The first African American mayors were elected during Reconstruction in the southern states beginning in 1867. Nine years later, white supremacists and a resurgent Democratic Party made it difficult for African Americans to vote in elections due to racial discrimination, such as Jim Crow Laws. But due to the civil rights movement and passage of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 and the Voting Rights Act of 1965, African Americans’ political participation has experienced a REVIVAL.
