What was the attitude of Americans towards African Americans at the time of the Spanish American War? How had the treatment of AfricanAmericans changed since the Civil War?

In the last decade of the 19th century, African Americans suffered segregation, exclusion, discrimination and racism. The Civil War assured the freedom of around 4 million black people. Despite the adoption of the 14th amendment and being given legal rights to elect and be elected, black people faced huge social and political inequality.

In the South, state legislatures had passed a series of laws that impeded African Americans from participating in elections. Poll taxes and literacy tests were put in place and turned into formidable barriers for the black southern populations given their poverty and lack of education. Those were the Jim Crow laws.

In 1896, a landmark US Supreme Court decision upheld segregated but equal faciliities for different racial groups as constitutional, validating the Jim Crow laws. That was the situation of African Americans by the late 19th century.