In Module 2, we explored the role white supremacist vigilante groups like the Ku Klux Klan played in ending Reconstruction in the South. In this module, we’ll examine the resurgence of Klan in the early twentieth century.
We'll examine the social and legal context of racial violence in the South at the end of the 19th and beginning of the 20th centuries. How was daily life for blacks in the South regulated by racial expectations? How did racial divisions shape opportunities, access to resources, and peoples’ general sense of safety?
Three questions will guide this module blog post:
What kinds of legal, political, and social restrictions were put on African Americans in the Jim Crow South?
What was lynching and how was it employed as a method of social control?
What are the historical legacies of lynching in contemporary society?
Content Note: This module contains some disturbing images and descriptions of racial violence and lynching.
Let's get started.
Part I: Racial Violence in the Late 19th/Early 20th Century South
Beginning in the late 1870s, with Reconstruction’s end, Democrats in the South passed a series of segregation laws which maintained that Blacks and whites could not use the same public facilities such as parks, schools, and hospitals. This system of racial segregation is known as “Jim Crow.”
These types of laws were upheld as constitutional by the Supreme Court in 1896 in the landmark case, Plessy v. Ferguson.
Plessy v. Ferguson (1896)
The Plessy case took place in the context of widespread violence and political limitations for freedpeople and their descendants in the late 19th century. As states passed laws segregating by race passengers on rail cars and other forms of public transportation, African Americans saw their citizenship rights—and the real gains they had made under Reconstruction—slipping farther and farther away. In 1891, leading members of the Afro-Creole community in New Orleans formed an organization called the Citizens’ Committee to Test the Constitutionality of the Separate Car Law.
Louisiana instituted the Separate Car Law in 1890. This law required railroad companies to maintain separate cars or sections for black passengers.
In her book, Right to Ride, historian Blair Kelley describes the unique place that Creoles of color occupied in New Orleans. Creoles of color were negatively affected by segregation laws, as they were classed as “Black” (or “colored”).
Prior to the end of slavery, Creoles of color had enjoyed a level of relative freedom, especially compared to blacks, both enslaved and free. Kelley notes that “Most Afro-Creoles did not want to be considered white or black. They wanted to be themselves and sought alliances with those who recognized their unique, in-between status.” [1] Though they were concerned with what the future would look like for themselves and black Americans as citizens, they were unwilling to identify as “Negro” or Black.
This unique racial situation in New Orleans is important for understanding how the Plessy case was presented to the court.
In order to challenge the Separate Car Law, the committee arranged with the railroads in advance to have their chosen plaintiff, Homer Plessy, expelled from a white car. The railroad companies were largely opposed to the law because of the extra cost and inconvenience it would create for them. They agreed to cooperate.
On June 7, 1892, Homer Plessy, an Afro-Creole shoemaker with one great-grandparent with African ancestry, purchased a ticket on an East Louisiana railroad. He identified himself as “colored” to a conductor after the train had left the station, and refused to leave the first-class car. He was arrested for violating the separate car statute.
Plessy’s lawyer, Albion Tourgée, claimed that legalized racial separation violated the equal protection clause of the Fourteenth Amendment: “Nor shall any State deprive any person of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law; Nor deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws.”
Tourgée also made another argument. He claimed that refusal to seat Plessy in the white passenger car deprived Plessy of property—“this reputation of being white which has an actual pecuniary value,” violating the due process clause. Because Plessy appeared to be white, refusing to seat him in the white car deprived him of the reputation of being regarded as white, and meant that he would not be able to access any of the public or private benefits which came with whiteness.
Tourgeé argued, “How much would it be worth to a young man entering upon the practice of law, to be regarded as a white man rather than a colored one? Six-sevenths of the population are white. Nineteen-twentieths of the property of the country is owned by white people. Ninety-nine hundredths of the business opportunities are in the control of white people…Probably most white persons if given a choice, would prefer death to life in the United States as colored persons. Under these conditions, is it possible to conclude that the reputation of being white is not property? Indeed, is it not the most valuable sort of property, being the master-key that unlocks the golden door of opportunity?” [2]
Kelley notes that Tourgée was “fascinated by the blurred color line in New Orleans,” and wanted to use Plessy’s white features to his advantage in the case.
However, it didn’t work. Supreme Court dismissed Plessy’s claim. They argued:
“The underlying fallacy of the plaintiff’s argument consists in the assumption that the enforced separation of the two races stamps the colored race with a badge of inferiority. If this be so, it is not by reason of anything found in the act but solely because the colored race chooses to put that construction on it.”
In other words, the Court upheld the idea of “separate but equal,” arguing that separating the races did not produce subordination. The decision was upheld 8-1, with one dissenter, Justice John Marshall Harlan, who insisted that “Our Constitution is color-blind.”
As for Plessy’s argument about injury to his reputation/property, the Court agreed that if Plessy were white, he could rightly ask for damages against the company to compensate for injury to his reputation. However, because he had one Black great-grandparent, and was thus considered Black, they ruled that he was not entitled to be compensated for damage to his reputation. The Court stated:
“If he be a white man assigned to a colored coach, he may have his action for damages against the company for being deprived of his so-called property. Upon the other hand, if he be a colored man and be so assigned, he has been deprived of no property, since he is not lawfully entitled to the reputation of being a white man.”
After the Supreme Court upheld the Louisiana statute, other states reacted by passing their own laws mandating racial segregation in every aspect of Southern life—schools, hospitals, waiting rooms, toilets, even cemeteries.
“Separate but equal” became the law of the land. But, as we know, separate facilities for Black people were often vastly inferior to those for white people.
Poll #1:
In Plessy v. Ferguson (1896), the Supreme Court upheld the constitutionality of a law requiring racial segregation, requiring “separate but equal” facilities for whites and Blacks. In your opinion, did Plessy have a greater impact on laws in the South or culture in the South?
Answer the poll below, or access it here.
Jim Crow and the Etiquette of Race Relations
Jim Crow refers not only to the legal segregation of public places and services, but also to a system of racial “etiquette” which governed the day-to-day encounters between Blacks and whites in the South. The rules of appropriate behavior were enforced with the threat of—and actual—violence.
These social codes required Blacks to demonstrate their subordination and supposedly “natural” inferiority, while whites demonstrated white supremacy.
For example, a white person would never refer to a Black person as “Mr.,” “Mrs.” or “Miss,” but whites insisted that Blacks be polite, respectful, and even cheerful towards whites at all times. In addition to using racial slurs and calling a Black person of any age by their first name, white southerners often used generic terms like “boy” or “girl,” or “aunt” or uncle” to refer to Blacks.
White men did not tip their hats to Blacks, and did not usually shake hands with Black people. Blacks, on the other hand, were expected to tip or remove their hats in the presence of whites, set out of the way of whites on sidewalks, and enter white houses using only the back door.
In stores, Blacks could expect to be kept waiting rather than served on a first-come, first-serve basis. Many stores refused to allow Black people to try on hats, gloves, and other articles of clothing because to do so would make them unfit to then sell to whites.
Racial etiquette thus distinguished between both “dominant” and “subordinate” members of society, but also between “pure” and “impure.” We can see this in the notion that even if a hat had touched a Black person’s head, it could somehow “contaminate” a white person’s head.
Keeping barriers between the races was seen as a way of keeping order in society. These divisions between the races existed in every part of life—from sharing meals to sex. [3]
Ku Klux Klan, Early 20th Century
In addition to Jim Crow restrictions, segregation, and disenfranchisement, throughout the early twentieth century, blacks also faced a wave of vigilante violence. In 1915, the Ku Klux Klan had a resurgence.
After 1872, with the passage of the Enforcement Acts (mentioned in Module 2), the Klan had almost disappeared. The first Enforcement Act made it a federal crime for individuals to conspire or wear disguises to deprive citizens of their constitutional rights. The second act gave the president the authority to send federal troops to areas incapable of controlling Klan violence.
The “second” Ku Klux Klan manifested as a nationwide movement. The Klan had a strong presence outside the South, spreading to cities like Chicago, Detroit, Atlanta, and Denver. At its height, it boasted 5 million members in 4,000 local chapters across the country.
The Klan promised to restore what it deemed to be “traditional” values in the face of the transformations of modern society. It opposed the social and political advancement of Blacks, Jews, and Catholics. It had popular support in communities who were devoted to moral reform—attacking bootleggers, drinkers, gamblers, and others who supposedly flouted Protestant moral codes.
The Klan was a well-organized group with many secret rituals that bound its members together. Additionally, throughout the country, it held public rallies, staged parades, and attempted to influence political leaders to adopt Klan politics.
To punish transgressors, the Klan would burn crosses outside their homes, ostracize them, or brutally beat and torture them. During the early twentieth century, there were hundreds of lynchings of Blacks and others, including whites who supposedly did not share the Klan’s view of “morality.
White women in the Klan formed the Women’s Ku Klux Klan in 1915. Klanswomen marched in parades, organized community events, and recruited new Klan members, including children. [4]
The "Lost Cause"
Starting with the end of the Civil War with Edward Pollard's The Lost Cause: A New Southern History of the War of the Confederates (1866), a big business of "Lost Cause" histories, biographies, novels, plays and art depicted a popular narrative of the Civil War. The narrative goes like this:
Confederates rose up against a tyrannical federal government trying to take away rights of their states. They fought a valiant cause against much larger forces, and were defeated, but laid down their arms in a gentlemanly way.
Slavery is completely written out of the narrative.
An extremely influential example of the "Lost Cause" narrative can be seen in the 1915 film directed by D.W. Griffith, Birth of a Nation. Based on the novel, The Clansman, by Thomas Dixon, Birth of a Nation portrayed an inaccurate historical account of the US after the Civil War. The “villains” in Birth of a Nation are the Black freedmen, who have torn apart the love between two white families (one from the North, the other from the South). It is only after they join together—as the KKK—that America is put back together. It is not a coincidence that this film's release corresponded with the second wave of KKK violence throughout the country. It is said to be part of why the Klan was revived in 1915.
It was one of the most controversial and profitable films ever made. It was the first film to cost over $100,000 to make, the first to have a full-scale premiere, and the first to be shown at the White House.
President Woodrow Wilson showed the film at the White House in a special screening. Reportedly, after viewing it, Wilson declared, “It’s like writing history with lightning. My only regret is that it is all so terribly true.”
This illustrates the context under which African Americans were living during this time—they lived with the threat of violence with no real consequences for those who imposed it, and the president himself sanctioned this flawed, racist narrative.
African Americans protested the film’s biased portrayal of Reconstruction. In cities like New York, Chicago, and Boston, the film was greeted with pickets, demonstrations, and lawsuits. The film was banned for a time in Newark and Atlantic City, New Jersey, St. Louis, and the states of Kansas, West Virginia, and Ohio.
In the early twentieth century, we can also see a significant rise in dedication of monuments and other symbols, like schools, to Confederates, as you can see in the graph from the Southern Poverty Law Center, below. (The other significant period occurs in the 1950s-1960s.)
Ninety-three percent of the monuments to the Confederacy erected in urban areas were built after 1895. One-half of them were unveiled between 1903 and 1912. The monuments were funded and framed by women organizations—first by the Ladies’ Memorial Associations, and then after 1894, the United Daughters of the Confederacy (UDC), a group of elite white southern women.
The UDC erected monuments which they purposefully placed in public settings like courthouse lawns and town squares, where, they reasoned, they could be most prominently viewed by children. Likewise, the Daughters also successfully placed Confederate flags in nearly every white public school in the South, accompanied by portraits of Confederate heroes (most commonly Robert E. Lee).
The objectives of the UDC were formally referred to as memorial, benevolent, historical, educational, and social. They built monuments, cared for indigent Confederate veterans and widows, promoted and published pro-southern textbooks, and formed chapters of the Children of the Confederacy. Their overarching goal was the vindication of the Confederacy. The Daughters were highly motivated, because they were quite literally the daughters of the Confederacy, they sought to vindicate their parents and grandparents. They were in many ways, the main leaders and architects of the “Lost Cause” historical narrative.
During the period of the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, monuments to the Confederacy became more than just memorializing fallen Confederate soldiers. They appeared in public spaces, civic spaces, making a political statement. These monuments were not just about honoring the past, but came to serve as symbols of the present moment: that the values and heroes of the “Old South” were important in the creation of the “New South.” The Daughters had a clear vision for the monuments: they believed that future generations would be able to look upon them and be inspired to defend the values of the Confederate generation. [5]
Lynching
Lynchings were usually public events where victims would be killed by mobs without a legal trial. Lynching was not just practiced by the Klan, although we often associate the Klan with lynchings in popular memory.
Lynching was practiced throughout the South, and later, throughout the country. Newspaper stories circulated which justified lynching as a punishment for Black men’s sexual attacks on white women.
Between the years 1882 and 1930, at least 3,386 African Americans died at the hands of lynch mobs.
Lynchings drew large crowds. Postcards, like the one pictured below, would be passed out as souvenirs.
Lynchings functioned as a way to stir up terror in African American communities for daring to question the social order. Read more about lynching in America in the JSTOR Daily article available here.
Ida B. Wells-Barnett, an African American writer and anti-lynching activist, exposed the lie that lynching was somehow connected to the “threat” that Black men posed to white women in a pamphlet she published herself.
She found that less than 30% of all lynchings involved even the charge of rape. Furthermore, she documented consensual and illicit contacts between black men and white women, and exposed the participation of white women in lynch mobs. She also called attention to the sexual assault of Black women.
This did not go over well with the white public. In 1892, a mob destroyed her newspaper office in retaliation. Wells-Barnett’s pamphlet revealed how African Americans who stepped outside the boundaries of the social order—for competing economically with whites, failing to pay debts, failing to uphold the standards of racial “etiquette,” etc.—faced the threat of violence that wreaked havoc on their lives. In addition, she called attention to the negative impact on the lives of whites who remained silent and allowed this practice to continue.
In a 1900 speech, “Lynch Law in America,” (assigned for Module 9) Ida B. Wells-Barnett stated, “Men who stand high in the esteem of the public for Christian character, for moral and physical courage, for devotion to the principles of equal and exact justice to all, and for great sagacity, stand as cowards who fear to open their mouths before this great outrage. They do not see that by their tacit encouragement, their silent acquiescence, the black shadow of lawlessness in the form of lynch law is spreading its wings over the whole country.”
Word Cloud #1:
Why do you think social norms and racial etiquette were policed and enforced so violently by whites in the late 19th/early 20th century South? What do you think was at stake for whites that entire communities overlooked or overtly sanctioned lynching?
Enter an answer below, or access the word cloud here.
Lynching in the West
Lynching was not confined to Black victims and not confined to the South. Between 1848 and 1928, mobs lynched at least 527 Mexicans, mostly in Texas, California, Arizona, and New Mexico.
The total number is much lower than African Americans. However, because of the smaller size of the Mexican population, the chance of being murdered by a mob was comparable for Mexicans and African Americans. [6]
Vigilante violence is considered to be a characteristic of life on the Western frontier in the late nineteenth century. Some scholars have perpetuated a theory that vigilantism served a positive function—without a formal criminal justice system, vigilantes kept criminal behavior in check, paving the way for a more formal legal system. However, in the case of Mexican lynching victims, this theory does not play out.
Most of the lynchings occurred in places where there was a fully operating legal system. Not only that, but they often involved the active collusion of law officers themselves.
For example, in the Journal of Social History, William Carrigan and Clive Webb described how in March 1881, Texas Rangers crossed the border into Mexico and arrested a man named Onofrio Baca on a murder charge. Baca was returned without extradition orders, where he was then handed over to a mob and hung from the gate in the court house yard. [7]
Lynchings of Mexicans served similar purposes as lynchings of Blacks in the South. They regulated a specific social and political order and also exerted white claims over land and economies in the Southwest.
Ultimately, it was the protests of the Mexican government which finally led the US to take action against lynching in the West. By the late nineteenth century, the US was receiving criticism from governments all over the world for its inability to protect foreign nationals on its soil. In the late 1880s and 1890s, the US tried to resolve diplomatic controversies and safeguard its reputation by providing financial compensation to families of lynching victims.
For example, in 1895, a mob stormed a jailhouse in California and seized four men awaiting trial on separate murder charges. They were hanged in the courthouse square. One victim, Luis Moreno, was a Mexican. President McKinley ultimately recommended to Congress that his family receive a $2,000 indemnity. They also compensated family members of the victims of the Rock Springs Massacre of Chinese miners (Module 3), and three attacks of Sicilian immigrants in Louisiana.
Part II: Film - An Outrage
For Part II of this module, please view the 30 minute film, An Outrage, by Hannah Ayers and Lance Warren. (Instructions on how to view the video below.)
The film examines the history of lynching by visiting six lynching sites and interviewing scholars, community activists, and descendants of lynching victims.
To view the film, please visit the Teaching Tolerance website here.
You'll be asked to sign in. You may create a free account as a student, or use my login details below:
Username: mklann@sdccd.edu
Password: HIST110Fall2020
Consider the following questions while watching the film.
Word Cloud #2:
What effects do you think lynchings had on white spectators? Think about the sizes of the crowds, the fact that photographs were taken and souvenirs distributed, and that children were present.
Enter a response below, or access the word cloud here.
Poll #2:
In your opinion, has the history of lynching been forgotten?
Enter your response below, or access the poll here.
Word Cloud #3:
What are the most significant legacies of lynching in today's society?
Enter your response below, or access the word cloud here.
Conclusion:
Under Jim Crow, Black Americans were subjected to segregated public facilities, schools, transportation, restaurants, and more, under the guise of “separate but equal” spaces for Blacks and whites. However, separate but equal, was not truly equal. The system of Jim Crow reinforced an ideology of white supremacy.
Lynchings were public acts of violence and murder of Black Americans and others who challenged the social status quo. In the American West, Mexicans were the primary victims of lynchings.
We are still reckoning with the history of lynching today. Recognizing and remembering victims of lynching and understanding how lynchings were publicly perpetrated and glorified can help us understand and address systemic racism and inequality in the US.
Citations:
[1] Blair M. Kelley, Ride to Ride: Streetcar Boycotts and African American Citizenship in the Era of Plessy v. Ferguson (Chapel Hill: The University of North Carolina Press, 2010), 55.
[2] Quoted in Cheryl Harris, "Whiteness as Property," Harvard Law Review 106, no. 8 (June 1993), 1748.
[3] Jennifer Ritterhouse, "Etiquette of Race Relations in the New South," The New Encyclopedia of Southern Culture, Volume 24: Race, Thomas C. Holt, Laurie B. Green, Charles Reagan Wilson, eds. (Chapel Hill: The University of North Carolina Press, 2013): 58-61.
[4] Elaine Frantz Parsons, "Ku Klux Klan, Reconstruction Era," and Kris Durocher and Amy Louise Wood, "Ku Klux Klan, Second (1914-1944)," in The New Encyclopedia of Southern Culture, Volume 24: Race, 229-235.
[5] Karen Cox, Dixie's Daughters: The United Daughters of the Confederacy and the Preservation of Confederate Culture (Gainesville, FL: University Press of Florida, 2003): 60-72.
[6] William D. Carrigan and Clive Webb, “The Lynching of Persons of Mexican Origin or Descent in the United States, 1848 to 1928,” in Journal of Social History 37, no. 2 (Winter 2003), 413-414.
[7] Carrigan and Webb, "Lynching," 416.
In your opinion, has the history of lynching been forgotten?
Though some people may underestimate the impact it had, I don't think the history of lynching is forgotten today. Many do seem to not care about it much though.
Public Lynching was most likely the biggest influence on Racial Tensions. The Public display of "Justice" Being delivered filled the people with joy. They saw them selves as the heroes of a tale. As they become desentitieze to murder and death. This would lead to the very easy to follow the notion that killing is ok when seeking vigiliante justice. Fueling the recruits to groups like the Klan, and the mob mentality of murder. As they dehumanize black Americans, they lose compassion and empathy for them. This turning into a very visibalily seen custom or culture practice, as it digs deeply into part of the legacy and history of America. Even today The Noose is such a powerful image. The…
Hi all, thanks for your thoughtful comments! There was an interesting theme in the question about Plessy's impact on the South. Many of you argued that it had a greater impact on laws over culture, in essence because the law caught up with the culture. When we get to Brown v. Board of Education, which undid Plessy in 1954, I'll ask the same question. It will be interesting to see the responses!
In her comment, Arlin mentioned how lynchings could affect spectators' understanding of morality. Perhaps some who witnessed lynchings might have understood them as profoundly immoral. Others might have acquired a "numbness" (as was noted in another comment) and lynchings would have been considered "moral" or "justified."
I was…
In your opinion, has the history of lynching been forgotten? My answer is no because it would never be forgotten. It was a miserable history that marked the dominance of white over black people. The unfairness of lynching would be hard to forget.
Did Plessy have a greater impact on laws in the South or culture in the South?
I believe "laws in the south"had a great impact, other states startes passing their own laws that were needed in terms of racial segregation. "separate but equal" law seperated blacks and whites. This created inequality between the two.