Description
Read Chapter 15 and the information included in the Mississippi Black Code. Once all reading is complete, respond to the following item(s):
During Reconstruction, Black Codes were enacted in several former states in the Confederacy. A Republican-controlled Congress would later react to suppress these codes.
- What ultimately were these codes designed to do?
- Precisely how did the codes aim to accomplish these objectives?
You are required to submit an initial posting (200 words minimum) that addresses the items above.
The American Yawp Reader
Mississippi Black Code, 1865
Mississippi Black Code, 1865
Many southern governments enacted legislation that reestablished antebellum power relationships. South Carolina and Mississippi
passed laws known as Black Codes to regulate black behavior and impose social and economic control. While they granted some rights
to African Americans ? like the right to own property, to marry or to make contracts ? they also denied other fundamental rights.
Mississippi?s vagrant law, excerpted here, required all freedmen to carry papers proving they had means of employment. If they had no
proof, they could be arrested, fined, or even re-enslaved and leased out to their former enslaver.
Vagrancy Law
Section 2. Be it further enacted, that all freedmen, free Negroes, and mulattoes in this state over the age of eighteen years found on the
second Monday in January 1866, or thereafter, with no lawful employment or business, or found unlawfully assembling themselves together either in the day or nighttime, and all white persons so assembling with freedmen, free Negroes, or mulattoes, or usually associating with freedmen, free Negroes, or mulattoes on terms of equality, or living in adultery or fornication with a freedwoman, free Negro,
14
or mulatto, shall be deemed vagrants; and, on conviction thereof, shall be fined in the sum of not exceeding, in the case of a freedman,
free Negro, or mulatto, 150, and a white man, $200, and imprisoned at the discretion of the court, the free Negro not exceeding ten
12
days, and the white man not exceeding six months?.
Section 7. Be it further enacted, that if any freedman, free Negro, or mulatto shall fail or refuse to pay any tax levied according to the
provisions of the 6th Section of this act, it shall be prima facie evidence of vagrancy, and it shall be the duty of the sheriff to arrest such
freedman, free Negro, or mulatto, or such person refusing or neglecting to pay such tax, and proceed at once to hire, for the shortest
time, such delinquent taxpayer to anyone who will pay the said tax, with accruing costs, giving preference to the employer, if there be
26
one.
Section 8. Be it further enacted, that any person feeling himself or herself aggrieved by the judgment of any justice of the peace, mayor,
or alderman in cases arising under this act may, within five days, appeal to the next term of the county court of the proper county, upon
giving bond and security in a sum not less than $25 nor more than $150, conditioned to appear and prosecute said appeal, and abide by
the judgment of the county court, and said appeal shall be tried de novo in the county court, and the decision of said court shall be final.
Civil Rights of Freedmen
Section 1. Be it enacted by the legislature of the state of Mississippi, that all freedmen, free Negroes, and mulattoes may sue and be sued,
implead and be impleaded in all the courts of law and equity of this state, and may acquire personal property and choses in action, by
descent or purchase, and may dispose of the same in the same manner and to the same extent that white persons may:
Provided, that the provisions of this section shall not be construed as to allow any freedman, free Negro, or mulatto to rent or lease any
lands or tenements, except in incorporated towns or cities, in which places the corporate authorities shall control the same?.
Section 7. Be it further enacted, that every civil officer shall, and every person may, arrest and carry back to his or her legal employer any
freedman, free Negro, or mulatto who shall have quit the service of his or her employer before the expiration of his or her term of service
14
without good cause, and said officer and person shall be entitled to receive for arresting and carrying back every deserting employee
aforesaid the sum of $5, and 10 cents per mile from the place of arrest to the place of delivery, and the same shall be paid by the em-
12
ployer, and held as a setoff for so much against the wages of said deserting employee:
Provided, that said arrested party, after being so returned, may appeal to a justice of the peace or member of the board of police of the
county, who, on notice to the alleged employer, shall try summarily whether said appellant is legally employed by the alleged employer
and his good cause to quit said employer; either party shall have the right of appeal to the county court, pending which the alleged deserter shall be remanded to the alleged employer or otherwise disposed of as shall be right and just, and the decision of the county court
26
shall be final.
Penal Code
Section 1. Be it enacted by the legislature of the state of Mississippi, that no freedman, free Negro, or mulatto not in the military service
of the United States government, and not licensed so to do by the board of police of his or her county, shall keep or carry firearms of any
kind, or any ammunition, dirk, or Bowie knife; and, on conviction thereof in the county court, shall be punished by fine, not exceeding
$10, and pay the costs of such proceedings, and all such arms or ammunition shall be forfeited to the informer; and it shall be the duty
of every civil and military officer to arrest any freedman, free Negro, or mulatto found with any such arms or ammunition, and cause
him or her to be committed for trial in default of bail?
Section 4. Be it further enacted, that all the penal and criminal laws now in force in this state defining offenses and prescribing the mode
of punishment for crimes and misdemeanors committed by slaves, free Negroes, or mulattoes be and the same are hereby reenacted and
declared to be in full force and effect against freedmen, free Negroes, and mulattoes, except so far m the mode and manner of trial and
punishment have been changed or altered by law?.
Section 5. Be it further enacted, that if any freedman, free Negro, or mulatto convicted of any of the misdemeanors provided against in
this act shall fail-or refuse, for the space of five days after conviction, to pay the fine and costs imposed, such person shall be hired out by
14
the sheriff or other officer, at public outcry, to any white person who will pay said fine and all costs and take such convict for the shortest
time.
12
Edward McPherson, The Political History of the United States of America during the period known as Reconstruction?. (Washington
D.C.: 1871), 80-82.
26
Available through Google Books
? Charlotte Forten Teaches Freed Children in South Carolina, 1864
General Reynolds Describes Lawlessness in Texas, 1868 ?
14
Purchase answer to see full
attachment
