Civil War Flashcards
Freedmen
The men and women who had been enslaved
Reconstruction
The rebuilding of the South after the Civil War
Amnesty
A government pardon
Freedmen’s Bureau
A government agency founded during Reconstruction to help former slaves
Thirteenth Amendment
A 1865 amendment to the United States Constitution and abolished slavery
Black Codes
The southern laws that severely limited the rights of African Americans after the Civil War
Radical Republicans
A member of Congress during Reconstruction who wanted to take power from the wealthy southern plantation owners and ensure that freedmen received the right to vote
Fourteenth Amendment
An 1868 amendment to the United States Constitution that guarantee equal protection of the laws including formerly enslaved people
Reconstruction Act
An 1867 law that threw out the southern states governments that refused to ratify the 14th amendment
Impeach
To bring charges of serious wrongdoings against a public official
Fifteenth Amendment
An 1869 amendment to the United States Constitution that forbids any state to deny African Americans the right to vote because of race
Scalawags
A white southerner who supported the Republicans during Reconstruction
Carpetbagger
An uncomplimentary nickname for a notherner who went to the south after the Civil War
Ku Klux Klan
A secret society organized in the South after the Civil War to reassert white supremacy by means of violence
Compromise of 1877
An agreement by Republican presidential candidate Rutherford B. Hayes to end Reconstruction in return for congressional Democrats by accepting his inaguration as president after the disputed election of 1876
Poll Tax
A tax required by law before a person can vote
Literacy Test
An examination to see if a person can read and write; used in the past to restrict voting rights
Grandfather Clause
In the post-Reconstruction South, a law that excused a voter from a literacy test if his grandfather had been eligible to vote on January 1, 1867
Segregation
The legal separation of people based on their racial, ethnic, or other differences
Jim Crow Laws
Laws that separated people of different races in public spaces in the South
Plessy V. Ferguson
An 1896 court case where the Supreme Court ruled that segregation in public facilities was legal as long as the facilities were equal
“New Laws”
A term used to describe the south in the late 1800’s when efforts were being made to expand the economy by building industry
