Was Reconstruction A Success Or Failure Essay

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Reconstruction was the rebuilding of the nation after the Civil War. It was President Lincoln’s method of reuniting the south and north back together. This consisted of methods and rules for the states of the south to rejoin the north. During reconstruction, there were several amendments established in favor of African Americans, such as the 13th amendment that ended slavery, the 14th amendment which said everyone was equal, and the 15th amendment which stated all men could vote. Although reconstruction could be seen as a good thing, when reconstruction failed it caused Jim Crow Laws, Sharecropping, and KKK. Reconstruction failed in 1877. It failed due to the fact that there was a lack of political focus. President Andrew Johnson didn’t really …show more content…

They were laws enforcing racial segregation in the south after reconstruction failed (Pilgrim, 2000). Basically, they were anti-black laws. These laws segregated schools, water fountains, restaurants, bathrooms, and many other places or things. They were laws to humanities black people, African Americans even had to sit in the back of the bus. The supreme court ruled Jim Crow laws constitutional and allowed them to be established in the south (PBS, 2002). The courts ruled it as okay because they thought the laws were “separate but equal” which wasn’t always the case. Blacks weren’t socially equal to whites, that was the point of Jim Crow laws. It was simple things that blacks couldn’t do but whites could. Simple things, like not lighting a cigarette for white women, and not showing any public display of affection (Pilgrim, 2000). Making laws like this made it easy for blacks to end up in trouble and arrested. It made sure blacks knew that they weren’t equal with whites. Some African Americans tried to resist these laws. They would protest, march, conduct boycotts, and many other things. And most of them would pay for their braveness with their …show more content…

It basically was slavery by another name. Sharecropping is/was when a landowner provided a place for a tenement to stay in exchange for their work. The tenement had to share the crops they made on their piece of land with the landowner. Because of African Americans not being able to find work due to racism, they turned to sharecropping (Bowers, 2013). Many former slaves had no other choice but to participate in sharecropping because they had nowhere to stay, no money, no food, just no way to support their family. They were never allowed to get an education so they were very illiterate. Sharecropping was so close to slavery, black people still didn’t have the freedom that they thought would come after slavery had ended. Sharecropping was an attempt for white people to still control blacks lives. Because of the black workers being uneducated, they were overworked and abused (Giesen, 2016). This means, if a family weren’t able to produce crops for the landowner on time, the landowner could advance credits for the family. They were expected to sometimes produce unreasonable amounts in little time. There wasn’t anything that the blacks could do about it, but submit because they didn’t have anywhere else to

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