...23, 2015 1 Intro Six college students founded the Ku Klux Klan between December 1865 and the summer of 1866 in the town of Pulaski, Tennessee. Former Confederate officers, the six young men organized as a social club or fraternity and spent their time in horseplay of various types, including wearing disguises and galloping about town after dark. They were surprised to learn that their nightly appearances were causing fear, particularly among former slaves in the area. They quickly took advantage of this effect and the group began a rapid expansion. Various factions formed in different towns, which led to a meeting in April 1867 to codify rules and organizational structure. (http://archive.adl.org/learn/ext_us/kkk/history.html?LEARN_Cat=ExtremismLEARN_SubCat=Extremism_in_Americaxpicked=4item=kkk) At this meeting, former Confederate General Nathan Bedford Forrest was elected Grand Wizard, or supreme leader, of all the Klan. The organization was divided into a number of realms, dominions, provinces and dens, which were in turn led by Grand Dragons, Titans, Giants and Cyclopes. The policies of Reconstruction -- aiming to extend the rights of Southern blacks -- had the unintended effect of pushing hundreds of resentful and anxious veterans into the Klan, which soon began instituting a systematic policy of violence in opposition to the new social order. Former slaves were the obvious target of this terrorism, but the Klan also harassed, intimidated and even killed Northern teachers...
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...Journal A A plethora of causes contributed to the Civil War. Firstly, the Kansas-Nebraska Act was a large contribution to the Civil War. In 1854, Stephen Douglas helped push the Kansas-Nebraska Act through Congress. Douglas wanted lands to develop west of Illinois and a railroad built from Illinois through Nebraska to the Pacific Coast. This would create the Kansas and Nebraska Territories which would use popular sovereignty to determine slavery in order to please the South as they were upset that these territories were above the Missouri Compromise line. However, the North was upset as this undid the Missouri Compromise and reopened the debate on slavery where it hadn’t already existed. Thus, this would lead to the Civil War as these disagreements...
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...government have influenced the direction of historical and social development in the United States. Analyze the rise of the United States to a world “super-power” and how that status has shaped its internal developments in recent decades. Identify how changes in social and economic conditions and technology can cause corresponding changes in the attitudes of the people and policies of the government. Identify at least (2) two major historical turning points in the period under discussion. The first major historical turning point was the changing roles of women. Women won the right to vote with the Nineteenth Amendment in 1920, one of the final great reforms of the Progressive era. A group of congressmen proposed an Equal Rights Amendment to the Constitution in 1923. It states: “Men and women shall have equal rights throughout the United States and every place subject to its jurisdiction” (Schultz, 2012 p.379). The amendment’s objective was to eliminate all legal distinctions between the sexes, such as those who permitted different pay scales for men and women doing the same job. The second historical turning point was the Resurgence of the Klan. The Ku Klux Klan, and organizations formed to “redeem” the South after Reconstruction, enjoyed a revival in the 1920s after being reborn in a ceremony on Georgia’s Stone Mountain in 1915. The third historical turning point was the stock market crash of October 1929....
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...In today’s society being a person of color was deeply impacted by the post-civil war amendments as well as the start of their freedom which started with the Emancipation Proclamation. The Civil War in the 1860s consisted of the North vs the South. The North were against slavery and tried to abolish it. The South better known as the Confederacy resisted the abolishment of slavery because slavery was a huge source of income since plantations required cheap labor which slaves provided. After the war ended, and the south lost there was a rise in what became known as the Ku Klux Klan. The Ku Klux Klan is a group of white people that lynched and killed colored people. They believe that whites are the superior race and that black people are an abomination...
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...The Intense Cultural Conflicts of The 1920s Throughout the 1920s the United States faced harsh cultural conflicts including controversies with race and immigration. First, in the years leading up to the 1920s racial tension began to rapidly cultivate due to a multitude of reasons including the rapid change in the racial demographic of the northern economy, which up until that point had been principally white. African Americans who had fought in World War I had additionally began to express their want for civil rights due to their contributions in Europe in the war. The previous actions caused the eruption of violence from white mobs in several areas. One of the first cities to see the eruption of violence was Tulsa, Oklahoma which had contained the wealthiest African American business community in the Southwest. The violence commenced after a 19-year-old African American man was accused of assaulting a white female elevator operator which would give rise to a substantial amount of violence in which the number of killed and injured is not completely known with an approximate by the state of Oklahoma stating that 26 African Americans killed, 10 Caucasian killed, and 317 injured. Following the events in Tulsa on New Year’s Day 1923 the small African American settlement in Rosewood, Florida was attacked by a white mob believed to be from Georgia. The death toll from the incident has varying accounts with some newspapers reporting seven deaths and others 21.Hence, the early 1920s...
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...Reconstruction ended because of southern white’s determination to never be considered equal with blacks. Several reasons play into effect, however. The political group known as the “Redeemers,” considered activist Republican Reconstruction as corrupted, so they cut back budgets and employment of state power. There was also a lack of commitment by whites or biracial power. A group of Democrats spread the message that their opposition to black power was not of hatred, but of the fear that the lack of intelligence in blacks would be harmful to the public. Their influence also resonated to Republicans, and since the Republicans were vague in how the government could enforce equality with the Fourteenth amendment. There were also scandals revealed within President Grant’s administration, which eventually undermined the Reconstruction policies. Also many in the Republican Party...
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...History in The Birth of a Nation, D. W. Griffith. Leticia Vázquez Soriano Literatura y cine en países de habla inglesa: interrelación semiótica y narrativa 18th January, 2012 Curso 2011-2012 Index Introduction........................................................ pp. 1 Historical filmic context...................................... pp. 3 History in the film............................................... pp. 4 Use of intertitles...................................... pp. 5 Free interpretation of facts..................... pp. 7 Fiction mixed with reality........................ pp. 8 The film as history............................................... pp. 10 An autonomous language........................ pp. 10 Critical reception......................................pp. 14 The cinema: a mass spectacle.................. pp. 15 Bibliography......................................................... pp. 17 Introduction In this essay I am going to talk about history in The Birth of a Nation by David Wark Griffith. By “history” I mean: the historical filmic context of the film, which was released in 1915. I am going to show how history is represented in the film. We can see some facts that may have been changed in some aspects in order to guide our minds to what the director want us to think. We also find, as a method to support this, the introduction of fictional characters in some much known historical events of the United States. To end with, I am going...
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...Which type of change—political, social, or economic—had the most impact on Southern life? All types of changes had a great effect on southern life, but I would have to say that the most impactful was economically. Since the African Americans were free they could choose to continue, or not, working for their former owners. Since, most of them left to live else where or search for loved ones. Their former owner's were left with no workers to work their lands making their product income suffer greatly. If the land owners were lucky their former slaves would stay with them and work in exchange for land to farm. 2. Which type of change—political, social, or economic—faced the most challenges? Why were Southerners against this type of change? The social change faced the most challenges because of the majority of southerners who still did not want to accept African Americans as free equals. Consequently, some southerners created groups solely to attack African Americans and spread their cause. Groups like the Ku Klux Klan would terrorize the free slaves. Not only were groups formed but, laws such as Jim Crow were created to separate them, starting a new form of...
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...African Americans Journey to attain Equality and Civil Rights African Americans Journey to attain Equality and Civil Rights African-Americans have been fighting to end segregation and discrimination ever since slavery began. The “isolation” on which they endured to attain civil rights and equality was crucial at this point in time. In relationship to their work to end slavery, the technology, politics, military, culture, and society played a huge role. This role was persistent when African Americans were slaves and when they began to break free from being known as property. At times, the ending of isolation had resulted of periods of tension and struggle. African Americans have worked hard to end segregation through the non-violent strategies of sit-ins, boycotting, and their massive resistance to give in to their freedom (Bowles, 2011). The enduring fight and struggles to end racial discrimination plus attain equality and civil rights have, and will continue to be an ongoing battle for existing and future African-Americans. The strategies that African Americans used to end this discrimination have been influential and will be forever known in history as strong individuals because they endured beatings, were thought of as property, and had to fight for any type of rights but they still fought for freedom and against the injustice of slavery. The fight for slavery started many years before the first slaves came to the United States. The history of slavery in the United States...
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...have very large effects on the future of the Black Panther Party. The Black Panther Party was targeted more because of its success. One of the BPP’s major accomplishments was the union between the BPP and the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC) that Seale and Eldridge Cleaver were able to make happen. As a result of this merger, many more powerful black activist such as Stokely Carmichael, and James Foreman were brought on board of the BPP association, something the FBI was trying to avoid. Once the FBI learned of this union, they immediately began a COINTELPRO plan to “foster a split...
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...Hate Crimes in American Society in the Twentieth and Twenty-first Centuries Sample Student Research Paper Project of Sociology Table of Contents I. Thesis Statement…………………………………………….………….....Page 4 II. Introduction and Summary………………………………….………….....Page 4 III. Literature Review………………………………………………………....Page 6 IV. Methods………………………………………………………….......….. Page 16 V. Socio-Historical Analysis………………………………………………. .Page 18 A. 20th Century 1. Lynching 2. Ku Klux Klan 3. Rodney King and the Los Angeles Riots 4. Matthew Shepard B. 21st Century 1. Post 9/11 2. Jena Six VI. Cause and Effect Analysis…………………………………………… ....Page 24 A. Causes 1. Prejudice a. Stereotypes b. Scapegoats c. Presence of Hate in American Culture d. Need for Status and Power 2. Reasons for Crime a. Sending a Message b. Thrill Seeking c. Defensive B. Effects 1. Psychological Trauma 2. Undo Social Progress 3. Community Unrest 4. Threat of Retaliation VII. Descriptive Analysis……………………………………………….........Page 30 A. Description of Victims 1. Bias against a Particular Race 2. Bias against a Particular Religion 3. Bias against a Particular Sexual Orientation 4. Bias against a Particular Ethnicity/National Origin 5. Bias against a Disability B. Description of Offenses and Offenders This must be your new section? VIII. Comparative Analysis…………………………………………………. Page 36 A. United States Justice Department Definition of Hate Crime B. International Justice...
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...The Ocoee Massacre of 1920 was a brutal riot that was brought about through a mixture of racist agendas by White Southerners and optimistic beliefs from African Americans living in Ocoee, Florida. The Jim Crow South was a hot bed of racist attitudes toward African Americans from White Southerners, culminating in public lynchings, beatings, and the formation of White supremacist groups such as the Ku Klux Klan. Due to the ever present threat of racial violence many African Americans in the South usually kept to themselves and avoided stepping over the lines created by their White neighbors, but attitudes began changing in the years leading up to the Ocoee Massacre however with the prospect of a Republican senator of Florida. Fear and panic of...
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...INTERPRETATIONS OF THE CIVIL WAR IN EARLY FILM One Film To Rule Them All In 1915, the blockbuster film, The Birth of a Nation swept the nation. In a pivotal scene, the attractive daughter of a former slave owner, whose cotton business had been ruined by the war, is stalked by a menacing looking black soldier, named Gus. He is shown with his shirt wide open and bare-chested. Flora, the stereotypical southern belle, notices the voyeur and is visibly shaken. Flora tries to hide from Gus, but Gus corners her and tells her that he wants her and that he is not married. Since the end of the Civil War, Flora has noticed several black soldiers in the area in the past few months harassing her family and other upstanding families. Gus forces Flora closer and tries to kiss her. In a panic, Flora slaps him and pushes him away. Flora flees into the woods. The ensuing pursuit shows Gus as a sex-crazed maniacal troll chasing down the seemingly innocent virginal fairy. Gus follows her absorbedly intent on raping her. Flora winds up on a cliff overlooking a series of jagged rocks. She stares at Gus and motions for him to leave her alone. In a silent ultimatum, she gesticulates that if he doesn’t leave then she’ll leap from the cliff to the rocks below. Gus is exposed as a beast, sweating and pulsating lustful desires. He moves closer to Flora to stop her from leaping. Unwilling to give herself to a black man and death being the only alternative, Flora jumps from the...
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...white women. All of these inaccurate perceptions led to the Ku Klux Klan being founded. The Ku Klux Klan was a group of white extremist who thought that white Americans were racially superior, and their main mission was to punish African American people. Another on of their missions was to reassert control over black women's bodies. The Ku Klux Klan engaged in a great amount of violence, which led to them lynching African Americans in the South. There was a great deal of lynching during this time, and women decided to fight for anti-lynching laws. Ida B. Wells was one of the most influential women that fought for anti-lynching in the South. After three of her dearest friends were murdered and lynched in 1892, she began to collect data on lynching. Wells managed to start an anti-lynching campaign, and she later published an anti-lynching article on May 22. However, Wells's article led to white Americans threatening to kill her. Although she received many death threats, Wells still managed to become one of the founders of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People. Despite Wells's efforts to stop lynching, in 1930, a year before her death, there was an increase in lynching. Amongst those who helped Wells stop lynching was a white woman named Jesse Daniel Ames. Ames was the founder of the Association of Southern Women for the Prevention of Lynching. The ASWPL discussed the increase in lynching, the causes, the cures, and how women could help solve the problem. The...
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...Social Gospel = liberal movement within American Protestantism that attempted to apply biblical teachings to problems associated with industrialization. It took form during the latter half of the 19th cent. under the leadership of Washington Gladden and Walter Rauschenbusch, who feared the isolation of religion from the working class. They believed in social progress and the essential goodness of humanity. The views of the Social Gospel movement were given formal expression in 1908 when the Federal Council of the Churches of Christ in America adopted what was later called "the social creed of the churches." Advocated in the creed were the abolition of child labor, better working conditions for women, one day off during the week, and the right of every worker to a living wage. With the rise of the organized labor movement in the early 20th cent. the Social Gospel movement lost much of its appeal as an independent force. However, many of its ideals were later embodied in the New Deal legislation of the 1930s New Nationalism was Theodore Roosevelt's Progressive political philosophy during the 1912 election. He made the case for what he called the New Nationalism in a speech in Osawatomie, Kansas, in August 1910. The central issue, he argued, was human welfare versus property rights. He insisted that only a powerful federal government could regulate the economy and guarantee social justice. Roosevelt believed that the concentration in industry was not necessarily bad, if the industry...
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