Explain to what extent the problems facing black communities had been overcome by federal legislations by 1968.

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Explain to what extent the problems facing black communities had been overcome by federal legislations by 1968.

Before 1940 there were a lot of problems facing the black public, segregation, bad housing, terrible education, discrimination in the work place and unable to vote and improve there situation. Black communities had not had help from the fed government to fix these problems, which were far worse in the South because of the Jim Crow laws, but through 1940-1968 many problems facing black people had been eradicated. I will explain the main points that contributed to the abolition of racism in America.

The first breakthrough was in 1940 – 1953 during WW2, where the president, (Federal Gov) issued order 8802 banning discrimination in firms working for the government. As such it ended discrimination in the aircraft industry, however this had only limited results, as it was only government companies that were disallowed segregation and no general laws to end discrimination in employment. The South hardly benefited at all as they had less factories than the North and only 20% of cases held in court. It was the North, which benefited the most, 40% of cases held up in court, and as there were more industries in the North. However any progress is good progress, and as such I believe that these contributed greatly to the ending of segregation and discrimination.

1954 – 57 were important years in the fight to end discrimination, the blacks started really fighting for there rights as equal citizens. In 1954 blacks started to challenge why blacks couldn’t go to the same schools as whites (Brown V Topeka). This was the first national challenge to segregation as a legal system. It was blacks opportunity to use law’s to challenge segregation, by going above the heads of the local government and going straight to the President It reversed the decision in 1896 which upheld segregation in school’s. However it wasn’t too successful as the president Eisenhower didn’t enforce the law as it would provoke white opposition and therefore would not be able to stay in power and as such many local governments chose to ignore this rule as they had legal control over the states education system. This was more like the presidents polite tap on states shoulders asking to them to please stop segregation in schools. There was no power behind it. However it was involving the president in fighting racism, which must be good. It didn’t affect the North’s segregation either as there segregation was mainly caused by situation of housing in relation to schools. Schools near Slums will have mainly black students and vice versa for schools close to white housing. Also this ruling has no legal impact on in crow system, as there is still segregation in every other area. A year later the Montgomery bus boycott began, Where blacks fought for the right to have an equal position on the bus as whites did. Through out 3 years blacks refused to use buses as transport. This had a terrible impact on the buses income as most of there passengers where blacks and as so got very little income. This was the first practical in fighting discrimination. This again had little impact on the fight against racism, but if u imagine each challenge to segregation was eroding away at Jim Crow laws then every thing counts and as such must be good.

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In 1957 the civil rights act was passed by the federal government, this was the first challenge to segregation by the federal government since 1875. It generally targeted black voting and as such white power in the south. However it was fat too general and limited in its power to face whites in south to end the voting system, again it was greatly ignored and consequently there was no increase in black voters. In the same year the ‘little-rock’ incident occurred, this is where the president was getting fed up of being ignored and enforced the supreme court ruling ...

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