Black Codes? What is That?
By Jeff Paulk, 28 January, 2026
I’m glad you asked. But first, you know how the South is always ridiculed, slammed, and lambasted for segregation? Well, guess what? Segregation did not exist in the South until the Yankees came in with their “Reconstruction” (Occupation). However, it was alive and well in the North. The Confederate Army paid blacks the same pay as the whites, and the army was not segregated. The Union, on the other hand, paid blacks in its army less than whites, and they were completely segregated. (And besides that, the Union used blacks for cannon fodder). Looks like another case of Yankee hypocrisy, doesn’t it? The almighty high-toned Yankee is quick to point out racial disparities in the South (which they introduced), but conveniently ignore the same things in Yankeeland.
Now, what on earth are “Black Codes”? Those were laws in Yankeeland that forbade blacks to enter or live in particular states. “But”, you might ask, “I thought the North loved the blacks and wanted them set free from slavery?” Oh, there were some radical abolitionists who wanted to end slavery and advocated slave insurrections whereby the white men, women, and children were slaughtered, but there were five times as many abolitionist organizations in the South as there were in the North, and slaves were already being gradually emancipated in the South.
Free blacks were seen as a threat to white laborers in the North, especially during the 1850s and 60s. Blacks were widely disenfranchised in Northern States, and had restrictions put on them for earning a living, education, and voting, and whether they could reside in a given State. In 1851, the Indiana constitution was changed to state that “no negro or mulatto shall come into or settle in the state”. 1853 Illinois law prevented “the immigration of free negroes into this State.” In 1862 the citizens of Illinois amended their State constitution to say that “No Negro or mulatto shall immigrate or settle in this state”. Oregon’s constitution, adopted on November 9, 1857, stated that “no free negroe or mulatto, not residing in this state at the time of the adoption of this constitution, shall come, reside or be within this state”.
Let’s take a look at some documented evidence on this:
“So the Negro [in the North] is free, but he cannot share the rights, pleasures, labors, grief, or even the tomb of him whose equal he has been declared; there is nowhere where he can meet him, neither in life nor in death.
In the South, where slavery still exists, less trouble is taken to keep the Negro apart: they sometimes share the labors and the pleasures of the white men; people are prepared to mix with them to some extent; legislation is more harsh against them, but customs are more tolerant and gentle.” (Alexis De Tocqueville, “Democracy in America,” transl. George Lawrence, Harper & Row, 1966, p.343.)
“Slavery was abolished in Ohio by the state’s original constitution (1802). But at the same time, Ohio, with slave-state Kentucky across the river, aggressively barred black immigration. When Virginian John Randolph’s 518 slaves were emancipated and a plan was hatched to settle them in southern Ohio, the population rose up in indignation. An Ohio congressman warned that if the attempt were made, “the banks of the Ohio ... would be lined with men with muskets on their shoulders to keep off the emancipated slaves.” (Congressional Globe,”30 Cong. 1 Sess., appendix, p.727.)
“We do not like the negroes. We do not disguise our dislike. As my friend from Indiana (Mr. Wright) said yesterday: ‘The whole people of the Northwestern States are opposed to having many negroes among them and that principle or prejudice has been engraved in the legislation of nearly all of the Northwestern States.” (John Sherman, the brother of the famous William Tecumseh, on April 2, 1862, from Truths of History, pg. 99, by Mildred Lewis Rutherford.)
Negroes left their homes in Alabama to work in Illinois, but many were killed and others driven from the State. Were the murderers of those negroes ever brought to trial?
One Republican said:
“If any more negroes come to Illinois, I will meet them on the border with gatling-guns!”
Mr. Seward, March 3, 1858 said:
“The white man needs this continent to labor in and must have it.”
The Legislature of Kansas, the home of John Brown, said:
“This state is for whites only.”
In 1850, 1855 and 1865, Michigan refused suffrage to free negroes.
In 1864 no negro could vote in Nevada.
“In Illinois (Lincoln’s State) no negro nor mulatto was allowed to remain in the State ten days. If a negro came into the State he was to be sold at auction.” (From, Truths of History, pgs. 92, 93.)
“The Indiana constitutional convention of 1851 adopted a provision forbidding black migration into the state. This supplemented the state’s laws barring blacks already there from voting, serving on juries or in the militia, testifying against whites in court, marrying whites, or going to school with whites. Iowa and Illinois had similar laws on the books and banned black immigration by statute in 1851 and 1853 respectively. These measures reflected the racist sentiments of most whites in those states.” (McPherson, Ordeal By Fire: The Civil War and Reconstruction, New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1982, p. 80)
Jim Crow Laws, like the Black Codes, were conceived in the North, but the South gets all the blame for them, just as it does for slavery. The self-righteous Yankees pointed their accusing fingers at the South, while these same Yankees were making restrictive laws against blacks, while their pockets jingled with the money they made from the slave trade. Isn’t that sweet? What we are not taught about our history would fill many railroad boxcars. What we are taught is mostly propaganda, with some sprinkling of truth. It is up to you to learn the truth about our history. Don’t think you will get it from our “educational system” or the media. They have an agenda, and it’s not to benefit you.