Civil Rights struggle of Africans and Asian Americans - Term Paper Example

Barriers and civil rights struggle of Africans and Asians Americans In the United s, racism and other formsof discrimination has been a major concern dating back in the 17th century to 1960s, since the colonial years and slave era, several groups such as Latin Americans, African Americans, Asian Americans, Mexican Americans and other groups in the American history have faced discrimination of many kinds in areas of literacy, political rights (voting), citizenship, land acquisition, immigration and criminal court processes. Many of these groups protested while others didn’t thus suffered xenophobia and other forms of exclusions. Evidence of institutions structured racially were slavery, segregations, residential schools and Indian wars. In 20th century though, discriminations of all kinds were banned following activities of civil rights groups from all quarters who opposed these discriminations using various strategies, its fundamental to note that some like employment, housing, education and lending prejudices still happen in the present society. In this paper however, focus is on the Asian and African Americans as two of the groups that faced barriers (discrimination) in United States’ history and what strategies they used to overcome these challenges. In the first part of this paper we shall look at the African Americans and then proceed to second part of Asian Americans in order to create contrast in the strategies they deployed in fighting for their freedom. African Americans Perhaps the most prominent barrier of this group is the institution of slavery in which the African Americans were enslaved and viewed as property and treated as second class citizens, stigmatized and denied industrial jobs. It the perception of slavery that resulted in all the barriers faced by the Africans in America, it started in 1630s in prehistoric era and has been practiced for a long period of time due to sugar, tobacco and other plantations that seek more workforces. There are several issues that kept them invisible in all aspects of their lives: Economically Their lives were incredibly difficult as slaves mostly for those who worked in the plantations, they could work from sunrise to sunset without exception of the old or the young all could work for this long period of time. It was considered to be lucky if the master gives the slave a day off from work or holidays like Christmas which was infrequent. In his free lucky time, the slave engage in his own activities of fishing or cultivating small piece of land in order to supplement what is given by the master that was poor in quality. As stated earlier it was the duty of the master to clothe the servant however, some gave inadequate clothing thus the slaves could go an extra mile to sew their own clothes at night. They were denied employment opportunities in industries during the post slavery era since they were viewed as lesser human to the whites. Politically During the slavery times the slaves (Africans) were organized into powerful kingdoms and other political units of governance before shipped to America, however, upon shipping to America their masters could not allow them to be in such organization for the fear of being overpowered by the slaves. They were not also allowed to engage in the political activities of their masters such as voting. Laws were made against them without their participation; slave trials were done in a separate court from that of masters or were sentenced by the court without trial. In post slavery years, they were still denied the chance to participate in elections by introduction of rigid laws, poll taxes and voting booth fees that were expensive for the blacks. Socially They faced segregation where the black codes were passed into laws such as ‘Jim Crow law’ that limited the blacks’ rights and separated them from the whites, in institutions of learning, theaters and other public places. Emergence of African American civil right movements and strategies used In view of these conditions several civil right groups emerged between 1954 and 1968 in order to fight for the blacks’ rights they placed organized efforts to do away with the economical, social and political discriminations. (Thomas Frazier, The Militant Black Liberation Movement: an Introduction, pg 1 &2) The Jim Crow law, regarding African Americans as second class citizens and other forms of discriminations are what cultivated the rise of these movements to propel the struggle for social, economic and political justice for African Americans; in Minnesota for instance Fredrick McGhee and other leaders lead the struggle. These groups at first were scattered but later coalesce by the end of World War II when soldiers of African origin risked their lives but on returning to US they were denied that freedom they fought for in the war, this made National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) and other groups to join hands making use of legal, political, judicial, legislative and other means to attain full citizenship for the blacks. Southern Christian Leadership Congress (SCLC) lead by Martin Luther King, Jr conducted non violent resistance and civil disobedience in 1955 and it spread through to sit-ins and demonstrations as many other groups joined and in the end brought the passage of Civil Rights Act 1964. (Thomas Frazier, The Militant Black Liberation Movement: an Introduction, pg 7 & 8) Prominent actions deployed by civil right movements to advocate for the rights of African Americans prior to 1955 were litigations and lobbying that was carried out by the NAACP. However, due to slow pace by the federal and states government to implement the desegregation and counter resistance by the conservative whites, blacks were frustrated and through their leadership adopted some other new strategies such as civil disobedience which was nonviolent and more direct. (Philip, The Call to Negro America to March on Washington, pg 3, 4 & 5) This action gave rise to crisis that had to force the federal and the state governments to act in order to avert the crisis situation; these in most cases favored the protesters. Examples of civil disobedience include sit-ins that used in Greensboro sit-in North Carolina in 1960 (Franklin, The Student sit in Begins), marches in 1965 and boycotts (Montgomery Bus Boycott) in 1955-1956. (Voice of freedom, Martin Luther King Jr. and the Montgomery Bus Boycott, pg 227-231) These groups achieved tremendous results and change of attitude, small enterprises stood to support the movement. In Brown v. Board Of Education case, the notion of separate but equal was nullified and segregation declared illegal. There was passage of Civil Rights Act that illegalized employment discrimination, Voting Rights Act that reinstated voting rights and enactment of Civil Rights Act of 1968 that illegalized discrimination of purchase or rental of housing premises. (Philip, The Call to Negro America to March on Washington, pg 3, 4 & 5) Asian Americans While African Americans struggled through their servitude to attain freedom, Asians on the other hand faced similar tribulations if not serve acts of discriminations such as racism, massacres, mass emancipations and close to genocidal policies. The Asians (Chinese) first came to America in Hawaii in 1778 settled there and married to American women, most of the Asians arrived in 19th century as workers in the sugar and cotton plantations. Later more came as laborers since they were attracted by the job availability and poor economic situation in their country; they were employed to work at the transcontinental railroad and in gold mining firms. Since the settlement of Asians in America, they have faced racism of all sorts such as prejudice and other forms of discrimination like harassment, hostility and denial of equal rights. The Chinese Exclusion Act 1882 that singled out Chinese not to immigrate into US for a period of ten years since the Americans were threatened by the massive influx of Asians into their soil. This in itself and meaning denotes racism channeled to a particular race (Chinese). This was then followed by justice denial to Asians who sought to claim equality in land ownership (California Alien Land Law 1913), citizenship and other rights. They were not allowed to testify in courts just like African Americans this was evident in the imprisonment of Asians during World War II and in 1982 in the case of murder of Vincent Chin, the murderers though intentionally killing Mr. Vincent the court placed them on two year probation with a fine instead of a jail term or execution. Emergence of Asian American civil right movements and strategies used During 1880s and latter years therefore, it was difficult for the Asians to live harmoniously with the whites due to such extreme negativity, due to these mistreatments Asian Americans organized themselves into community organizations with sole purpose of monitoring and mobilization of all their resources to obtain justice. These groups started in 1960s and mobilized slew of political cause and achieved the introduction of ethnic studies in the universities, end of Vietnam War and preparation of the Asians place in the American society. In watch of African Americans expose racism and hypocrisy in government, Asian Americans started to establish ways in which they too can avert their situation. The Black power movement gave rise to yellow power movement since it made Asians realize that they are also a people of a color, defined and dominated by European cultures and they only had to solidify themselves as one unit and fight from a common cause. In the Yellow power Asians opposed the war in Vietnam terming it as war against an ethnic group motivated by racism. (The Asian American Movement: Yellow Power Movement, pg 1, 2 & 3) Asian Americans formed political parties such as Asian American Political Alliance which its founders believed that American society is historically racist and had employed social and political discriminations both internally and externally to exploit people of all races and that their goal was to bring both political and social changes to Asian community. (The Asian American Movement: Yellow Power Movement, pg 6) A number of these activists were the Japanese Americans internees who during World War II and after sharing their experiences of discrimination with other Asian Americans demanded for curriculum that enlighten them on their history sparking strikes in colleges. Campuses was a good place for these Asian movements, in University of California there was Asian American Political alliance, publications of articles such as Gidra in 1969 and by 1970 more than 60 colleges had Asian American group. One of the tremendous achievement was after participation in a strike in San Francisco State University and University of California, these institutions developed ethics studies that taught them their historical social, political and cultural lives. (The Asian American Movement: Finding Cohesion in Ethnic Difference, pg 1) It’s important to note that from the onset many Asian American civil rights movements viewed themselves as ethnic organizations rather than as racial organization. However, the war in Vietnam altered this perception since during this war whether one was a Vietnamese or not all Asians in America faced discrimination and hostilities. At the end of Vietnam War many of the Asian movements dissolved for lack of a unifying factor but Japanese Americans’ activists made federal government to apologize for what it had done during World War II. (The Asian American Movement: Finding Cohesion in Ethnic Difference, pg 6) In summary, the African and Asian Americans all in general faced discriminations of all forms like racism and employment prejudice, however, they differed in some aspects of discrimination such as Africans were at one point slaves to the Whites but Asians weren’t, thus as Africans fight for freedom from slavery, Asians fought for other forms of discriminations but at the end of their struggle they all succeeded in obtaining freedom, their successes were equal in that for whatever the cause for the struggles, they got solutions. Africans succeeded due to their unity from all social and political affiliations and good articulated organization however, Asians realizing importance of unity from African Americans and motivated by Vietnam War they came together fought for their liberalization but at the end of the war they disintegrated. These two groups used totally different strategies to achieve their freedom. Africans deployed civil disobedience to which in my view the most effective since the target institution (government) gets directly involved your grievances because of crisis it causes forcing the government to address the matters expeditiously(nonviolent) as compared to legal or strike used by the Asian students (radicalism), in the latter case it’s the institution (university) that the crisis is directed but not directly to the government that was championing these segregations through institutions such as courts and congress. Works cited The Asian American Movement: Yellow Power Movement The Militant Black Liberation Movement: an Introduction Source: Thomas Frazier, Readings in American History, 3rd ed. (Belmont, CA: Wadsworth, 2011) Lien, Pei-te. The Making of Asian America Through Political Participation. Philadelphia: Temple Univ. Press, 2001. Print. Read More