1890s

• By 1890, 65% of black children in south unable to write compared to the 15% Of white children.
• The bill weevil reached southern states in 1892, damaging the cotton crop and leading to black sharecroppers suffering as their ‘masters’ made them grow labour intensive crops like cotton or tobacco.
• The North Carolina Mutual Life Assurance company was a large business founded by 7 AAs in 1898. Succeeded as whites wouldn’t offer AAs life insurance.
• After 1891, segregation laws were formally and rapidly extended over all kinds of public places.
• Plessy v. Ferguson (1896)

  • Mixed race man sued after being denied a seat in an all-white carriage.
  • Justices decided 8-1 against him that segregation constitutional
  • ‘Separate but equal’
  • This case acted like a legal precedent for segregation
• Cumming v. Board of Education in 1899 extended the separate but equal principle to schools. Greater amounts were spent on white schools.
• Mississippi v. Williams (1898)

  • Ruled that Mississippi poll tax was constitutional.
  • Undermined black voting rights and led to even stricter conditions.
• The Progressive Movement started in 1897 and was supported by Theodore Roosevelt (who held meetings with Booker T. Washington) but the movement failed to take action.