Question

How did some states respond to the Thirteenth, Fourteenth, and Fifteenth Amendments?

A.People used the judiciary to place limits on African-Americans.

B.States passed laws to work around Constitutional law.

C.Some state officials moved African-Americans to other states.

D.Some states ignored the Constitution

Answer 1

Between B and D, because Jim Crow laws were established to limit the freedoms of African Americans which work around the constitution. The states also ignored aspects of the 14th and 15th amendments, look at education, where desegregating took ages before actually happening in some southern states. The best answer choice, in my opinion, is B because it applies more to all three amendments and is less vague than answer D.

Answer 2

The correct answer is B.

After the US Civil War, the federal goverment aimed to guarantee equality of rights for all US citizens, by including such provision in the US Constitution. This happened during the so-called Reconstruction era, through the enactment of the 13th, 14th and 15th Amendments in 1865, 1868 and 1870 respectively. These amendments abolished slavery and included the Equal Protection clause, that guaranteed equality of rights for all US citizens without discrimination in terms of race, color or previous condition of servitude.

Many Southern states disagreed with the Equal Protection clause and started to issue laws which aimed to circumvent it. These are called Jim Crow laws.

For example, for preventing black citizens from voting, newly-enacted laws set voting requirements, such as a minimum income level or a literacy test. In the end, the result of such laws, was that most black citizens could not exercise their right to vote.