Introduction
After the civil war, there where new policies put in place to promote equality by amending the constitution with the 13,14,15 and other policies such as Freedman's Bureau & Civil Rights act 1871. They also compare/contrast multiple perspectives of different groups such as Black Codes, Booker t. Washington and failed policies of reconstruction and long-term effects on society.
Task
Use research to evaluate and analyze Reconstruction policies, people ,and perspectives, using the historical method of inquiry.
Process
Use historical method to evaluate primary,secondary sources,critically analyze and interpret data,and develop interpretations using evidence.
Evaluation
13th,14th,15th Amendments and the Implications for Society
The 13th amendment to the United States constitution offically abolished and continues to prchibit slavery to this day.
The 14th amendment to the United States constitutiond eclared that all persons born or naturalized in the united states are american citizens incuding african americans.
The 15th amendement to the united states constitution prohibits each government in the united states from denying a citizen the right to vote based on that citizens race,color,or previous conditions of servitude.
Reconstruction Policies
Freedmen's Bureau: The Freedmen's Bureau was established in march 1865 by president Abraham Lincoln. It was intended to last for a year after the end of the civil war. The Bureau helped African Americans gain employment. The Bureau encouraged both white and blacks to work together as employers and employees rather than as masters and as slaves.
Civil rights act of 1866 is a united states federal law that protect the civil rights of African-Americans. It provided equality of all citizens of the united states. The act protected African Americans by puting in a law that stated there will be no more discrimination in civil rights based on race,color,or servitude.
Ku Klux Klan 1871 in 1870,1871: The federal government passed the force acts, which were used to prosecute klan crimes. Prosecution of klan crime and enforcement of the force acts suppressed klan activity.
The Civil Rights act of 1875 was a united states federal law that guaranteed African Americans equal treament in public accommodations, public transportation,and prohibited exclusion from jury service.
Compare/Contrast Multiple Perspectives of Different Groups
south north
ag com
cotton rairoads
tobacco factories
carning steel
carn,wheat textiles
Reconstruction Era Leaders and Policies
Black Codes were laws passed by southern states in 1865 and 1866 after the civil war. These laws tried to restrict African Americans' freedom, and made them work in a labor economy based on low wages or debt.
Booker t. Washington was African American educator, author, orator, and adivsor to the presidents of the United States. Between 1890 and 1915, Washington was the dominant leader in the African-American community.
W.E.B. Dubois was an american sociologist,historian,civil rights activist pan-africanist, author and editor. After graduating from Harvard, where he was the first African-American to earn a doctorate. He became a professor of history, sociology, and economics at Atlanta University. Dubois was one of the co-founders of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP 1909).
Abraham Lincoln was the 16th president of the United States serving from March 1861 until his assassination in April 1865. Abraham Lincoln led the United States through the Civil War, its bloodiest war and its greatest moral, constitutional, and political crisis. In so doing, he preserved the Union, abolished slavery, strengthened the national government and modernized the economy.
Andrew Johnson was the 17th president of the United States serving from 1865-1869. Johnson became president after Abraham Lincoln's assissination. His plans did not give protection to former slaves and he came into conflict with the Republican domincated Congress. He was the first American president to be impeached.
The Klu Klux Klan (KKK) is the name of an extremist organization in the United States. The KKK advocates for White supremacy, White nationalism, anti-immigration. Historically, the KKK expresses their beliefs through terrrorism. The first KKK began in the southeren United States in the late 1860s.
Sharecropping - With the southern economy in disarray after the abolition of slavery and the devastation of the civil war, conflict arose between many white land owners attempting to reestablish a labor force and freed blacks seeking economic independence and autonomy.
Tenant Farming - Tenant Farmer has been important in the U.S.A. from the 1870's to the present. Tenants typically brings their own tools and animals. Tenant farming historically a step on the "agricultural ladder" from hired hand or sharecropping taken by young farmers as they accumulated enough experience and capital to buy land (or buy out their siblings when a farm was inherited).
Failures of Reconstruction Era
After the American Civil War, the South was in ruins and there was doubt about how the Southern states would treat newly freed slaves. So the US government instituted a 15-year policy known as Reconstruction, in which the military was stationed in the South in order to maintain law and order now that the Confederate government was gone, help rebuild the infrastructure after the devastation of the war, and ensure the equal treatment of whites and blacks, for instance concerning the ability to vote. Reconstruction is widely viewed as a failure; the South suffered from a lot of exploitative Northern entrepreneurs known as "carpetbaggers", and in the end the South reverted to unequal treatment of blacks through Jim Crow laws.
Conclusion
Although the Reconstruction era had many positive leaders and encouraging policies to help protect freed slaves, African Americans did not end up with equal rights. The positive leaders such as W.E.B. Dubois, Booker T. Washington, and most importantly, Abraham Lincoln, did not see the success of their ideas. The south remained unstable and the protection of freed slaves (Andrew Johnson did not see this through) was not carried through like they had hoped. Today, we look back into the past and see African Americans continue to be unequal from the 1860's until the Civil Rights movement ended in 1968. It took 108 years for African Americans to earn the right to live as free and equal American citizens.