A device introduced in Louisiana in 1898 achieves the difficult task of giving the vote even to illiterate whites while denying it to all who are black. Literacy tests have by this time been introduced in several states. A typical example requires would-be voters to be able to read and explain any part of the state constitution. But this has the effect of also excluding large sections of the white population. READ MORE:

During the mid-19th century, even "free" African Americans in California were barred from testifying in court or sending their children to public schools. In 1855, Mifflin Wistar Gibbs, an African American abolitionist who had spent years lecturing with Frederick Douglass, helped organize the First State Convention of Colored Citizens of California to fight for suffrage and equal rights.

Despite their lack of equal rights, African Americans served in the military during and after the Civil War. Included here is an image of an African American in a Union uniform during the early 1860s; an 1899 photograph shows Buffalo Soldiers from the 24th Mounted Infantry in Yosemite.

READ MORE: