Blog 4 Post 3

      The Civil Rights Act of 1964 was one of the most important Civil Rights Legislations in United States history. It has been a great foundation for the nation moving forward in its mission to promote equality and freedom. The law was passed on a moral issue over the Jim Crow Laws, a legal argument over the Constitution, and an emotional memorial for John F. Kennedy. The Civil Rights Act of 1964 was necessary for the United States, and really set the tone for Civil Rights back in the ‘60’s. The law is not perfect however, and things can always be added to make it better. Today, though, I am thankful that we have come to a point where some of my best friends are of a different race/ethnicity than I am, as it has been one of the biggest blessings of my first year of college.

Blog 4 Post 2

Thesis:

The Civil Rights Act of 1964 was passed for moral, legal, and emotional reasons, and set the United States in a more positive direction to give all citizens equal rights.

Outline:
1. Intro
2. Background on segregation in America
3. More specific information about the Civil Rights Act of 1964
4. Moral reasons it was passed
5. Legal (Constitutional) reasons why it was passed
6. Emotional reasons it was passed
7. Conclusion

Blog 4 Post 1----Bibliography

Sources for the Civil Rights Act of 1964

Primary Source:


"Civil Rights Act (1964)." Our Documents -. N.p., n.d. Web. 09 May 2013. http://www.ourdocuments.gov/doc.php?flash=true.


Secondary Sources:

Napolitano, Andrew P. Dred Scott's Revenge: A Legal History of Race and Freedom in America. Nashville: Thomas Nelson, 2009. Print.

Patterson, Thomas E. We The People. 6^th ed. New York: McGraw-Hill, 2006. Print.

"The Civil Rights Act of 1964." United States Senate: Committee on the Judiciary. N.p., n.d.         Web. 09 May 2013.

Blog 3 Post 3 REVISED

As I was trying to decide on a topic, I had it narrowed down to either World War II or Civil Rights. Initially, I chose to write on the the War, but as I was researching, I found some pretty good sources from the library and online for The Civil Rights Act of 1964, so I am pulling an audible and changing topics!  I chose this topic because as I have come to Greenville, I have really diversified my friend group, especially coming from a town that is even smaller than Greenville.  It is hard for me to think about times where things were so segregated and people couldn't do certain things just because of race.  My new research question is Why was the Civil Rights Act of 1964 passed?  I will explore what pushed Congress and the rest of the country to pass the Act and move America forward.

I do not know a ton about the Civil Rights Act of 1964 in particular, but have read in different places that it was an important part of helping to move past segregation.  I have learned it was a really tough period, especially for minorities and one that our country shouldn't be proud of.  I do not have a good impression of segregation and think that the Act was necessary to move the country forward.  In order to prevent bias though, I will try to imagine myself in that time period and see what other issues were going on at the time.

Blog 3 Post 2

http://www.npr.org/2013/03/26/175288241/angry-days-shows-an-america-torn-over-entering-world-war-ii

For the topic of the American involvement in World War II, I found a really cool primary source of a speech about how the Americans weren't exactly sure how they felt about entering the war.  There were also two good websites that I could use in my paper about the involvment.  One article from EBSCO would also go well with it, as it discusses all of the world events going on at the time.  There were a lot of books in the library about World War II, but for causes, they dealt mostly with Germany.  I think I would change my question to "Why/How did the United States get involved in World War II? Since the United States didn't cause the war, the sources are all more focused on why the United States had to enter the war.  My research will be geared more in that direction.  The sources I have are solid and would be very helpful in writing a paper on this topic.

For the topic of Civil Rights, I also found some great sources.  I found three books from the library that all went into great detail about the Civil Rights Act of 1964 and the challenges it faced in being passed.  The books talked a lot about the influence of John F. Kennedy and the impact he had on Lyndon Johnson to pass civil rights.  The primary source I got was a picture and the words of the Civil Rights Act from this website: http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/americanexperience/features/primary-resources/lbj-civilrights/
I also found another article from EBSCO regarding the Civil Rights Act of 1964.  I think I would keep my question, "What pushed Congress to pass this law?" the same because the sources discuss this in good detail, talking a lot about moral and emotional issues with John F Kennedy and Lyndon B. Johnson.

"Civil Rights Act Of 1964." Civil Rights Act Of 1964 (2009): 1. MasterFILE Premier. Web. 28 Apr. 2013. 

My interpretation of this topic has stayed about the same since the research, as many people still resisted the law, but those who fought for it did it for moral reasons.

 

The topic of 9/11 is the one that I am the most familiar with obviously, because I lived through it. The primary sources I found were numerous videos of the attack and also some recorded phone calls from the time of the attack.  There were also speeches given by President at the time George W. Bush.  I found a couple articles that discussed some of the implications from the attack, and they focused on the health effects, and also the economic effects.  http://www.nyc.gov/html/doh/wtc/html/know/know.shtml

Mustapha, Jennifer. "Threat Construction In The Bush Administration's Post-9/11 Foreign Policy: (Critical) Security Implications For Southeast Asia." Pacific Review 24.4 (2011): 487-504. Academic Search Premier. Web. 28 Apr. 2013.

The article above talked about safety implications for those from other countries and how the attacks contributed to prejudice feelings towards them.

The books I found in the library mostly had to deal with just a history of what happened and there wasn't a lot of analytical information.  It is a fairly recent event, so there may not be as many books out on the subject.  I think I would change my question for this topic to say " What were the implications for America after the 9-11 attacks?"  This is more specific and intertwines with the book sources I found.  My perspective of the 9-11 attacks is obviously that they were very bad, but I haven't really ever thought a lot about the aftermath, so I would be interested in learning about them in greater detail and how they affect me when I may not even realize it.

Blog 3 Post 1

World War II- I would be writing about the United States involvement in World War II in the 1940's. What role did the U.S. play in starting the war?

Civil Rights-  I would be writing about the Civil Rights Movement and the Acts in the 1960's, and why the Civil Rights Act of 1964 was passed.
What pushed Congress to pass this law?

9-11-  I would be writing about the terrorist attacks in New York and Washington D.C. on September 11, 2001, and the implications that they have caused.
What were the post-effects of the attacks?

Interpretation

 

       After reading through both of my primary sources having to do with John Ross and his opposition to Indian removal, I felt like I had a pretty clear interpretation of what Ross was trying to do and the type of person he was.  I also felt like I understood what was going on between the government and the Indians.  My initial interpretation was to think of John Ross as a hero who was sticking up to the United States government for his people, the Cherokee.  In his speech he talked about how many other Indian groups were relocating to the west like the government told them to do, but a majority of the Cherokee people were staying in their homeland and it was a pretty lonely feeling.  He was making a point to let the government know that he wasn't going anywhere and that he would not go down without a fight.  The protest that Ross made to Congress had a lot of the same meaning as the speech.  He was arguing that the treaties between the Cherokees and the government were not legitimate and had been obtained by fraud.  This also showed me that he was willing to fight for his people and work hard on their behalf.  His intentions seemed genuine, and his effort to fight Indian removal seemed very noble.  My interpretation of the primary sources is that Ross was standing up to the government for bullying the Cherokee and the rest of the Indian groups.  I also thought of John Ross as a hero.


 My interpretation was challenged,    however, by the article I read that involved John Ross and his connection to the Cherokee people.  From my point of view, the article made John Ross out to be somewhat of a dishonest man.  The article claimed that Ross would use old myths about Cherokee people to help fight colonialsism.  While the primary sources did not talk specifically about how Ross went about fighting colonialism, this article opened my eyes a little more to the fact that I can not just assume Ross is a true hero. This might be a stretch, but the story of Robin Hood kind of came to mind.  Ross could have been dushonest to the government, but was doing it for the cause of helping the Cherokee people.  It correlates with Robin Hood who obviously stole from the rich and gave it to the poor.  The article did not necessarily insinuate that Ross was doing it for selfish reasons, so that is the interpretation I had after reading the article through a different lens.

       The primary sources I have read do not elude to the fact that John Ross was a sneaky man, and no evidence is in the speech and protest that he was standing up to fight colonialism for selfish reasons only.  Obivously, since they are both spoken sources from Ross himself, they won't be anything negative about him.  However, I still believe that my original interpretation of Ross as a good leader and hero is more accurate of the true story, regardless of what the article describes.  The protest Ross made against the government that the treaty was illegitimate makes a lot of sense to me because I can't see the Indians making a deal that would require them to leave their homeland.  I don't believe that the Indians would be at a peace with that settlement.  The accusation that the government obtained this treaty by fraud makes sense to me.  Another reason I believe Ross is genuine in his protest is because many Cherokees also protested the treaty with him.  It was believed that almost 15 thousand people from the tribe protested it.  With John Ross leading this protest, my interpretation of him being a great leader and hero appears to be on target after reading both of my primary sources and reading the article as a secondary source through a different lens.  All of the sources are important and have added to my knowledge, but I am confident in my original interpretation that John Ross was a genuine leader for the Cherokee people and Indians as a whole.

Investigation

I really enjoyed the speech and protest of John Ross, who was a Cherokee leader in the 1800's, a time in which Native Americans were being forced off of their homeland in the United States and pushed west.  John Ross stood up to the government, however, and fought against this Indian removal policy.  I gained some respect for him by the way he "went to bat" for his people, something a true leader does.  I could not obtain all of my information about this situation and John Ross just with these two primary sources, so I of course had several questions after reading them.  First of all, and this might be a dumb and ignorant question, I did not picture John Ross looking the way he did in the picture.  He was a white man, and I expected him to look more like my interpretation of an Indian.  I wondered if he grew up as a Cherokee, or was just moved into a leadership position after he got older?  Another question I had involved the Native Americans that stayed put even after they were told to head west.  In his speech he talks about a large base of Cherokees still staying in their homeland.  I am curious to find out how those Cherokees coexisted with the Europeans and where they stayed?  My third question involves his protest.  Where did he get his evidence that the treaties that justified Indian Removal were gathered and obtained by fraud?  These questions made it obvious to me that I still have a lot to learn about the topic/primary source and that I do not have a ton of background and previous knowledge on it.

As far as the speech and protest by John Ross go, I do not know anything about them in particular, but can relate and understand to the context and subject.  When Europeans kept immigrating to the United States, the hunger for more territory kept getting stronger.  The settlers forced the Indians to move off of their homeland and pushed them west.  I knew that there was some resistance by the Indians, but was not sure how much.  John Ross is an example of some resistance, and I am excited to learn more about his role in opposing Indian removal.

In order to get more information about John Ross and his role, I researched other secondary sources.  One source I found, which is cited below and taken from The Journal of American History, looks at John Ross and Indian removal in a few different angles.  This article made it out to be that Ross was pretty strategic, and a little sly as well.  Ross was trying to fight colonialism, so he wanted to learn more about Cherokee history in order to preserve it.  Ross studied ancient Cherokee stories, and found a lot of historical information, that had more than likely been tainted as the years went by.  He used them anyway, and these myths were used to fight colonialism.  A lot of people questioned the authenticity of the stories, because many believed that only the Cherokees of hundreds of years ago knew some of the stories Ross was sharing and passing on as true.  Ross was somewhat criticized  for being only 1/8 Cherokee, which answers a question I had earlier in the investigation.  In the primary sources, I was looking at John Ross through the lens of a hero, but in this article, I view him more as tricky and strategic.  The different viewpoints of the articles are very intriguing and insightful.

Telling Stories: The Political Uses of Myth and History in the Cherokee and Creek Nations

Claudio Saunt

The Journal of American History
Vol. 93, No. 3 (Dec., 2006), pp. 673-697

Published by: Organization of American Historians

Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/4486409

Pre-Investigation

       The two primary sources I am investigating both involve John Ross and the topic of resistance to Indian removal.  The first is a speech he makes in the Supreme Court, and the second is a protest that he makes in Congress regarding the issue.  Ross was a leading opponent of Indian removal.



      The speech seems to be about the Indian frusteration with the white people coming over to America and forcing them to move out of their homeland.  The Indians felt like they could not live as distinct communities within the rest of America because of the way they were treated by white people.  The protest seems to be about the fact that treaties that allowed and made  Indian, in this case Cherokee, removal right had been recieved illegally and by fraud.

       Both of these primary sources were obviously written by John Ross, as he created and presented the speech and protest to the Supreme Court and Congress, respectively.  It is possible and more than likely that many other people have recoreded these two sources, but John Ross wrote the original primary sources.  His motivation for writing these was to express his frusteration on behalf of the Cherokee Indians, and Indians in general, stating that they were being treated both poorly and unfairly.  He was a leader, so he did the best he could to speak out on his peoples' behalves and to support them the best he could.  He was fighting for them and did his best to stand up against what he felt was wrong.  Defense for Indians was his prime motivation for creating these two works.





       The context of these primary sources seems to obviously be during times of negative relations between the white people and the Indians.  The Indians were being forced out of their lands by white settlers and either had to leave and move farther west, or adapt to the customs of the whites who settled in their land.  The Indians had made great advances in their society, but were being forced to give that all up and act like savages again.  The justifications the white people and the government were giving for Indian removal were not legitimate according to Ross, which created the need for his protest.

Primary source

The primary sources I will be using are the speech and protest by John Ross, both on the topic of Indian Removal Resistance.

http://www.digitalhistory.uh.edu/learning_history/indian_removal/resistance.cfm

Life for African Slaves in Early America

One of the groups of people that made up a large chunk of the population in British Colonial America were African slaves.  Life in colonial America was obviously pretty difficult for the slaves, and they faced many rough conditions and trials just to get to America in the first place.  Once they arrived, things did not get much better.

The African Slave Trade was an extremely brutal thing for many Africans.  Europeans set up ports at different places in Africa, and European sailors would bring goods to these ports in exchange for humans (PBS).  The sailors would then sell the humans to American slave owners so they could provide labor on their fields and farms (PBS).  The conditions for the Africans on the ships were absolutely terrible.  There was limited space, and diseases spread quickly (PBS).  A classmate said during the discussion, "The people were treated like animals." Sadly,  I think that is a fair way of describing it.  Many of the Africans died before they reached America on these ships (PBS). 

For the Africans who reached America on the boats, there was not exactly a great sigh of relief.  Cash crops had become a huge industry in the colonies, and with the newly arrived Africans as slaves, the plantation owners realized they could get a lot of labor for basically no cost (PBS).  Many of the Africans knew how to cultivate the crops so they were used to help make the owners rich (PBS).

The conditions on the plantations were usually very inhumane.  The slaves often had to work very long hours and they often were treated with violence, such as being hit or whipped if they were not keeping up with the required "pace" of work (PBS).  This was even the case on Thomas Jefferson's, one of America's presidents, plantations.   I was somewhat surprised when I heard that Thomas Jefferson had slaves.  Jefferson inherited slaves from his parents and owned a plantation called Monticello in Virginia (Jefferson and Slavery...).  Jefferson however did not want his slaves to be treated brutally, but whenever he was gone from the plantation, his workers often went against his wishes (Jefferson and Slavery...).  The African slaves often had to live in fear because they never knew what was going to be facing them in the upcoming days.  As the relations between the white colonists and black Africans grew more tense, the colonists grew stronger in their oppression against the African slaves (PBS).  There were times when some Africans would try to rebel, but they were often unsuccessful.  The cruelty of the slaves had almost just become normal (PBS).   Some of the colonies legalized killing and torturing slaves (PBS). 


The lives of Africans slaves in early America were extremely difficult.  They were shipped over to the new land in harsh conditions, and stepped onto land in conditions that were almost just as bad in some places.  The slaves were beaten, lived in fear, and often did not get sufficient food and water.  The relations between the white colonists and the slaves grew more and more bitter, and set off a racism trend that would continue for many years.











"Jefferson and Slavery at Monticello: Paradox of Liberty- Thomas Jefferson's Monticello." Thomas
        Jeffersons Monticello Blog RSS. N.p., n.d. Web. 17 Feb. 2013.

PBS. PBS, n.d. Web. 17 Feb. 2013.

British Colonial Regions in North America

The three British colonial regions in North America, which were the Northern, Middle, and Southern, were all very similar in their reasons for colonizing land and creating the same goals.  However, based upon geography and the factors that shaped their society and economy, they each had different factors and ways of acheiving those goals.

One of the main reasons all of these new colonies were created in North America was over religion, as in the case of the Pilgrims and the Puritans.  The three different regions had different religious influences, but it was still one of the core parts of the colonization.  Similarly in all of the regions, as time went on, there began to be a decline in religious favor, though.   Also, the settlers were curious to start society in a new place and to expand as much as they could with their abundant land they had found in this new territory and to in a sense "spread their wings" from England.  They didn't necessarily want to seperate from England, but just become more adventurous.  The three different regions had different ways of going about this though, beginning with the first colonies in the southern region.

The first region to be colonized was the South ("Slave Law...").  Jamestown, Virginia was the first British North American settlement in 1607 ("Slave Law...").  The present day states included Virginia, Maryland, and both of the Carolinas.  The main factors that shaped the economy in the south were cash crops such as tobacco, rice and indigo.  These crops were abundant in the region and were sold for heavy profits.  These cash crops required a lot of labor, and in order to accomplish all of the work, the colonists brought in slaves, which first arrived from Africa in 1609 ("Slave Law..."). The region was defined by slavery, and was mainly settled by single men and not families.  The South also did not have as good of relationships with the Native Americans as the other regions.

While the south relied on cash crops and slavery, the Northern/New England colonies utilized subsistence farming, maritime industries such as shipbuilding and fishing, and trade in livestock and timber.  The region also had a lot of Pilgrim and Puritan influence.  The only difference between the two groups was that the Pilgrims were seperatists from the English church and the Puritans were not.  One classmate in an earlier lecture said, "The Puritans believed that they could purify the church."  There were few slaves, especially compared to the South.  This region was shaped more by whole familes rather than single males. The Northern colonies (Current-day Massachusetts, Rhode Island, New Hampshire, and Connecticut) were the the least diverse and had mostly an English population.  This is in direct contrast to the third and final region, the Middle Colonies.


The Middle colonies were made up of present-day New York, New Jersey, Pennslyvania and Delaware.  This was the most diverse colony because it was settled by several different nationalities, such as the Dutch, Germans, and obviously English.  Since the colony was so diverse, it led to more religious tolerance and acceptance ("The Middle Colonies").  There was a large Quaker influence in the region, which is a religious group that believed in peace and no social class distinctions.  The main crop was wheat, as flour made up 75% of the regions' exports.  There was a pretty high standard of living so they enjoyed a wide range of imports.  There was not a huge emphasis on cash crops overall, though, as subsistence farming played a somewhat larger role("The Middle Colonies").

The thre different British Colonial Regions in North America all seemed to be pretty different when looking in from the outside with all of their different economic and social factors.  However, on the inside, they had a lot of the same core goals and reasons for colonizing, which included religious toleration and blazing their own trail away from England.


"The Middle Colonies." The Middle Colonies. N.p., n.d. Web. 12 Feb. 2013.

"Slave Law in Colonial Virginia: A Timeline." N.p., n.d. Web. 10 Feb. 2013.

Columbian exchange

The Columbian exchange was obviously a huge part of American history, and had huge implications for both the European colonists and the Native Americans.  The appearance of the colonists had both negative and positive affects on the native people, while the native people as well created benefits and drawbacks for the Europeans.
To begin with, there were some very apparent negative results for the Native Americans after the European colonists settled in the New World.  The Europeans were colonizing the land.  In class, I was asked what colonization meant, and I responded with, "Claiming new land and starting a civlization where no one has been before."  Dr. Holden slightly corrected me by saying, "By claiming land that you don't AKNOWLEDGE where others have already settled." This statement is completely true about the Columbian exchange because the European settlers came and began to start their own civlizations and almost acted as if there was no one there in some areas, which was obviously very disrespectful to the Native Americans.  Along with the disrespect, the Europeans also brought many diseases that turned out to be fatal for the native people.  Diseases such as smallpox, influenza, and malaria killed many Native Americans and were devastating to their population ("The Columbian Biological Exchange").  The natives did not have any prior contact with these diseases, so their immune systems were not strong enough to handle them.  The Europeans were also affected by disease, as they had never been exposed to some illnesses that the Native Americans passed on to them, such as syphilis ("The Columbian Biological Exchange").  The diseases were be far the most negative side effects of the Columbian exchange.  However, there were also some positive things that came out of it.

The Native Americans benefited greatly from the technology that the Europeans brought over to the New World.  The natives learned a type of European alphabet and were able to communicate through a common language, which led to a breakthrough in their own society ("The Columbian Exchange").  The enhanced farm equipment, like the plow, helped lead to more efficient farming and a greater crop surplus ("The Columbian Exchange").  The Europeans also benefited from the fertile soil in the New World.  Guns and knives brought over from Europe also helped the Native Americans to hunt and to get more food that way as well ("The Columbian Exchange").

The exchange of different plants and animals had important and positive implications for both the Europeans and Native Americans.  The Europeans brought over horses, pigs, cattle, chicken, sheep, and goats ("The Columbian Biological Exchange").   These animals served as a new mode of transportation, labor, and food.  The Native Americans shared turkeys, alpacas, and guniea pigs that were sent back to the Old World, once again signifying a mutual relationship with the Europeans.  The exchange of different plants also had great economic benefits. The Europeans brought over Sugercane, which ended up being a huge cash crop in the New World.  The two main plants sent from the New World to the Old World were Maize and Potatoes (The Columbian Biological Exchange").  Both of these plants became large parts of a European diet ("The Columbian Exchange").

The Columbian Exchange plays a substantial part in the story of American History.  It had huge effects on both the Native Americans and European colonists.  Overall, the effects were both positive and negative for both sides.  The Native Americans and Europeans were negatively effected by disease, but theu also benefited from the exchange of technology, plants, and animals.

"The Columbian Biological Exchange." The Columbian Biological Exchange. N.p., n.d. Web. 12 Feb. 2013.

"The Columbian Exchange." The Columbian Exchange. N.p., n.d. Web. 12 Feb. 2013.