Did the position of black Americans improve 1919-1941?

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Did the position of black Americans improve 1919-1941?

By Shadi Paterson

   It is debatable whether the position of black Americans improved during the years in question. There were some improvements such as black Americans were given the vote and could get an education, but racism still continued and ghettos were still in place to segregate black and white Americans.

There were many improvements for black Americans such as the “great migration”. The movement from the southern states of America to the north. This was done to escape racism that existed in the south and take advantage of the greater opportunities such as better jobs. Many black Americans were able to raise a family and earn a wage that was just about decent. An education was available to the black Americans and many became intelligent members of society, such as dentists, doctors and teachers. Oscar Depient became the first black member of congress in 51 years. All of these things boosted the reputation of the black Americans. This was down to the universities set up for black Americans. The life expectancy of black Americans improved by 8.1 years and living conditions improved when the electrification of the south states took place.  In Harlem black musicians such as Ellington and Ella Fitzgerald showed that black people had original talent and in the 1920s jazz music was the most popular from of music, people came from all over the untied states to see these people perform, yet again boosting the reputation of black Americans, isolation of black Americans slowly broke down when black music was aired on the radio because they could voice their political views through song. The NAACP campaigned for the rights of black Americans and UNIA promoted black culture and encouraged people to return to Africa but was not successful on their second objective as people wanted to stay in America. The membership of the KKK declined after 1925 and therefore the activity declined as a result.

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   The Jim crow laws separated black and white people in schools meaning that the black people had the worse recourses and the worse education because 20% of the money spent on white children was deducted from the money spent on black children. This led to the vote not being won by many black Americans as they could not pass the “literacy test”. Racism was still high, an example of this was the case of the Scotsboro boys, the nine Williams brothers were charged with attacking 2 white women and eight of the nine boys were sentenced to death. ...

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