Did Slavery End with the Civil War?

By

Andrew Waber

The Reconstruction Era (1865-1877)

• The Reconstruction was the period after the American Civil War.

• The Union, Federal Government, attempted to resolve the consequences and aftermath in the Confederate States post Civil War

• Reconstruction addressed how secessionist Southern states would return to the Union, the civil status of the leaders of the Confederacy, and the Constitutional and legal status of the newly freed men, the African Americans.

Source for Image:

Village Gallery

http://www.villagegallery.com/viewimages.asp?ID=438

Reconstruction Era Pros

• Creation of the:

– Freedmen’s Bureau– The 13th Amendment Promises Freedom– The 14th Amendment Promises Equality – The 15th Amendment Gives the Right to Vote

Freedmen’s Bureau

• Freedmen’s Bureau was created with their focus to provide food, medical care, help with resettlement, administer justice, manage abandoned and confiscated property, regulate labor, and establish schools for the newly freed slaves.(McElrath)

• Reconstruction had made some progress in providing the Freedmen with equal rights under the law, and Freedmen were voting and taking political office. Republican legislatures, coalitions of whites and blacks, established the first systems of public school systems in the South.

• Over 1,000 schools were built, teacher-training institutions were created, and several black colleges were founded.(McElrath)

Image Source:

The Freedmen's Bureau." Harper's Weekly 06/25/1868: 473.

The 13th Amendment Promises Freedom

• The 13th amendment, which formally abolished slavery in the United States, passed the Senate on April 8, 1864, and the House on January 31, 1865. On February 1, 1865, President Abraham Lincoln approved the Joint Resolution of Congress submitting the proposed amendment to the state legislatures. The necessary number of states ratified it by December 6, 1865. ("13th Amendment to the U.S.

Constitution: Abolition of Slavery (1865)." )

• The 13th amendment to the United States Constitution provides 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”("13th

Amendment to the U.S. Constitution: Abolition of Slavery (1865)." ).

Image Source:

Historical Documents

http://www.historicaldocuments.com/13thAmendment.htm

The 14th Amendment Promises Equality

• In June 1866, Congress proposed the 14th Amendment to the U. S. Constitution. It provided blacks with citizenship and guaranteed that federal and state laws applied equally to blacks and whites. With the passage of the Amendment, Congress also provided that Southern states could not be readmitted to the Union until it ratified the 14th Amendment. All of the states, except Tennessee, refused to do so. By 1870, however, the remaining 10 states ratified the 14th Amendment (McElrath).

Image Source:

KOCE- TVSchoolhouse Video Kits

http://www.schoolhousevideo.org/Pages/BrownVSBoard.html

The 15th Amendment Gives the Right to Vote

• In 1870, African Americans were given the right to vote through the 15th Amendment. According to this amendment, the right to vote applied to citizens regardless of race or color. Despite this right, some Southern states added grandfather clauses to their state Constitutions in an effort to counter this new right. Typical clauses stated that the right to vote extended only to citizens or their descendants who had the right to vote prior to 1866 or 1867(McElrath).

Image Source:

Primary Documents in American History

http://www.loc.gov/rr/program/bib/ourdocs/15thamendment.html

The Reconstruction Era Cons

• The Black Codes

• The Battle for Political Power

• The Election of 1876

• The Disfranchisement

The Black Codes

• In 1865, several Southern states passed legislation creating Black Codes, in effect, criminal laws that apply exclusively to the newly "freed" slaves. They vary somewhat from state to state, but all are designed to reinstate the economic and social conditions of slavery (McElrath).

• These laws generally restricted blacks’ right to own property, controlled where they were allowed to live, established a curfew, and forced blacks to work as agricultural laborers or as domestics (McElrath).

• The Black Codes were quickly eliminated with the passage of the Civil Rights Act of 1866. The Act gave blacks the rights and privileges of full citizenship (McElrath).

Image Source:

Reconstruction

http://afroamhistory.about.com/cs/reconstruction/a/reconstruction.htm

The Battle for Political Power

• Although most Black Codes were eliminated, some state legislatures revised and implemented less severe codes. To make matters worse for newly freed slaves, Abraham Lincoln’s successor, President Andrew Johnson, a Democrat, had reneged on his promise to implement Lincoln’s reconstruction plan. Not only was he unsupportive of the Freedmen’s Bureau but he supported southern white rule over local governments. Abolitionists and radical Republican Congressional members were intent on putting a stop to Johnson’s plan. In 1867, the Reconstruction Act eliminated the white controlled governments (McElrath).

• With the local white politicians out of the way, blacks were given the freedom to participate in the political process. Black delegates became an ordinary sight at state constitutional conventions and black state legislators became commonplace. It was at these conventions that blacks helped write new laws and repeal Black Codes. Blacks were also part of the federal legislature; between the Reconstruction period and 1900, two blacks occupied senate seats while twenty served as House of Representative members. Although their numbers were significant for the time, blacks worked alongside white legislative members, as opposed to dominating the political structure (McElrath).

The Election of 1876

• The United States presidential election of 1876 was one of the most disputed presidential elections in American history. Samuel J. Tilden, Democrat, defeated Rutherford Hayes, Republic, in the popular vote, and had 184 electoral votes to Hayes' 165, with 20 votes yet uncounted. These 20 electoral votes were in dispute. The votes were awarded to Hayes after a sour electoral dispute.

Image Source:

Images of American Political History

http://teachpol.tcnj.edu/amer_pol_hist/thumbnail223.html

Compromise of 1877

• In the months following the Election of 1876, but prior to the inauguration in March 1877, Republican and Democratic leaders secretly hammered out a compromise to resolve the election impasse and address other outstanding issues("Politics and Public Service Compromise of 1877." ).

• Under the terms of this agreement, the Democrats agreed to accept the Republican presidential electors (thus assuring that Rutherford B. Hayes would become the next president), provided the Republicans would agree to the following:

– To withdraw federal soldiers from their remaining positions in the South

– To enact federal legislation that would spur industrialization in the South

– To appoint Democrats to patronage positions in the South

– To appoint a Democrat to the president’s cabinet. • ("Politics and Public Service Compromise of 1877." )

Disfranchisement

• The end of Reconstruction marked the beginning of a period, 1877–1900, in which white legislators passed laws and new constitutions that created barriers to voter registration and voting for African-Americans and poor whites.

• African-Americans were barred from voting by poll taxes and grandfather clauses.

• White Democrats also passed Jim Crow laws imposing segregation in public facilities and transportation, as well as other restrictions on blacks

Image Source:

Struggle for Mastery http://uncpress.unc.edu/books/T-4830.html

Civil Rights Movement of the 1960’s

• Since the end of the Civil War many organizations had been created to promote the goals of racial justice and equality in America, but progress was painfully slow. It was not until the sixties that a hundred years of effort would begin to garner the attention necessary to force a modicum of change ("Civil Rights

Movement 60s." )

• There were numerous marches, rallies, strikes, riots, and violent confrontations with the police. National leaders such as Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. and Malcolm X would be assassinated, violence would claim the lives of young and old, and rigged all-white juries mocked justice in cases involving crimes perpetrated by whites against African Americans. Restaurants, hotels, night clubs, public facilities, and the school systems were still segregated during the early sixties, and educational and job opportunities for minorities were far below those available to the white majority ("Civil Rights Movement

60s." ).

• http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AXBvLbYqVMA

The Outcome

• The Equal Rights Movement of the 1960’s promoted integrated school, and eliminated “Jim Crow” laws, although we lost great leaders throughout this struggle for Equal Rights, from Abraham Lincoln to John and Robert Kennedy, Martin Luther King and Malcolm X.

• Today we have a African-American as the Democratic Nominee, although we still struggle in the deep South with the Jena Six innocent that occurred fall 2007 I feel the country has and is making great strides to see everyone as a human being, with equal opportunities, and dignity.

Image Source:

Obama

http://www.democrats.com/node/7609

Works Cited• "13th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution: Abolition of Slavery (1865)." ourdocuments.gov. ourdocuments.gov. 1

Aug 2008 <http://www.ourdocuments.gov/doc.php?flash=true&doc=40>.

• "Civil Rights Movement 60s." lib.virginia.edu. 02 Jun 2008. University of Virginia . 3 Aug 2008 <http://www.lib.virginia.edu/small/exhibits/sixties/civil.html>.

• McElrath, Jessica . "Reconstruction." About.com:African-American History. About.com, a part of The New York Times Company.. 1 Aug 2008 <http://afroamhistory.about.com/cs/reconstruction/a/reconstruction.htm>.

• "Politics and Public Service Compromise of 1877." Travel & History. U-S-History.com. 3 Aug 2008 <http://www.u-s-history.com/pages/h396.html>.