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Origins of Reconstruction
Presidential reconstruction, radical reconstruction.
- The end of Reconstruction
What was the Reconstruction era?
What were the reconstruction era promises, was the reconstruction era a success or a failure.
- Who was W.E.B. Du Bois?
- What did W.E.B. Du Bois write?
Reconstruction
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The Reconstruction era was the period after the American Civil War from 1865 to 1877, during which the United States grappled with the challenges of reintegrating into the Union the states that had seceded and determining the legal status of African Americans . Presidential Reconstruction, from 1865 to 1867, required little of the former Confederate states and leaders. Radical Reconstruction attempted to give African Americans full equality.
Why was the Reconstruction era important?
The Reconstruction era redefined U.S. citizenship and expanded the franchise, changed the relationship between the federal government and the governments of the states, and highlighted the differences between political and economic democracy.
While U.S. Pres. Andrew Johnson attempted to return the Southern states to essentially the condition they were in before the American Civil War , Republicans in Congress passed laws and amendments that affirmed the “equality of all men before the law” and prohibited racial discrimination, that made African Americans full U.S. citizens, and that forbade laws to prevent African Americans from voting.
During a brief period in the Reconstruction era, African Americans voted in large numbers and held public office at almost every level, including in both houses of Congress . However, this provoked a violent backlash from whites who did not want to relinquish supremacy. The backlash succeeded, and the promises of Reconstruction were mostly unfulfilled. The Fourteenth and Fifteenth Amendments were unenforced but remained on the books, forming the basis of the mid-20th-century civil rights movement .
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Reconstruction , in U.S. history, the period (1865–77) that followed the American Civil War and during which attempts were made to redress the inequities of slavery and its political, social, and economic legacy and to solve the problems arising from the readmission to the Union of the 11 states that had seceded at or before the outbreak of war. Long portrayed by many historians as a time when vindictive Radical Republicans fastened Black supremacy upon the defeated Confederacy , Reconstruction has since the late 20th century been viewed more sympathetically as a laudable experiment in interracial democracy . Reconstruction witnessed far-reaching changes in America’s political life. At the national level, new laws and constitutional amendments permanently altered the federal system and the definition of American citizenship. In the South , a politically mobilized Black community joined with white allies to bring the Republican Party to power, and with it a redefinition of the responsibilities of government.
The national debate over Reconstruction began during the Civil War. In December 1863, less than a year after he issued the Emancipation Proclamation , Pres. Abraham Lincoln announced the first comprehensive program for Reconstruction, the Ten Percent Plan. Under it, when one-tenth of a state’s prewar voters took an oath of loyalty, they could establish a new state government. To Lincoln, the plan was an attempt to weaken the Confederacy rather than a blueprint for the postwar South. It was put into operation in parts of the Union-occupied Confederacy, but none of the new governments achieved broad local support. In 1864 Congress enacted (and Lincoln pocket vetoed) the Wade-Davis Bill , which proposed to delay the formation of new Southern governments until a majority of voters had taken a loyalty oath. Some Republicans were already convinced that equal rights for the former slaves had to accompany the South’s readmission to the Union. In his last speech, on April 11, 1865, Lincoln, referring to Reconstruction in Louisiana , expressed the view that some Blacks—the “very intelligent” and those who had served in the Union army—ought to enjoy the right to vote .
Following Lincoln’s assassination in April 1865, Andrew Johnson became president and inaugurated the period of Presidential Reconstruction (1865–67). Johnson offered a pardon to all Southern whites except Confederate leaders and wealthy planters (although most of these subsequently received individual pardons), restoring their political rights and all property except slaves. He also outlined how new state governments would be created. Apart from the requirement that they abolish slavery, repudiate secession, and abrogate the Confederate debt, these governments were granted a free hand in managing their affairs. They responded by enacting the Black codes , laws that required African Americans to sign yearly labour contracts and in other ways sought to limit the freedmen’s economic options and reestablish plantation discipline . African Americans strongly resisted the implementation of these measures, and they seriously undermined Northern support for Johnson’s policies.
When Congress assembled in December 1865, Radical Republicans such as Rep. Thaddeus Stevens of Pennsylvania and Sen. Charles Sumner from Massachusetts called for the establishment of new Southern governments based on equality before the law and universal male suffrage. But the more numerous moderate Republicans hoped to work with Johnson while modifying his program. Congress refused to seat the representatives and senators elected from the Southern states and in early 1866 passed the Freedmen’s Bureau and Civil Rights Bills. The first extended the life of an agency Congress had created in 1865 to oversee the transition from slavery to freedom. The second defined all persons born in the United States as national citizens, who were to enjoy equality before the law.
A combination of personal stubbornness, fervent belief in states’ rights , and racist convictions led Johnson to reject these bills, causing a permanent rupture between himself and Congress. The Civil Rights Act became the first significant legislation in American history to become law over a president’s veto. Shortly thereafter, Congress approved the Fourteenth Amendment , which put the principle of birthright citizenship into the Constitution and forbade states to deprive any citizen of the “equal protection” of the laws. Arguably the most important addition to the Constitution other than the Bill of Rights , the amendment constituted a profound change in federal-state relations. Traditionally, citizens’ rights had been delineated and protected by the states. Thereafter, the federal government would guarantee all Americans’ equality before the law against state violation.
In the fall 1866 congressional elections, Northern voters overwhelmingly repudiated Johnson’s policies. Congress decided to begin Reconstruction anew. The Reconstruction Acts of 1867 divided the South into five military districts and outlined how new governments, based on manhood suffrage without regard to race , were to be established. Thus began the period of Radical or Congressional Reconstruction, which lasted until the end of the last Southern Republican governments in 1877.
By 1870 all the former Confederate states had been readmitted to the Union, and nearly all were controlled by the Republican Party. Three groups made up Southern Republicanism. Carpetbaggers , or recent arrivals from the North, were former Union soldiers, teachers, Freedmen’s Bureau agents, and businessmen. The second large group, scalawags , or native-born white Republicans, included some businessmen and planters, but most were nonslaveholding small farmers from the Southern up-country. Loyal to the Union during the Civil War, they saw the Republican Party as a means of keeping Confederates from regaining power in the South.
In every state, African Americans formed the overwhelming majority of Southern Republican voters. From the beginning of Reconstruction, Black conventions and newspapers throughout the South had called for the extension of full civil and political rights to African Americans. Composed of those who had been free before the Civil War plus slave ministers, artisans , and Civil War veterans, the Black political leadership pressed for the elimination of the racial caste system and the economic uplifting of the former slaves. Sixteen African Americans served in Congress during Reconstruction—including Hiram Revels and Blanche K. Bruce in the U.S. Senate—more than 600 in state legislatures, and hundreds more in local offices from sheriff to justice of the peace scattered across the South. So-called “Black supremacy” never existed, but the advent of African Americans in positions of political power marked a dramatic break with the country’s traditions and aroused bitter hostility from Reconstruction’s opponents.
Serving an expanded citizenry, Reconstruction governments established the South’s first state-funded public school systems, sought to strengthen the bargaining power of plantation labourers, made taxation more equitable, and outlawed racial discrimination in public transportation and accommodations. They also offered lavish aid to railroads and other enterprises in the hope of creating a “New South” whose economic expansion would benefit Blacks and whites alike. But the economic program spawned corruption and rising taxes, alienating increasing numbers of white voters.
Meanwhile, the social and economic transformation of the South proceeded apace. To Blacks, freedom meant independence from white control. Reconstruction provided the opportunity for African Americans to solidify their family ties and to create independent religious institutions, which became centres of community life that survived long after Reconstruction ended. The former slaves also demanded economic independence. Blacks’ hopes that the federal government would provide them with land had been raised by Gen. William T. Sherman ’s Field Order No. 15 of January 1865, which set aside a large swath of land along the coast of South Carolina and Georgia for the exclusive settlement of Black families, and by the Freedmen’s Bureau Act of March, which authorized the bureau to rent or sell land in its possession to former slaves. But President Johnson in the summer of 1865 ordered land in federal hands to be returned to its former owners. The dream of “ 40 acres and a mule” was stillborn. Lacking land, most former slaves had little economic alternative other than resuming work on plantations owned by whites. Some worked for wages, others as sharecroppers, who divided the crop with the owner at the end of the year. Neither status offered much hope for economic mobility. For decades, most Southern Blacks remained propertyless and poor.
Nonetheless, the political revolution of Reconstruction spawned increasingly violent opposition from white Southerners. White supremacist organizations that committed terrorist acts, such as the Ku Klux Klan , targeted local Republican leaders for beatings or assassination. African Americans who asserted their rights in dealings with white employers, teachers, ministers, and others seeking to assist the former slaves also became targets. At Colfax, Louisiana, in 1873, scores of Black militiamen were killed after surrendering to armed whites intent on seizing control of local government. Increasingly, the new Southern governments looked to Washington, D.C. , for assistance.
By 1869 the Republican Party was firmly in control of all three branches of the federal government. After attempting to remove Secretary of War Edwin M. Stanton , in violation of the new Tenure of Office Act , Johnson had been impeached by the House of Representatives in 1868. Although the Senate, by a single vote, failed to remove him from office, Johnson’s power to obstruct the course of Reconstruction was gone. Republican Ulysses S. Grant was elected president that fall ( see United States presidential election of 1868 ). Soon afterward, Congress approved the Fifteenth Amendment , prohibiting states from restricting the right to vote because of race. Then it enacted a series of Enforcement Acts authorizing national action to suppress political violence. In 1871 the administration launched a legal and military offensive that destroyed the Klan. Grant was reelected in 1872 in the most peaceful election of the period.
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In short, the South was effectively brought into a national system of credit and labor as a result of Reconstruction. “Free” labor, rather than some system of coerced labor would prevail in the region. Neither serfdom nor peasantry would replace slavery. And southern landowners and freedmen, whether they wanted to or not, were incorporated into the national credit markets.
Let us now take stock of the answers to the questions that we began with. On what terms would the nation be reunited? In short, on national terms. Property was not expropriated or redistributed in the South. Reforms that were imposed on the South—the Fourteenth and Fifteenth Amendments, for example—applied to the entire nation.
What implications did the Civil War have for citizenship? The Fourteenth and Fifteenth Amendments represented stunning expansions of the rights of citizenship to former slaves. Even during the depths of the Jim Crow era in the early twentieth century, white supremacists never succeeded in returning citizenship to its pre-Civil War boundaries. African Americans especially insisted that they may have been deprived of their rights after the Civil War but they had neither surrendered nor lost their claim to those rights.
What would be the future of the restored nation’s economy? In simplest terms, Abraham Lincoln’s famous observation that a house divided cannot stand was translated into policy. However impoverished and credit starved, the former Confederacy was integrated back into the national economy , laying the foundation for the future emergence of the most dynamic industrial economy in the world. African Americans would not be enslaved or assigned to a separate economic status. But nor would African Americans as a group be provided with any resources with which to compete.
Guiding Student Discussion
Possible student perceptions of Reconstruction Aside from the challenge of organizing the complex events of the Reconstruction era into a narrative accessible to students, the biggest challenge is to help students understand what was possible and what was not possible after the Civil War. Students, for example, may be inclined to believe that white Americans were never committed to racial equality in the first place so Reconstruction was doomed to failure. Some students may fixate on northern white hypocrisy; many white Republicans pressured southern voters to pass the Fourteenth and Fifteenth Amendments even while they opposed its passage in the North. Yet others may emphasize that citizenship rights for blacks were hollow because blacks had no economic resources; blacks in postwar America could not easily escape an economic system that was slavery by another name. Each of these positions is worth discussion, but each tends to flatten out the motivations and behavior of the actors in the drama of Reconstruction. And virtually all of these interpretations presumed that the outcome of Reconstruction was both inevitable and wholly outside the hands of African Americans.
Ask students to design their own version of Reconstruction. One approach that I have adopted in hopes of countering these tendencies is to ask students to state their “first principles” that they think Reconstruction should have pursued and established. If your students are like mine, many will propose that Reconstruction should have guaranteed equal rights for all Americans. I then ask them to define what those rights should have been. At this point, even students who are in broad agreement about the principle of equal rights for all Americans may differ on the specific content of those rights. For example, some may stress economic equality whereas others may emphasize equality of opportunity. In any case, the next step is to ask the students to think about how they would have turned their principle into policy. Those students who may have stressed economic equality may then sketch out a plan for “forty acres and mule” for each former slave. Those who stress the need for equal opportunity may sketch out the need for public education for freed people and other southerners. I next ask students where the requisite resources for these policies would come from. For example, where would the federal government have gotten the land and money to provide former slaves with land and livestock? If the federal government had expropriated land and resources from former slave masters, what consequences would that policy have had for private property elsewhere in the United States? (If the government could take lake and property from former slave masters, would it then have had precedent to later take land and property from former slaves?) What would the consequences of this policy have been for the production of cotton, the nation’s most important export? In response to students who propose universal public education, I ask them about the funding for these new schools. Who would pay for them? If taxes needed to be raised, what and whom should have been taxed? Should the schools have been integrated? If so, how would the resistance of white southerners to integrated schools be overcome? If not, would separate schools for blacks and white have legitimized segregation ?
Through this exercise, students gain a better sense of how all of the facets of Reconstruction were interrelated and how any broad principle was shaped by the circumstances, constraints, and traditions of the age. Equally important, students will better appreciate how astute African Americans were in pursuing their goals during the Reconstruction era. They recognized that the Civil War had ended slavery and destroyed the antebellum South, but it had not created a clean slate on which they had a free hand to write their future. Instead, black Americans were constantly gauging what was possible and who they might ally with to translate their long-suppressed hopes into a secure and rewarding future in American society.
The role of African Americans in Reconstruction The search by African Americans for allies during Reconstruction is the focus of another worthwhile exercise. It is essential for students to understand that African Americans were active participants in Reconstruction. They were not the dupes of northern politicians. Nor were they cowed by southern whites. This said, African Americans never had decisive control over Reconstruction. Whatever their goals, they needed allies. With that fundamental reality in mind, Ask students to identify the major stakeholders in Reconstruction. I ask students to draw up a list of the groups in American society who had a major stake/role in Reconstruction. Typically, students will identify the major actors as white northerners, white southerners and blacks. I then press the students to break those groups down further. Were all white northerners alike in their attitudes toward blacks? Were all white southerners? And were there any sub-groups of African Americans that should be distinguished? After this revision, my students typically distinguish between pro- and anti-black white northerners, elite white southerners, middling white southerners, blacks who were free before the Civil War, and recently freed slaves .
Once we have identified the actors in Reconstruction, we then systematically work thorough this list and consider what interests each of these groups might have shared. Put another way, on what grounds could each (any) of these groups found common cause with African Americans? Take middling whites for example. Many students may wonder why poor white southerners did not forge an alliance with former slaves. After all, they had poverty in common. Some students might suggest that poor whites refused to acknowledge their common condition with African Americans because of racism; a poor white man, in short, may have been poor but he could insist that at least he was a member of the “superior” white race. I also point out that poor whites and poor blacks may both have been poor, but they were poor in very different ways so that they were at best tentative allies. Poor whites typically were land poor; that is, they owned land but usually not the other resources that would have allowed them to exploit their land intensively. Black southerners were poor and landless; most had no significant holding of land to exploit. Consequently, when blacks called for expanded social services such as schools to meet their needs, they were implicitly calling for additional taxes to fund the services. What would be taxed to fund these new schools and services? In the nineteenth century, tangible property, and specifically land, was the principal taxed property. Taxes on the land of poor whites, then, helped to underwrite new schools in the Reconstruction South. These taxes, in the end, drove a wedge between poor whites and African Americans and ensured that black southerners could not take for granted the support of poor white southerners who bridled at paying taxes on their land to fund new schools. Or take the example of white northerners. Even some white Republicans who were unsettled by calls for racial equality could be allies of former slaves. Republicans believed that without the support of black voters in the South their party might surrender national power to the Democratic Party. Expediency alone, then, coaxed some white Republicans to support political rights for blacks. But as soon as the Republican Party garnered a sufficient national majority so that the support of southern blacks was no longer essential, these same northern Republicans urged the party to jettison its pledge to defend African American rights.
This exercise helps students see African Americans as actors in Reconstruction, but actors constrained by the actions of other actors. This exercise turns Reconstruction into a dynamic process of contestation, negotiation, and compromise, which, of course, is precisely what Reconstruction was.
What resources did the formerly enslaved bring to freedom? Finally, another possible approach is to focus students’ attention on the resources that African Americans could tap as they made the transition from slavery to freedom. I ask students to consider the needs that African Americans, as free Americans, had in 1865 and the resources they had at their disposal to allow them to survive as free Americans. This exercise prompts students to consider the resources and institutions that blacks already possessed in 1865 as well as those that blacks would subsequently need to build. In other words, many slaves possessed skills (some could read, some were skilled artisans) and had built institutions (particularly religious institutions ) that were foundations for black communities after emancipation. Taking these into account, students can then consider what additional resources former slaves needed and how they might have acquired these resources. This approach to Reconstruction inevitably leads to discussion of the possibilities and limits of black self-help as well as the prospects for meaningful assistance to blacks from white Americans. It also often leads to valuable discussions of the merits and drawbacks of the racially exclusive institutions that emerged during Reconstruction, such as schools and churches. Students gain a better appreciation, for example, of why blacks preferred schools taught by black teachers and black denominations even while students also recognize the subsequent vulnerability of these institutions.
Historians Debate
No era of American history has produced hotter scholarly debates than Reconstruction. Historians may have written more about the Civil War but they have argued louder and longer about Reconstruction. With a few notable exceptions, however, most of the scholarship on Reconstruction from the late nineteenth century to the 1960s ignored or denied the prominent role of African Americans in the era’s events. Blacks were rendered as the pawns and playthings of whites, whether they be white northerners or southerners. The most notable exception to this willful silence about blacks and Reconstruction was W. E. B. Du Bois’s Black Reconstruction (1935). Du Bois dissented from the then current interpretation of Reconstruction as a failed experiment in social engineering by placing the former slaves and the battle over the control of their labor at the center of his story. For him, Reconstruction was a failure not because blacks were unworthy of it but because white southerners and their northern allies sabotaged it. Not until the 1960s did a new generation of professional historians begin to reach similar conclusions. Spurred on by the civil rights struggle , which was commonly referred to as the “Second Reconstruction,” historians systematically studied all phases of Reconstruction. In the process, they fundamentally revised the portrait of African Americans. John Hope Franklin, in Reconstruction , Kenneth Stampp, in Era of Reconstruction , and others recast African Americans and their Republican allies as principled and progressive minded. By the 1970s, a subsequent wave of scholarship began to revise the largely positive take on the Reconstruction offered by Franklin, Stampp, et. al. Now Reconstruction was seen as an era marked by muddled policies, inadequate resources, and faltering commitment. William Gillette’s Retreat from Reconstruction (1979) was the fullest expression of this interpretation. Eric Foner’s Reconstruction synthesized the previous quarter century of scholarship on the period and offered the richest account yet of the role of African Americans in shaping Reconstruction. Foner also placed the accomplishments of Reconstruction in a comparative framework and concluded that the rights that the former slaves acquired during the era were exceptional when compared to those in any other post-emancipation society in the western hemisphere. Reconstruction may have left the former slaves with “nothing but freedom” but that freedom, Foner stressed, was written into the Constitution and was never completely compromised.
Since the publication of Foner’s work, most scholarship on Reconstruction has been devoted to topics that had previously been ignored by scholars. For example, the roles of black women , the struggle to develop a system of labor to replace slavery, and the emergence of black institutions have all been the focus of recent scholarly monographs. Two recent works that build on these works and suggest new directions for scholarship on Reconstruction are Heather Cox Richardson’s West From Appomattox: The Reconstruction of America after the Civil War (2007) and Steve Hahn’s A Nation Under Our Feet: Black Political Struggles in the Rural South, From Slavery to the Great Migration . Richardson highlights the importance of the Trans-Mississippi West in the political machinations and economic visions of the architects of Reconstruction while Hahn highlights the shared ideological values and cultural resources that sustained southern blacks in their struggle for economic and political power in the postbellum South.
W. Fitzhugh Brundage was a Fellow at the National Humanities Center in 1995-96. He is the William B. Umstead Professor of History at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.
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To cite this essay: Brundage, W. Fitzhugh. “Reconstruction and the Formerly Enslaved.” Freedom’s Story, TeacherServe©. National Humanities Center. DATE YOU ACCESSED ESSAY. <https://nationalhumanitiescenter.org/tserve/freedom/1865-1917/essays/reconstruction.htm>
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Essays on the civil war and reconstruction and related topics
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"Of the essays included in this volume all but one--that on 'The process of reconstruction'--have been published before during the last eleven years: four in the Political Science Quarterly, one in the Yale Review, and one in the 'Papers of the American Historical Association.'"--Pref.
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James W. Loewen (1942-2021)
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Essay 6: Reconstruction
Recognizing that inaccurate history often subtly promotes continuing white supremacy, the National Education Association (NEA) commissioned these articles and has posted some of them in slightly different form at its website . I thank Harry Lawson and others at NEA for the commission, for editorial suggestions, and for other assistance.
The United States is entering the sesquicentennial of Reconstruction. No other era has been so lied about. An “aha moment” convinced me of that, way back in January, 1969. I was teaching at Tougaloo College in Mississippi. I asked my “Freshman Social Science Seminar” on the first day of class, “What happened during Reconstruction?” Sixteen of my seventeen students, all African Americans, replied: That was the period right after the Civil War, when blacks took over the government of the Southern states, but they were too soon out of slavery, so they screwed up, and whites had to take control again.
I sat stunned. At least three lies resided in that sentence. African Americans never “took over”; all Southern states had white governors during Reconstruction, and all but one had white legislative majorities. The Reconstruction governments did not “screw up.” They adopted the best state constitutions most Southern states have ever had, started public schools for African Americans, and passed many other beneficial measures. I visited nearby high schools and watched teachers presenting uncritically material on Reconstruction in textbooks written during the pre-Civil Rights era. Then I understood. My students had simply learned what they had been taught. This taught me that history had been deployed as a weapon against my students. To some extent it still is. Therefore teachers need to give students weapons to use in self-defense. Perhaps the best of these is historiography. Put most simply, “historiography” means the study of history. When was this history written? Who wrote it? Who didn’t write it? Is it based on credible sources? Reconstruction offers a fine way to introduce students to historiography. Teachers can visit used bookstores, which sell old textbooks for as little as 50¢. Many published before 1923 are also available on the web. Different editions of the same book offer a particularly effective demonstration of the importance of historiography. The 1966 edition of The American Pageant , for example, not yet influenced by the Civil Rights Movement, took largely negative views of blacks and of Reconstruction: “The ill-prepared colored voter, duped by Radicals, had allegedly done so poorly that the [white] South found further justification for denying him the ballot.”
Fortunately the same book, exactly 40 years later, emphasized accomplishments: “The radical legislatures passed much desirable legislation and introduced many badly needed reforms. For the first time in Southern history, steps were taken toward establishing adequate public schools. Tax systems were streamlined; public works were launched.” Students cannot conclude that both editions are accurate — they are just too different. In fact, white violence, not black ignorance, was the key problem during Reconstruction. The figures are astounding. In Louisiana in the summer and fall of 1868, white Democrats — then the party of white supremacy — killed 1,081 African American and white Republicans. In one judicial district in North Carolina, a Republican judge counted 700 beatings and 12 murders of his party members. Moreover, violence was only the most visible component of a broader pattern of white resistance to black progress. Students will find these facts and many others in Eric Foner’s Reconstruction . Comparing textbooks against facts then primes them to think about how and why authors might go so far astray between about 1890 and 1965, and why they finally improved after about 1970.
Essential Reading
- Loewen, “Five Myths About Reconstruction,” Washington Post , 1/25/2016, washingtonpost.com/opinions/five-myths-about-reconstruction/2016/01/21/0719b324-bfc5-11e5-83d4-42e3bceea902_story.html , shows how distorted views of Reconstruction affect race relations today.
All essays in the Correct(ed) series: Introducing the Series Essay 2: How to Teach Slavery Essay 3: How to Teach Secession Essay 4: Teaching about the Confederacy and Race Relations Essay 5: Confederate Public History Essay 6: Reconstruction Essay 7: Getting History Right Can Decrease Racism Toward Mexican Americans Essay 8: Problematic Words about Native Americans Essay 9: How and When Did the First People Get Here? Essay 10: The Pantheon of Explorers Essay 11: Columbus Day Essay 12: How Thanksgiving Helps Keep Us Ethnocentric Essay 13: American Indians as Mascots Essay 14: How to Teach the Nadir of Race Relations Essay 15: Teaching the Civil Rights Movement Essay 16: Getting Students Thinking about the Future
Home — Essay Samples — Life — Reconstruction
Reconstruction Essays
Reconstruction essay topics and outline examples, essay title 1: the reconstruction era: a complex period of american history.
Thesis Statement: The Reconstruction era in the United States, following the Civil War, was marked by both progress and setbacks in the quest for civil rights, and this essay examines the multifaceted challenges, achievements, and lasting impact of this critical period.
- Introduction
- The Aftermath of the Civil War and the Need for Reconstruction
- The Freedmen's Bureau and Early Efforts at Civil Rights
- Challenges and Setbacks: Opposition and Violence
- Legacies of Reconstruction: Constitutional Amendments and Beyond
Essay Title 2: Reconstructing the South: Political, Economic, and Social Transformations
Thesis Statement: The Reconstruction era initiated significant political, economic, and social changes in the South, impacting the lives of both African Americans and white Southerners, and this essay explores the transformations that reshaped the region.
- The Emergence of New Southern Governments
- Economic Reconstruction: Land Redistribution and Labor Changes
- Social Reforms and Challenges to White Supremacy
- The Rise of the "New South" and the End of Reconstruction
Essay Title 3: The Legacy of Reconstruction: Its Impact on Civil Rights and Racial Relations
Thesis Statement: The Reconstruction era left a lasting legacy that continues to shape civil rights and racial relations in the United States today, and this essay explores how the struggles and achievements of this period continue to resonate in modern society.
- The Rise of Jim Crow Laws and Segregation
- The Civil Rights Movement: A Continuation of Reconstruction's Goals
- Legal and Social Battles for Equality
- Reflections on the Unfinished Business of Reconstruction
Prompt Examples for Reconstruction Essays
Goals and objectives.
Examine the goals and objectives of the Reconstruction era following the American Civil War. What were the main aims of Reconstruction, and how were they pursued?
The Freedmen's Experience
Discuss the experiences of newly freed African Americans during Reconstruction. How did they seek to secure their rights, and what challenges did they face in the post-war South?
Reconstruction Amendments
Analyze the significance and impact of the 13th, 14th, and 15th Amendments to the U.S. Constitution during Reconstruction. How did these amendments attempt to address issues of slavery, citizenship, and voting rights?
Political and Social Changes
Examine the political and social changes that occurred in the South during Reconstruction. How did the region transform politically, economically, and socially, and what were the consequences of these changes?
Reconstruction Success or Failure
Assess whether Reconstruction can be considered a success or failure. What were the achievements and shortcomings of the era, and how did they shape the course of American history?
Legacy of Reconstruction
Discuss the lasting legacy of Reconstruction in American history. How have the events and policies of this era continued to influence the nation's politics, race relations, and civil rights movements?
Reconstruction's Failure: Political and Economic Factors
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The Failures of The Reconstruction Era
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History of Facial Reconstruction
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North Or South: Who Killed Reconstruction
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Reconstruction Essay
The essay below was a very strong essay answering the question about Reconstruction. It was an actual essay (word for word) written by one of the students in class. It received 28.5 points out of 30. This was a great essay; about the only comment I would write was that the thesis in the introduction could have been a little more direct:
As a country, America has gone though many political changes throughout her lifetime. Leaders have come and gone, all of them having different objectives and plans for the future. As history takes its course, though, most all of these “revolutionary movements” come to an end. One such movement was Reconstruction. Reconstruction was a time period in America consisting of many leaders, goals and accomplishments. Though, like all things in life, it did come to an end, the resulting outcome has been labeled both a success and a failure.
When Reconstruction began in 1865, a broken America had just finished fighting the Civil War. In all respects, Reconstruction was mainly just that. It was a time period of “putting back the pieces”, as people say. It was the point where America attempted to become a full running country once more. This, though, was not an easy task. The memory of massive death was still in the front of everyone’s mind, hardening into resentment and sometimes even hatred. The south was virtually non-existent politically or economically, and searching desperately for a way back in. Along with these things, now living amongst the population were almost four million former slaves, who had no idea how to make a living on their own. They had been freed by the 13th amendment in 1865, and in the future became a great concern to many political leaders. Still, it was no secret that something had to be done. So, as usually happens, political leaders appeared on the stage, each holding their own plan of Reconstruction, each certain their ideas were the correct ones. One of the first people who came up with a blueprint for Reconstruction was the president at the time, Abraham Lincoln. The “Lincoln Plan” was a very open one, stating that after certain criteria were met a confederate state could return to the union. To rejoin, a state had to have ten percent of voters both accept the emancipation of slaves and swear loyalty to the union. Also, those high ranking officers of the state could not hold office or carry out voting rights unless the president said so.
Well, sadly enough, Honest Abe was assassinated at Fords Theatre on April 14th, 1865, before he could put his plan to the test. After his death, several other political leaders emerged with plans in hand. These men were of the Republican Party, and they called themselves Radicals. The Radical Republicans that came out to play after Lincoln ’s death had two main objectives to their cause. First, they were mad at the south, blaming them for the Civil War that had just ended. Ergo, they wanted to punish them and make them pay. Secondly, they wanted to help all of the near four million slaves who were now free men after the war. They felt these “men” needed protection, and it was their job to do so. There were three main Radical Republican leaders. These men were Thaddeus Stevens, Charles Sumner, and the formally inaugurated president Andrew Johnson. Thaddeus Stevens was a very political man, holding a place in the House of Representatives. His main concern was the economic opportunity for slaves. He wanted them to be able to make a living on their own, and not depend on the “white man” as they had done all their lives. Thinking almost on these same lines was Charles Sumner. He was a senator who fought mainly for political rights for African Americans, as well as for their citizenship. He felt that the “all men are created equal” part of the constitution really should hold up for everybody. Well, for men that is. Finally there was President Andrew Johnson. Probably due to the fact that he had been Lincoln ’s vice president, Johnson had in mind a Reconstruction plan that almost mirrored the former presidents. Many of the Radicals did not approve of Johnson’s plan, though. They felt he went over the limit with 13,000 pardons, and that he wasn’t paying enough attention to the major issue, the rights of slaves. In 1868 Andrew Johnson was impeached. All though he was not removed from office at this time, he was basically without authority.
It was at this point that Congress really stepped in with their own plan of Reconstruction. The Reconstruction Act finally passed by congress had two main points to it. First, troops were required to move in and take up residence in the confederate states of the south. Secondly, any state that wanted back into the union was only allowed to do so when and if they changed their 14th amendment. They had to agree that all men born in the U.S. were citizens, and that because of that they were guaranteed equal treatment by the law. Later, in 1870, black men were also granted the vote…but this would come later.
Now, the Reconstruction Act looked really good on paper, but as usually happens in politics somebody rocked the boat. The shake up took place in the 1876 presidential election. The two men running were Democrat Samuel Tilden, and Republican Rutherford B. Hayes. Due to the closeness of the race, a group of men called a “commission” was set up in order to figure out an outcome. In the end, the result was the Compromise of 1877. In this compromise, Hayes was declared the winner, and this was agreed on by both parties. The real kicker was the other stipulation, though. The military occupation of the southern states was put to an end. No big deal, right? WRONG! Without military force to back them up, the freed slaves living down there were without safety. There was nothing to keep the southerners from taking advantage of the freed men, and this is exactly what they did. Knowing that they couldn’t directly disobey the law, many southerners set up their own laws, or black codes, that put hard restrictions on African Americans. So, even though protection laws were in place, they did little good with nobody to enforce them. At this point Reconstruction ended. The laws were in place, and though they didn’t always work, some people felt that was enough, they had done their jobs. It’s hard to say for sure whether or not Reconstruction was a success or a failure. Since the time it began people have been debating that question.
Personally, I believe it is a toss-up. I think that though it wasn’t a total success, it was at least a step in the right direction. Granted, laws that were set up weren’t followed strictly. Still, at least laws were being created to protect African American rights. I mean, they were now formally known as citizens, and were given the right to vote. Though not a huge leap, it was a major step. If that doesn’t convince you, think of it this way. Without Reconstruction and the 14th and 15th amendments, another group may have never got the courage to fight for their rights. This group is women. Many suffrage leaders would later look at this point in African American history as a hopeful sign that they, too, might someday be recognized. So, was Reconstruction a success? Yes. It was a success with exceptions.
Reconstruction
Text of douglass's essay.
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Featured in The Atlantic Monthly , Volume 18, Number 110, pages 761–765. (December 1866).
THE assembling of the Second Session of the Thirty-ninth Congress may very properly be made the occasion of a few earnest words on the already much-worn topic of reconstruction.
Seldom has any legislative body been the subject of a solicitude more intense, or of aspirations more sincere and ardent. There are the best of reasons for this profound interest. Questions of vast moment, left undecided by the last session of Congress, must be manfully grappled with by this. No political skirmishing will avail. The occasion demands statesmanship.
Whether the tremendous war so heroically fought and so victoriously ended shall pass into history a miserable failure, barren of permanent results,—a scandalous and shocking waste of blood and treasure,—a strife for empire, as Earl Russell characterized it, of no value to liberty or civilization,—an attempt to re-establish a Union by force, which must be the merest mockery of a Union,—an effort to bring under Federal authority States into which no loyal man from the North may safely enter, and to bring men into the national councils who deliberate with daggers and vote with revolvers, and who do not even conceal their deadly hate of the country that conquered them; or whether, on the other hand, we shall, as the rightful reward of victory over treason, have a solid nation, entirely delivered from all contradictions and social antagonisms, based upon loyalty, liberty, and equality, must be determined one way or the other by the present session of Congress. The last session really did nothing which can be considered final as to these questions. The Civil Rights Bill and the Freedmen's Bureau Bill and the proposed constitutional amendments, with the amendment already adopted and recognized as the law of the land, do not reach the difficulty, and cannot, unless the whole structure of the government is changed from a government by States to something like a despotic central government, with power to control even the municipal regulations of States, and to make them conform to its own despotic will. While there remains such an idea as the right of each State to control its own local affairs,—an idea, by the way, more deeply rooted in the minds of men of all sections of the country than perhaps any one other political idea,—no general assertion of human rights can be of any practical value. To change the character of the government at this point is neither possible nor desirable. All that is necessary to be done is to make the government consistent with itself, and render the rights of the States compatible with the sacred rights of human nature.
The arm of the Federal government is long, but it is far too short to protect the rights of individuals in the interior of distant States. They must have the power to protect themselves, or they will go unprotected, spite of all the laws the Federal government can put upon the national statute-book.
Slavery, like all other great systems of wrong, founded in the depths of human selfishness, and existing for ages, has not neglected its own conservation. It has steadily exerted an influence upon all around it favorable to its own continuance. And to-day it is so strong that it could exist, not only without law, but even against law. Custom, manners, morals, religion, are all on its side everywhere in the South; and when you add the ignorance and servility of the ex-slave to the intelligence and accustomed authority of the master, you have the conditions, not out of which slavery will again grow, but under which it is impossible for the Federal government to wholly destroy it, unless the Federal government be armed with despotic power, to blot out State authority, and to station a Federal officer at every cross-road. This, of course, cannot be done, and ought not even if it could. The true way and the easiest way is to make our government entirely consistent with itself, and give to every loyal citizen the elective franchise,—a right and power which will be ever present, and will form a wall of fire for his protection.
One of the invaluable compensations of the late Rebellion is the highly instructive disclosure it made of the true source of danger to republican government. Whatever may be tolerated in monarchical and despotic governments, no republic is safe that tolerates a privileged class, or denies to any of its citizens equal rights and equal means to maintain them. What was theory before the war has been made fact by the war.
There is cause to be thankful even for rebellion. It is an impressive teacher, though a stern and terrible one. In both characters it has come to us, and it was perhaps needed in both. It is an instructor never a day before its time, for it comes only when all other means of progress and enlightenment have failed. Whether the oppressed and despairing bondman, no longer able to repress his deep yearnings for manhood, or the tyrant, in his pride and impatience, takes the initiative, and strikes the blow for a firmer hold and a longer lease of oppression, the result is the same,—society is instructed, or may be.
Such are the limitations of the common mind, and so thoroughly engrossing are the cares of common life, that only the few among men can discern through the glitter and dazzle of present prosperity the dark outlines of approaching disasters, even though they may have come up to our very gates, and are already within striking distance. The yawning seam and corroded bolt conceal their defects from the mariner until the storm calls all hands to the pumps. Prophets, indeed, were abundant before the war; but who cares for prophets while their predictions remain unfulfilled, and the calamities of which they tell are masked behind a blinding blaze of national prosperity?
It is asked, said Henry Clay, on a memorable occasion, Will slavery never come to an end? That question, said he, was asked fifty years ago, and it has been answered by fifty years of unprecedented prosperity. Spite of the eloquence of the earnest Abolitionists,—poured out against slavery during thirty years,—even they must confess, that, in all the probabilities of the case, that system of barbarism would have continued its horrors far beyond the limits of the nineteenth century but for the Rebellion, and perhaps only have disappeared at last in a fiery conflict, even more fierce and bloody than that which has now been suppressed.
It is no disparagement to truth, that it can only prevail where reason prevails. War begins where reason ends. The thing worse than rebellion is the thing that causes rebellion. What that thing is, we have been taught to our cost. It remains now to be seen whether we have the needed courage to have that cause entirely removed from the Republic. At any rate, to this grand work of national regeneration and entire purification Congress must now address itself, with full purpose that the work shall this time be thoroughly done. The deadly upas, root and branch, leaf and fibre, body and sap, must be utterly destroyed. The country is evidently not in a condition to listen patiently to pleas for postponement, however plausible, nor will it permit the responsibility to be shifted to other shoulders. Authority and power are here commensurate with the duty imposed. There are no cloud-flung shadows to obscure the way. Truth shines with brighter light and intenser heat at every moment, and a country torn and rent and bleeding implores relief from its distress and agony.
If time was at first needed, Congress has now had time. All the requisite materials from which to form an intelligent judgment are now before it. Whether its members look at the origin, the progress, the termination of the war, or at the mockery of a peace now existing, they will find only one unbroken chain of argument in favor of a radical policy of reconstruction. For the omissions of the last session, some excuses may be allowed. A treacherous President stood in the way; and it can be easily seen how reluctant good men might be to admit an apostasy which involved so much of baseness and ingratitude. It was natural that they should seek to save him by bending to him even when he leaned to the side of error. But all is changed now. Congress knows now that it must go on without his aid, and even against his machinations. The advantage of the present session over the last is immense. Where that investigated, this has the facts. Where that walked by faith, this may walk by sight. Where that halted, this must go forward, and where that failed, this must succeed, giving the country whole measures where that gave us half-measures, merely as a means of saving the elections in a few doubtful districts. That Congress saw what was right, but distrusted the enlightenment of the loyal masses; but what was forborne in distrust of the people must now be done with a full knowledge that the people expect and require it. The members go to Washington fresh from the inspiring presence of the people. In every considerable public meeting, and in almost every conceivable way, whether at court-house, school-house, or cross-roads, in doors and out, the subject has been discussed, and the people have emphatically pronounced in favor of a radical policy. Listening to the doctrines of expediency and compromise with pity, impatience, and disgust, they have everywhere broken into demonstrations of the wildest enthusiasm when a brave word has been spoken in favor of equal rights and impartial suffrage. Radicalism, so far from being odious, is now the popular passport to power. The men most bitterly charged with it go to Congress with the largest majorities, while the timid and doubtful are sent by lean majorities, or else left at home. The strange controversy between the President and Congress, at one time so threatening, is disposed of by the people. The high reconstructive powers which he so confidently, ostentatiously, and haughtily claimed, have been disallowed, denounced, and utterly repudiated; while those claimed by Congress have been confirmed.
Of the spirit and magnitude of the canvass nothing need be said. The appeal was to the people, and the verdict was worthy of the tribunal. Upon an occasion of his own selection, with the advice and approval of his astute Secretary, soon after the members of Congress had returned to their constituents, the President quitted the executive mansion, sandwiched himself between two recognized heroes,—men whom the whole country delighted to honor,—and, with all the advantage which such company could give him, stumped the country from the Atlantic to the Mississippi, advocating everywhere his policy as against that of Congress. It was a strange sight, and perhaps the most disgraceful exhibition ever made by any President; but, as no evil is entirely unmixed, good has come of this, as from many others. Ambitious, unscrupulous, energetic, indefatigable, voluble, and plausible,—a political gladiator, ready for a "set-to" in any crowd,—he is beaten in his own chosen field, and stands to-day before the country as a convicted usurper, a political criminal, guilty of a bold and persistent attempt to possess himself of the legislative powers solemnly secured to Congress by the Constitution. No vindication could be more complete, no condemnation could be more absolute and humiliating. Unless reopened by the sword, as recklessly threatened in some circles, this question is now closed for all time.
Without attempting to settle here the metaphysical and somewhat theological question (about which so much has already been said and written), whether once in the Union means always in the Union,—agreeably to the formula, Once in grace always in grace,—it is obvious to common sense that the rebellious States stand to-day, in point of law, precisely where they stood when, exhausted, beaten, conquered, they fell powerless at the feet of Federal authority. Their State governments were overthrown, and the lives and property of the leaders of the Rebellion were forfeited. In reconstructing the institutions of these shattered and overthrown States, Congress should begin with a clean slate, and make clean work of it. Let there be no hesitation. It would be a cowardly deference to a defeated and treacherous President, if any account were made of the illegitimate, one-sided, sham governments hurried into existence for a malign purpose in the absence of Congress. These pretended governments, which were never submitted to the people, and from participation in which four millions of the loyal people were excluded by Presidential order, should now be treated according to their true character, as shams and impositions, and supplanted by true and legitimate governments, in the formation of which loyal men, black and white, shall participate.
It is not, however, within the scope of this paper to point out the precise steps to be taken, and the means to be employed. The people are less concerned about these than the grand end to be attained. They demand such a reconstruction as shall put an end to the present anarchical state of things in the late rebellious States,—where frightful murders and wholesale massacres are perpetrated in the very presence of Federal soldiers. This horrible business they require shall cease. They want a reconstruction such as will protect loyal men, black and white, in their persons and property; such a one as will cause Northern industry, Northern capital, and Northern civilization to flow into the South, and make a man from New England as much at home in Carolina as elsewhere in the Republic. No Chinese wall can now be tolerated. The South must be opened to the light of law and liberty, and this session of Congress is relied upon to accomplish this important work.
The plain, common-sense way of doing this work, as intimated at the beginning, is simply to establish in the South one law, one government, one administration of justice, one condition to the exercise of the elective franchise, for men of all races and colors alike. This great measure is sought as earnestly by loyal white men as by loyal blacks, and is needed alike by both. Let sound political prescience but take the place of an unreasoning prejudice, and this will be done.
Men denounce the negro for his prominence in this discussion; but it is no fault of his that in peace as in war, that in conquering Rebel armies as in reconstructing the rebellious States, the right of the negro is the true solution of our national troubles. The stern logic of events, which goes directly to the point, disdaining all concern for the color or features of men, has determined the interests of the country as identical with and inseparable from those of the negro.
The policy that emancipated and armed the negro—now seen to have been wise and proper by the dullest—was not certainly more sternly demanded than is now the policy of enfranchisement. If with the negro was success in war, and without him failure, so in peace it will be found that the nation must fall or flourish with the negro.
Fortunately, the Constitution of the United States knows no distinction between citizens on account of color. Neither does it know any difference between a citizen of a State and a citizen of the United States. Citizenship evidently includes all the rights of citizens, whether State or national. If the Constitution knows none, it is clearly no part of the duty of a Republican Congress now to institute one. The mistake of the last session was the attempt to do this very thing, by a renunciation of its power to secure political rights to any class of citizens, with the obvious purpose to allow the rebellious States to disfranchise, if they should see fit, their colored citizens. This unfortunate blunder must now be retrieved, and the emasculated citizenship given to the negro supplanted by that contemplated in the Constitution of the United States, which declares that the citizens of each State shall enjoy all the rights and immunities of citizens of the several States,—so that a legal voter in any State shall be a legal voter in all the States.
In the final sentence of his essay, Frederick Douglass reiterates his two primary political desires: to encourage the primacy of the federal government over disparate state governments and to enfranchise all American citizens, African-American or white, Northern or Southern. Douglass’s method of crafting a conclusion which seamlessly combines and highlights his two main points serves as an example of effective rhetoric.
To “disfranchise” is to “disenfranchise,” which means to deprive someone of the right to vote. The disenfranchisement of African Americans by Southerners was one of the most significant challenges to the advancement of civil rights in the wake of the war.
Here Douglass again tackles the issue of states’ rights. In trying to grant citizenship to former slaves in the wake of the Emancipation Proclamation, Congress encountered the problem of whether the definition of citizenship could alter from state to state. Douglass proposes that citizenship should not be thus alterable, that an American citizen in one state ought to be an American citizen in all states, maintaining all the rights and privileges of a citizen. The Fourteenth Amendment of 1868 clarified this point but did not eradicate resistance among the Southern states.
Douglass is correct to indicate that in 1866 the Constitution did not delineate citizens according to race. Despite this fact, Congress was compelled to pass the Fourteenth Amendment in 1868 , a measure which clarified the citizenship of all Americans, regardless of race.
The policy that Frederick Douglass refers to here is the Emancipation Proclamation , issued in 1863 by Abraham Lincoln. Douglass’s point is that just as the Emancipation Proclamation was met first with resistance and later with acceptance, so will the controversial cause of African American suffrage eventually be viewed as a clear and necessary advancement.
Douglass suggests here that what is best for the country is what is best for African Americans, and vice versa. His point is that African Americans represent neither a nuisance nor a specialized group in discussions of Reconstruction. Rather, all Americans are genuinely seeking the same goals and the process of Reconstruction ought to be approached from such an angle.
Douglass is calling for two developments here. First, he wants a centralized federal government guiding the South, rather than scattered, inconsistent state legislatures. Second, he wants enfranchisement for those of all races, including African Americans. While the changes he proposes would take many decades to come about, Congress soon passed the laws he calls for here in the form of the Fourteenth and Fifteenth Amendments.
In this metaphor, Douglass reveals his broader vision for the United States in the wake of the Civil War. The Great Wall of China stretches along the western Chinese border and was built and maintained over millennia to keep Mongolian tribes out. Douglass views a similar, though metaphorical, wall dividing the North and South of the United States, with the South—in the mode of medieval China—resisting the North’s laws and values. Thus, along with Reconstruction, Douglass is calling for “the light of law and liberty” to flow into the South. Ultimately, Douglass is calling for national unity.
According to the values of Northerners, progressive for their time, the ideal constituency would have been all male citizens, “black and white.” The cause of women’s suffrage had already begun, however, and would advance for the next half century, eventually culminating in the passing of the Nineteenth Amendment in 1920. Frederick Douglass was an active figure in the women’s rights movement, which was centered in New England. In fact, there was a great deal of overlap between abolitionists and women’s rights activists.
Here Douglass refers to President Johnson’s initiation of the new “pretended” state governments without holding democratic elections. The Southern states held conventions to draft new constitutions and vote for new officials. African Americans—the “four millions” Douglass mentions—were excluded from these conventions, per Johnson’s orders. It was during these conventions, which largely consisted of ex-Confederate white men, that the brutal “Black Codes” were passed.
Douglass recommends a fate for the new state governments of the South: “begin with a clean slate, and make clean work of it.” As President Johnson instated of a new set of Southern governors and legislative bodies, Congress watched in bafflement and fury. Douglass’s suggestion to Congress is to wipe the slate clean of Johnson’s questionable choices, and start over in the reinstitution of the Southern state governments.
The phrase “Once in grace, always in grace” refers to the Christian notion of eternal security , which originated in the writings of St. Augustine in the 5th century. Eternal security suggests that those who are faithful to God will always remain so, despite any sinful acts along the way. Frederick Douglass offers this Augustinian formula as context for the status of the Southern states, who have sinned in their rebellion. Douglass nods to the ongoing debates over whether the South may redeem itself, though he does not throw his own voice in.
The “strange controversy” Douglass refers to is the rift between President Johnson and Congress. Johnson first turned from Congress when enacting a series of Reconstruction measures. Congress reacted by rejecting the new batch of Southern congressmen and passing a series of civil rights-oriented laws without Johnson’s approval.
An “apostasy” is an abandonment of faith. In this case, Douglass is suggesting that those who wish to see the advancement of civil rights might experience despair in the wake of President Johnson’s brash, retrogressive actions.
Douglass refers to President Andrew Johnson as “a treacherous President” for several reasons. Johnson undertook the process of Reconstruction by shutting out the opinions of Congress and effectively resurrecting the former governing bodies of the South. Johnson handpicked new governors for the Southern states and gave each state the opportunity to gather a whites-only convention and draft a new state constitution. These actions infuriated Congress and Douglass alike.
Here Douglass appeals to Congress to push for responsible Reconstruction at a faster rate. Douglass takes a no-excuses approach, stating that Congress has had enough time to enact the proper changes. Douglass’s idea of enough time is one year, for this essay was published one year after the end of the war. Ultimately, it would take five years for Congress to pass the entire body of civil rights legislation Douglass calls for.
Diction choices such as “anarchical,” “frightful murders,” and “wholesale massacres” serve as a pathos appeal, or an appeal to the emotions of his audience. Douglass uses this language to bring home the dangers present in the “late rebellious States” to his readers and emphasize the need for consistent federal policies to protect the people from such violence.
Douglass refers to President Johnson as a “convicted usurper” because of Johnson’s actions immediately after the end of the Civil War. A “usurper” is someone who seizes power or authority without appropriate cause. While Johnson was Lincoln’s vice president, Douglass calls him a usurper because of Johnson’s immediate actions after Lincoln’s assassination, which he performed without consulting Congress. Douglass likely states that Johnson is “convicted” of these crimes because Congress took measures into their own hands to protect the freed African Americans by passing legislation and overriding Johnson’s veto for the Civil Rights Act of 1866.
In the pursuit of women’s rights, Douglass was a strong supporter. The first American women’s rights convention, known as the Seneca Falls Convention, was held in June of 1848. Douglass was the only African American present, and he eloquently argued for women’s suffrage, signing a key document in women’s suffrage— Elizabeth Cady Stanton’s Declaration of Sentiments .
The noun “suffrage” has had varied meanings over time, but from the 18th century on, it has referred to exercising one’s right to vote. For Douglass, “impartial suffrage” is akin to full enfranchisement of all American citizens. Douglass was not only an advocate for African-American suffrage, he also was a vocal proponent of women’s suffrage in the 19th century, supporting the efforts of Elizabeth Cady Stanton, Susan B. Anthony, and other women’s rights activists.
Douglass employs a rhetorical strategy in this passage to make an appeal to his audience. By claiming that people from all walks of life have expressed favor for a radical policy, Douglass not only illustrates that his argument has broad support but also connects with the public, showing that their concerns are his concerns.
The upas, Antiaris toxicaria , is a tree known for the deadly poisons it produces. Douglass uses the upas as a metaphor for the systemic problems at the heart of the United States, namely slavery and inequality. Just as one must uproot and destroy the upas in its entirety, so must the United States eradicate the remaining sources of inequality.
Henry Clay was a famous politician from Kentucky who served as a senator, representative, and secretary of state. Known for his remarkable ability to forge compromises between clashing interests, he was instrumental in limiting the spread of Southern slavery in the decade before the Civil War. Despite his Kentucky background, he brought to Washington a staunch anti-slavery stance.
The word “bond” literally refers to a restraint, or something which binds. So, a “bondman” refers to someone kept in bondage, such as a serf or a slave, but it also has historically referred to peasants or those in service to a superior. Douglass contrasts the bondman with the tyrant to appeal to a broad audience by claiming that regardless of status, rebellion can happen when reason fails.
Here Douglass discusses how social and political problems build up below the level of public awareness. Such a trend is particularly true in a time of prosperity and bustling busyness, as was the case in the United States—particularly the North—during the mid-19th century. The problem Douglass targets is that of class inequality, a deep disease of which Southern rebellion was a mere symptom. Only a clear crisis can alert the public to structural ills. Douglass illustrates this phenomenon with the metaphor of the broken bilge pump that goes unnoticed until a storm strikes and its disrepair becomes lamentably clear.
In this passage, Douglass is presaging the Fourteenth Amendment , which would be passed two years later, in 1868. The Fourteenth Amendment, one of the most important pieces of legislation of the Reconstruction era, definitively granted full citizenship to all natural-born Americans, regardless of race or former enslavement. As with many of the changes Douglass calls for in this essay, the proper laws were passed swiftly but the deeper sources of racism continued to linger long after.
Douglass expresses his desire for the full enfranchisement of African Americans, a change that would come about four years later with the passing of the Fifteenth Amendment in 1870. Douglass would go on to champion the cause of African-American suffrage for the rest of his life. Even after the passing of the Fifteenth Amendment, many white Southerners have endeavored, often effectively, to block African Americans from voting.
The noun “franchise” means “freedom,” or access to privileges and rights granted by a governing body. When Douglass expresses a desire to “give to every loyal citizen the elective franchise,” he means the power to vote, as full enfranchisement—having the same rights as whites—was not yet a reality for African Americans during Reconstruction.
Douglass’s use of an accessible metaphor allows him to appeal to a wider audience. Here, the “arm of the Federal government” refers to the influence it has in enforcing laws. On a connotative level, “arm” calls to mind “arms,” which also suggests that Douglass includes the military power of the Federal government in this claim. This brings up a practical perspective: enforcing the laws through Federal troops is costly, expensive, and cannot reach the rights of all individuals.
Douglass uses the adjective “despotic” in several locations in this text. The word itself refers to the nature of a despot, or a tyrant that possesses absolute power. His use of this word helps to clarify that while he favors a strong federal government, he is against a government that abuses its power and oppresses its citizenry.
Douglass takes a nuanced view of federal governance. He supports a centralized federal government and favors consistency across the nation. However, he knows that there is a limit to how much power a government ought to wield. The problem of protecting freedmen highlights the challenge of striking such a balance. To enforce new federal laws protecting freedmen, there would need to be a “Federal officer at every cross-road.” Such a solution is not only unrealistic but also suffocating to a democratic body—in Douglass’s words, it is “despotic.”
Congress established the Bureau for the Relief of Freedmen and Refugees, known as the Freedmen’s Bureau Bill , shortly before the Civil War. Since Lincoln and others knew that the Emancipation Proclamation could only temporarily serve until a constitutional amendment was instituted, the bureau helped support the newly freed slaves by providing food, opportunities to lease land, and negotiating labor contracts.
Congress passed the Civil Rights Act of 1866 in response to the Black Codes that the former Confederate States had established. These codes essentially recreated most aspects of slavery, implementing discriminatory laws to keep African Americans subjugated by barring them from owning land or meeting after dark. Police had the power to arrest unemployed African Americans and force them to work for the white men who bailed them out.
Douglass confronts the immense challenges of dismantling the tradition of Southern slavery. He understands that new laws alone cannot obliterate the underlying attitudes, prejudices, and values that accompany the institution of slavery. Douglass notes that, despite emancipation, slavery “could exist… even against law.” This is correct; indentured servitude continued in the South for decades after the Emancipation Proclamation, often backed up by insidious “Black Codes.”
Douglass constructed the preceding part of this paragraph in a set of conditional “whether” clauses. This allows him to ask rhetorical questions without actually asking them, allowing his audience to understand them as issues needing resolution. This serves as an appeal to his audience by allowing them to interpret his conditions and sympathize with his point. With this line, he claims that despite the actions of Congress in 1865 and the majority of 1866, the central, lasting answers to how to approach Reconstruction need to be addressed.
Douglass employs the metaphors to “deliberate with daggers” and “vote with revolvers” to emphasize the danger and disloyalty of incorporating Confederate politicians into the US government. Both daggers and revolvers are weapons, so saying politicians deliberate and vote with them suggests that no constructive debate is possible. Douglass is likely referring to the former Confederates whom Congress refused to seat in December 1865.
Douglass takes a realistic stance here. Regarding the fates of the recently freed slaves in the South, referred to at the time as “freedmen,” Douglass claims that they must defend themselves. Despite the “long arm” of the federal government, the South remains a hostile territory for African Americans. Newly inked laws cannot quickly erase a deep tradition of racism.
This paragraph displays Douglass’s distaste for states’ rights. In his view, the best government is a strong, centralized federal government. One of the primary sources of division between the North and the South—both before and after the war—was their differing visions of governance. The North favored a powerful federal government, the South strong state governments and minimal federal supervision. President Johnson’s first moves towards Reconstruction aligned with the Southern ideal. Douglass thinks this scattered, state-by-state model of government is a disaster, hampering attempts at nationwide progress.
Douglass claims that “statesmanship” is needed; that is, he believes that the work of Reconstruction requires a skillful, diplomatic approach. Since he makes this claim, he suggests that thus far Reconstruction has not been handled appropriately by those in authority. This claim sets the foundation for his argument by providing the necessary context, identifying the main problem, and offering a proposal for action.
Douglass’s use of “solicitude” here is notable due to varying definitions of the word. In one sense, it refers to a state of unease, disquietude, anxiety, care, or concern. In another, it is similar to “solicitation” and means something similar to “petition.” Douglass’s choice of diction here appears to take both into account: Congress had been subject to unease and concern as well as the petitions of citizens to deal with Reconstruction following the Civil War.
At the time of Frederick Douglass’s writing, Congress was in the middle of passing a series of laws intended to assist the African-American population, both in the North and the South. The Civil Rights Bill granted full citizenship to African Americans; the Freedmen’s Bureau Bill established organizations to assist former slaves in the South; the constitutional amendments—the Thirteenth and Fourteenth—abolished slavery and granted African Americans equal protection under the law. Douglass supports all of these measures but emphasizes that laws alone are not enough to bring proper change to the South, still under the spell of centuries of deeply-ingrained racism.
The 39th Congress met from March 4, 1865, to March 4, 1867. By December of 1866, Congress had enacted the Freedmen’s Bureau Bill and the Civil Rights Act of 1866 in response to President Johnson’s personal Reconstruction policy. He calls the topic of Reconstruction “much-worn” due to the constant debate, opposing policies, and general anxiety around reintegrating the rebel states into the Union. Because of this, he uses the gathering of the second session of Congress as an occasion to call for specific action on Reconstruction, which he outlines shortly.
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Intro Essay: The Lost Promise of Reconstruction
To what extent did founding principles of liberty, equality, and justice become a reality for african americans from reconstruction to the end of the nineteenth century.
- I can explain how the Reconstruction Amendments and federal laws sought to protect the rights of African Americans after the Civil War.
- I can identify examples of Jim Crow laws and explain how these laws undermined the rights of African Americans.
- I can explain how violence and intimidation were used to threaten African Americans from exercising their political and civil rights.
- I can analyze Reconstruction’s effectiveness in ensuring the faithful application of Founding principles of liberty, equality, and justice to African Americans.
- I can explain the various ways that African American leaders and intellectuals supported their communities and worked to end segregation and racism.
Essential Vocabulary
| A system of slavery in which enslaved men, women, and children were actual property and could be bought, sold, traded, or inherited. | |
| The constitutional amendment that abolished slavery and involuntary servitude in the United States. | |
| The period of reuniting and rebuilding the country after the Civil War. Priorities included restoring the former Confederate states to the Union and establishing the status of the formerly enslaved as well as free Blacks. | |
| The constitutional amendment that granted national citizenship and equal rights to African Americans and enslaved people who had been emancipated. | |
| A government bureau established to assist African Americans during the aftermath of the Civil War by providing them with food, housing, education, and medical aid. | |
| Laws that restricted the rights of African Americans. | |
| A white supremacist paramilitary group that formed during Reconstruction to oppose Black equality. | |
| The constitutional amendment that banned states from denying males the right to vote because of race or color. | |
| A type of law passed in southern states that allowed citizens to vote only if their grandfathers were able to vote prior to the Civil War. The purpose was to prevent African Americans from voting through measures like poll taxes and literacy tests while not affecting poor and uneducated whites. | |
| A tax individuals needed to pay before voting. | |
| The practice of forcing someone to work for another in order to pay off debts. | |
| State and local laws that enforced racial segregation in the southern United States. | |
| A form of extrajudicial violence by which a mob kills an individual, usually by hanging. |
The Lost Promise of Reconstruction and Rise of Jim Crow, 1860-1896
After more than two centuries, race-based chattel slavery was abolished during the Civil War. The long struggle for emancipation finally ended thanks to constitutional reform and the joint efforts of Black and white Americans fighting for Black freedom. The next 30 years, however, were a constant struggle to preserve the freedom achieved through emancipation and to ensure for Blacks the equality and justice of U.S. citizens in the face of opposition, violence, and various forms of discrimination.
The Civil War created conditions for the demise of slavery. Early in the war, Congress passed two Confiscation Acts that allowed the federal government to seize and later free enslaved persons in conquered Confederate territory. On January 1, 1863, President Abraham Lincoln used his wartime executive powers to issue the Emancipation Proclamation. Enslaved persons ran away from their owners and joined free Blacks enlisting in the Union Army to fight for freedom and human equality. The 54th Massachusetts Regiment was the most famous Black unit to fight in the war, but almost 200,000 Black soldiers fought for the Union. Black abolitionists joined the cause, with Harriet Tubman joining Union raids that helped liberate enslaved persons and Frederick Douglass recruiting Black troops. By the end of 1865, the requisite number of states had ratified the Thirteenth Amendment to confirm the end of slavery.
Slavery may have been banned, but Black Americans faced an uncertain future during the process of restoring the Union, called Reconstruction . The Civil Rights Act of 1866 protected basic rights of citizenship, and the Fourteenth Amendment (1868) provided for Black U.S. citizenship and equal protection under the law. Congress established the Freedmen’s Bureau as a federal agency in order to give practical help to freed people in the form of immediate aid and economic and educational opportunities. The efforts of the Freedmen’s Bureau to grant Blacks confiscated land and open Black schools in the South were frustrated by President Andrew Johnson’s vetoes of the Bureau bill and by the opposition of white supremacists.
Storming Fort Wagner by Kurz & Allison, 1890
This print shows soldiers of the 54th Massachusetts Regiment attacking the walls of Fort Wagner on Morris Island, South Carolina. The Massachusetts 54th was one of the first African American Union regiments formed in the Civil War. The regiment fought valiantly during the attack on Fort Wagner while suffering nearly 40 percent casualties. The bravery and sacrifice of the 54th became one of the most famous and inspirational parts of the Civil War.
Johnson succeeded Lincoln, and while he supported the restoration of the national union, he impeded the protection of equal rights for Black Americans. He vetoed numerous laws intended to promote Black equality, including the Civil Rights Act of 1866, the extension of the Freedmen’s Bureau, the Reconstruction Acts, and the Tenure of Office Act, among several others. While Congress overrode most of his vetoes, Johnson proved himself a consistent opponent of Black rights. In his third annual message in December 1867, he asserted, “Negroes have shown less capacity for government than any other race of people. No independent government of any form has ever been successful in their hands.” When he fired Secretary of War Edwin Stanton for resisting his policies, Congress impeached President Johnson, but the vote to remove him from office failed by one vote.
Initial protections for Blacks were also weakened by restrictions and opposition to equal civil rights. The new constitutions of former Confederate states did not protect Black citizenship or suffrage. Indeed, the states passed Black Codes that severely curtailed the legal and economic rights of Black citizens. Moreover, the codes penalized Blacks unfairly for committing the same crimes as whites.
The Union As It Was by Thomas Nast, 1874
Klan violence was documented in the press. “The Union as It Was,” an 1874 Harper’s Weekly cartoon by Thomas Nast, shows a Klan member and a White League member shaking hands over an African American family huddled together in fear. A schoolhouse burns and a man is lynched in the background.
Black Americans were also the victims of horrific violence perpetrated by white mobs and local authorities. White supremacists killed thousands of Blacks to intimidate them, prevent them from voting, and stop them from exercising their rights. The Ku Klux Klan and other groups such as the White League were organized to terrorize Blacks and keep them in a constant state of fear. The Colfax Massacre of 1873 and mass killings in places like Memphis and New Orleans were only a few examples of the wave of violence Black Americans suffered. Black and white leaders wrote to state and national officials about the violence in their communities. Congress, with the support of President Ulysses S. Grant, passed several acts aimed at protecting freed people from politically motivated violence. Such enforcement legislation was quickly challenged in the courts, and the withdrawal of all federal troops from the South in 1876 effectively ended federal intervention on behalf of the rights of freed people.
The first Black senator and representatives – in the 41st and 42nd Congress of the United States by Currier and Ives, 1872
This 1872 lithograph by Currier and Ives depicts several of the African American men who served in Congress.
Left to right: Senator Hiram Revels (MS), Representatives Benjamin Turner (AL), Robert DeLarge (SC), Josiah Walls (FL), Jefferson Long (GA), Joseph Rainey (SC), and Robert Elliott (SC).
In 1870, the passage of the Fifteenth Amendment protected the right of Black male suffrage when it banned states from denying voting rights on the basis of “race, color, or previous condition of servitude.” Despite violence and intimidation, Blacks exercised their right to vote and served in local offices, state legislatures, and Congress. During Reconstruction, 14 African Americans served in the House of Representatives and 2 in the Senate. Nine of these leaders had been born enslaved. Local governments, however, increasingly found ways to subvert the exercise of the constitutional right to vote. Grandfather clauses , poll taxes , and literacy tests were applied to prevent Blacks from voting.
Many southern Blacks were farmers who lived under the crushing economic burdens of the sharecropping system, which forced them into a state of peonage in which they had little control over their economic destinies. In this system, white landowners rented land, tools, seed, livestock, and housing to laborers in exchange for a significant portion of the crop. As a result, Blacks barely earned a living and suffered perpetual debt that limited their economic prospects for the future.
In the later decades of the nineteenth century, Blacks also lived under confining social constraints that effectively made them second-class citizens. Segregation laws legally separated the races in public facilities, including trains, schools, churches, and hotels. These “ Jim Crow ” laws humiliated Blacks with a public badge of inferiority. Black members of Congress Robert B. Elliott and James T. Rapier made eloquent speeches in support of legislation to protect African Americans’ civil rights. Congress passed a Civil Rights Act in 1875 that protected equal access to public facilities, but the Supreme Court declared it unconstitutional in the Civil Rights Cases (1883), arguing that while states could not engage in discriminatory actions, the law incorrectly tried to regulate private acts. Frederick Douglass called the decision an “utter and flagrant disregard of the objects and intentions of the National legislature by which it was enacted, and of the rights plainly secured by the Constitution.” In 1896, however, the Court ruled in Plessy v. Ferguson that segregation laws were constitutional if local and state governments provided Blacks with “separate but equal” facilities. Separate was never equal, particularly in the eyes of Black Americans.
Watch this BRI Homework Help video for a review of the Plessy v. Ferguson case.
Blacks endured escalating violence in the Jim Crow era of the 1890s. White mobs of the time lynched more than 100 Blacks a year. Lynching was summary execution by angry mobs in which the victim was tortured and killed and the body mutilated. Ida B. Wells was a courageous Black journalist who cataloged the horrors of almost 250 lynchings in two pamphlets, A Red Record: Lynchings in the United States and Southern Horrors: Lynch Law in All Its Phases . Despite her efforts, lynching of Black Americans continued into the twentieth century.
The shackle broken by the genius of freedom by E. Sachse & Co., 1874
This 1874 lithograph, “The shackle broken by the genius of freedom,” memorialized Congressional representative Robert B. Elliott’s famous speech in favor of the 1875 Civil Rights Act. Elliott is shown in the center of the image, while the banner at the top contains a quotation from his speech: “What you give to one class you must give to all. What you deny to one you deny to all.”
Black leaders and intellectuals like Wells, Douglass, Booker T. Washington, and W. E. B. Du Bois advocated for education as the means to achieve advancement and equality. Black newspapers and citizens’ groups supported their communities and fought back against segregation and racism. Though their strategies differed, their goal was the same: a fuller realization of the Founding principles of equality and justice for all.
W. E. B. Du Bois summed up the Black experience after the Civil War when he stated, “The slave went free, stood a brief moment in the sun; and then moved back again toward slavery.” Du Bois points to the fact that whatever constitutional amendments were intended to protect the natural and civil rights of Blacks, and however determined Blacks were to fight to preserve those rights, they struggled to overcome the numerous legal, political, economic, and social obstacles that white supremacists erected to keep them in a subordinate position. Slavery had distorted republicanism and American ideals before the Civil War, and segregation continued to undermine republican government and equal rights after the conflict had ended.
Black leaders such as Ida B. Wells, Frederick Douglass, Booker T. Washington, and W. E. B. Du Bois worked for Black rights in a variety of ways.
Reading Comprehension Questions
- How did the Reconstruction Amendments and federal laws protect the natural and civil rights of African Americans during the Civil War and Reconstruction?
- Despite constitutional and legal protections, how were Blacks’ constitutional rights restricted during Reconstruction?
- Reflecting on Reconstruction, W. E. B. Du Bois stated: “The slave went free, stood a brief moment in the sun; and then moved back again toward slavery.” In what ways do you think this conclusion was accurate? In what ways might have Du Bois been wrong?
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Reconstruction Essay | Essay on Reconstruction Essay for Students and Children in English
February 13, 2024 by Prasanna
Reconstruction Essay: America has gone through several political changes to d ate with various leaders that have come and gone. Each of these leaders had different objectives and plans for the future. There were a number of revolutionary movements that eventually came to an end. Reconstruction was one such movement.
Reconstruction was a time period in American history which consisted of many leaders, goals and accomplishments. The Reconstruction era lasted from around 1868 to 1877. Even though like all other things in life, the Reconstruction era came to an end, the outcome of the era has been labelled as both success and failure.
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Long and Short Essays on Reconstruction Essay for Students and Kids in English
We are providing students with essay samples on a long essay of 500 words and a short essay of 150 words on the topic Reconstruction for reference.
Long Essay on Reconstruction Essay 500 Words in English
Long Essay on Reconstruction Essay is usually given to classes 7, 8, 9, and 10.
A period in American history, the Reconstruction era lasted from 1863 to1877. The era was followed by the American Civil War (1861 – 1865) and proved to be a significant chapter in the history of American civil rights. When the Reconstruction era began, a broken America had just finished fighting the civil war.
As people say, Reconstruction was a period of putting back the pieces. At this point, America attempted at becoming a full running country once more. However, this was not an easy task; everyone’s mind was still traumatized by the memory of massive death which hardened into resentment and sometimes even hatred.
Preceding the Civil Wars, the South’s infrastructure and industry was practically left into ruins. It was practically non-existent politically and economically, desperately searching for a way back in.
Along with this, there were almost 4 million former salves that had become a part of the population and had no clue about how to make a living on their own. The 13th Amendment in 1865 had freed them, and they became a great concern to many political leaders in the future.
Political leaders each came with their plan of Reconstruction, and each was certain that their plan was the correct one. President at the time, Abraham Lincoln, was one of the first people to come up with a blueprint for Reconstruction. The ‘Lincoln Plan’ was open to people that stated that once certain criteria were met, a confederate state could return to the Union.
The Reconstruction era also was an attempt at transforming the 11 Southern former Confederate states – as the Congress directed – and the role of the Union States in the transformation.
There were three visions of the Civil War memory that appeared during the Reconstruction. The reconciliations vision – rooted in coping with the death and devastation that the war had brought. The White Supremacist vision – that included racial segregation and the preservations of White cultural and political domination in the South. Finally, the emancipationist vision – that sought full citizenship, freedom, male suffrage and Constitutional equality for African Americans.
Reconstruction began and ended at different times in different states. The federal Reconstruction ended in 1877 with the Compromise.
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The Reconstruction encompassed three major initiatives, the transformation of the southern society, restoration of the Union, enactment of progressive legislation that will be favouring the rights of the slaves that were freed.
The Reconstructions end is often spoken off its psychological terms as a failure of the Republican political will, or as a collapse of the white American’s nerve; when the sheer truth is that Reconstruction did not fail so much as it was thrown over.
The most obvious role in the overthrow of the Reconstruction was of the Southern Whites. Still, their success wouldn’t have been a success without the consent of the Northern Democrats – who were never in favour of an even-handed Reconstruction, much less a conventional one. The Reconstruction Era was a success but still had its drawbacks and exceptions.
Short Essay on Reconstruction Essay 150 Words in English
Short Essay on Reconstruction Essay is usually given to classes 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, and 6.
The Reconstructions Era took place from 1868 to 1877. Before the Civil war, the infrastructure and industry of the South were virtually left in ruins. It had to rely on the government that they had tried to stray away from as they were in dire need of help.
The Reconstruction Era can be evaluated as both success and failure of the ideals. This is chiefly because of the laws and bills that were passed as well as the backs of the steps that were encountered in the process.
When the eleven ex-Confederate states were restored to the Union, the Reconstruction Acts and the Radical Republicans that were passed during that time are examples of accomplishments that were made during the time.
The belief in White supremacy, the Black Codes and the corruption in business and government, are among the many failures that took place during the Reconstruction. Reconstruction was overall a period of greed, corruption and discrimination.
10 Lines on Reconstruction Essay in English
1. President Andrew Johnson granted many Confederate leaders a pardon. 2. The South was divided into five military districts that were run by the army after the Reconstruction Act of 1867. 3. White Southerners that joined the Republican Party and helped the Reconstruction were called Scalawags. 4. The national debate over the Reconstruction began during the American Civil War. 5. The first comprehensive program was announced by then American President Abraham Lincoln – The Ten Percent Plan. 6. Abraham Lincoln was assassinated in April 1865. 7. All the former Confederate states by the year 1870 had been readmitted to the Union with nearly all being controlled by the Republican Party. 8. African Americans in every state formed the overwhelming majority of Southern Republican voters. 9. During the Reconstruction, sixteen African Americans served in Congress. 10. President Andrew Johnson offered the greatest resistance to Reconstruction.
FAQ’s on Reconstruction Essay
Question 1. Who opposed the Reconstruction?
Answer: Radical Republicans opposed Lincoln’s Reconstruction plan as the plan did not ensure equal civil rights for the freed slaves.
Question 2. How did South Carolina change during Reconstruction?
Answer: South Carolina underwent Reconstruction from 1865 to 1877. The Civilian Government was shut down by Congress in 1867, put the army to charge, the freed slaves were given the vote and ex-Confederates were prevented from holding office.
Question 3. What was Andrew Johnson’s Reconstruction plan?
Answer: The plan was implemented in 1865 that gave the South white a free hand in regulating the transition from slavery to freedom, and no political roles were offered to the black of the South.
Question 4. What were the results of Reconstruction?
Answer: The “Reconstruction Amendments” that were passed by Congress between the years 1865 to 1870 helped in abolishing slavery, black Americans were given equal protection under the law, and the black men were granted suffrage.
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Reconstruction History: Success or Failure? Essay
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What were some of the plans for Reconstruction created during the war?
The Emancipation Proclamation signed in 1863 signified that the end of the war would produce some far-reaching consequences (Foner 12). During the war, the first comprehensive Reconstruction plan was introduced by the end of 1863.
The initial plan did not yet include racial equality before the law and black suffrage but was merely intended to end the war. The Proclamation of Amnesty and Reconstruction presupposed the restoration of all rights to those Southerners who swore to accept the abolition, with the exception of some high-ranking officers. The abolishment of slavery was a necessary requirement although the states were allowed to introduce some temporary measures regarding blacks as a “laboring, landless and serving class.” Apart from that, the so-called Ten Percent Plan aimed to establish loyal local governments in the South, if at least ten percent of voters pledged allegiance to the North (Foner 27).
What was the definition of African American freedom early on in Reconstruction?
In the early days of Reconstruction, the notion of freedom encompassed several definitions. Freedom was, of course, the absence of slavery, but it also extended far beyond that. To the African Americans, freedom also meant the end of injustice and access to the same rights that the white people enjoyed. Fundamentally, these definitions had one underlying theme – the independence from the control exercised by the white people. This independence included both individual and community autonomy, as black institutions – namely, churches and schools – were also freed from the white supervision (Foner 46).
What were some of the desires for Reconstruction after the war ended (include both Andrew Johnson, the Radical Republicans, and others)?
The stances are taken by different stakeholders largely depended on their background, ideologies, and interests. Thus, Andrew Johnson, even though he embraced emancipation, did, however, resent the expansion of political and civil freedoms of the African Americans and wanted to curtail it (Foner 90). After the end of the war, the Radical Republicans desired to ensure, above all, equality before the law and loyal Unionists’ control over the Southern governments (Foner 39). Southerners, on the other hand, intended to resist the pressure that the government put on them and wanted to retain their political autonomy to the extent possible (Foner 92).
What were the main issues dealt with in the Reconstruction Acts of 1867? Who won this initial battle?
The Reconstruction Acts of 1867 presupposed the division of the South into five military districts, all headed by a general. Apart from that, the Southern states were required to draft a new constitution and ratify the Fourteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution (Foner 125). Essentially, these measures were intended to help introduce black suffrage into American society. Despite President Johnson’s attempt to veto the bill, it was nevertheless passed by Congress. Thus, one can say that the Radical Republicans won this initial battle to have the bill passed, even if Democrats managed to disenfranchise the African American population through consecutive legislation (Foner 126).
How did Southern politicians, law enforcement, economic leaders, and others ignore or circumvent the rights conferred on African Americans?
Upholding the rights conferred on African Americans presented a major challenge. The law enforcement agencies and officers excluded the blacks from the jury, punished them with severe penalties, and obstructed justice through a variety of other methods (Foner 184). Legislators and economic leaders, even though they could not overtly disenfranchise the black population, we’re looking for more creative ways to strip them of their voting rights. One of the most common practices was the introduction of a poll tax and, in some states, certain residency and registration requirements, that effectively disenfranchised the majority of the black population (Foner 185).
While these groups at least tried to pretend that their actions were not aiming to harm the states’ African American population, the Ku Klux Klan simply engaged in lynching and other violent practices (Foner 186). Essentially, individual freedoms and even the lives of the black population were still endangered in the South.
What does Foner mean by “The Reconstruction of the North”?
Clearly, the North did not have to undergo such dramatic changes as were taking place in the South. However, Foner considers the industrial, economic, and social transformation that the North went through to be part of Reconstruction. The North experienced the rise and consolidation of the capitalist economy. The manufacturing sector was quickly expanding, and new infrastructure was put in place to facilitate mining, lumbering, and other production activities. The social structure also underwent some changes: “wage-earners” replaced the independent craftsmen, the number of white-collar workers went up, and a new power elite of industrialists and railroad entrepreneurs had emerged. Ultimately, the North’s formerly agriculture and the artisanship-centered economy was replaced by the new industrial one (Foner 201).
Was Reconstruction successful? If so, why? If not, why not?
While some historians see Reconstruction as both success and failure, Foner takes an unequivocal stance that Reconstruction was not at all successful. He cites several reasons in support of his opinion – economic and political, as well as social. The main flaw of Reconstruction was that it ultimately failed to improve the living conditions for the blacks (Foner 233). Moreover, Foner considers Reconstruction to be a failure because it was based, to a significant degree, on intimidation and violence. Finally, Reconstruction did little to improve the economic conditions in the South, ultimately leaving it in poverty and even backwardness.
Who “won” Reconstruction?
Strictly speaking, it is difficult to say that one side won Reconstruction as it was not a conflict in the word’s traditional sense. Nevertheless, given Foner’s analysis, two conclusions can be drawn. Insofar as the Southerners managed to hinder Reconstruction, effectively disenfranchise and intimidate the blacks, regardless of the measures imposed by the North, one can say that the South won Reconstruction. It is, perhaps, even more, accurate to say that the North lost it as they failed to design a policy response that would further the cause of equality in the country. While the North managed to industrialize successfully, the country remained vulnerable to deep social and economic cleavages as the differences between the two parts of the country became even more apparent.
What is Foner’s thesis about Reconstruction? Basically, what is he arguing in his book?
The main argument put forward by Foner, as well as his primary conclusion, is that Reconstruction should be regarded as a failure (Foner 256). This failure was precipitated by several political, social, and economic factors. Unfavorable conditions such as the depression of the 1870s and a global decrease in demand for cotton limited the opportunities for economic change. Southern politics largely remained dominated by a racist agenda, and factionalism and corruption undermined the new governments’ legitimacy. Perhaps, worst of all, the anti-black violence prevalent in the South undermined the prospects for equality and free labor. Foner believes that the failure of Reconstruction significantly slowed down the development of American society, although he acknowledges that such a claim lies in the domain of speculations rather than facts (257).
List what Foner highlights as the most important themes of this era
Foner lists five most important themes of the Reconstruction era: first, it is the “centrality of the black experience” meaning that the blacks were among the makers of Reconstruction, and not merely its passive victims (9). The second theme is the drastic political and social changes that the Southern states went through, even if with some local variations. Next is the evolution of the public attitudes and opinions regarding race and the connection between race and class in the postbellum South. The fourth theme is the emergence of a national state with new and extended powers and principles, such as the commitment to national citizenship. The last theme concerns the changes in the “economy and class structure” of the North, as well as their influence on the process of Reconstruction (Foner 9).
Do you believe what Foner argues? Does he prove his thesis?
I think that, overall, Foner makes good use of historical evidence to illustrate his point and support his thesis. His analysis is thorough and comprehensive, and he presents some compelling arguments in favor of his claim. However, I believe that he makes a mistake common for many revisionists in that he considers the events of Reconstruction in the light of our contemporary reality as opposed to in view of their historical context. Surely, it is evident to us these days that the American society had a long way ahead of it to achieve racial equality – and, to some extent, we cannot even say we have fully achieved it today. It appears to me that his analysis is still built on the “what-if” premise, even though he admits that such an approach can produce nothing but speculation.
What were some of the more surprising elements of Foner’s book to you? What did you learn from the book?
Two elements of Foner’s analysis stood out to me. First of all, I believe I was not aware of the extent to which President Andrew Jackson opposed the advancement of civil rights and liberties of the African American community. Even though I was aware of him vetoing the Reconstruction Acts of 1867, it was Foner’s insights that helped me fully understand the role that he played in hindering the progress of improving racial equality and justice. Secondly, I enjoyed Foner’s approach to analyzing the role of black people in Reconstruction. Usually, analysis of the period tends to adopt a white-centered approach that leaves the African Americans to be passive recipients rather than active agents of change.
What would YOUR thesis be for this era? Write a thesis statement of at least three sentences that presents your argument for the era
The Reconstruction era was a failure in political, social, and economic terms as it created new political cleavages, failed to advance racial justice and equality in the country, and left it deeply divided as the South resented the North’s interventionist approach. Nevertheless, the significance of the period is twofold: first of all, Reconstruction de jure unified the country and ended a military conflict on its territory. Secondly, the period facilitated the formation of a common black identity and growth of cultural self-awareness that, in turn, helped the community life through the segregation era and contributed to the birth of the Civil Rights Movement in the 1960s.
List what you believe to be the most important themes of the era
For the most part, I agree with the themes outlined by Foner in his book. I would like, however, to add two more themes to the analysis. The first theme would be that of unification: after all, Reconstruction managed to keep the Northern and Southern states together, even if not under the most favorable circumstances. Perhaps, if the Southern states succeeded to establish a new state, racial inequality and injustice would persist in this new country much longer than it actually did. I would also put more emphasis on the formation and solidification of the black community and racial identity. I believe that the common identity, together with the strengthened institutions of school and church, helped the black community retain its strength throughout the Jim Crow and segregation era.
Works Cited
Foner, Eric. A Short History of Reconstruction. 1st ed. 1990. New York, New York: Harper Perennial. Print.
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IvyPanda. (2020, July 8). Reconstruction History: Success or Failure? https://ivypanda.com/essays/reconstruction-history-success-or-failure/
"Reconstruction History: Success or Failure?" IvyPanda , 8 July 2020, ivypanda.com/essays/reconstruction-history-success-or-failure/.
IvyPanda . (2020) 'Reconstruction History: Success or Failure'. 8 July.
IvyPanda . 2020. "Reconstruction History: Success or Failure?" July 8, 2020. https://ivypanda.com/essays/reconstruction-history-success-or-failure/.
1. IvyPanda . "Reconstruction History: Success or Failure?" July 8, 2020. https://ivypanda.com/essays/reconstruction-history-success-or-failure/.
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Reconstruction Essay Examples
We have 46 free papers on reconstruction for you, essay examples, essay topics, the reconstruction era essay (705 words).
Reconstruction
The Civil War was one of the bloodiest wars in American history. Its damage to America was profound. It tore at the very fiber of America itself. The Reconstruction Era Essay however was as damaging to America as the Civil War itself. Its damage has its roots in the reasons America went to civil war….
Reconstruction: Success or Failure? Essay
February 25, 2004 U.S. History Period 4 After the Civil War the United States was at a difficult point in its history. There were many controversial issues that were yet to be resolved, and many people with a number of different opinions on how things should be settled. Due to this, the nation was forced…
The Effects of Reconstruction Essay
The affects of the Civil War, and the actions that led to the war were very detrimental to the United States. The nation was not in good shape, and was all divided up. President Abraham Lincoln saw this division, and wanted to reconstruct the nation, by restoring national unity. Reconstruction did not only restore national…
The Reconstruction Era: A High Price for Freedom
The Reconstruction-era offered numerous opportunities to African-Americans, by attempting to secure the rights for ex-slaves, but the opportunities presented even more obstacles to them. The thought of freedom intrigued the African-Americans at first, but many of them quickly changed their minds after experiencing it. Henry William Ravenel, a slaveowner, proclaimed, “When they were told they…
Differing Views On Reconstruction Essay
By 1866, several distinct positions on Reconstruction emerged. These were divided into three opposing camps: Conservatives (democrats), Moderates, and Radicals. The Conservatives believed the South should be readmitted into the Union as soon as possible, but the Radicals and Moderates believed there should be consequences for succeeding. The question of what those consequences should be…
The Triumphant Reconstruction Essay
Of the many trials and tribulations that occurred during reconstruction we arefaced with determining whether it was a success or a failure. Many good things and badthings happened as a result of reconstruction. . Although some setbacks and tragedies didhappen as with any project of this size would. The entire effort overall was successful. Although…
Reconstruction period Essay (203 words)
Victoria Hubble February 8, 2000 Reconstruction The Reconstruction, a time most people would call a rebirth, succeeded in few of the goals that it had set out to achieve within the 12 years it was in progress. It was the reconstruction’s failure in its objectives, that brought forth the inevitable success in changing the South,…
The Era of Reconstruction Essay
The Era of Reconstruction following the Civil War was a period marked by an intense struggle to restore a worn-out and devastated society. The war, which was aimed at confronting the national problem of slavery, only led to subsequent dilemmas over emancipation and an undefined condition of freedom. Some had naively believed that ending slavery…
After the Reconstruction years, blacks and whites Essay
often rode together in the same railway cars, ate in the same restaurants, used the same public facilities, but did not often interact as equals. The emergence of large black communities in urban areas and of significant black labor force in factories presented a new challenge to white Southerners. They could not control these new…
The Reconstruction Essay (619 words)
The Reconstruction held out the promise to rectify racial injustices in America. The Reconstruction, rising out of the Civil War had as its goals equality for blacks in voting, politics, and use of public services. Even though movement, was born of high hopes it failed in bringing about their goals. Born in hope, they died…
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information
| Key events | Freedmen’s Bureau, Assassination of Abraham Lincoln, Formation of the KKK, Reconstruction Acts, Impeachment of Andrew Johnson, Enforcement Acts, Reconstruction Amendments, Compromise of 1877 |
|---|---|
| Location | United States, Southern United States |
| President(s) | Abraham Lincoln, Andrew Johnson, Ulysses S. Grant |
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- Impeachment of Johnson. In 1867, the political battle between President Johnson and Congress over southern Reconstruction came to a confrontation.
- The Reconstructed South. The postwar South, where most of the fighting had occurred, faced many challenges. ...
- Reconstruction Ends. In the election of 1868, General Ulysses S. ...
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Reconstruction Era Essay
- Background Information
- Primary vs. Secondary Sources
- Articles and E-books
Chicago Manual of Style, 17th ed.: Author-Date
Citation help & examples, sources from reference databases, u.s. constitution - amendments.
- Evaluate Sources
- Reviews vs. Articles
IMPORTANT! You should always cite your sources following your instructor's requirements! The following information is to help you along, but does not in any way take priority over how your teacher wants your sources cited.
In-Text Citations = Parenthetical Citations
When using the author-date references system, you signal that you've used a source by placing a parenthetical citation (in-text citation) next to the reference to it in your paper. Include the author's last name, year, and relevant page numbers.
- Example: (Davis 2023, 150)
- No page numbers: (Davis 2023)
- No author; Use the first four words of the title: (Answering the Difficult Questions 2023, 150)
- No author, no page numbers: (Answering the Difficult Questions 2023)
List all sources in a References list at the end of your paper in alphabetical order with a hanging indent. This list should include every source you cited in a parenthetical citation within your paper.
Single space each entry with one double-space between each.
- Sample Paper with Instructions (Author-Date) from Purdue OWL
- Turabian Tip Sheet: Reference List Example from ChicagoManualofStyle.org
- Citing Your Sources: Chicago: Author-Date (17th) from Williams College Library
- Chicago Format & Citation Style: Author-Date, 17th Edition from University of West Florida Libraries
- Class Handout - Sept. 11, 2023 from PCC Library
Basic pieces of information needed:
Author: Davis, Angela.
Year of Publication: 2023.
Title of the Essay: “Answering the Difficult Questions.”
Title of the Book: In The Encyclopedia of Library Wisdom ,
Editor: edited by Shannon Zarnesky and Wynn Whittington,
Page numbers of the essay, end with a period: 154-55.
Edition only if it is not the first edition: 2nd ed.
Place of Publication: Greenville:
Publisher: Bulldog Press.
Title of Database: Credo Reference .
Putting all the pieces together:
Davis, Angela. 2023. “Answering the Difficult Questions.” In The Encyclopedia of Library Wisdom , edited by Shannon Zarnesky and Wynn Whittington, 154-55. 2nd ed. Greenville: Bulldog Press. Credo Reference .
The US Constitution should only be cited in parenthetical (in-text) citations within the text of your paper. In many cases, you can just include the identifying information within the text itself.
In-text Citation:
(US Constitution, amend. 14, sec. 2)
Or, if you mention it within the text, you do not need an in-text citation:
Section 3 of the Fourteenth Amendment of the US Constitution states that...
- 14th Amendment Note that there are sections within the text that you can use to more clearly show where you found your information.
Basic Templates
Creator Last name, First name. Year. Title (or Untitled). Medium. Museum Name, Location. URL or Database Name.
Graphic Arts, Ads, Maps, Cartoons:
Creator Last name, First name. Year. "Title of Cartoon." Title of Periodical/Newspaper/Magazine . URL or Database Name .
Image from a Published Source (Book)
Citation Copied from U.S. History: Gale in Context
"Political cartoon illustrating the intimidation tactics used by southern Democrats after the Civil..." In Encyclopedia of the Supreme Court of the United States, edited by David S. Tanenhaus. Vol. 3. Detroit, MI: Macmillan Reference USA, 2008. Gale In Context: U.S. History (accessed September 10, 2023). https://link-gale-com.libpro.pittcc.edu/apps/doc/PC3241287137/UHIC?u=pittcc&sid=bookmark-UHIC&xid=29920ec8 .
Corrected Citation:
“Political Cartoon Illustrating the Intimidation Tactics Used by Southern Democrats After the Civil...” 1876. In Encyclopedia of the Supreme Court of the United States , edited by David S. Tanenhaus. Vol. 3. Detroit, MI: Macmillan Reference USA, 2008. Gale in Context: U.S. History .
(Political Cartoon Illustrating the Intimidation 1876)
(Political Cartoon...Intimidation Tactics 1876)
Image from an Online Collection
Basic Template:
Photographer/Artist/Creator Last Name, First Name. Year. Title (or Untitled) . Medium. Institution Name, Location. URL.
In-Text Citation:
(Photographer Last Name Year)
Reference List Citation:
Smith, William Morris. 1863-66. [District of Columbia. Company E, 4th U.S. Colored Infantry, at Fort Lincoln] . Digital file from original negative. Library of Congress Prints and Photographs Division, Washington, D.C. https://www.loc.gov/pictures/item/2018667050/ .
(Smith 1863-66)
Newspaper Article from a Database
Basic Template:
Author Last Name, First Name. Year. “Title of Article.” Title of Newspaper , January 1, 2023. Title of Database .
(Author Last Name Year, Page #)
If a newspaper article is unsigned (does not list an author), the title of the newspaper goes in place of the author.
The Weekly Sentinel (Raleigh, NC) . 1866. “The Radical Reconstruction Plan.” May 8, 1866. Historic North Carolina Digital Newspaper Collection .
(Weekly Sentinel 1866, 3)
NOTE: Page numbers are not listed in the citation, but if you know it, you would put it in the in-text citation.
Includes 3.5 million pages of digitized content from over 1,000 North Carolina county newspapers.
For sources that include a date of publication or revision, use the year of publication in the reference list entry. Repeat the year with the month and day to avoid any confusion. If there is no personal author, start with the page title or site sponsor. If there is no last modified date, use n.d. Only include an access date if no date of publication or revision can be determined.
Author Last name, First name. Last modified Year. "Page Title." Website Title. Last modified Month Day, Year. URL.
Franklin, Harper. 2020. "1860-1869." Fashion History Timeline. Last modified August 18, 2020. https://fashionhistory.fitnyc.edu/1860-1869/.
(Franklin 2020)
Google. 2016. “Privacy Policy.” Privacy & Terms. Last modified March 25, 2016. https://www.google.com/policies/privacy/.
(Google 2016)
Yale University. n.d. “About Yale: Yale Facts.” Accessed May 1, 2017. https://www.yale.edu/about-yale/yale-facts.
(Yale University n.d.)
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Discussion. President Lincoln and later Johnson set the pace for reconstruction 2. Their emphasis by both presidents on a speedy reunion of the country by bringing back the South characterized presidential reconstruction phase. Both presidents' policies were mostly moderate and found little favor among Radical Republicans in congress.
Reconstruction, in U.S. history, the period (1865-77) that followed the American Civil War and during which attempts were made to redress the inequities of slavery and its political, social, and economic legacy and to solve the problems arising from the readmission to the Union of the 11 states that had seceded at or before the outbreak of war. Long portrayed by many historians as a time ...
Essentially, Congress, controlled by a Republican majority, used its legislative powers and control over the federal purse strings in an attempt to impose answers to the "Big Questions of Reconstruction" listed above. The recalcitrance of white Southerners opened Republicans to extending full citizenship to the formerly enslaved.
in. Reconstruction. The End of the War and Reconstruction: As the Civil War stretched into 1864 and 1865, the Confederacy could no longer sufficiently fight the Union. Their armies and resources were dwindling, accelerated by the Union army's trade blockades along the Southeastern seaboard. The consequences of the war were enormous.
Book digitized by Google from the library of Harvard University and uploaded to the Internet Archive by user tpb. "Of the essays included in this volume all but one--that on 'The process of reconstruction'--have been published before during the last eleven years: four in the Political Science Quarterly, one in the Yale Review, and one in the 'Papers of the American Historical Association.'"--Pref
Thirty years after the publication of John Hope Franklin's influential interpretative essay Reconstruction: After the Civil War, ten distinguished scholars have contributed to a new appraisal of Reconstruction scholarship. Recognizing Professor Franklin's major contributions to the study of the Reconstruction era, their work of analysis and review has been dedicated to him.Although most of ...
Get a custom Essay on Reconstruction in the US After the Civil War. Republicans started punitive actions targeted at the Southern states for the war. As Johnson became a president, the Reconstruction altered. Being a Southerner, Johnson rejected Republicans' wish to punish the states.
All essays in the Correct (ed) series: Introducing the Series. Essay 2: How to Teach Slavery. Essay 3: How to Teach Secession. Essay 4: Teaching about the Confederacy and Race Relations. Essay 5: Confederate Public History. Essay 6: Reconstruction. Essay 7: Getting History Right Can Decrease Racism Toward Mexican Americans.
Beginning with 1875, the Reconstruction was retreating when, following the panic of 1873, Democrats won the majority in the House. With the withdrawal of troops from the South in 1877, the era of Reconstruction was ended. The 1877 Compromise made the future of the political rights of the black ended up uncertain to put it mildly.
Reconstruction Essay Topics and Outline Examples Essay Title 1: The Reconstruction Era: A Complex Period of American History. Thesis Statement: The Reconstruction era in the United States, following the Civil War, was marked by both progress and setbacks in the quest for civil rights, and this essay examines the multifaceted challenges, achievements, and lasting impact of this critical period.
The essay below was a very strong essay answering the question about Reconstruction. It was an actual essay (word for word) written by one of the students in class. It received 28.5 points out of 30. This was a great essay; about the only comment I would write was that the thesis in the introduction could have been a little more direct:
Reconstruction was a period of repair after the civil war. Freed African Americans were protected by the government during reconstruction by the Freedmen's Bureau, despite the South's bitterness towards the new changes. Overall, reconstruction was positive because it brought many affirmative. 435 Words.
Text of Douglass's Essay. Featured in The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 18, Number 110, pages 761-765. (December 1866). THE assembling of the Second Session of the Thirty-ninth Congress may very properly be made the occasion of a few earnest words on the already much-worn topic of reconstruction. Seldom has any legislative body been the subject of ...
The Lost Promise of Reconstruction and Rise of Jim Crow, 1860-1896. After more than two centuries, race-based chattel slavery was abolished during the Civil War. The long struggle for emancipation finally ended thanks to constitutional reform and the joint efforts of Black and white Americans fighting for Black freedom.
Long Essay on Reconstruction Essay 500 Words in English. Long Essay on Reconstruction Essay is usually given to classes 7, 8, 9, and 10. A period in American history, the Reconstruction era lasted from 1863 to1877. The era was followed by the American Civil War (1861 - 1865) and proved to be a significant chapter in the history of American ...
Reconstruction Essay Writing: Essence & Tricky Moments. The reconstruction era in the United States history lasted from 1865 till 1877, years after the Civil War. This period is characterized by attempts to readmit eleven southern states that separated from the Union during the war and abolishment of slavery on the whole territory of the country.
In the early days of Reconstruction, the notion of freedom encompassed several definitions. Freedom was, of course, the absence of slavery, but it also extended far beyond that. To the African Americans, freedom also meant the end of injustice and access to the same rights that the white people enjoyed. Fundamentally, these definitions had one ...
The period that followed the Civil War was referred to as Reconstruction Era, with the aim of addressing societal issues posed by the integrating former slaves into the nation once again. These were among those important years that could aid in the resurrection of America following the war, incorporating the ex-confederate states into union and tackling slavery aftermath consequences in the ...
The Reconstruction Essay (619 words) Reconstruction. Words: 619 (3 pages) The Reconstruction held out the promise to rectify racial injustices in America. The Reconstruction, rising out of the Civil War had as its goals equality for blacks in voting, politics, and use of public services. Even though movement, was born of high hopes it failed in ...
Basic pieces of information needed: Author: Davis, Angela. Year of Publication: 2023. Title of the Essay: "Answering the Difficult Questions." Title of the Book: In The Encyclopedia of Library Wisdom, Editor: edited by Shannon Zarnesky and Wynn Whittington, Page numbers of the essay, end with a period: 154-55. Edition only if it is not the first edition: 2nd ed.
The following entry discusses deconstruction theory as a method of critical analysis of philosophical and literary texts. Deconstruction is a literary criticism movement originated by French ...
Richard III. This production at Shakespeare's Globe — a reconstruction of the 16th-century theater where many of the Bard's plays were first performed — has been a talking-point in London ...