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04537aam a2200409 i 4500 001 46C063444DCE11E89F5D1D5C97128E48 003 SILO 005 20180502010046 008 170516t20182018nyua bv 001 0 eng c 010 $a 2017023644 020 $a 0190249188 020 $a 9780190249182 035 $a (OCoLC)988749617 040 $a NcU/DLC $b eng $e rda $c NOC $d DLC $d OCLCO $d BTCTA $d OCLCF $d YDX $d BDX $d SGB $d RCJ $d YDX $d OCLCO $d GZL $d TJC $d OCLCQ $d OCLCO $d CLU $d IGA $d OCL $d SILO 042 $a pcc 043 $a n-usu-- 050 00 $a KF4757 M49 2018 100 1 $a Milewski, Melissa Lambert, $e author. 245 10 $a Litigating across the color line : $b civil cases between black and white southerners from the end of slavery to civil rights / $c Melissa Milewski. 264 1 $a New York, NY : $b Oxford University Press, $c [2018] 300 $a ix, 345 pages : $b illustrations ; $c 25 cm 504 $a Includes bibliographical references (pages 315-334) and index. 505 0 $a Part 1. Civil cases between black and white southerners, 1861-1899 -- A revolution in the courts -- How to litigate a case against a white southerner -- Challenging whites' bequests -- The law of contracts and property -- Part 2. Civil cases between black and white southerners, 1900-1950 -- The New South and the law -- Confronting fraud through the courts -- The law of bodily injury -- Fighting for rights in the courts -- Appendix A. Notes on methodology, sources, and findings -- Appendix B. Tables. 520 $a As a result of the violence, segregation, and disfranchisement that occurred throughout the South in the decades after Reconstruction, it has generally been assumed that African Americans in the post-Reconstruction South litigated few civil cases and faced widespread inequality in the suits they did pursue. In this groundbreaking work, Melissa Milewski shows that black men and women were far more able to negotiate the southern legal system during the era of Jim Crow than previously realized. She explores how, when the financial futures of their families were on the line, black litigants throughout the South took on white southerners in civil suits and, at times, succeeded in finding justice in the Southern courts. Between 1865 and 1950, in almost a thousand civil cases across eight southern states, former slaves took their former masters to court, black sharecroppers litigated disputes against white landowners, and African Americans with little formal education brought disputes against wealthy white members of their communities. As black southerners negotiated a legal system with almost all white gate-keepers, they found that certain kinds of cases were much easier to gain whites' support for than others. But in the suits they were able to litigate, they displayed pragmatism and a savvy understanding of how to get whites on their side. Their negotiation of this system proved surprisingly successful: in the civil cases African Americans litigated in the highest courts of eight states, they won more than half of their suits against whites throughout this period. Litigating Across the Color Line shows that in a tremendously constrained environment where they were often shut out of other government institutions, seen as racially inferior, and often segregated, African Americans found a way to fight for their rights in one of the only ways they could. Through these suits, they adapted and at times made a biased system work for them under enormous constraints. At the same time, Milewski considers the limitations of working within a white-dominated system at a time of great racial discrimination -- and the choices black litigants had to make to get their cases heard. - Publisher. 650 0 $a African Americans $x History. $z Southern States $x History. 650 0 $a African Americans $x Legal status, laws, etc. $z Southern States $v Cases. 650 0 $a African Americans $x History. $z Southern States $x History. 650 0 $a Race discrimination $z Southern States $x History. 650 0 $a Courts $z Southern States $x History. 650 0 $a Due process of law $z Southern States $x History. 776 08 $i Online version: $a Milewski, Melissa Lambert. $t Litigating across the color line. $d New York, NY : Oxford University Press, [2018] $z 9780190249199 $w (OCoLC)988749764 $w (OCoLC)988749764 941 $a 3 952 $l PLAX964 $d 20240724073937.0 952 $l USUX851 $d 20200702013704.0 952 $l OVUX522 $d 20191213023241.0 956 $a http://locator.silo.lib.ia.us/search.cgi?index_0=id&term_0=46C063444DCE11E89F5D1D5C97128E48 994 $a C0 $b IWAInitiate Another SILO Locator Search