DBQ: Reconstruction Essay Reconstruction was an era of time after the Civil War to rebuild America. It lasted from 1865-1877. After the Civil War, the nation was still divided over many issues. This period was to reinstate the Southern States after the Civil War. Reconstruction focused on improving tensions between the people and the country. A group called the Radical Republicans were people who believed that the South should be punished for causing the war and taking away their property. They also believed Reconstruction was the best opportunity to give African Americans civil rights under the Constitution. Many rights were denied to African Americans before the Civil War, and Radical Republicans believed they could protect these rights. …show more content…
Along with literacy tests, African Americans had to pay to vote in the form of poll taxes. Poll taxes go in conjunction with the grandfather clause. The grandfather clause says that if people’s grandfathers could vote before 1867, then their descendants could avoid poll taxes or literacy tests. African Americans could not avoid poll taxes or literacy tests because they were not able to vote before 1867. They do not say that these literacy tests or poll taxes are targeted towards African Americans, but it is generally affecting them the most because any white man who was born before 1867 was able to vote without an issue. Document I shows literacy tests from the state of Louisiana and a Texas poll tax receipt. The literacy tests are designed to be confusing and unfair because some questions do not make sense. For example, one of the questions states, “Draw a line around the number or letter of this sentence.” This could mean many things. But, these tests were designed for people, mostly African Americans, to fail. When African Americans are unable to pass literacy tests or pay poll taxes, then they are not able to …show more content…
Newly freed African Americans and whites could be sharecroppers. Document F shows a diagram of sharecropping and how it is similar to being enslaved. At first, African Americans started with land and seed provided for them in exchange for the land owner getting half the crop. After that, the sharecropper buys food, clothing, and necessities on credit from the landowner's store. Throughout the season, the sharecropper plants and harvests the crop. When the sharecropper has reached the end of the crop season, he gives the landowner the crop to sell. The sharecropper will get half of the earnings, subtracting the cost of his purchases made throughout the year. The landowner will then tell the sharecropper he owes more than he has earned. The sharecropper would be in debt, and to pay off that debt, the sharecropper must promise the landowner a greater share of next year’s crop. This was generally forced slavery because African Americans were uneducated and could not argue with landowners or merchants who had cheated them. This made sharecroppers tied to one plantation and had no choice but to work until all their debts were paid
The sharecroppers paid "rent" with a share of the crops that they raised, with roughly one-half of all they produced belonged to the white owner (Ransom and Sutch, 1977). The landowner also advanced money to the farmer to purchase seed and other necessary farming equipment. The problem was the sharecroppers rarely, if ever, made enough money from the sale of their crops to pay back their debt. This often led to what some called "debt peonage," and it effectively bound sharecroppers to the land, and the landowner (Bowles, 2011). This was a veiled form of slavery, much like convict leasing was.
Sharecropping: Sharecropping is when a landowner ‘rents’ out his house or land to freed slaves in return for a share of the crops produced on the land to the landlords.
When the Civil War ended, reconstruction occurred in the nation and the North and South would be trying to find ways to reconnect the sides in a civilized way. The Reconstruction Era was a time period after the Civil War where the states formerly part of the Confederacy joined back into the United States. But in the process of trying to fix the states, the North slowly started to oppose the idea of reconstruction. The North killed reconstruction by not caring about the problems in the South (document c) and their opinion on blacks in the government (document d).
Economic equality was not granted to African Americans. Sharecropping was a process in which a sharecropper would come to a landowner for land and seeds, and in return, the sharecropper would give the landowner half the crops. However, the sharecroppers needed tools so they could use credit to buy those items from the landowner's store. The sharecropper would plant, harvest, and sell their crops, and since they owed a debt they gave their earnings to the landowner to pay off the debt, but the
After they settle, the sharecropper cannot pay his debt to the landowner and the cycle starts over. This shows economic discrimination because African Americans must keep working until the debt is paid which is forced work, so The Sharecropper Cycle of Poverty is a step back to slavery, not to a bright
The concept of sharecropping states that a sharecropper could farm a piece of land and in return, they would have to give the landowner a share of the crop that is produced. In the Black Codes, it stated that “Every person may, arrest and carry back his or her legal employer any freedman…who shall have quit the service of his or her employer before the expiration of his or her term of service without good cause”(Document 7). In many ways, the Mississippi Black Codes were another form of slavery in that it treated African Americans as property and allowed them to be taken back to their landowners. In 1881, Frederick Douglass said that “When you turned us loose, you have us no acres. You turned us loose to the sky… and worst of all, your turned us loose to the wrath of our infuriated masters”(Document 9).
"The rising generation of … blacks needed a period of probation and instruction;" (Doc D). This is saying that they need to learn how to be free before they can be apart of government but really they didn't wont the African Americans to be in government and get
The Reconstruction of the south was to rebuild the infrastructure the economical system of the South and rebuild white and black social system. The Reconstruction of the Confederacy from (1865-1877) was first by Abraham Lincoln until his assassination and then by President Johnson. The textbook stated (Such accounts add another dimension to the usual narrative of the Reconstruction era (1865–1877). The period witnessed the liberal readmission of southern states to the Union as proposed by Lincoln and his successor, Andrew Johnson. But when the readmitted states restricted the rights of former slaves, a furious Republican Congress “reconstructed” the South by empowering former slaves—and their Republican allies.
Reconstruction Era happened after the Civil War ended. Reconstruction addressed how states in the south would regain what the Constitution and be reseated in Congress, the civil status of the former leaders of the Confederacy, and the Constitutional and legal status of freedmen, especially their civil rights and whether they should be given the right to vote. Controversy erupted
With black Americans still working on farms for white people, they still had the limited freedom they had during slavery. “There was a whole year cycle where African Americans had to work on a farm and give all their crops to the landowners.” (Doc. B) Sharecropping was worked the same way slavery was worked, but without the grueling punishments. African Americans are expected to make all different types of crops by the end of the year ready for the landowner.
Social developments after slaves were freed shows the great extent in which former slave’s lives were not all that different after they gained their freedom. Many former slaves had to go back and voluntarily work for a white owner or even purposely enslave themselves again just have some financial support because most blacks had nowhere to go. Those who were fortunate enough to gain some land were often extremely poor and had to work their farm by themselves because they were too poor to afford help or assistance. What commonly brought blacks back into slavery and sometimes even mired whites and blacks into heavy debt was the sharecropping system. Sharecropping is a system of agriculture in which a landowner allows a tenant to use the land in return for a share of the crops produced on the land.
Reconstruction was a time period following the Civil War that lasted from 1865 through 1877. Reconstruction was a challenging task for the United States because the government had to figure out how they would help four million slaves acquire the rights they deserved. This was such a difficult task because the North and South did not have the same views on African American rights. In hope to piece the Union back together Abraham Lincoln devised a plan that would ensure rights to the freedmen, but after Lincoln was assassinated Andrew Johnson was put in charge and had a racist opinion that did not include African Americans becoming equals. Congress’ Reconstruction efforts to ensure equal rights to the freedmen failed because of the activities
During reconstruction, blacks were no longer forced to work as slaves however they still needed to work to support themselves and their families. Not many blacks had skills outside of farming so most worked the lands of the wealthy white landowners but not as slaves. They had the right to do whatever they wanted and the landowners could do nothing about it. Wealthy landowners still needed work hands and blacks needed an income so former slaveholders established the sharecropping system. Land owned by a white person would be farmed by black families and they shared the crop yield. This often resulted in the white person taking more than their share and the black families struggled to support themselves. Sharecropping did little to help economic advancement for blacks and was a way the white man could prevent blacks from making enough money
Reconstruction was the time between 1863 and 1877 when the U.S. focused on abolishing slavery, destroying the Confederacy, and reconstructing the nation and the Constitution and is also the general history of the post-Civil War era in the U.S. between 1865 and 1877. Under Abraham Lincoln, presidential reconstruction began in each state as soon as federal troops controlled most of the state. The usual ending date is 1877, when the Compromise of 1877 saw the collapse of the last Republican state governments in the South
Reconstruction was a period of time after the Civil War (1865-1877) that was supposed to be the rebuilding of America. It was also the process used to readmit all the Confederate states back into the Union. There was controversy, however, on how to go about rebuilding the nation. Abraham Lincoln proposed a lenient plan. After he was assassinated, Andrew Johnson proposed a very similar plan. The Radical Republicans, a group of legislators that were in favor of freedmen’s rights, were opposed to both plans under “Presidential Reconstruction”. They initiated “Congressional Reconstruction”. Because of the conflicting views, there was little cooperation between the Executive and Legislative branches. This lead to many unsuccessful