Segregation
Segregation
Firstly, politics affected the rights of black people in America and South Africa. For America, the Jim Crow laws ‘mandated de jure racial segregation in all public facilities.(2) The system was labelled as ‘separate but equal although the reality of this statement was very different. Laws were being passed to prevent a majority of the black population and some white poor people from being able to vote through poll taxes, comprehension and literacy tests and such. Although Grandfather clauses were made so some illiterate whites could vote. As they were denied the ability to vote, the blacks also could not serve on juries or in local offices. After the 1660s, laws were also passed in some American colonies ‘that discriminated against blacks and set them apart from white colonists. (3) Africans had to live and work on plantations with no pay, very little food and inadequate housing.
South Africa also had to face similar laws. The initial aim of Apartheid was so that the white people could maintain domination and extend racial separation. The Bantu Authorities Act was established in 1951 to create homelands or African reserves. All political rights – including voting – held by an African were restricted to the designated homeland. Parliament held complete hegemony over the homelands which denationalized nine-million South Africans. ‘The homeland administrations refused the nominal independence, maintaining pressure for political rights within the country as a whole(4). The Public Safety act and the Criminal law amendment Act were passed in 1953, empowering the government to increase the penalties for people who protested against or supported the repeal of a law. The penalties imposed on political protest were severe.
Secondly, were the social factors that prevented blacks from having civil rights in both countries. Public schools, places, modes of transportation, restaurants, restrooms and drinking fountains among others were segregated in America. ‘While the separation of the African Americans from the general population was being legalised and formalized in the progressive era, it was also becoming customary.(1) There were many cases where despite the Jim Crow laws not forbidding it, black people still didnt participate in events such as sports, recreational activities and church services. Black slaves could not live with their family without the fear of separation. Slaves could not own their own home nor choose their work field. In fear of an uprising, it was also forbidden for blacks to have meetings with other blacks and later it became law that they needed written permission from their master to leave the plantation where they worked for errands.
‘Strategists in the National Party invented Apartheid as a means to cement their control over the economic and social system. (4) The Apartheid laws controlled the social lives of the black population in South Africa. Some jobs became ‘white only and marriage of whites and non-whites was prohibited. The Population Registration Act in 1950 made it so that every South African be put into one of three categories – white, black or coloured. Being classified into these groups were based on appearance, descent and