DOCSLIB.ORG

Laws That Affect the Life of Americans from Slavery to the 21St Century

Total Page：16

File Type：pdf, Size：1020Kb

Download full-text PDF Read full-text
Laws That Affect the Life of Americans from Slavery to the 21St Century Against the Grain Volume 28 Issue 2 Article 42 2016 Wandering the Web--Laws that Affect the Life of Americans from Slavery to the 21st Century Audrey Robinson-Nkongola Western Kentucky University, [email protected] Follow this and additional works at: https://docs.lib.purdue.edu/atg Part of the Library and Information Science Commons Recommended Citation Robinson-Nkongola, Audrey (2016) "Wandering the Web--Laws that Affect the Life of Americans from Slavery to the 21st Century," Against the Grain: Vol. 28: Iss. 2, Article 42. DOI: https://doi.org/10.7771/2380-176X.7341 This document has been made available through Purdue e-Pubs, a service of the Purdue University Libraries. Please contact [email protected] for additional information. Wandering the Web — Laws that Affect the Life of Americans from Slavery to the 21st Century by Audrey Robinson-Nkongola (Assistant Professor/Campus Librarian, Western Kentucky University) <[email protected]> Column Editor: Jack G. Montgomery (Professor, Coordinator, Collection Services, Western Kentucky University Libraries) <[email protected]> Author’s Note: Part One of the bibliog- The “Law Library” link will take the researcher was an attempt to avoid the divide between raphy is a list of Websites where informa- to the online catalog of LOC Law Library. the North and the South that was to occur. tion concerns laws and cases that greatly Items such as “Extracts from the American LeFrancois summarized the aspects under impacted African American lives in the slave code” can be found. the 1850 act that made the recapture of slaves nineteenth century. These laws are listed The site states slave codes were in existence easier and the successful escape nearly impos- chronologically beginning at slave codes to from 1660s to 1860s, 200 years of codes that sible. He points out “federal marshals were Plessy v. Ferguson. The slave codes and were designed to control the daily lives of financially liable for not trying to execute the fugitive slave laws were meant to control the African Americans. Maryland and the District warrants and for allowing fugitives to escape. possibility of slave rebellion. As the History of Columbia’s slave codes were published on Penalties were increased for obstructing slave Channel stated, black codes and the Jim March 17, 1862, one month after President owners or helping fugitives, and included Crow laws were meant to maintain white su- Abraham Lincoln signed a law to compensate imprisonment.” LeFrancois states under “an premacy and Southern agricultural society. slave owners for their loss of “property.” Unsuccessful Accommodation” section the The Dred Scott decision declared African PBS (Public Broadcasting Service) — Compromise merely “illustrated the North’s Americans were not citizens. Plessy made http://www.pbs.org/wnet/slavery/experience/ and South’s opposing views on the issue of segregation the law of the land. Laws, such legal/history.html — broadcasted a series slavery.” The last section is a debate about as the Civil Rights Acts and Voting Rights called “Slavery and Making of America.” whether reparations should be paid to African Americans as the result of slavery. Although Act, demanded that the United States gov- The Website entitled, “The Slave Experience: Legal Rights and Government,” is a part of the an interesting debate, it seems out of place in ernment honor the Constitution, particularly the discussion of the Compromises. the Fourteenth Amendment — “all persons series. The page is divided vertically into two born or naturalized in the United States” are columns. The first column on the left, “Legal The History Channel Website — http:// citizens and “… forbids states from denying Rights and Government,” provides a historical www.history.com/topics/black-history/fugi- any person life, liberty or property without overview. The second column discusses the tive-slave-acts — entitled “Fugitive Slave due process of law” or “deny to any person implementation and rationale for slave codes. Acts” begins with a dramatic banner “The within its jurisdiction the equal protection According to the author, Kimberly Sabol-Tos- Slave-hunter is among us. Be on Your Guard. of the laws.”1 co, one of the first slave codes was enacted An arrest is planned for to-night (sic).” It in South Carolina in 1696. It was called the summarizes the Fugitive Slave acts and cir- Part Two lists Websites of laws that “Act for the Better Ordering and Governing of cumstances they were enacted. In addition, the attempted to reserve the centuries of oppres- Negroes and Slaves.” This act originated from Website notes that statues regarding runaway sion. These laws illustrate the small gains Barbados and became the foundation for what slaves were in the thirteen colonies as early African Americans made to obtain de facto other states used for their slave codes. as 1643. freedom. — ARN Fugitive Slave Laws Fugitive Slave Law of 1793 Slave Codes Encyclopedia.com — http://www.ency- U.S. History.org — http://www.ushistory. clopedia.com/topic/fugitive_slave_laws.aspx org/presidentshouse/history/slaveact1793.htm The U.S. History.org — http://www.ushis- — operated by Cengage Learning, repub- — created a Website for the fugitive slave acts. tory.org/us/6f.asp — owned by Independence lished Arthur G. LeFrancois’s article entitled The title of the Website is “The President’s Hall Association of Philadelphia, provides the “Fugitive Slave Acts.” The Website includes House in Philadelphia: Fugitive Slave Act definition and rationale for slave codes. Slave Fugitive Slave laws of 1793 and 1850. The of 1793.” The Website consists of the entire codes were not implemented in the South in Website is divided into five parts, “the Fugitive document of the Fugitive Slave act. In the the 1800s, but it existed in the colonies in the Slave Act of 1793,” “the Fugitive Slave Act of “Fugitive Slave Act of 1793,” in order to force 1700s. U.S. History.org states slave codes 1850,” “an Unsuccessful Accommodation,” a person back into slavery, the burden of proof were employed to control the movement of “Slave Reparations,” and the bibliography. was on the person making the charge. Section slaves in order to avoid rebellion. The bibliography provides citations of Le- Two states “if any person takes a slave or aids At the top of the page is a drop-down menu, Francois’s resources. in the escaping of the slave shall be fined five which provides various aspects of United The site succinctly states the North and hundred dollars and up to a year in prison.” A States history. The subtitle of the page is “Af- South’s views on slavery and the recapture slave owner’s word or a document before the rican Americans in the British New World.” of slaves. The varying views caused division judge was sufficient to provide the proof that a The section for slave codes is label as “6F. between the two regions. According to Le- person should be returned to slavery. African Americans.” The subsection “f” is Francois, the “Fugitive Slave Act of 1793” WGBH New England PBS channel — where slave codes are located. The left side of was an effort to provide a means to enforce http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/aia/part2/2h62. the page includes further information on slave the constitutional clause concerning escaped html — aired a series called “Africans in codes on other sites. slaves. “The act allowed a slave owner to seize America.” The Website, “Africans in America: The American Treasures of the Library an escaped slave and present him/her before a Revolution, Fugitive Slave Act of 1793.” This of Congress: Memory — http://www.loc.gov/ federal or local judge, and, upon ownership, Website is a continuation of the program. The exhibits/treasures/trm009.html — maintained receive a certificate authorizing the slave to site quotes Article IV, Section 2 of the Constitu- by the Library of Congress (LOC), is a be retaken.” tion: “any person held to service or labor” can Website about slave codes in the District of LeFrancois maintains that the “Fugitive be returned to the owner. PBS points out the Columbia (DC). To the left of the page is an Slave Act of 1850” “was an important part of Constitution does not say a slave. Additionally, image of the actual slave code passed in D.C. the Compromise of 1850.” The Compromise continued on page 83 82 Against the Grain / April 2016 <http://www.against-the-grain.com> should any marshal or deputy marshal refuse of Memorabilia. The Webpage features a slide Wandering the Web to receive such warrant or other process when show of some of the museum’s artifacts, which from page 82 tendered or to use all proper means diligently are very disturbing. However, the menu tab, to execute he shall on conviction thereof, be “About us” and under the section “About the the slave law allowed any official the power to fined in the sum of one thousand dollars.” In Museum,” the goal of the museum is “to get seize a slave and return him/her to bondage. the “Fugitive Slave Act of 1793,” the fine was people to think deeply” and show the alarming Fugitive Slave Law of 1850 five hundred dollars. In addition, if a fugitive artifacts of history of racism in the U.S.” By escape under an officer’s control, that officer clicking on the “video” tab, various YouTube The part four PBS series — http://www.pbs. will be prosecuted “for the full value of the videos on racism are available for viewing. org/wgbh/aia/part4/4p2951.html — entitled service or labor of said fugitive.” In this act, “Africans in America: Judgment Day, 1831- The Library of Congress (LOC) — http:// unlike the previous one, the slave catcher is re- www.loc.gov/teachers/classroommaterials/ 1865,” included the Compromise of 1850 and sponsible for the successful return of the slave.
Load more

Recommended publications
  • Frederick Douglass
    Central Library of Rochester and Monroe County · Historic Monographs Collection AMERICAN CRISIS BIOGRAPHIES Edited by Ellis Paxson Oberholtzer, Ph. D. Central Library of Rochester and Monroe County · Historic Monographs Collection Zbe Hmcrican Crisis Biographies Edited by Ellis Paxson Oberholtzer, Ph.D. With the counsel and advice of Professor John B. McMaster, of the University of Pennsylvania. Each I2mo, cloth, with frontispiece portrait. Price $1.25 net; by mail» $i-37- These biographies will constitute a complete and comprehensive history of the great American sectional struggle in the form of readable and authoritative biography. The editor has enlisted the co-operation of many competent writers, as will be noted from the list given below. An interesting feature of the undertaking is that the series is to be im- partial, Southern writers having been assigned to Southern subjects and Northern writers to Northern subjects, but all will belong to the younger generation of writers, thus assuring freedom from any suspicion of war- time prejudice. The Civil War will not be treated as a rebellion, but as the great event in the history of our nation, which, after forty years, it is now clearly recognized to have been. Now ready: Abraham Lincoln. By ELLIS PAXSON OBERHOLTZER. Thomas H. Benton. By JOSEPH M. ROGERS. David G. Farragut. By JOHN R. SPEARS. William T. Sherman. By EDWARD ROBINS. Frederick Douglass. By BOOKER T. WASHINGTON. Judah P. Benjamin. By FIERCE BUTLER. In preparation: John C. Calhoun. By GAILLARD HUNT. Daniel Webster. By PROF. C. H. VAN TYNE. Alexander H. Stephens. BY LOUIS PENDLETON. John Quincy Adams.
    [Show full text]
  • Independent Freedpeople of the Five Slaveholding Tribes
    Anderson 1 “On the Forty Acres that the Government Give Me”1: Independent Freedpeople of the Five Slaveholding Tribes as Landholders, Indigenous Land Allotment Policy, and the Disruption of Racial, Gender, and Class Hierarchies in Jim Crow Oklahoma Keziah Anderson Undergraduate Senior Thesis Department of History Columbia University April 15th, 2020 Seminar Advisor: Professor George Chauncey Second Reader: Professor Celia Naylor 1 Kiziah Love, interview with Jessie R. Ervin, spring 1937, Colbert, OK, in The WPA Oklahoma Slave Narratives, ed. T. Lindsay Baker and Julie Philips Baker (Norman, OK: University of Oklahoma Press, 1996), 262. See Appendix 6 for a full transcript of Kiziah Love’s slave narrative. © 2020 Anderson 2 - Notice - None of the work included in this document may be cited or quoted without express written permission from the author. © 2020 Anderson 3 - Table of Contents - Acknowledgements 4 Introduction 5-15 Chapter 1: “You’ve an Indian Not a Negro”: Racecraft, 15-36 Land Allotment Policy, and Class Inequalities in Post-Allotment and Post-Statehood Oklahoma Racecraft and Land Use in the Pre-Allotment Period 15 Racecraft, Blood Quantum, and Ideology in the Jim Crow South & Indian Territory 18 Racecraft in the Allotment Process: Blood Quanta, One-Drop-of-Blood Rules, and Land Land Allotments, Indigeneity, and Racecraft in Post-Statehood Oklahoma 25 Chapter 2: The Reshaping of Gender in the Post-Allotment and 38-51 Post-Statehood Period: Independent Freedwomen Landowners, the (Re)Establishment of Black Infrastructure, and
    [Show full text]
  • Jim Crow Laws to Pass Laws to Their Benefit
    13, 1866. It stated that "No state shall deprive any person of life, Name liberty, or property without due process of law; nor deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws." Many states got around this amendment by creating their own laws. Whites still held the majority of seats in the state legislatures, so it was easy Jim Crow Laws to pass laws to their benefit. Several states made marriage or even dating between races a crime. You could be put in prison for such a By Jane Runyon crime. Some vigilantes took the law into their own hands and hanged anyone they thought might be breaking this law. Vigilantes are people Many people believed that who try to enforce a law without the help of regular law enforcement. the end of the Civil War The hangings by these vigilantes were called lynchings. The Ku Klux would bring great changes to Klan became infamous as a vigilante group. the lives of slaves in the South. They were given There were several types of Jim Crow laws enforced during this time. freedom from slavery by the Louisiana had a law that made black passengers ride in separate President of the United States. railroad cars. A black man named Homer Plessey took the railroad to They were declared to be court saying this law was unconstitutional. The U.S. Supreme Court citizens of the United States. ruled that as long as the railroad cars used by the blacks were As citizens, they were guaranteed certain rights by the Constitution.
    [Show full text]
  • The Underground Railroad in Tennessee to 1865
    The State of State History in Tennessee in 2008 The Underground Railroad in Tennesseee to 1865 A Report By State Historian Walter T. Durham The State of State History in Tennessee in 2008 The Underground Railroad in Tennessee to 1865 A Report by State Historian Walter T. Durham Tennessee State Library and Archives Department of State Nashville, Tennessee 37243 Jeanne D. Sugg State Librarian and Archivist Department of State, Authorization No. 305294, 2000 copies November 2008. This public document was promulgated at a cost of $1.77 per copy. Preface and Acknowledgments In 2004 and again in 2006, I published studies called The State of State History in Tennessee. The works surveyed the organizations and activities that preserve and interpret Tennessee history and bring it to a diverse public. This year I deviate by making a study of the Under- ground Railroad in Tennessee and bringing it into the State of State History series. No prior statewide study of this re- markable phenomenon has been produced, a situation now remedied. During the early nineteenth century, the number of slaves escaping the South to fi nd freedom in the northern states slowly increased. The escape methodologies and ex- perience, repeated over and over again, became known as the Underground Railroad. In the period immediately after the Civil War a plethora of books and articles appeared dealing with the Underground Railroad. Largely written by or for white men, the accounts contained recollections of the roles they played in assisting slaves make their escapes. There was understandable exag- geration because most of them had been prewar abolitionists who wanted it known that they had contributed much to the successful fl ights of a number of slaves, oft times at great danger to themselves.
    [Show full text]
  • TERRIBLE. Publlbed Kiery Saturday Morulas of Barn and Tshouted, " There Goes Way North
    ing to molest the family, someone saw the Many of the escaping fugitives were THE COUNTY. the best Interests for the timt being of way In rear armed by their sympathisers while on the ward and troublesome humanity, suoh aa de Otu ttrnw Met. negro mounting another horse the light in violating ixtt Dayton Dotting--. the law, and once looked TERRIBLE. Publlbed Kiery Saturday Morulas of barn and Tshouted, " there goes way north. They were advised to use rear the in the solid iron ease in lbs baek room, is diseases, Street, weapons only when to do so as Dattor, 111., Feb. 7. Another floe snow ars Xldasy and Liver and At Mot. 810 and 814 I Sail thenlggerl" In a moment other horses their farced entirely safe; in faot, the iron oage is just as firm storm baa oommeneed this morniig which whia ones they havs secured a ColwU-8horwoo- Block.) were mounted by the slave catchers and the last extremity of self defense, and then brm aud secure aa any eer ereoted, and hold en tha annua system there la BONS,l'roprirtoni, were In swift pursuit of to "strike hard and spare not." A mulatto, will make the sleighing still better. It bas Marshal Maber or Seneca looks al it with no time to be lost life la to ba WM.OBMAN their friends and May if named Free, living at Springfield, bad a been excellent this winter, and during the pride. the oitiitna never have occasion saved. Kany remedies have been TV11U4 l)F 8MHHCKIPT10N the solitary horseman, whom they caught to use tbe cage part of past few weeks the it.
    [Show full text]
  • (In)Determinable: Race in Brazil and the United States
    Michigan Journal of Race and Law Volume 14 2009 Determining the (In)Determinable: Race in Brazil and the United States D. Wendy Greene Cumberland School fo Law at Samford University Follow this and additional works at: https://repository.law.umich.edu/mjrl Part of the Comparative and Foreign Law Commons, Education Law Commons, Law and Race Commons, and the Law and Society Commons Recommended Citation D. W. Greene, Determining the (In)Determinable: Race in Brazil and the United States, 14 MICH. J. RACE & L. 143 (2009). Available at: https://repository.law.umich.edu/mjrl/vol14/iss2/1 This Article is brought to you for free and open access by the Journals at University of Michigan Law School Scholarship Repository. It has been accepted for inclusion in Michigan Journal of Race and Law by an authorized editor of University of Michigan Law School Scholarship Repository. For more information, please contact [email protected]. DETERMINING THE (IN)DETERMINABLE: RACE IN BRAZIL AND THE UNITED STATES D. Wendy Greene* In recent years, the Brazilian states of Rio de Janeiro, So Paulo, and Mato Grasso du Sol have implemented race-conscious affirmative action programs in higher education. These states established admissions quotas in public universities '' for Afro-Brazilians or afrodescendentes. As a result, determining who is "Black has become a complex yet important undertaking in Brazil. Scholars and the general public alike have claimed that the determination of Blackness in Brazil is different than in the United States; determining Blackness in the United States is allegedly a simpler task than in Brazil. In Brazil it is widely acknowledged that most Brazilians are descendants of Aficans in light of the pervasive miscegenation that occurred during and after the Portuguese and Brazilian enslavement of * Assistant Professor of Law, Cumberland School of Law at Samford University.
    [Show full text]
  • Courthouse-Narrative.Pdf
    Second Leesburg Courthouse, 1815 REPORT OF THE LOUDOUN COUNTY HERITAGE COMMISSION THE HISTORY OF THE COUNTY COURTHOUSE AND ITS ROLE IN THE PATH TO FREEDOM, JUSTICE AND RACIAL EQUALITY IN LOUDOUN COUNTY March 1, 2019 Robert A. Pollard, Editor This report is not intended to be a complete history of the Loudoun County Courthouse, but contains a series of vignettes, representations of specific events and people, selected statistics, reprints of published articles, original articles by Commissioners, copies of historic documents and other materials that help illustrate its role in the almost three century struggle to find justice for all people in Loudoun County. Attachment 2 Page 2 MEMBERS OF HERITAGE COMMISSION COURTHOUSE SUBCOMMITTEE Co-Chairs – Donna Bohanon, Robert A. Pollard Members –Mitch Diamond, Lori Kimball, Bronwen Souders, Michelle Thomas, William E. Wilkin, Kacey Young. Staff – Heidi Siebentritt, John Merrithew TABLE OF CONTENTS Prologue -- p. 3 Overview Time Line of Events in Loudoun County History -- pp. 4-8 Brief History of the Courthouse and the Confederate Monument -- pp. 9-12 I: The Period of Enslavement Enslavement, Freedom and the Courthouse 1757-1861 -- pp. 13-20 Law and Order in Colonial Loudoun (1768) -- pp. 21-23 Loudoun and the Revolution, 1774-1776 -- pp. 24-25 Ludwell Lee, Margaret Mercer and the Auxiliary Colonization Society of Loudoun County -- pp. 27-28 Loudoun, Slavery and Three Brave Men (1828) -- pp. 29-31 Joseph Trammell’s Tin Box -- p. 32 Petition from Loudoun County Court to expel “Free Negroes” to Africa (1836) -- pp. 33-35 The Leonard Grimes Trial (1840) -- pp. 36-37 Trial for Wife Stealing (1846) -- pp.
    [Show full text]
  • Apartheid and Jim Crow: Drawing Lessons from South Africaâ•Žs
    Journal of Dispute Resolution Volume 2019 Issue 1 Article 16 2019 Apartheid and Jim Crow: Drawing Lessons from South Africa’s Truth and Reconciliation Benjamin Zinkel Follow this and additional works at: https://scholarship.law.missouri.edu/jdr Part of the Dispute Resolution and Arbitration Commons Recommended Citation Benjamin Zinkel, Apartheid and Jim Crow: Drawing Lessons from South Africa’s Truth and Reconciliation, 2019 J. Disp. Resol. (2019) Available at: https://scholarship.law.missouri.edu/jdr/vol2019/iss1/16 This Comment is brought to you for free and open access by the Law Journals at University of Missouri School of Law Scholarship Repository. It has been accepted for inclusion in Journal of Dispute Resolution by an authorized editor of University of Missouri School of Law Scholarship Repository. For more information, please contact [email protected]. Zinkel: Apartheid and Jim Crow: Drawing Lessons from South Africa’s Truth Apartheid and Jim Crow: Drawing Lessons from South Africa’s Truth and Reconciliation Benjamin Zinkel* I. INTRODUCTION South Africa and the United States are separated geographically, ethnically, and culturally. On the surface, these two nations appear very different. Both na- tions are separated by nearly 9,000 miles1, South Africa is a new democracy, while the United States was established over two hundred years2 ago, the two nations have very different climates, and the United States is much larger both in population and geography.3 However, South Africa and the United States share similar origins and histories. Both nations have culturally and ethnically diverse populations. Both South Africa and the United States were founded by colonists, and both nations instituted slavery.4 In the twentieth century, both nations discriminated against non- white citizens.
    [Show full text]
  • Slave Traders and Planters in the Expanding South: Entrepreneurial Strategies, Business Networks, and Western Migration in the Atlantic World, 1787-1859
    SLAVE TRADERS AND PLANTERS IN THE EXPANDING SOUTH: ENTREPRENEURIAL STRATEGIES, BUSINESS NETWORKS, AND WESTERN MIGRATION IN THE ATLANTIC WORLD, 1787-1859 Tomoko Yagyu A dissertation submitted to the faculty of the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy in the Department of History. Chapel Hill 2006 Approved by Advisor: Peter A. Coclanis Reader: William L. Barney Reader: Paul W. Rhode Reader: W. Fitzhugh Brundage Reader: Lisa Lindsay © 2006 Tomoko Yagyu ALL RIGHTS RESERVED ii ABSTRACT Tomoko Yagyu: Slave Traders and Planters in the Expanding South: Entrepreneurial Strategies, Business Networks, and Western Migration in the Atlantic World, 1787-1859 (Under the direction of Peter A. Coclanis) This study attempts to analyze the economic effects of the domestic slave trade and the slave traders on the American South in a broader Atlantic context. In so doing, it interprets the trade as a sophisticated business and traders as speculative, entrepreneurial businessmen. The majority of southern planters were involved in the slave trade and relied on it to balance their financial security. They evaluated their slaves in cash terms, and made strategic decisions regarding buying and selling their property to enhance the overall productivity of their plantations in the long run. Slave traders acquired business skills in the same manner as did merchants in other trades, utilizing new forms of financial options in order to maximize their profit and taking advantage of the market revolution in transportation and communication methods in the same ways that contemporary northern entrepreneurs did. They were capable of making rational moves according to the signals of global commodity markets and financial movements.
    [Show full text]
  • The Afterlife of Reproductive Slavery
    The afterlife of reproductive slavery This page intentionally left blank Alys Eve Weinbaum The afterlife of reproductive slavery Biocapitalism and Black Feminism’s Philosophy of History duke university press | durham and london | 2019 © 2019 Duke University Press All rights reserved Printed in the United States of Amer i ca on acid- free paper ∞ Designed by Julienne Alexander Typeset in Quadraat Pro and Scala Sans Pro by Westchester Publishing Ser vices Library of Congress Cataloging- in- Publication Data Names: Weinbaum, Alys Eve, [date] author. Title: The afterlife of reproductive slavery : biocapitalism and Black feminism’s philosophy of history / Alys Eve Weinbaum. Description: Durham : Duke University Press, 2019. | Includes bibliographical references and index. Identifiers:lccn 2018035543 (print) lccn 2018047129 (ebook) isbn 9781478003281 (ebook) isbn 9781478001768 (hardcover : alk. paper) isbn 9781478002840 (pbk. : alk. paper) Subjects: lcsh: Womanism— United States. | Human reproduction— Political aspects— United States. | Surrogate motherhood— United States— History. | African American women— Social conditions— History. | Women slaves— Atlantic Ocean Region. | Slavery— United States— History. | Slavery— Atlantic Ocean Region. Classification:lcc ht1523 (ebook) | lcc ht1523 .w44 2019 (print) | ddc 306.3/620973— dc23 lc rec ord available at https:// lccn . loc . gov / 2018035543 Cover art: Senga Nengudi, Per for mance Piece, 1978. Nylon mesh and artist Maren Hassinger. Pearl C. Woods Gal- lery, Los Angeles. Photo by Harmon Outlaw.
    [Show full text]
  • Capital Punishment and Race: Racial Culture of the South Jerry Joubert
    Undergraduate Review Volume 8 Article 21 2012 Capital Punishment and Race: Racial Culture of the South Jerry Joubert Follow this and additional works at: http://vc.bridgew.edu/undergrad_rev Part of the Criminal Law Commons, Criminology and Criminal Justice Commons, and the Race and Ethnicity Commons Recommended Citation Joubert, Jerry (2012). Capital Punishment and Race: Racial Culture of the South. Undergraduate Review, 8, 111-119. Available at: http://vc.bridgew.edu/undergrad_rev/vol8/iss1/21 This item is available as part of Virtual Commons, the open-access institutional repository of Bridgewater State University, Bridgewater, Massachusetts. Copyright © 2012 Jerry Joubert National Conference on Undergraduate Research (NCUR) Capital Punishment and Race: 2012 Presenter Racial Culture of the South JERRY JOUBERT Jerry Joubert is a here are currently 34 states with the death penalty and 16 states double major in without the death penalty in the United States. According to the most Criminal Justice and recent report from the Death Penalty Information Center, there have been 1276 executions in the United States since 1976. In the year Philosophy. After T2011 alone, there were 42 executions. This was 4 executions less than the previous graduation in 2013, year. Among the 1276 total executions in the United States since 1976, 1048 have Jerry plans to pursue a Masters degree taken place in the South. There are approximately 3,251 inmates on death row. African-Americans represent 42% of these inmates (Death Penalty Information in Criminal Justice. He presented Center, 2011). This statistic is quite disproportional because African-Americans this paper at the 2012 National only represent 9.7% of the population (2010 US Census, 2011).
    [Show full text]
  • The Operation of the Fugitive Slave Law the OPERATION of THE
    150 The Operation of the Fugitive Slave Law THE OPERATION OF THE FUGITIVE SLAVE LAW IN WESTERN PENNSYLVANIA,FROM 1850 to 1860 By IRENE E. WILLIAMS* Negro slavery engrossed the whole attention of the country during the decade from 1850 to 1860. The "Under- ground Railroad" was a form of combined defiance of national laws on the ground that they were unjust and oppressive. The Underground Railroad was the oppor- tunity for the bold and adventurous ;ithad the excitement of piracy, the secrecy of burglarly, the daring of insurrec- tion ;it developed coolness, indifference to danger and quick- ness of resource." (1) In the course of the sixty years immediately preceding the outbreak of the Rebellion, the Northern states became traversed by numerous secret pathways leading from South- ern bondage to Canadian liberty. Even in colonial times there was difficulty in recovering fugitive slaves because of the aid rendered them by friends. (2) For the acceptance and adoption of the ordinance of 1787 and the United States constitution, clauses relative to the rendition of fugitive slaves were necessary. In1793 the first Fugitive Slave Law was enacted. This was rendered nugatory in1842, by the judicial decision in the famous case of "Prigg versus Pennsylvania." Incorporated in the com- promise measures of 1850 was the Fugitive Slave Law. (3) Under this law the alleged fugitive was denied trial by jury; was forbidden to testify in his own behalf; could not summon witnesses, and was subject to the law though he might have escaped years before it was enacted. Should the judge decide against the negro his fee was ten dollars ;should he decide for the accused it was but five.
    [Show full text]