The Meaning of Freedom The Promise of Reconstruction

The Meaning of Freedom The Promise of Reconstruction, 1865 -1868

The Ending of the Civil War 1861 -1865 April 9, 1865 Lee surrenders One week later: Lincoln is assassinated; Johnson becomes President (Senator from TN-a southerner that did not agree with succession)

Congress and the President Reconstruction Plan ¬ South was divided into five military districts ¬ Each was governed by a U. S. Army general w/troops ¬ Before any southern state could be readmitted, they had to accept the 13 th Amendment & write a new constitution ¬ Congress established the Freedmen’s Bureau – Provided food & clothing to newly freed blacks – Helped in searches for jobs & homes – Built schools & provided teachers ¬ Strong for advocates for the Civil War Amendments (Radical Republicans)

The Five Military Districts

Reconstruction Amendments 13 th – forbids slavery (1865) 14 th – defines U. S. citizenship (1868) 15 th- cannot deny suffrage based on race, color or previous condition of servitude (1870)

Reconstruction Government ¬ Former Confederate states held conventions to draw up new constitutions: – a. Blacks attended all of the conventions – b. New constitutions abolished property qualifications for voting & granted the right to vote to adult males ¬ African American men flocked to the polls a. State Offices represented 80% of Republican voters ¬ Elected Republican legislatures that included black members

Goals of Freedmen ¬ Land ¬ The Black Church ¬ Education ¬ Family

Land ¬ Special Field Order #15: 30 acre of land along the Atlantic coast from Charleston, SC to Jacksonville, FL ¬ The Port Royal Experiment: land given to freedmen in SC ¬ Freedmen’s Bureau: General Oliver O. Howard promised 40 acres and a mule to newly freedmen

The Black Church ¬ After emancipation, blacks built their own houses of worship ¬ Churches housed schools, social gatherings & political meetings ¬ Ministers were wellrespected; many of the black men who elected to political office were ministers

Education ¬ Freedom and Education were Inseparable ¬ To remain illiterate after emancipation was to remain enslaved. ¬ Ex-slave master: “Charles you is a free man they say, but AH tells you now, you is still a slave and if you lives to a hundred, you’ll STILL be a slave, cause you got no education, and education is what makes a man free!!! ¬ Free blacks raised money to buy land, build schools & pay teachers ¬ By 1867, Freedmen’s Bureau had set up almost 4, 500 schools ¬ Tuition represented 10% or more of their monthly income ¬ Schools were full; by 1870, 250, 000 students were enrolled

Education • Northern missionaries open schools in the South - and freed slaves rejoice in the opportunity to be educated. • The South's new, racially integrated legislatures create the region's first public schools -- for blacks and for whites.

Education: Historical Black Colleges and Universities (HBCUs) ¬ Consisted of Elementary and Secondary education – – – – Fisk University, TN Hampton University, VA Tougaloo, Alabama Avery, SC Lincoln, Missouri Virginia Union, VA Shaw University, NC Benedict, SC Morehouse, GA Clafin, SC Rust, Mississippi Bennett, NC St. Augustine, NC St. Paul, VA

Family ¬ Years and decades advertisement appeared in black newspapers for lost family members ¬ Some walked 600 miles looking for their spouses ¬ Ben and Betty Dodson found each other after 20 years of separation “Dis is my Betty, shuah. I foun’ you at las’. I’s hunted and hunted till I track you up here. I boun’ to hunt till I fin’ you if you’s alive” ¬ Husbands and wives sometimes learned that their spouses had remarried during the separation.

Family ¬ Believing that his wife was died, the husband of Laura Spicer remarried—only to learn after the war that Laura was still alive. ¬ He wrote to her but refused to see her. “I would come and see you but I know I could not bear it. I want to see you and I did the last day I saw you, and it will not do for you and I to meet. ” “Tormented he wrote again: “Laura I do not thing that I have change any at all since I saw you last—I thinks of you and my children everyday of my life. Laura I do love you the same. My love to you never have failed. Laura, truly, I have got another wife, and I am very sorry that I am. You feels and seems to me as much like my dear loving wife, as you ever did Laura.

Black Politicians ¬ ¬ More than 600 served in Southern state legislatures ¬ Pinchback was governor of LA for 43 days ¬ Reconstruction governments expanded services for newly freed blacks & poor whites (i. e. public schools, hospitals, mental health institutions, etc. ) ¬ Mississippi's John Roy Lynch, pass ambitious civil rights and public education laws. African Americans did not dominate any state government but: Federal Government- from 1869 to 1876, 20 blacks were elected to the U. S. House of Representatives & 2 served in the Senate (Hiram Revels & Blanche K. Bruce)

The First Colored Senator and Representatives

Black Codes/Sharecropping ¬ Ensure the availability of a subservient agricultural labor supply controlled by white people. ¬ Earning a living in the South proved difficult a. Few former slaves could afford to buy land b. Many states had laws that prohibited blacks from owning land c. Sharecropping developed: – Farmed a small plot of land belonging to another in return for a share of the crop – Many families bought supplies & groceries on credit – At the time of the harvest, the growing debt was subtracted from the sale of the crop – Families had to turn to credit again – Becomes a cycle of poverty & debt

Black Codes ¬ Restrictions on freedmen ¬ Sign annual labor contracts with white landowners ¬ Charged African Americans for owning businesses ¬ Could not vote or serve on juries ¬ Children from the ages of 2 – 21 to be apprenticed to white people ¬ Corporal punishments was legal ¬ Employers were designated “masters” and employees “servants”

The Radical Republicans ¬ Charles Sumner ¬ Benjamin Wade ¬ Henry Wilson ¬ Thaddeus Stevens ¬ George W. Julian ¬ James M. Ashley ¬ Fought for the abolition of slavery ¬ Reluctant to compromise ¬ Honest, tough, and articulate, abrasive, difficult, selfrighteous, and vain. ¬ Black people appreciated them ¬ Many white people excoriated them.

Charles Sumner ¬ Black veteran “ Your name shall live in our hearts forever”

Attack on Charles Sumner ¬ Charles Sumner was a Harvard man, ¬ Saw slavery as a sin, an evil. ¬ In the midst of the Kansas controversy, Sumner denounced Douglas and the SC Senator Andrew Butler—in very personal terms, calling him a john for the harlot slavery, an imbecile and a blunderer. ¬ Butler’s nephew Preston Brooks, a congressman from SC went to avenge the insult. ¬ He caught Sumner seated at his senate desk and beat him mercilessly with a cane.

The Reaction of White Southerners ¬Violence ¬Outrage ¬Denial ¬Anger