Stop & Frisk, in New York and other American cities is just the latest version of the practice of white men with guns stopping black men because they viewed them as "suspicious". We know, full well by now, that during slavery armed "slavers" stopped black males wherever they found them, assuming them to be runaways, and therefore, subject to suspicion.
But, even free black men and boys(free blacks numbered more than 400,000 in the 1700 & 1800's) could be stopped by anyone, and put in bondage, even if they had documents declaring them legally free. This practice continued after the Civil War, and the Emancipation Proclamation of 1865.
In 1865/66, so called, Black Code laws were passed in southern states restricting the freedoms of blacks. This happened after the Civil War. Even so, these laws made free black men "suspicious", and subject to
arrest, by declaring them indigent, even though no one would hire them. Further, they could be arrested for being vagrants, even though no one would rent them a room. In some states you could be jailed for not being a Christian, if you were the wrong color.
In his 1987 play, "Joe Turner's Come and Gone", Pulitzer Prize and Tony Award winning playwright, August Wilson, tells a story centered around the practice of white men taking groups of blacks, by gunpoint, and delivering them to slave labor camps. The time frame of the play is 1910. The play's focal point depicts the impact on the family of one black man taken off the streets by a "slaver" for being in the wrong place at the wrong time.
What I find troubling is that many whites can't connect the dots between treatment of blacks during, and after slavery. Signing documents does not guarantee freedom. Emancipation did not eliminate prejudice.
But, even free black men and boys(free blacks numbered more than 400,000 in the 1700 & 1800's) could be stopped by anyone, and put in bondage, even if they had documents declaring them legally free. This practice continued after the Civil War, and the Emancipation Proclamation of 1865.
In 1865/66, so called, Black Code laws were passed in southern states restricting the freedoms of blacks. This happened after the Civil War. Even so, these laws made free black men "suspicious", and subject to
arrest, by declaring them indigent, even though no one would hire them. Further, they could be arrested for being vagrants, even though no one would rent them a room. In some states you could be jailed for not being a Christian, if you were the wrong color.
In his 1987 play, "Joe Turner's Come and Gone", Pulitzer Prize and Tony Award winning playwright, August Wilson, tells a story centered around the practice of white men taking groups of blacks, by gunpoint, and delivering them to slave labor camps. The time frame of the play is 1910. The play's focal point depicts the impact on the family of one black man taken off the streets by a "slaver" for being in the wrong place at the wrong time.
What I find troubling is that many whites can't connect the dots between treatment of blacks during, and after slavery. Signing documents does not guarantee freedom. Emancipation did not eliminate prejudice.
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