Reconstruction Dbq

The Civil War was “a revolution, but only half accomplished” because it ended slavery and reunited the country; however, Reconstruction failed to rebuild the South and to promote democracy and political unity. Even though the Freedmen’s Bureau was created to provide support for newly freed African Americans, it did not change the Southerners mindset about slavery. The Thirteenth Amendment abolished slavery, but the Solid South reacted by creating the Black Codes, “Compulsory Free Labor”, Jim Crow Laws, and the KKK. The Black Codes were laws that restricted African Americans’ freedom, imposing travel restrictions; preventing them from voting, serving on juries, and testifying against white people; and implementing vagrancy laws and limiting work opportunities to domestic/agricultural jobs, thus creating “Compulsory Free Labor.” In addition, the Jim Crow laws followed the principle of “separate but equal,” which enforced

Carl Schurz, a German revolutionary and American Statesman and journalist said that until whites “cut loose from the past, it [would] be a dangerous experiment to put Southern society upon its own legs.” In addition to the failure to rebuild the South, the Reconstruction failed to promote democracy and political unity. Lincoln's Proclamation of Amnesty and Reconstruction offered full pardon, restoring property and political rights; however, one of its weaknesses is that it was not inclusive, since a state could organize a new government and be readmitted into the Union after just 10% of its state’s voting population had taken an oath of allegiance. In other words, not all the population from the new states (Arkansas, Louisiana, Tennessee and Virginia) were looking forward the political part of the reconstruction. This plan was rejected by the Congress, which proposed the Wade-Davis