The Era of Jane Crow is Upon Us

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One hundred years ago, our nation was still in the throes of the era of Jim Crow. Yes, the 13th Amendment had abolished slavery in 1865 and yes, the 14th Amendment, in 1868, had granted former slaves citizenship, and yes, the 15th Amendment, in 1870, had even given male former slaves the right to vote (50 years before any women in the U.S. won that right).

But 11 Southern states had formed their own country rather than give up slavery, and those states began concocting other means of keeping black folks from enjoying the benefits of the law of the land.

As soon as the last federal troops withdrew from Southern soil and Reconstruction ended, in 1877, the former Confederate states fought on the local and state levels to thwart all federal laws recognizing black people as citizens, much less as equals to whites. They pointed to “states’ rights” as their rationalization for instituting poll taxes as a voting requirement and for mandating the segregation of blacks and whites in education, employment, housing, transportation, restaurants, pools, parks, hotels, theaters and more. This is not even to mention the discriminatory Southern justice system, or the constant terrorism aimed at blacks in the form of lynchings, home burnings, and the birth of the Ku Klux Klan. All of these lasted well into the 20th century.

Since 1973, we have had a new law in this land – the Roe v. Wade decision, enshrining the right of women to choose whether and when to bear children. But today we are seeing the rise of Jane Crow: harmful laws enacted by fearful men in various state legislatures that are making a federally legal medical procedure, arrived at by a woman and her doctor, nearly impossible to obtain.

Reactionary state legislators saw President Trump’s appointment of Brett Kavanaugh to the Supreme Court as an invitation to pass anti-abortion legislation. They’re actually hoping these laws will be challenged and end up before the now conservative court, which would overturn the right to have an abortion.

Most states abide by the Roe decision, which legalizes abortion until the fetus reaches viability, usually at 24 to 28 weeks. But Georgia, Kentucky, Louisiana, Missouri, Mississippi and Ohio have prohibited abortions after six weeks of pregnancy. In reality this is a complete ban, since most women do not even learn they are pregnant until they are more than six weeks along. Alabama recently passed a ban on all abortions, even in cases of rape.

And now that we have entered the era of Jane Crow, who knows what will happen next?

The assault on women’s reproductive rights is in full swing. Ninety percent of the counties in the U.S. have no abortion clinic at all; in Texas, it’s 96%. We now have to travel many miles for this crucial service. Who can take off from work to do that? Who can afford childcare during that time? Unsurprisingly, Jane Crow laws harm minority women more drastically than white women.

The Jim Crow era really dragged on until the 1960s, with the advent of that decade’s Civil Rights laws. Let’s keep the Jane Crow era from lasting a similar hundred years or more. If politicians don’t trust women to make good decisions about our health and our families’ wellbeing, we shouldn’t trust them to lead our states or our nation.

Vote them out: End Jane Crow now.