Word Smith: Jim Crow
There are few two-syllable names that can be uttered and receive more charged, racial epithets, than “Jim Crow.” And although it sounds as if it’s the name of some Southern State Senator, or struggling lawyer, the name has a more curious origin. It comes from the name of a white character, playing a black man who was from the South.
Minstrel shows from the 1830s depicted African Americans as musically talented, fun-loving and intellectually inferior people. These shows were a staple of Northern urban entertainment (New York, Boston, Philadelphia), before spreading nationally. Jim Crow was the name of a demeaning stage character, created by a white actor in the early 1830s. The popular song and dance minstrel shows were performed by white actors wearing black makeup, and images of the dancers adorned advertisements, magazines and sheet-music covers. One of these sheet-music covers was “Jump Jim Crow,” a popular song from the era, which introduced the term “Jim Crow” to the public.
The set of regulations that were dubbed “Jim Crow laws,” dated from the end of Reconstruction (mid-to-late 1870s) and lasted for nearly a century. They were named after the theatrical character, who was still making the rounds with whites in blackface, four decades later. The new regulations covered laws in public schools, on transit buses and in public places such as: bathrooms, swimming pools, restaurants and bars. The laws forced racial segregation. The name – Jim Crow – became a common mocking symbol used by whites to treat Black people as unequal citizens. Those laws and social practices came to represent the nickname equivalent to America’s own system of racial apartheid.
Jim Crow segregation laws stuck around in America far too long, with some states dragging their feet on any repeal. It was not until the mid-1960s that these laws officially ended. The final legal abolition was driven by the Federal Government with the Civil Rights Act of 1964 and the Voting Rights Act of 1965.
Henry E. Hooper 