Political Participation During The Reconstruction Era

Born in 1925 in Monroe, North Carolina, Robert F. Williams was the grandchild of former slaves who left home at an early age and ended up enlisted in the Marines. He returned home in 1955, founding and becoming President of Monroe’s chapter of the NAACP where he recruited the working class along with the unemployed to create an unprecedented chapter. “We ended up with a chapter that was unique in the whole NAACP because of working class composition and a leadership that was not middle class. Most important, we had a strong representation of returned veterans who were very militant and didn’t scare easy.” (In Memory of Robert F. Williams)

The Reconstruction Era was a fourteen-year period in which the South rejoined the Union after the Civil War and the abolishment of slavery. The Southern states’ dependency upon slave labor left their economy in ruins. In addition, the social constructs of The South were diminished as well; southern white society now had to interact with individuals they once oppressed. Charles Chestnut’s, “The Marrows of Tradition”, dives into southern aristocracy highlighting the unjust execution of the law and the twisted interpretations of “Impartiality”. Due to the fact the Wellington society dwelled on Impartiality, newly freed blacks had to encounter all types of prejudices, each one masked deeper by the newly constructed attitude towards African Americans.

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. Despite the fact that African Americans were liberated from slavery, during the early years of Reconstruction, they were not equal citizens under the law. Even though blacks had fought loyally for the union, they were initially denied the right to vote (Doc a). The President of the United States, President Johnson, regarded black suffrage as something to radical that would “change the entire structure and character of the State governments,” (Doc b).

The primarily focus of this paper is to address the studies of the African-American views, conflict, and treatments from the Southern states following The Civil War. Documents include “Black Codes of the State of Mississippi” and the “Address of the Colored Convention to the People of Alabama”. These documents provide shaped rules, laws, and statutes for black society among whites. Between the years of, 1865 and 1867, both Alabama and Mississippi took action and state their thoughts towards the end of slavery in the United States.

“Long, hot summers” of rioting arose and many supporters of the African American movement were assassinated. However, these movements that mused stay ingrained in America’s history and pave way for an issue that continues to be the center of

Sources Analysis Freedom During the Reconstruction era, the idea of freedom could have many different meanings. Everyday factors that we don't often think about today such as the color of our skin, where we were born, and whether or not we own land determined what limitations were placed on the ability to live our life to the fullest. To dig deeper into what freedom meant for different individuals during this time period, I analyzed three primary sources written by those who experienced this first hand. These included “Excerpts from The Black Codes of Mississippi” (1865), “Jourdan Anderson to his old master” (1865), and “Testimony on the Ku Klux Klan in Congressional Hearing” (1872).

While racial attitudes and “Reconstruction weariness” contributed to the collapse of Reconstruction efforts, the use of violence against whites and blacks combined with the belief in white supremacy played the

Freedom is the right to act, speak, or think as one wants without hindrance or restraint. Everyone in the world has the right to do whatever they want whenever they want, without having to answer to nobody. Unfortunately there was a time when African Americans were enslaved to work fields by the white man. But thanks to the civil war freedom was blessed onto them. The Reconstruction Era was a time of rebuilding the aftermath of the civil war.

But, when these officials were elected to Congress, they passed the “black codes” and thus the relations between the president and legislators became worst (Schriefer, Sivell and Arch R1). These so called “Black Codes” were “a series of laws to deprive blacks of their constitutional rights” that they were enacted mainly by Deep South legislatures. Black Codes differ from a state to another but they were stricter in the Deep South as they were sometimes irrationally austere. (Hazen 30) Furthermore, with the emergence of organizations such as the Red Shirts and the White League with the rise of the Conservative White Democrats’ power, efforts to prevent Black Americans from voting were escalating (Watts 247), even if the Fifteenth Amendment to the U.S constitution that gave the Blacks the right to vote had been ratified in 1870.

The Reconstruction Era occurred in 1865, it was was a period after the Civil War in which America was focused on rebuilding the broken South. In 1867, the Radical reconstruction gave former slaves a voice in government. During this era, formers slaves gained a platform in the government, with some blacks as Congressmen. However, not everyone supported the idea of Reconstruction. Less than a decade after the Reconstruction period, a small group composed of democratic ex-confederate veterans, white farmers and white southerners sympathetic to white supremacy joined forces together to form the Ku Klux Klan.

Ida B. Wells-Barnett was a journalist and newspaper editor who stood against inequality. She was an anti-lynching activist whose goal was to expose the truth of the injustice that occurred in the South. During the Reconstruction Era, from 1865 to 1877, the 13th, 14th, and 15th Amendments were ratified to abolish slavery, ensure citizenship and equal rights, and grant African Americans men the right to vote. Although the Reconstruction Era was a time of progression for African Americans, nonetheless what followed was a period of social injustice because of intense racial discrimination, extralegal punishment, and false accusations that led to death. After Reconstruction, African Americans in the South suffered extreme discrimination due

The reconstruction period was a failure because African Americans, mainly males, were not treated with equality although the constitution said that the they were free and had the right to vote, be educated and had the right to liberty, life and the pursuit to happiness. Organizations, like the KKK, were created to harm freed slaves and their families. Laws were created such as the Black Codes restricting former slaves from their rights. African Americans endured a lot of violence over the years. “In Grayson, Texas, a white man and two friends murdered three former slaves because the wanted to ‘ thin the niggers out and drive them to their hole’”.

The KKK used violence against Black Freedmen and others who opposed them to show dominance over them. The KKK used violence the stop Black Freedmen from voting so the Democrats could win more elections. After the Civil War the South elected ex-Confederate leaders to office. They denied freedmen the right to vote and passed “Black Codes” to restrict freedmen.

Racism’s Impact on Reconstruction While the issue of slavery evidently contributed to the divide that resulted in the American Civil War, it is debated whether prevailing ideals of racism caused the failure of the era following the war known as Reconstruction. With the abolishment of slavery, many of the southern states had to reassemble the social, economic, and political systems instilled in their societies. The Reconstruction Era was originally led by a radical republican government that pushed to raise taxes, establish coalition governments, and deprive former confederates of superiority they might have once held. However, during this time common views were obtained that the South could recover independently and that African Americans

Judging from the latter half of the nineteenth century in the United States, the ideas of freedom for African Americans held by whites and blacks were varied and often in conflict with each other. Such a generalization results from, on the one hand, white ideas of freedom found in speeches from southern loyalists and Confederate leaders, as well as historical accounts of abolitionists, all in the period before the outbreak of the Civil War; coupled with black ideas of freedom found in speeches both before and as late as the end of the nineteenth century. From this selection of documents, one can see white ideas of black freedom range from, seeing black freedom as directly in conflict with the social, political, and religious institutions of