Freedmen During Reconstruction Dbq

The recently freed African Americans plead to receive citizenship and equal rights, they expected to be treated as any other human being. After many years of slavery, the African Americans were finally freed from slavery by president Lincoln. Many of them were granted freedom for serving loyally in the Union army, along with certain rights, such as the right to buy land. The freed slaves were then allowed to purchase land, and received help from the government in the form of establishments such as Freedman’s Bureau and Freedmen’s Aid Society. The former slaves were now allowed to attend certain churches, schools, and were also allowed to socialize in public, although only in certain places. The church played a major role in the post-emancipation

The Union victory in the Civil War prompted the abolition of slavery and African American’s were granted freedom, along with rights that should have been there from the start, however, white supremacy overpowered in the South, forcing African Americans back into a state of slavery. The Reconstruction era, the postwar rebuilding of the South, proved to be an attempt towards change in the lives of African Americans but the opportunities were only available for a limited time.

Just after Reconstruction, life for African Americans began to go downhill as all of their newly gained rights became suppressed because of the new laws and systems that were put in place. Many African Americans that stayed in the South did so because they wanted to continue working in agriculture, and, therefore, had the end goal of getting their own land, which let them fall into the trap that was sharecropping. Africans Americans would rent small plots of land from a landowner, and pay their debts in the form of a portion of their crops. There was also the vagrancy law, which caused any African American that was not working and had no proof that they had a job to be arrested. This leads to the convict lease system, in which wealthy, usually Caucasian American, people rented out prisoners for labor.

Brown v. Board of Education was a court case to desegregate schools. During this time over one-third of states, mostly in the south, segregated their schools by law. Most people don’t know that the lawsuit actually started off as five, in Kansas, South Carolina, Virginia, Delaware, and the District of Columbia. Unfortunately all the lower court cases resulted in defeat (Greenspan 1). The bigger issue was still at hand though, it wasn’t only the schools being segregated, it was everywhere. Anywhere you would’ve went during this time period you would’ve seen “Whites only” and “Colored only” signs on just about anything and everything; the signs were displayed on stores,

African Americans weren’t actually free during Reconstruction because they were initially not accorded the full rights of citizenship under the constitution, they were forced into submission by violence and intimidation, and were abridged the rights they had later gained by Black Codes.

During the Reconstruction Era from 1865 to 1877, Southern white people were segregated to a large extent between wealthy plantation owners and poor white farmers. Both E. B. Seabrook and a New York Times’ writer compare poor white farmers’ horrid lifestyles to freed slaves because there was an extreme similarity between the two. Although the slaves were emancipated as a result of the Civil War, they underwent economic hardships similar to poor white farmers in the South. In fact, the New York Times author makes the argument that the poor whites lived in a worse condition than freed blacks.

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The founding fathers of the United States built America on the ideals of Life, Liberty, and the Pursuit of Happiness, and this applied to each and every person living in the country- not only to a specific racial group. Slavery was abolished with the defeat of the Southern Confederacy in the Civil War, leading to the Era of Reconstruction, in which the primary focus was to reunite the nation and promote of rights of former slaves. Africans Americans were not as free as Whites during this period. Although African Americans were free individuals during the reconstruction period, they did not have complete freedom as their rights were extremely limited due to mistreatment from punishment, segregation, and racism by white supremacists.

Eric Foner is correct when he describes Reconstruction as “America’s unfinished Revolution”. In the early days of Reconstruction, the main purpose was to rebuild the South, but it soon became much bigger than that. Reconstruction made way to several changes in America. Reconstruction in America is an “unfinished revolution” because during the time period of 1865 and 1877, major changes were taking place due to the Civil War and the readmission of the South to the Union. Within the time frame of Reconstruction, America was and can still be considered to have been moving in the right direction, towards equality and civil rights, while also making social and economical changes throughout the country. But due to several obstacles in the south,

After the Civil War, there were “three and a half million men and women” (Brinkley, 352) freed from slavery. These individuals now faced Reconstruction, the reestablishment of the south after their secession from the Union. There were many different ideas on the proper way to proceed with reconstruction. To African Americans, the goals of reconstruction was freedom, to some that meant political equality others economic success, or social equivalence.

This established a base that made “…it illegal to discriminate on the basis of race, but there was a national backlash…[which] led to the Supreme Court’s nullification of the Civil Rights Act in 1883.” Because of the nullification, throughout the years to come blacks were being torn down and positions that they acquired before were being taken from them. In the year of 1901 a colored representative who was in Congress was fired. It’s not till 30 years later when “a black person could gain a seat in the House or Senate.” Many of what was going on was because of the South being so involved with slaves they didn 't want those rights and beliefs taken from them. Also, many didn 't want black people to have the same rights as

As a result of the end of the Civil War in 1865, which was fought over the system of slavery, three amendments were passed in order to achieve equality between whites and African Americans. Slavery was abolished by the 13th amendment, citizenship was given to all African Americans in the

Lincoln’s emancipation proclamation in 1863 declared “all persons held as slaves…shall be free,” which granted Black Americans a necessity they had not had before, freedom. This significantly improved Black American’s lives as it meant they were able to marry, own property and move freely between states. This was a definite improvement as Black Americans had not had this opportunity before. Without the President Lincoln having issued the proclamation, this would not have been put into effect.

The Freedmen’s Bureau gained additional support from organizations such as the New England Freedmen’s Aid Society, Boston Educational Commission, The Philadelphia Freedmen’s Relief Association and the American Missionary Society. The impact of agent Pierce’s project in Hilton Head influenced the creation of the New England Freedmen’s Aid Society. The NEFAS later created the Boston Educational Commission. These two groups worked together on issues that dealt with the Sea Islands. Both groups decided to send “a group of 321 teachers and experts in agriculture” for educational purposes in the Sea Islands. By 1868, the NEFAS and BEC accounted for “182 teachers and 79 schools in Maryland, Virginia, North Carolina, South Carolina, Georgia,

Throughout history, in America, there has been several rough patches that makes countless amounts of people feel ashamed to have been living in such a world. Civil wars, shootings, riots, bombings, and worst of all, segregation has left scars, real and figuratively, too deep to truly ever go away. To be apart of something so horrible hurts and will hurt the country forever; no one will ever forget these events that shaped history. Lots of events have never been forgotten especially those when innocence is a factor. Little Rock, Arkansas was riddled with segregation and the governor, the one person who was supposed to help residents, only made the situation worse at Little Rock Central High School,