Inspired by Major Kong’s thread about gun ownership in dictatorships.
Among the comments made in the above thread were how history might have been different if German Jews had guns in their hands when they opened their doors to Nazis, or similarly, if southern blacks had offered armed resistance to the Klan. Which made me wonder why blacks in the south didn’t organize widespread armed resistance to the Klan.
Were their Jim Crow laws about firearms ownership?
Upon rereading, I see that I’ve made the automatic and incorrect assumption that everybody reading this is American and will understand the context if my question.
My apologies. More specifically, the question relates to the United States, and the time period between roughly 1865 to 1970. By 1970 the Black Panthers had publicly advocated armed resistance to racial opression. I’m trying to understand why it took so long, though ultimately this question is beyond the scope of this forum.
During “Presidential Reconstruction” (1865-68), in which Southern whites elected conventions and legislatures which rewrote their state constitutions to abolish slavery but not recognize other African American civil rights, several Southern states did adopt bans on black ownership of firearms. (This was part of the complex of laws known as “Black Codes”, not to be confused with the later “separate but equal” Jim Crow laws.) After the Fourteenth Amendment was ratified in 1868, any such ban would have been an unconstitutional violation of the “Equal Protection” clause.
As for the broader question of armed resistance to Jim Crow, it wasn’t easy to fight people with (lots) more money, better guns and organization, and the full power of state and local government behind them.
Plus blacks were an overall minority in all the southern states. A race war would have been suicidal for them.
The first concealed weapons laws, were directed against blacks, but that then, and this is now .
Originally, long ago, since white people could/did openly carry guns in plain sight, the blacks had to “hide/conceal” guns, leading to the establishment of laws outlawing the concealing of guns, but still letting people openly carry guns.
Unless you are aware of the history of laws against blacks carrying guns, then the laws against “concealing guns”, while allowing guns to be openly carried, makes no sense to those unfamiliar with guns and gun history.
All those old restrictions from a previous century, are “history”, and greatly misrepresent the current south, which now is very/EXTREMELY pro-black, than any other region. We now have 35 states which allow citizens, of any color to own, and carry guns, including all of the southern states.
The fact that for a short time, blacks were not allowed guns, is not much different than slavery and various and similar laws against blacks in the north.
The southern states today, more than any other region, more than any other country, allow blacks to own and carry guns for self defense and protection. Blacks have more freedom in the south, more rights to gun ownership in the south, than in any other part of the country.
NO other region except the south, do all of its states let blacks carry guns for self defense.
Alabama, Arkansas, Florida, Georgia, Missippi, Kentucky, Tennesee, North Carolina, South Carolina, Texas, Virginia, all of them, now let blacks carry concealed guns for self defense.
http://www.packing.org/state/report_basic.jsp?search=shall_issue
And it wasn’t suicidal for an individual to get lynched without putting up a fight…
My post in the closed thread was directed at the time of the deepest racism in the South, when African-Americans were routinely killed for no reason other than race. I’d imagine that at least a few would get the idea that the Klan didn’t leave anyone alive and at least decide to take a few with them when they came for them.
Maybe I’m misunderstanding the era’s dynamics completely. Maybe guns simply weren’t available to the dark-skinned. That’s why I asked.
Not true(or at least a misleading statement).
If I read this right:
Blacks were a VERY substantial minority, nearly equal in number to the whites, or even the majority of the population in some southern states.
Yes, overall, blacks were “only” 39% of the southern “aligned” population, but still a very substantial number and certainly not without much power, nor heavily outnumbered. Many battles/wars in history were won by one group having a 4-6 ratio in population. Any group that composes 39%, or is outnumbered by only 6-4 has considerable power/clout and can not be taken lightly or written off as insignificant.
http://www.civil-war.net/docs/events_leading_to_war.htm
Some states, like South Carolina and mississippi blacks were a majority of the populaion, not the minority. South Carolina was 57% slave/black and Mississippi was 55%. These figures are of slaves, and do not count additional blacks who were free men.
Other southern states had very significant slave/black populations . Florida 44%, Georgia 44%, Alabama 45%, Louisianna 47% , etc.
http://www.civil-war.net/docs/1860_census.htm
Again these number only include blacks who were slaves, and do not include free blacks which only increase the percentages.
furthermore, these numbers are from the 1860 census, and the black population proportionately increased during the civil war, by 1865, blacks were a higher percentage than those numbers listed.
The fact is that blacks in the south were not heavily outnumbered by whites, and in some cases even outnumbered white populations. To say that blacks in the south were a minority, is either an exageration, or is at least misleading to say the least.
I’d love to know what this means.
This is misleading because these states allow people of all races to carry concealed guns. According to your link, all 50 states have laws in place to issue permits to residents, black or otherwise.
Putting up that fight would not have saved the life of the targeted lynching victim, and may well have endangered the lives of his family and friends. Repercussions for taking a few with them would have been severe.
As it was, though lynching, while not unknown, was a tactic of fear. In other words, it targeted the weak - and against a mob, any lone man is weak.
The factual question seems to have been answered. Those wishing to debate the matter are directed to the Great Debates forum.
bibliophage
moderator GQ