African American’s Battle for Equality and Right’s
Luis Gomezfranco
HIS204: American History Since 1865
Prof. Lisa Bowie
January 14,2012

African American’s Battle for Equality and Right’s During and after the Civil War (1861-1865), the African American people were mistreated and discriminated against for many years. There is still racism going on until this day that routes from years of violence and maltreatment of the Black community in the United States. Black men and women were in a constant struggle in order to try to gain their equal rights as American citizens throughout history. When the United States was first getting colonized around the year 1619 there were African Americans who were stripped of their homes and forced into slavery. It was only years later that there was a Civil War that ended slavery but didn’t end resentment and animosity between Whites and Blacks. Even though Blacks were constantly beaten in public places and made to feel like insignificant human beings, they still fought long and hard for their right’s to live in this nation as equal as a White man and Woman. In this essay I will explain how they fought for their rights and what trials and tribulations they had to go through in order to get the respect they deserved and the life they fought to live amongst the White population. “The Black Codes codified some of these feelings into law when in 1865 southern state governments created legislation that restricted and controlled the lives of the ex-slaves.”(Bowles,2011) These rules that were made specifically for Black men and women of the U.S. at the time, argued by some to be a new form of slavery. According to the Black Codes African Americans couldn’t work any other job then farming. They also couldn’t own guns even though it clearly says in the United States Constitution, “ the right of the people to keep and bear