Slavery And The Reconstruction Of The United States

The Reconstruction Period was the time after the Civil War when The United States government was trying to reunite the North and South, as well as integrate the free slaves. When the troops left in 1877 everything started to go downhill. The United States government made laws to help integrate the freed slaves called Pig Laws and “Black Code”. These laws were definitely geared towards pleasing the Southern people because they were made by the Southern State Legislature. These laws did give free slaves some freedom, but still highly restricted them.

Throughout the 1800s in America, slavery was a controversy between the north and the south. A Slave was one who was the property of another human being under law and was forced to obey them. The North felt that slavery was unfair and inhumane, whereas in the South, they felt as though slavery was crucial to their success. African American slaves were not allowed many rights: they were not allowed to testify in court against a white person, could not receive an education, or even sign contracts. Due to the brutality they faced each day, many slaves escaped with hopes to find freedom. The Underground Railroad, a system utilized by many runaway slaves to help them escape from the South to Canada, played a large role in the downfall of slavery and eventual abolition in the United States following the Civil War.

The American Civil War is also referred to as the war between the Northern and Southern States or the Rebellion War that began in 1861. Slavery was regarded as the main cause leading to the start of the war, as a high level of discrimination against the African Americans existed upon their arrival in the United States. The African Americans were either sold and traded by the elders in their villages or plucked from their native countries for a sometimes deadly transatlantic journey to serve wealthy southern families. They were not viewed as peers but as laborers and farmers. Americans who were rich and owned large plantations took the African Americans as their slaves. They suffered as if they were not worthy of compensation including working without pay and the standard consequence was lynching. During the period, they fought for their freedom, which was not given to them until the Civil War was fought. Consequently, they aligned themselves with the white men who were also soldiers in fighting for their freedom.

Cotton was the king of the South. It was bringing in large amounts of money as the textile industry in the North grew. Slavery was vital to the economic well-being of the South, and when the North began to question the “peculiar institution” of the South the wall of civility between the two sectionalized areas began to crumble. Due to the growing issue of slavery in the 1850s, the United States of America was in a state of total disarray and turmoil. The tension that had always existed between the North and South over the matter of slavery was no longer ignorable. As the United States expanded to the West, the status of slavery in the new states erupted in a violence that could no longer be controlled by sectionalism. The peace treaties that had worked in the past became Band-Aids over stab wounds. Southern states began to leave the United States of America to form the Confederate States of America and war was declared as the South fired onto the forts of the North. The Civil War was caused directly by the issue of slavery; the fugitive slave act in the Compromise of 1850, Dred Scott v. Sandford, and Bleeding Kansas prove that slavery was the key factor in the eruption of the nation.

The Civil War, occurring between the years 1861 and 1865, was a devastating effect of sectionalism caused by the division of the country on the topic of slavery. Slavery impacted every aspect of the country, whether in the North or the South, though primarily in the South; major impacts were in the politics and economy of the early country ways which inevitably caused the Civil War.

A revolution is a dramatic and sudden change in an organization in the social order that is replaced by a new, more favorable system. When Historian Eric Foner called the Reconstruction period “America’s Second Revolution”, his characterization was correct. Reconstruction can be viewed as a revolution because the previous social order, slavery, was replaced suddenly by a more favorable one, freedom for African-Americans. There was a long period of politicization for incorporating free African-Americans into white society. Reconstruction also revolutionized the preconceived notion that the states had autonomous power.

2. The development of a national railroad system was hampered by which of the following?

In the 1860s the United States was a nation that had been ripped apart by the Civil War and left in torn pieces. The war left many white southerners stripped of their slaves, land, and in destroyed towns with little to eat. The only people worse off than the white southerners at this point in history were the black southerners who had nothing to their names but the freedom they had recently been granted which left them penniless and searching for a place to go. In hopes of a resolution president Abraham Lincoln took charge in by announcing a reconstruction plan in hopes of bringing the country back together.

The Reconstruction Era which followed the Civil War was a period marked by a severe effort to re-establish a depleted and distraught society. The war, which was aimed at confronting the national dilemma of slavery, only led to subsequent problems over emancipation and an undefined condition of freedom. Some, who had naively assumed that ending slavery would resolve the problem of racial inequality, overlooked the prejudice and unpleasant feeling towards blacks.

By 1860 Manifest Destiny divided America, making it hard for the Union to hold itself together. The spread of slavery broke bonds as more terrain was gained. Southern states and Northern states couldn’t reach common ground on slavery, causing more problems in the government. Slave labour was used for every state, and if slavery was to end many states could suffer financially. Slavery also had many members of the Union question if owning humans and treat them as property was just. Slavery threatened every state in the Union because it separated the country by political interests, economical requirements, and moral beliefs.

The Civil War may have ended, yet that did not seem to halt the blatant racism that continued to linger throughout the country during the Reconstruction period. The Thirteenth Amendment was a great step forward for this country, unfortunately not every southern individual felt this way. Freed slaves faced a multitude of problems ahead; even if people believed in abolishing slavery, that did not necessarily mean they agreed with freed people possessing the same civil rights as themselves. Abolishing slavery was the first step, but dealing with the social, economic, and political racism was to be dealt with in the years to come.

In the history of the United States, it is known that slavery originated during the colonization of the New World. As more western territories were acquired from the Louisiana Purchase, people began to expand west as it was justified by the Manifest Destiny. With the availability and desire to colonize the new lands, slaves became more of a necessity especially in the Southern territories. As slavery sparked controversy between the Northern and Southern states, there was no solution to be found that satisfied the nation and was unable to prevent secession of states. The establishment of slavery brought unforeseen consequences and can be argued as the principle cause of the Civil War.

After the Civil War, the Freedmen got heaved, taking all the things into account, in little isolation assets. Landless and evacuated, they moved about scanning for work. They general obliged sufficient nourishment, clothing, and haven. The Southern states set up laws taking after the slave codes of slave times. These laws confined the past's change slaves with the last target to urge them to limit as home workers a significant part of the ideal opportunity for their previous directors at moronically low wages. In the midst of Reconstruction period, slaves wielded political power in the South shockingly. Their pioneers were overall pastors, legal educators, and instructors who had been told in the North and abroad. Among the ablest were Robert

The question of slavery and the rights of states to decide on the matter for themselves completely controlled politics in the years prior to the Civil War. Laws were passed, such as the Fugitive Slave Act of 1850, which made it so any slaves that escaped were to be sent back to their owners. Not only would these runaway slaves be punished severely, but anybody who aided them in escape would also be subject to harsh punishment. These desperate men, women, and children had no protection in the legal system and were left with no options in life other than escape. Many of these escapees had to watch friends and family be beaten, sold, or even killed and were expected to work just as hard, like nothing had happened. After losing everything, it

The film “Slavery and The Making Of America” covered the beginning of American slavery in the British colonies until the end of slavery in the southern states and post-civil war reconstruction. This film shows viewers remarkable stories of individual slaves, providing new perspectives on how unjust the slaves experiences were, and besides all the trouble they were facing still having to survive and shape their own lives. The British colonies in North America had an abundance of land and a scarcity of labor ended up producing money crops with the forced labor of African slaves, literally being treated as if they were machines for production.