The notion of power generally implies a basic division between those who have and exercise
power and those who have none or little of it. As a consequence, the exercise of power within a
community requires that its members accept or even internalise a complex system of relations,
laws, rules and regulations, and respect symbols such as specific places (court, parliament, jail,
castle, ect…), which helps to create social cohesion on the one hand, and which reveals quite
clearly the conflicts and tensions existing within the group on the other hand.
I’m going to talk about the power that exercised white people on black people even after the 1
January of 1863 when the President of the United States, Abraham Lincoln changed the federal
legal status of more than 3,5 million enslaved African Americans in the designated areas of the
South from slave to free.
At that time, despite this new law, black people were not equal to the whites. In 1865, the Ku Klux
Klan apparead at the end of the Civil War. This white supremacist hate group still exists
nowadays. However, this is a group, we can think that the American government passed laws
against the segregation but in fact the contrary happened. In 1896, Jim Crow laws which were
state and local laws, enforced racial segregation in the Southern United Stats. The quotation was
« separate but equal ». In reality, it was clear that black people didn’t have the same rights that
white people. These laws were enforced until 1965.
We find the same contradiction in two documents that we studied in class. The first document is a
passage from the American Declaration of Independence which was signed on July, 4, 1776. In
this passage, the Founding Fathers focus on what they consider to be obvious facts: all men are
equal from birth, they have God-given rights that no one can take away from them, such as the
right to live, the right to be free and the right to find happiness. The second document is passage
from the Black Codes that became a law in Mississippi in 1865, just after the end of the Civil War
and the abolition fo slavery. The law states that it is forbidden by law for Whites and non-Whites
to intermarry. Anyone doing so risked being sentenced to life in jail. It is an extremely harsh and
racist law imposing segregation. This reveals that there must have been a wide gap between the
Founding Fathers’s ideals and the reality of the time.
Fortunately, as we saw in class, blacks decided to fight for their rights. First, Rosa Parks in 1955
didn’t want to give up her seat on a bus. She was fired and jailed for doing so. She basically
ignited the flame that became the Civil Rights Movement. Then, Martin Luther King became the
leader of the Montgomery bus boycott and one of the figures of the Civil Rights Movement. His
most famous speech is « I have a dream ». He was, unfortunately assassinated in 1968
As said Malcolm X « Nobody can give you freedom, nobody can give you equality or justice or
anything, If you are a man, you take it ».In my view, this is more than a quotation for blacks. It is for
everybody, for women all around the world, if we stop fighting for our rights, we will definetely lose
them.
We can also relate these articles to the notion of Myths and Heroes. Indeed, Rosa Parks and
Martin Luther King are considered as heroes to many people. Before the civil rights movement,
when whites were thought to be better than all other races,, they decided it was time for change.
This could even be linked to the « idea of progress » because the actions of Rosa Parks and
Martin Luther King contributed to a change in rights for black people in the USA. A lot of progress
has been made since they stood up for the rights of black americans. For example, Barack
Obama the last president was black. This can be considered as great progress for human rights.
