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Reconstruction. 1865—1877




12 Reconstruction of the Union held many promises. Black men and women in the South could move to their new home in Florida. Black refugees quickly poured into these lands. By 1865 40 thousand freedmen were living in their new home. But the opposition to the Reconstruction in the South steadily grew. In 1869 the Ku-Klux-Klan added organized violence to the whites' resistance. Despite federal efforts to protect them, black people were intimidated at the polls, robbed of their earnings, beaten, or murdered. By the early 1870s the failure of the Reconstruction was apparent. The Military Reconstruction Act of 1867 called for new governments in the South; it barred from political office those Confederate leaders who were listed in the Fourteenth Amend­ment. But the law required no redistribution of land and guaranteed no basic changes in southern social standards.

13 Terrorism against blacks was widening. Nighttime visits, whippings, beatings, and murder became common. In time, however, the Man's purpose became not only economic (to keep the slaves) but also openly political and social. Klansmen also attacked white Republicans and school teachers who were aiding the freedmen. No one who helped to raise the status of the blacks was safe. Then in 1871 the actions of Ku-Klux-Klan moved Congress to pass two acts directed against the KKK's violence. These acts permitted the use of martial law, but they were unsuccessful in combatting the Man's activities.

14 The Klan's terror frightened many voters and weakened local party organization, but it did not stop Reconstruction. Throughout the South conventions met and drafted new constitutions. New governments were set up, and Republicans won majorities nearly everywhere. But they failed to break down the social structure or the distribution of wealth and of power. Freedmen were exploited during the Recon­struction as well. Without land of their own, they were dependent on white landowners. Then the retreat from Reconstruction began. The rights of black citizens were insecure. Under the new interpretation of the 15th Amendment blacks were actually denied suffrage on the grounds that they lacked education, property or a grandfather who had been qualified to vote before the Reconstruction Act. In 1872 an Amnesty Act was adopted which pardoned the rebels.

15 After 1877 thousands of blacks gathered up their possessions and migrated to Kansas. They were disappointed people who were searching for their share in the American dream.

16 Thus the nation ended over 15 years of bloody civil war without establishing full freedom for black Americans.

(Based on "An Outline of American History"; "Making America";

"A People and A Nation "; "The American Way of Life')

The Thirteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution officially abolished and continues to prohibit slavery and involuntary servitude, except as punishment for a crime. It was passed by the Senate on April 8, 1864, passed by the House on January 31, 1865, and adopted on December 6, 1865. On December 18, Secretary of State William H. Seward, in a proclamation, declared it to have been adopted. It was the first of the Reconstruction Amendments.

President Lincoln was concerned that the Emancipation Proclamation, which outlawed slavery in the ten Confederate states still in rebellion in 1863, would be seen as a temporary war measure, since it was based on his war powers and did not abolish slavery in the border states.

The Fourteenth Amendment (Amendment XIV) to the United States Constitution was adopted on July 9, 1868 as one of the Reconstruction Amendments.

Its Citizenship Clause provides a broad definition of citizenship that overruled the decision in Dred Scott v. Sandford (1857), which held that blacks could not be citizens of the United States.

Its Due Process Clause prohibits state and local governments from depriving persons of life, liberty, or property without certain steps being taken to ensure fairness. This clause has been used to make most of the Bill of Rights applicable to the states, as well as to recognize substantive and procedural rights.

Its Equal Protection Clause requires each state to provide equal protection under the law to all people within its jurisdiction. This clause was the basis for Brown v. Board of Education (1954), the Supreme Court decision which precipitated the dismantling of racial segregation in the United States.

The amendment also includes a number of clauses dealing with the Confederacy and its officials.

The Fifteenth Amendment (Amendment XV) to the United States Constitution prohibits each government in the United States from denying a citizen the right to vote based on that citizen's "race, color, or previous condition of servitude" (i.e., slavery). It was ratified on February 3, 1870.

The Fifteenth Amendment is one of the Reconstruction Amendments.

In United States history, "carpetbaggers" was a pejorative term Southerners gave to Northerners (also referred to as Yankees) who moved to the South during the Reconstruction era, between 1865 and 1877.

The term referred to the observation that these newcomers tended to carry "carpet bags," a common form of luggage at the time (sturdy and made from recycled carpet). It was used as a derogatory term, suggesting opportunism and exploitation by the outsiders. The relocated northerners often formed alliances with freed slaves and southern whites who were Republicans, who were nicknamed scalawags. Together they are said to have politically manipulated and controlled former Confederate states for varying periods for their own financial and power gains. In sum, carpetbaggers were seen as insidious Northern outsiders with questionable objectives meddling in local politics, buying up plantations at fire-sale prices and taking advantage of Southerners. Carpetbagger is not to be confused with copperhead, which is a term given to a person from the North who sympathized with the Southern claim of right to Secession.

The term carpetbaggers was also used to describe the white Northern Republican political appointees who came South, arriving with their travel carpetbags. Southerners considered them ready to loot and plunder the defeated South.

In modern usage in the U.S., the term is sometimes used derisively to refer to a politician who runs for public office in an area where he or she does not have deep community ties, or has lived only for a short time. In the United Kingdom, the term was adopted to refer informally to those who join a mutual organization, such as a building society, in order to force it to demutualize, that is, to convert into a joint stock company, solely for personal financial gain.




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