The ideology of “separate but equal,” providing facilities to blacks that were equal to those facilities available to whites, made it constitutionally permissible for whites to exclude African Americans from their facilities, though such facilities were rarely, if ever, equal. Upheld in the case Plessy v. Ferguson (1896), this policy became the standard practice throughout the United States. Allowing this doctrine to became legally entrenched at the end of the 19th century and the start of the 20th, it was virtually impossible for the black community to integrate into society.
Segregation was prevalent in nearly every aspect of life throughout the country: stores, schools, transportation, restaurants, restrooms, and even water fountains kept blacks separated from whites. Segregation was represented in two forms, de facto, by custom, largely prevalent in the North, and de jure, by law, virtually everywhere in the South.
Segregation was a national problem. At the end of World War II, there was a massive migration of African Americans from the southern states to the North in search of job opportunities in northern factories. Many African Americans settled in communities throughout the North. Since the economic status of these individuals was quite poor, their living conditions were substandard as well. The term “ghetto” came to describe these neighborhoods. While law did not mandate separation, it occurred nonetheless as a result of economic conditions.
In the South, the pattern was different. Rigid laws there enforced patterns of segregation that governed all contacts between the black and white races.
The black community launched its assault against segregation during the Civil Rights movement. Blacks and whites held many siT-lNs, marches, and rallies alike, protesting segregation. Rosa Parks, an African American, refused one day to sit at the back of a bus, violating a standard practice of segregation. This event triggered a bus boycott and led to the boycotting of other businesses, such as lunch counters and restaurants. Martin Luther King, Jr., one of the most prominent civil rights leaders, was arrested in his efforts to end segregation through peaceful, nonviolent protest.
The first legal step taken to put an end to the practice of segregation came with the unanimous decision in Brown V. Board of Education (1954) handed down by the Warren Court. This Supreme Court decision stated that the separate but equal facilities provided in schools were inherently unequal, and the ruling led to the desegregation of the public education system. This outraged leaders in many southern states, who resisted complying with the radical ruling. Arkansas governor Orval Faubus placed state military forces in front of a school building to keep blacks from entering. President Dwight D. Eisenhower answered with federal troops, reaffirming the validity of the Supreme Court ruling.
The Civil Rights Act of 1964 also helped advance the desegregation process. The legislation established that the commerce clause of the Constitution made segregation illegal in privately owned public facilities, such as restaurants and other public accommodations. This act was upheld with the ruling of Heart of Atlanta Motel, Inc. v. United States, in 1965, forcing the hotel to admit African Americans at their facilities.
The Voting Rights Act of 1965 furthered the advancement of desegregation in guaranteeing black suffrage by removing previous restrictions placed solely on African Americans.
By the end of the 1960s, legally enforced segregation in the United States had almost completely disappeared. Even so, segregated patterns based on economically determined residential separation still persisted.
Further reading: Sean Dennis Cashman, African-Americans and the Quest for Civil Rights, 1900-1990 (New York: New York University Press, 1991); Davison M. Douglas, Jim Crow Moves North: The Battle over Northern School Desegregation, 1865-1954 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2005); Douglas S. Massey, American Apartheid: Segregation and the Making of the Underclass (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1993).
—Jennifer Howell
World History
