Penoage

Civil struggle and World War II: For a period of nearly eighty years, between the Civil War and World War II, Southern blacks were no longer slaves, exactly they were not yet free. Generations of black Southerners lived in the shadow and under(a) the threat of being forced to labor against their will. Leg all(prenominal)y, slavery was proscribe by the Thirteenth A mendment in 1865, except as a punishment for crime, and even before Reconstruction ended in 1877, many Southern states began enacting a series of laws mean to re-subjugate saucily freed blacks and provide cheap sources of labor. Vagrancy, loitering, riding the rails, changing jobs, even public lecture too loudly in public these behaviors and more all became crimes carrying stiff fines or sentences. Although these statutes made no mention of race, Southerners knew that they were intended as instruments of white control. The result was a huge amplification in the numbers of blacks arrested and convicted. Peonage or debt slavery, an illegal but general practice, flourished. Many black men were picked up for these minor crimes or on trumped-up charges. When faced with staggering fines and court fees, these men were then forced to work for a local employer who would net profit their fines for them.



Others were victims of laws that made it a crime to leave employment for some early(a) job, keeping many blacks working under intolerable conditions as sharecroppers or elsewhere, rather than face the terrifying possibility of being arrested and sent to a forced labor camp. In other cases, workers would become indebted to planters (through sharecropping loans) merchants (through credit) or company stores (through living expenses). The workers were oft unable to re-pay the debt, and found themselves continuously forced to work without pay. inpatient leasing, a form of forced labor that was legal, occurred in contrive with Southern state and county governments. These governments realized they could lease their convicts to local planters or industrialists who...If you want to get a full essay, order it on our website: Ordercustompaper.com



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