In 1865 4 million people were freed and let out on their own for the first time ever. They weren’t really sure what to do at this time but they had to find a way because they were now by themselves in a world that didn’t accept them. There were 3 Amendments made to the US Constitution that freed these slaves and put the African Americans in the country in such a bad situation. These Amendments and the actions by the president and his appointed boards were unsuccessful due to the racist laws and resistance against the American Reconstruction. Some of these laws include the Jim Crow Laws and some of these racist people congregated in a group called the Klu Klux Klan. These actions went against the 13th 14th and 15th Amendments voiding them as a whole. The 13th Amendment to the constitution was made to give African American people declared that "Neither slavery nor involuntary servitude, except as a punishment for crime whereof the party shall have been duly convicted, shall exist within the United States, or any place subject to their jurisdiction"(S.Banfield). This, to the African Americans, was such an amazing new law. It freed many slaves in the South and slaves in the North who weren’t freed already. It put an end to the harsh treatment and work with no pay that the men and women who were slaves had to deal with on a daily basis. This was something good that came from the 13th Amendment. But once they were on their own most African Americans had a very hard time. Before this Amendment was passed they were used to living in someone elses home and being fed by their family. They almost never had the skills needed to live on their own in the 19th Century. The 14th Amendment was created in favor of African Americ... ... middle of paper ... ...ecame a hallmark of the Klan” (History.com). These acts were terrorizing in mostly the south and it made it very difficult for an African American to adapt and get used to life as a free person. This was a tragedy for the United States and Grant, the president at the time, was willing to use military force or martial law in an effort to put an end to these actions of resistance. Scalawags and Carpetbaggers are two terms that were used to refer to the two sides of resistance during Reconstruction. The scalawags are to refer to the Southerners. A scalawag is defined as a rascal and a carpetbagger is a hitchhiker who carries all of their belongings in their suitcase, called a carpetbag (dictionary.com). These terms are used to describe the separate sides of the country. The scalawags disobeying and resisting the new laws and the carpetbaggers trying to enforce them.
In this essay I will be writing about the effectiveness of the 13th, 14th and 15th amendments to the Constitution of the United States of America and considering whether they achieved the purpose of making life better for African Americans. I’m going to start this essay by talking about the Amendments and what they were designed to achieve.
Groups of people soon received new rights. Congress passed the Civil Rights Act. It gave black Americans full citizenship and guaranteed them equal treatment. Also, it passed the Fourteenth Amendment to make sure that the Supreme Court couldn’t declare the Civil Rights Act unconstitutional. The amendment made blacks citizens of the United States and the states in which they lived. Also, states were forbidden to deprive blacks of life, liberty, or property without due process. Additionally, blacks could not be discriminated by the law. If a state would deprive blacks of their rights as citizens, it’s number of congressional representatives would be reduced. The Civil Rights Act as well as the Fourteenth Amendment affected both the North and the South.
"Bushwhackers, Bushwackers, Civil War Bushwhackers." Civil War, American Civil War, Reconstruction. 2007. Web. 12 Jan. 2012. .
We saw the Thirteenth Amendment occur to abolish slavery. We also saw the Civil Rights Acts which gave full citizenship, as well as the prohibiting the denial of due process, etc. Having the civil rights laws enabled African Americans to new freedoms which they did not used to have. There was positive change occurring in the lives of African Americans. However, there was still a fight to suppress African Americans and maintain the racial hierarchy by poll taxes and lengthy and expensive court proceedings. Sadly, this is when Jim Crow laws appeared. During this time African Americans were losing their stride, there was an increase in prison populations and convict labor, and the convicts were
Scalawags and Carpetbaggers were terms used during the reconstruction period in the south. Scalawags were white southerners who supported the Republican Party. Scalawags consisted of the following persons, rich merchant owners, farmers who owned small amounts of land, and planters. During the old confederate period, most these people wanted a new south so they supported the reconstruction and abided in the changes concerning newly freed black slaves. Carpetbaggers were northern citizens who came to the south in terms to make a quick profit. The goals of the carpetbaggers were to encourage their new political power on the newly freed blacks. It was the goal of the northerners to help establish the freed slaves and improve their lives. It was the ideal of providing education, medications, food, and clothing for the blacks. The ideal was a success and was called the Freedmen’s bureau.
Reconstruction(1865-1877) was the time period in which the US rebuilt after the Civil War. During this time, the question the rights of freed slaves in the United States were highly debated. Freedom, in my terms, is the privilege of doing as you please without restriction as long as it stays within the law. However, in this sense, black Americans during the Reconstruction period were not truly free despite Lincoln’s Emancipation Proclamation in 1863. While legally free, black Americans were still viewed through the lens of racism and deeply-rooted social biases/stigmas that prevented them from exercising their legal rights as citizens of the United States. For example, black Americans were unable to wholly participate in the government as a
Although many laws were passed that recognized African Americans as equals, the liberties they had been promised were not being upheld. Hoffman, Blum, and Gjerde state that “Union League members in a North Carolina county, upon learning of three or four black men who ‘didn’t mean to vote,’ threatened to ‘whip them’ and ‘made them go.’ In another country, ‘some few colored men who declined voting’ were, in the words of a white conservative, ‘bitterly persecute[ed]” (22). Black codes were also made to control African Americans. Norton et al. states that “the new black codes compelled former slaves to carry passes, observe a curfew, live in housing provided by a landowner, and give up hope of entering many desirable occupations” (476). The discrimination and violence towards African Americans during this era and the laws passed that were not being enforced were very disgraceful. However, Reconstruction was a huge stepping stone for the way our nation is shaped today. It wasn’t pretty but it was the step our nation needed to take. We now live in a country where no matter the race, everyone is considered equal. Reconstruction was a success. Without it, who knows where our nation would be today. African American may have never gained the freedoms they have today without the
People attending schools before 1960’s were learning about certain “unscrupulous carpetbaggers”, “traitorous scalawags”, and the “Radical Republicans”(223). According to the historians before the event of 1960’s revision, these people are the reason that the “white community of South banded together to overthrow these “black” governments and restore home rule”(223). While this might have been true if it was not for the fact that the “carpetbaggers were former Union soldiers”, “Scalawags… emerged as “Old Line” Whig Unionists”(227). Eric Foner wrote the lines in his thesis “The New View of Reconstruction” to show us how completely of target the historians before the 1960’s revision were in their beliefs.
On December 6, 1865, the thirteenth amendment to the United States constitution was ratified (Archives). This amendment effectively abolished slavery with the exception of a punishment for a crime (Archives). This was a great victory for blacks, who had been the preferred target for slaves. For many, however, the passage of the amendment failed to change the attitudes of white Americans. Blacks were clearly not welcome in many cities across the nation, with laws allowing blacks to work within a city’s limits, but requiring them to leave before sundown.
The Union won the Civil War and after the Civil War, the African Americans got their freedom. Even though this may be known as the bloodiest battles of the U.S., it got the African Americans its freedom and the U.S. to remember how they got it.
After the emancipation of slaves in 1862, the status of African-Americans in post civil war America up until the beginning of the twentieth century did not go through a great deal of change. Much legislation was passed to help blacks in this period. The Civil Rights act of 1875 prohibited segregation in public facilities and various government amendments gave African-Americans even more guaranteed rights. Even with this government legislation, the newly dubbed 'freedmen' were still discriminated against by most people and, ironically, they were soon to be restricted and segregated once again under government rulings in important court cases of the era.
...avorable cause, and many Radicals began to lose their seats in Congress. The Radical Republicans, those who remained in Congress, urged President Ulysses S. Grant to take action against the newly formed Ku Klux Klan, who killed blacks, whites, and immigrants. On April 20th, 1871, Congress passed the Ku Klux Act, which gave the president the power to intervene in troubled states with the authority to suspend a writ of habeas corpus in countries where such conflicts occurred. The Ku Klux Act became the Radical Republicans’ last considerable victory in Congress.
The 13th amendment was adopted speedily in the aftermath of the Civil War, with the simple direct purpose of forbidding slavery anywhere in the United States. The 13th Amendment took authority away from the states, so that no state could institute slavery, and it attempted to constitutional grant the natural right of liberty. Think that this amendment would suffice, Congressional Republicans pushed the amendment through. To counter the amendment, a series of laws called the Black Codes were enacted by the former Confederate states, which
The conclusion of the Civil War in favor of the north was supposed to mean an end to slavery and equal rights for the former slaves. Although laws and amendments were passed to uphold this assumption, the United States Government fell short. The thirteenth, fourteenth, and fifteenth amendments were proposed and passed within five years of the Civil War’s conclusion. These amendments were to create equality throughout the United States, especially in the south where slavery had been most abundant. Making equality a realization would not be an easy task. This is because many problems were not perceived before and during the war. The reunification of the country would prove to be harder than expected, and entry into a new lifestyle would be difficult for both the freedmen and their former oppressors. The thirteenth amendment clearly prohibits slavery in the United States. All slaves were to be freed immediately when this amendment was declared ratified in December of 1865, but what were they to do? Generations of African-Americans had been enslaved in America, and those who had lived their whole lives in slavery had little knowledge of the outside world. This lack of knowledge would not be helpful in trying to find work once they were released. Plantation owners with a lack of workforce were eager to offer extremely low pay to their former slaves. In addition, the work force of the plantation would often live in the same quarters they did while enslaved. These living condition...
It wasn’t easy being an African American, back then they had to fight in order to achieve where they are today, from slavery and discrimination, there was a very slim chance of hope for freedom or even citizenship. This longing for hope began to shift around the 1950’s. During the Civil Rights Movement, where discrimination still took place, it was the time when African Americans started to defend their rights and honor to become freemen like every other citizen of the United States. African Americans were beginning to gain recognition after the 14th Amendment was ratified in 1868, which declared all people born natural in the United States and included the slaves that were previously declared free. However, this didn’t prevent the people from disputing against the constitutional law, especially the people in the South who continued to retaliate against African Americans and the idea of integration in white schools....