A Guide to De Jure and De Facto Segregation
This involves the legal segregation of African Americans and European American people. This was quite common in the past and was present in all parts of society, particularly during the Jim Crow era. The claim was that segregation was encouraged in order to reduce violence. The Jim Crow segregation lasted from 1880 to 1964 and was used to cement the dominant belief that white people were better than black people.
De facto segregation was the next stage of segregation and arose as a result of de jure segregation. Once segregation became outlawed, it managed to continue, although it could no longer be legally enforced. White people who believed they were superior to black people could still choose not to interact with black people or move within the same spaces. The law had not erased racism from the hearts of society. De facto segregation represented an agreement among the culture to purposefully exclude African Americans from certain spaces without needing the backing of the law. A large number of white people began to move to more developed areas, most especially the suburbs, in order to live and raise their children in spaces that were free from African Americans.
The suburbs still exist, and to this day, there is a wide difference between white neighborhoods and black neighborhoods so much that it almost looks as though little changed. Black communities and schools are very underfunded and don’t receive much attention and assistance from the government as their white neighbors.