Discuss The Three Competing Notions In The Era Of Freedom

744 Words2 Pages
bulb-icon

Recommended: Slavery topics for essay

The Three Competing Notions in the Era of ‘Freedom’ After the Civil War ended in 1865 there were three competing notions of freedom concerning the want for independence, the end of slavery with the recreation of the Northern economy, and the persistent desire for white supremacy. Separation was drawn between the white Northerners and Southerners, as well as the freed Blacks. Each one began to assert their ideas of freedom, interpreting what this freedom meant personally, and for the nation as a whole. The North wanted to end slavery, and recreate the South in what they saw as moral. The Southern whites wanted to return to the life attained before the Civil War, by practically maintaining control through white supremacy. The freed Blacks and slaves wanted their own independence through community strengthening, without the interference of white power. All of these notions …show more content…

The North believed that slavery was morally wrong, economically damaging, and should be destroyed with due punishment to the South for starting the war. As far as the economy, they wanted the Southern economy to become stable by providing the North with a market system and materials, like cotton, for Northern factories. Along with the economy, the Northern business leaders sought to replace the slavery system with a wage system. After the Civil War, the Republican Party planned the Union League in Northern cities. This Union became a platform that supported slaves with the right to vote and limited discriminations among the Black community. Along with the Union, the Northerners fought for Congressional acts, such as Freedmen’s Bureau that supported Black communities through providing food, clothing, and other services, further serving to fully end the hatred aftermath of the Civil

Show More
Related

  • Paul Finkelman Defending Slavery Summary

    1545 Words  | 4 Pages

    The North had a very different opinion of the American way and made it exceedingly clear with the formation of numerous abolition societies, effectively abolishing slavery across the northern region and allowing blacks to live as productive members society, rather than its the property. Even one of the most prominent slave holders of that time was forced to rethink the legitimacy of slavery. “Seeing free black soldiers in action undermined [George] Washington’s racial prejudice and ultimately his support for slavery itself” (Finkelman 18). The productivity, societal and political benefits, and military empowerment made available by freed slaves challenged the South’s sense of racial supremacy, thus they began to establish a defense against the complete abolition of

    Read More

  • 13th, 14th and 15th Ammendments to the US Constitution and the Jim Crow Law

    1671 Words  | 4 Pages

    When becoming free, blacks desired independence the most. They wanted two freedoms: the freedom from whites, as well as the freedom to move wherever they wanted. They persevered to having their own schools and churches, while not having the consequences for these actions. Although the blacks thought these actions were possible, the white southerners had other ideas.

    Read More

  • Reconstruction Dbq Essay

    771 Words  | 2 Pages

    After the Civil War, America went through a period of Reconstruction. This was when former Confederate states were readmitted to the Union. Lincoln had a plan that would allow them to come back, but they wouldn’t be able to do it easily. He would make 10% of the population swear an oath of loyalty and establish a government to be recognized. However, he was assassinated in Ford’s Theater and Andrew Johnson became the president; Johnson provided an easy path for Southerners. Congress did their best to ensure equal rights to freedmen, but failed because of groups who were against Reconstruction, white southern Democrats gaining control within the government and the lack of having a plan in place for recently freedmen.

    Read More

  • How Free Were Free Blacks in the North?

    735 Words  | 2 Pages

    Imagine that you are an escaped African slave. After years of being a slave you’ve finally done it, you escaped the terrors that is slavery. You are looking forward to the freedoms that you have heard are promised in the north. However, these “freedoms” are all what they were made out to be. Blacks in the north were to some extent free in the years before the Civil War. This can be shown by looking at four areas of society: political and judicial rights, social freedoms, education and job opportunities, and religious freedom.

    Read More

  • The Battle of Gettysburg as the Turning Point of the Civil War

    1599 Words  | 4 Pages

    The Union economy was based on manufacturing, and even the minorities in the North were better off than those in the South most of the time. The Northern politicians wanted tariffs, and a large army. The Southern plantation owners wanted the exact opposite.

    Read More

  • The Breakup of the Union

    841 Words  | 2 Pages

    In the years paving the way to the Civil War, both north and south were disagreeable with one another, creating the three “triggering” reasons for the war: the fanaticism on the slavery issue, the Kansas-Nebraska Act, and the separation of the Democratic Party. North being against the bondage of individuals and the South being for it, there was no real way to evade the clash. For the south slavery was a form of obtaining a living, without subjugation the economy might drop majorly if not disappear. In the North there were significant ethical issues with the issue of subjugation. Amazing measures to keep and dispose of subjugation were taken and there was never a genuine adjusted center for bargain. Despite the fact that there were a lot of seemingly insignificant issues, the fundamental thing that divided these two states was bondage and the flexibilities for it or against. With these significant extremes, for example, John Brown and Uncle Tom's Cabin, the south felt disdain towards the danger the Northerners were holding against their alleged flexibilities. The more hatred the South advanced, the more combative they were to anything the Northerners did. Northerners were irritated and it parted Democrats over the issue of bondage and made another Republican gathering, which included: Whigs, Free Soilers, Know Nothings and previous Democrats and brought about a split of segments and abbreviated the street to common war. Southerners loathed the insubordination of the north and started to address how they could stay with the Union.

    Read More

  • The American Civil War: The Inevitable Confrontation

    1753 Words  | 4 Pages

    Since the beginning of the Market Revolution, the institution of slavery became the leading factor that intensified the relations between the North and the South. Regarding the geographic differences between the North and South, the South was primarily agrarian and the North was mainly urban. Therefore, the North rapidly industrialized while the South remained relatively rural and cotton-slave based. As a result, the Market Revolution economically separated the North and the South and created a second party system. Thus, the issues of pro-slavery and anti-slavery arose between the Southern Democrats and Northern Republicans in the 1850s. The North desired to halt the expansion of slavery into western territories while the South strongly opposed. These two opposing parties led to radical abolitionism in the North, William Henry Seward and John Brown, and extreme secessionism in the South, James Henry Hammond, and South Carolina Ordinance of Secession. Due to their strict ideologies regarding slavery, both parties could not compromise on the issue of the expansion of slavery. Therefore, according to Americans in the years prior to the Civil War, conflict was inevitable.

    Read More

  • The Failure of the First and Second Reconstruction

    4645 Words  | 10 Pages

    The economic condition of ex-slaves after the Civil War was just as uncertain; many had left former masters and roamed the highways. Amid the post Civil War chaos, various political groups were scrambling to further their agendas. First, Southern Democrats, a party comprised of leaders of the confederacy and other wealthy Southern whites, sought to end what they perceived as Northern domination of the South. They also sought to institute Black Codes, by limiting the rights of Blacks to move, vote, travel, and change jobs,3 which like slavery, would provide an adequate and cheap labor supply for plantations. Second, Moderate Republicans wanted to pursue a policy of reconciliation between North and South, but at the same time ensure slavery was abolished.4 Third, Radical Republicans, comprised of Northern politicians, were strongly opposed to slavery, unsympathetic to the South, wanted to protect newly free slaves, and keep their majority in Congress.5 The fourth political element, at the same time, was the repression of the North.

    Read More

  • 1860-1877 Constitutional Developments

    275 Words  | 1 Pages

    By the end of the American Civil War in 1865, Blacks had gained their freedom from southern plantation owners and farmers. The south was angered by

    Read More

  • African American Reconstruction

    1245 Words  | 3 Pages

    Prior to the Civil War, African Americans were treated as second class individuals. They lacked the freedom and equality they sought for. To the African Americans, the Civil War was a war of liberation. Contrary to what African Americans perceived, Southerners viewed the war as an episode of their journey to salvation. Southern lands may have been destroyed and depleted, but the South was persistent that their racial order would not be disrupted. To most, the goals of the Reconstruction era were to fully restore the Union, and to some, grant emancipation and liberty to former slaves. Although the newly freedmen gained various rights and liberties, their naïve dreams of complete equality and liberation collapsed due to the immense resistance of the South.

    Read More

  • The Long Struggle for Civil Rights

    2179 Words  | 5 Pages

    The Civil War was meant to end slavery in the United States, but the victory could not keep prejudiced feelings and beliefs away. The newly freed African Americans who lived in the South ...

    Read More

  • Differences Between the North and South that Led to the Civil War

    1460 Words  | 3 Pages

    Constitutionally the North favored a loose interpretation of the United States Constitution, and they wanted to grant the federal government increased powers. The South wanted to reserve all undefined powers to the individual states themselves. The South relied upon slave labor for their economic well being, and the economy of the North was not reliant on such labor or in need of this type of service. This main issue overshadowed all others. Southerners compared slavery to the wage-slave system of the North, and believed their slaves received better care than the northern factory workers received from their employers. Many Southern preachers proclaimed that slavery was sanctioned in the Bible. Southern leaders had constantly tried to seek new areas into which slavery might be extended (Oates 349).

    Read More

  • Economies of North and South During American Civil War

    1250 Words  | 3 Pages

    The economies of the North and South were vastly different leading up to the Civil War. Money was equivalent to power in both regions. For the North, the economy was based on industry as they were more modern and self-aware. They realized that industrialization was progress and it could help rid the country of slave labor as it was wrong. The North’s population had a class system but citizens could move within the system, provided they made the money that would allow them to move up in class. The class system was not as rigid as it was in the South. By comparison, the South wanted to hold on to its economic policy. In doing so, the practice of slavery kept the social order firmly in place. The economic factors, social issues and a growing animosity between the two regions helped to induce the Civil War.

    Read More

  • The Effects Of The Emancipation Proclamation

    1028 Words  | 3 Pages

    Following the outbreak of the Civil War, President Abraham Lincoln believed that the Union could not survive while it remained profoundly divided on the subject of slavery. Revered by numerous historians, Lincoln’s actions throughout the Civil War created social and political change that would bring the United States of America into a new era of cultural reform. In attempting to abolish slavery and weaken the Confederacy, the Emancipation Proclamation redefined the objectives of the Civil War. While successful in gradually abolishing the institution of slavery in the southern states, the Emancipation Proclamation failed to extinguish racial discrimination against the newly freed African Americans. Indeed, although progress had been made, the use of intimidation and segregation by white southerners continued to strip black citizens of their fundamental rights, thus deepening racial tensions, not only in the southern states, but across the entire fractured nation.

    Read More

  • Black Americans After Slavery

    878 Words  | 2 Pages

    The four-year war between the states not only left the southern cities destroyed, economy in shambles and its people destitute, but it also introduced an overwhelming population of former slaves to be integrated into the folds of the victorious Union. Freedom for the blacks came slow and progress on their behalf was contaminated, inconsistent and feeble. Freedmen and women, accustomed to strife and adversity, desired only equality as citizens of the United States, however that status was going to come at a hefty price. Lincoln proclaimed the slaves freedom in the midst of the Civil War, but that freedom was neither instant nor accepted at war’s end. With great uncertainty and only the title of freedmen the black community immediately sought out their greatest needs no matter what brutality they faced from those that refused to accept their freedom.

    Read More

More about Discuss The Three Competing Notions In The Era Of Freedom

Open Document