Racism in America
American racism has been an issue since the time of colonial period all the way to the time of slave trade and slavery. America is still one of the leading countries where racism has been practiced to a larger extent from the colonial periods where it was sanctioned and heavy punishments were administered to the offenders. America being a country of long history, it has people from different races namely; Native Americans, African Americans, Asian Americans, Latin Americans and Anglo Americans (Rhoads, 2005). The long struggle of these races against American racism has allowed them to be obliged in matters such as literacy, immigration, voting rights, owning citizenship, acquiring land and liberty. In reading American history, many people have suffered from racism and religious intolerance which led to xenophobic in 1938 (Price, 2004). This was mainly an attack which targeted the non Protestants such as the Jews, Italian Americans among others who were affiliated to the Roman Catholic. This people among other immigrants in America suffered from discrimination in the highest order during the early days when anti-discrimination legislations had not been passed.
America has over the time structured its institution to suit the tendency of racism in various ways. Slavery was an issue characterized by racism and the Indian war. This was meant to discriminate some races against the Americans hence denying them opportunities and privileges in the American society. Other forms of racial discrimination in the American society included Native American reservation, racial segregation, and residential schools for the Native Americans. This form of racism was largely dominant in the American society until the formal racism was banned by the acts of parliament in 20th century (Marger, 2011). During this time, racial discrimination was banned and declared socially unacceptable in the American society and morally wrong to discriminate one against his race. However, racial discrimination took another twist from this time and until today political racism is still being practiced which has remained an historical phenomenon (Sears and Bobo, 2000). In America today, racial discrimination is still rampant in other sectors related to employment opportunities, access to education, banking services as well in the government department. Many ethnic and racial groups in America have in one way suffered a form of discrimination based on their race. This has been the ghost that the American society has tried in vain to deal with and is still hindering the unity of the American people to date. During the early days of liberalism in America, one of the major issues of concern was to bring equality among the Americans free from prejudices brought about by racism. Inequality in America has been brought about by racism in the society where some believe they are superior to others and can do other things at the expense of others. The liberalism was meant to correct these inequalities and prejudices which has caused the American society and the minority ethnic tribes who are experiencing social injustices with little or no voice to air their concern. The diverse racism in America was mostly caused with the institution of slavery as most ethnic minorities were freed slaves with few people being business men who were subjected to the reality of American racism. The subjection of the majority of the American society characterized by inequalities and prejudices must have contributed largely to the formation of the liberalism movements (Welch et al, 2011).
This is after the government failure to meet the expectation of the minority ethnic tribes from the time of independence and during the establishment of the constitution of America. The need for equal representation in the government as well as free access to government amenities free of being subjected to discrimination contributed largely to liberalism movement.