Reconstruction DBQ

Although slavery was declared over after the passing of the thirteenth amendment, African Americans were not being treated with the respect or equality they deserved. Socially, politically and economically, African American people were not being given equal opportunities as white people. They had certain laws directed at them, which held them back from being equal to their white peers. They also had certain requirements, making it difficult for many African Americans to participate in the opportunity to vote for government leaders. Although they were freed from slavery, there was still a long way to go for equality through America’s reconstruction plan.

“A thing that has been rebuilt after being damaged or destroyed.” The definition of reconstruction. The Reconstruction Act was proposed by The Government. The purpose of the reconstruction act was to readmit Southern States back into the Union. The fourteenth amendment provided former slaves with national citizenship, and the fifteenth amendment granted black men the right to vote.

After the Civil War conditions were really bad because a lot of homes and personal properties were destroyed. Because of the War the Union lost 370,000 troop members and the Confederacy lost 260,000. Total 375,000 troop members were injured. Many civilians in the South died because of access to food was infrequent. I believe Reconstruction was necessary because after four long years of war they should move on from it and reunite as one.

The Klu-Klux-Klan was a white supremacist group that opposed “Reconstruction” and equal rights for freed slaves (Hook Exercise). They, to my standards, really would do whatever it takes to stop Reconstruction, even if it meant killing innocent people for that. John W. Stephens, a former senator from Caswell, was brutally murdered by none other than the Klu-Klux-Klan in a Grand Jury room (Doc. A Par.1). John W. Stephens was stabbed five to six times then even hanged on a hook in the same jury room.

To begin, the Klu Klux Klan is an organization whose purpose is to terrorize people of color. Dressed in all white, their identities are hidden as they attack in the dead of night. The KKK is founded by a group of confederate veterans in 1865, and their goal was to end Reconstruction. The Klan only recruited members who were male, white, and not Jew. Former Confederate Nathaniel Bedford Forrest tried to stop the organization for, “...the Klan’s violent tactics grew too extreme” (Source 1).

In the South, there was a group called the Ku Klux Klan, or the KKK. They would run rampant killing whoever they pleased, and no one would stop them. The KKK would kill political figures who supported Reconstruction or freedman. In a testimony to the Senate, Abram Colby states, “On the 29th of October 1869, [the Klansmen] broke my door open , took me out of my bed, took me to the woods and whipped me three hours or more and left me for dead” (Colby 513). The KKK targeted African Americans and tortured them to death.

In history growing up I learned that slavery ended when president Lincoln issued the emancipation proclamation. After this law was passed, African Americans were embarking a new journey, Radical reconstruction. The end of slavery was only the beginning. It was the beginning of and unjust, corrupted system. Reconstruction was a brief period following the Civil War in which an attempt was made by the federal government to disenfranchise the former slaveholding oligarchy and to improve the economic, educational, political, and human rights conditions of poor whites and blacks in the South (Feagin, Feagin 2011).

The KKK was a white nationalized group that included former veterans, which created the first branch of the group. The Klansmen founded in 1865, in Pulaski, Tennessee, is now known as the birthplace of the KKK. This group dedicated themselves to a campaign of violence to Republican leaders and voters. The KKK targeted many people based on their race or sexuality , including, Gays, Immigrants, African Americans, and Catholics(KKK history). Jim Crow laws,

The Union victory in the Civil War in 1865 gave millions of slaves their freedom, however, the process of rebuilding the South during what is known as the Reconstruction Era, that took place between 1865 and 1877, introduced a whole new set of significant challenges. The most important part of reconstruction was to secure rights for former slaves. Radical republicans, aware that newly freed slaves would face racism and inequality, passed a series of progressive laws and amendments in Congress that protected blacks’ rights under federal and state law. This included the Fourteenth and Fifteenth Amendments that granted black men citizenship and the right to vote. However, before the 14th and 15th amendments were passed, the Civil Rights Act of

Maceo Cardinale Kwik Reconstruction Reconstruction was the twelve years after the civil war. Those twelve years were full of readjustment fixing the ruin the United States had fallen into. The problems that had the United states in disarray were how to, rebuild the South, reunite the states, and ensure the rights and protection of the newly freed African Americans. The civil war left the South in shambles, and newly freed slaves struggled to adjust to their new freedom. Most Southerners hated reconstruction and everything else about the North.

The Reconstruction affected the freed slaves economically, politically, and socially. There is no doubt that Freed slaves had no clothes and money plus black people voting rights were taken away. The African-Americans had negatives things, such as Sharecropping, the Fourteenth Amendment, and the Ku Klux Klan. Sharecropping was the biggest economical reason that affected the freed slaves during reconstruction. Sharecropping means that the slaves had to give a portion of whatever they grew to their land owners.

The Reconstruction Era of American history was plagued by many problems. One of the most important problems being the recently released from slavery Freedmen. Freedmen were in a tricky situation in which they had just been released from their owner and had nowhere to go, but the Federal Government made many successful attempts to help them out. The Government helped alleviate all the problems Freedmen had from their finances to basic needs and rights, and in doing so, made the period of reconstruction more helpful than harmful for Freedmen. The events of reconstruction were helpful to freedmen as they were not only freed from slavery, they were given rights directly from the federal government.

The Civil War was a great twist to America and revised the meanings of freedom for Americans from that point on because it solved the great issue of slavery. Freedom was never enjoyable for many due to the fact that African Americans were being kept as slaves because of their skin color. During the time before and during the Civil War many believed that the United States would never stay half slave, and half non-slave. Also, families fought and argued with each other because of their standing points about slavery. Plus, slavery was such an extravagant and passionate issue that it tore a whole government in half.

The Civil War that stretched across America from 1861 to 1865 activated the violent decades of the division between the North and South regions. Economically and Politically different, the North heavily depended on free labor and industrial economy, whereas the South revolved around and agricultural economy that benefited from slave labor. These differencing opinions that developed throughout the Civil War had a deep impact on the divide in American during Reconstruction. After the Civil War ended there was a million questions as to what to do with all the recently freed slaves. There were an abundant of opposing ideas as to how to treat these newly freed slaves and the loosing white southerners of the Confederacy.

As the Ku Klux Klan’s membership grew, organizations such as the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP), which fought to end racial discrimination and segregation, grew as well. With these two growing groups pushing for opposite ideals, tensions continued to increase. The NAACP pushed for reform and rights for African Americans and the Ku Klux Klan combated their progress with lynching and