“How Enfranchisement Stops Lynchings” by Ida B. Wells is an Investigative Article that aims to encourage individuals to protect the constitutional rights of black people. The Black Panther Party's “10-Point Program” is a list of demands aimed to highlight the criminal injustices and disparities black Americans face from the government, and to call other minorities to defend their rights. While “How Enfranchisement Stops Lynchings” uses Logos to state facts to support her argument and urge for government action. The Black Panther Parties' “10-Point Program” uses the authorial choice of historical reference to highlight the hypocrisy of the American Government. Both texts aim to promote racial justice and equity to influence their audience to …show more content…
Wells uses logos to state the horrific facts regarding lynchings from 1882-1893 in her effort to get organizations to protect the constitutional rights of Black People. Wells writes “that less than one-fourth of the persons hanged, shot and burned by white Christians were even accused of the usual crime--that of assaulting white women.”(Wells 5). The usage of Logos supports the author's purpose because the author uses facts to support her argument and urge for government action. The misrepresented lynching statistics are used by the author to demonstrate that the victims of the lynch mobs were largely innocent; only one-third of lynching victims were convicted of rape. Thus the government's unwillingness to protect them under the law and constitution makes them …show more content…
The Declaration of Independence states, “That to secure these rights, governments are instituted among men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed; that when any form of government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the right of the people to alter or abolish it, and to institute a new government…” (Declaration of Independence/ 10-Point Program). The authorial choice of historical references supports the main idea of this manifesto because it highlights the American government’s hypocrisy in acting against its founding principles when they commit these injustices against black people. Additionally, they reference that it is the people’s right to take action if the government becomes destructive of these rights according to the declaration of independence. Ultimately the Black Panther Party uses historical references to founding principles and articles to successfully criticize the government's hypocritical behavior while also highlighting their own rights to act and protect their rights in accordance with those same founding principles. Similarly to “The 10-Point Program”, Ida B. Wells holds those in power accountable for the fraud they commit in upholding the constitution and civil rights. Both texts were created to call out the racial injustices faced by black people and share a common goal of promoting racial equality. However, Wells'
Ida B. Wells was born and brought up in slavery during the Civil War. Being settled in the segregated and violent South, she was exposed to racial discrimination and brutality. After the lynching of her childhood friend, Wells turned her attention and journalism to white mob violence. To build her argument and appeal to ethos, Ida B. Wells uses many personal examples and first-hand experiences. In her pamphlet, “Southern Horrors: Lynch Law in All Its Phases”, Wells establishes her credibility throughout the accounts of others, including Frederick Douglass.
Wells traveled around the country even to Great Britain to speak out against lynchings. She has made various speeches in her time, one in particular “Lynching, Our National Crime” highlights the hypocrisy of the Southerners and calls on the nation to find a solution. Wells questions the nation's “Christian values” and the excuse that lynchings happen to protect women. Wells said in her speech, “The cowardly lyncher revels in murder, then seeks to shield himself from public execration by claiming devotion to woman. But truth is mighty and the lynching record discloses the hypocrisy of the lyncher as well as his crime.”
However, the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People’s coverage of lynching went steps further than the Telegraph. Assessing Walter White’s 1929 book “Rope and Faggot: A Biography of Judge
Jesse Washington, a teenage African American farmland, was lynched in Waco, Texas, 0n May 15, 1916, in what became a well-known example of racially motivated lynching. RecWashington was accused of raping and murdering Lucy fryer, the wife or his white employer in rural Robinson, Texas. There were no eyewitnesses to the crime, but during his interrogation by the mc Lennon county sheriff he signed a confession and described the location of the murder weapon. Washington was tried for murder in Waco, in a courtroom filled with furious locals. He entered a guilty plea and was quickly sentence to death.
According to Chesnutt, lynching is an evil practice not only because it is carried out unlawfully against persons who were often not responsible for any crime, but also because it was used as a violent display to intimidate the African American community and the denial of justice. False accusations often led to lynchings which was a crime committed by white mobs against black men. The criminal would either be burned or hung, as a way of punishment. The act, however, was actually meant as a mode of violent oppression and warning to the black community. The act of lynching is not meant to punish a single person, but to represent the idea of violence and purity to an entire community.
In the news article "Lynching in the South, " by Brooke T. Washington he argues that the white people take advantage of him and other African Americans. In the news article he says "The laws are a rule made by the white people..." this means that the African Americans have no saying in the making of the laws. He wants the execution and brutality to stop. Washington is directing this to the news article to the white people of that time so they can see they are doing isnt right that they arent treating everyone
Historians should interpret and disperse the first-hand accounts that are compiled into the book 100 Years of Lynchings, to help Americans understand exactly what happened from 1865 to the late 1900s. These accounts are written from a variety of stand points, allowing for a wide array of opinions. The majority of the
This inquiry is the most essential. In the Declaration of Independence it is expressed, "We hold these realities to act naturally obvious, that all men are made equivalent, that they are enriched by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the quest for Happiness"(Jefferson1). He is suggesting that these rights are not being reached out to African Americans. At the point when this nation was made it was intended to be where everybody could be free and have similar rights. Frederick Douglass trusts these rights have been taken far from African Americans and change is required.
Very few whites showed any emotion or horror to these spectacles of violence. It was common to see white families with children gawking and cheering at the hanging and charred bodies. Mark Twain once said that about every white Southerner celebrated mob violence. Lynching was a crude and brutal tool used for white supremacy, used by many lynch mobs (Fitzhugh Brundage,4). Some tortures included cutting off of the fingers, toes, ears, and genitals which would be sold to the crowd as souvenirs (Robert L Zangrando, 1).
Lynching Lynching in the United States was more common in the south, since people there was still unhappy about the civil war. « Lynching is the practice whereby a mob--usually several dozen or several hundred persons--takes the law into its own hands in order to injure and kill a person accused of some wrongdoing. » (Zangrado 1) The lynching period was between 1882 and 1968, a few years after the civil war. Although lynching did not just occur in the United States or between 1882 and 1968, it was a big event that caused lots of problems.
Lynchings took the lives of many African Americans, they became so absurd one could argue that black people's lives were little to no value at all. Tension had grown greatly, especially in the Southern parts of the United States. Many of the people of the south accused that the freeing slaves had a great impact on their financial problems. As a result of many whites being angered at the black people for not having the freedom that they all have by the thirteenth amendment, they still wanted to kill thus reverted to lynching. Many saw Lynching as entertainment and would take photographs to put in their family photo albums, and or make them into postcards.
However, the overwhelming realities of the Black American experience disallow any optimism to truly shine. Not only does Sinha discuss the lack of a specific definition of what it means to be an American citizen in the Declaration, but also that it allowed for a sense of White nationalism to take place due to the absence of the Black community being mentioned. Seventeen years after the Revolutionary War ended, the 1790 Naturalization Act was passed to only allow White immigrants into the US (Sinha, 1). Shortly after, a slew of laws were passed aiming to disenfranchise Black people and support the view that Black people were property rather than citizens with legislature like the Fugitive Slave Act of 1793 (Sinha, 1). The Declaration of Independence is a document that to Allen fights for equality and freedom, with the potential to answer the question of who is a citizen and finally include those unmentioned in the document itself.
In Ida B. Wells’ works Southern Horrors: Lynch Law in All Its Phases and A Red Record, Ida B. Wells argues against the lynching of African Americans of the time. Wells’ uses many strategies and techniques to make her arguments as convincing as possible throughout her works. She also uses clear language and well-structured sentences to make it clear what she is arguing. Ida B. Wells makes sure to use statistics and offers rebuttals to the opposing side’s point of view to strengthen her argument. Wells presents these arguments by isolating and clearly stating the problem, giving descriptive and specific examples, using statistics, and offering rebuttals.
The black panthers put a lot of their dedication into police brutality since police officers used their powers against blacks on a daily. Freedom to all black men in prisons and jails because majority of the blacks put into jails had unfair trials and are innocent of their accusations. The next point is the black people to be tried with a jury of their race for the sake of equality and fairness. The last point in the ten point program is the need for land, bread, housing, education, clothing, justice and peace. The need for all of these points shows the dedication of the black panther party.
In The Meaning of Freedom, activist Angela Davis critiques the plausibility of democracy and collective freedom in the United States. By examining parallels between slavery and the carceral state, Davis contends that the two systems mutually characterize black people as disposable and compels them to incapacitation. Focusing on the two oppressive systems’ reliance on the maintenance of ignorance, Davis discusses how this ignorance is connected to America’s dominant sentiments of capitalism and self-interest, which, altogether, perpetuate cycles of abuse that disproportionately harm communities of color and lower-class peoples. As a result, this propels the creation of social hierarchies which, because it inherently cultivates inequalities, causes America’s classification as a “democracy” to be impossible.