THE FREEDMEN'S BUREAU
The U.S. Bureau of Refugees, Freedmen and Abandoned Lands, popularly known as the Freedmen’s Bureau, was established in 1865 by Congress to help former black slaves and poor whites in the South in the aftermath of the U.S. Civil War (1861-65). Some 4 million slaves gained their freedom as a result of the Union victory in the war, which left many communities in ruins and destroyed the South’s plantation-based economy. The Freedmen’s Bureau provided food, housing and medical aid, established schools and offered legal assistance. It also attempted to settle former slaves on Confederate lands confiscated or abandoned during the war.
Military Reconstruction
With the Radical Republicans fully in control of Congress after the mid-term elections of 1866, they quickly passed the Military Reconstruction Acts of 1867. These acts divided the south into five military districts. Each district was placed under military leadership and new elections were held with voting only allowed by Congress' approved voters, which were mostly former slaves. Each state was also required to ratify the 13th and 14th Amendments after drafting new state constitutions. This could only be done after new public officials were elected that had pledged their loyalty to the Union. Most of these were either poor whites or former slaves. This new influx of voters led to the Republican control of a traditionally Democratic south.
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13th, 14th, and 15th Amendments
The Thirteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution officially abolished and continues to prohibit slavery to this day.
The Fourteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution declared that all persons born or naturalized in the United States are American citizens including African Americans. The Fifteenth Amendment 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. |
15th Amendment: Free State of jones
Reconstruction
The Union victory in the Civil War in 1865 may have given some 4 million slaves their freedom, but the process of rebuilding the South during the Reconstruction period (1865-1877) introduced a new set of significant challenges. Under the administration of President Andrew Johnson in 1865 and 1866, new southern state legislatures passed restrictive “black codes” to control the labor and behavior of former slaves and other African Americans. Outrage in the North over these codes eroded support for the approach known as Presidential Reconstruction and led to the triumph of the more radical wing of the Republican Party. During Radical Reconstruction, which began in 1867, newly enfranchised blacks gained a voice in government for the first time in American history, winning election to southern state legislatures and even to the U.S. Congress.
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black codes: free state of jones
jim crow laws
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The segregation and disenfranchisement laws known as "Jim Crow" represented a formal, codified system of racial apartheid that dominated the American South for three quarters of a century beginning in the 1890s. The laws affected almost every aspect of daily life, mandating segregation of schools, parks, libraries, drinking fountains, restrooms, buses, trains, and restaurants. "Whites Only" and "Colored" signs were constant reminders of the enforced racial order.
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the Sharecropping System
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With the southern economy in disarray after the abolition of slavery and the devastation of the Civil War, conflict arose between many white landowners attempting to reestablish a labor force and freed blacks seeking economic independence and autonomy. Many former slaves expected the federal government to give them a certain amount of land as compensation for all the work they had done during the slavery era. Union General William T. Sherman had encouraged this expectation in early 1865 by granting a number of freed men 40 acres each of the abandoned land left in the wake of his army. During Reconstruction, however, the conflict over labor resulted in the sharecropping system, in which black families would rent small plots of land in return for a portion of their crop, to be given to the landowner at the end of each year.
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First African American Senator
On February 25, 1870, visitors in the Senate galleries burst into applause as senator-elect Hiram Revels, a Republican from Mississippi, entered the chamber to take his oath of office. Those present knew that they were witnessing an event of great historical significance. Revels was about to become the first African American to serve in the Senate.
TRANSCONTINENTAL RAILROAD
A railroad linking America's east and west coasts had been a dream almost since the steam locomotive made its first appearance in the early 1830s. The need for such a link was dramatized by the discovery of gold in California in 1848 that brought thousands to the West Coast. At that time only two routes to the West were available: by wagon across the plains or by ship around South America. Traveling either of these could take four months or more to complete.
Construction of the railroad presented a daunting task requiring the laying of over 2000 miles of track that stretched through some the most forbidding landscape on the continent. Tunnels would have to be blasted out of the mountains, rivers bridged and wilderness tamed. Two railroad companies took up the challenge. The Union Pacific began laying track from Omaha to the west while the Central Pacific headed east from Sacramento.
Progress was slow initially, but the pace quickened with the end of the Civil War. Finally the two sets of railroad tracks were joined and the continent united with elaborate ceremony at Promontory, Utah on May 10, 1869. The impact was immediate and dramatic. Travel time between America's east and west coasts was reduced from months to less than a week.
Construction of the railroad presented a daunting task requiring the laying of over 2000 miles of track that stretched through some the most forbidding landscape on the continent. Tunnels would have to be blasted out of the mountains, rivers bridged and wilderness tamed. Two railroad companies took up the challenge. The Union Pacific began laying track from Omaha to the west while the Central Pacific headed east from Sacramento.
Progress was slow initially, but the pace quickened with the end of the Civil War. Finally the two sets of railroad tracks were joined and the continent united with elaborate ceremony at Promontory, Utah on May 10, 1869. The impact was immediate and dramatic. Travel time between America's east and west coasts was reduced from months to less than a week.
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The Joining of a Nation
May 10, 1869 the Union and Central Pacific Railroads joined their rails at Promontory Summit, Utah Territory and forged the destiny of a nation. Golden Spike National Historic Site shares the stories of the people and settings that define the completion of the first Transcontinental Railroad. The First Transcontinental Railroad stretched from the East Coast of the United States to the West Coast. No longer would people travel in long wagon trains that took months to reach California. They could now travel faster, safer, and cheaper by train. In addition to people, things like mail, supplies, and trade goods could now be shipped across the country in just a few days. The railroad was built between 1863 and 1869. |
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dawes act
The General Allotment Act of 1887, known commonly as the Dawes Act, was introduced by Henry Dawes, a Senator from Massachusetts. Simply put, the Act broke up previous land settlements given to Native Americans in the form of reservations and separated them into smaller, separate parcels of land to live on. More importantly, the Act required Natives to live apart from their nations and assimilate into European culture.
Dawes felt that the law, once fully realized, would actually save Native Americans from the alternative, which was their total extermination. However, the Dawes Act may in fact be the gold medal winner of all time when it comes to how often the best intentions result in the worst harm, since, ironically, it just about accomplished what Dawes claimed he was trying to avoid.
Dawes felt that the law, once fully realized, would actually save Native Americans from the alternative, which was their total extermination. However, the Dawes Act may in fact be the gold medal winner of all time when it comes to how often the best intentions result in the worst harm, since, ironically, it just about accomplished what Dawes claimed he was trying to avoid.