We talk about the "Jim Crow South" a lot, but we don't really ever talk about what it was. We also don't really ever talk about the fact that it wasn't just the south, it was alive and well nationwide, in various forms.
Jim Crow was the name of a minstrel show character. He was the idea of what slave song and dance was like, and performed by a white actor in Blackface. The above picture depicts the fictitious "Jim Crow."
Jim Crow was both a legal system, and a social caste system set up after the Civil War to reinforce white supremacy. It was a system of legal segregation. You've seen images and depictions on tv/movies of "whites only" and "colored only" signs on buses and drinking fountains. The KKK developed during this time, as well as miscegenation laws. Voting rights were discouraged, outlawed, or made too difficult to participate in. This was Jim Crow.
The Nazis were so inspired by our Jim Crow system that they adopted some of it into their own laws prior to the start of the Holocaust. They were really big fans of our use of eugenics and other pseudosciences to "prove" white superiority.
This legal system was enforced by law, and was the law of the land for a century. In case you've never thought about it before, a century is approximately five generations. Five generations of our white ancestors reinforced and benefited from Jim Crow while five generations of Black ancestors were held back from advancement. This is why there's talk about reparations now, because even if "Oh, but we're all equal now," is true, it doesn't mean there is equity. We unfairly got head for so long that it will never be "equal" unless we even the playing field.
Here are more sources on Jim Crow:
How Jim Crow influenced the Nazis.
More info on Jim Crow and the Nazis.
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