Unit 5: Topic 11 - Failure of Reconstruction

Question 1

What was slavery replaced by after the Civil War?

Answer 1

Crop-lien system:
- Owners gave credit to farmers under the agreement that debtors would pay with a portion of their future harvest.
- Creditors charged high interests to make it harder to freed people to gain economic independence

Sharecropping:
- Farmers rented tools, seeds, and land from the owner but paid their rent with a portion of the crops harvested
- Typically ended with accumulation of debt and further contracts to pay off this debt

Question 2

How did Southern whites resist attempts at Reconstruction?

Answer 2

Black codes: State laws that restricted African Americans from serving on juries, testifying against whites, marrying whites, or owning land as well as other discriminatory policies

Ku Klux Klan: Racist group committed to extreme violence to achieve its goals of racial segregation and white supremacy. They threatened and lynched carpetbaggers, scalawags, and African Americans. However, the Force Acts outlawed intimidation at the polls and gave the federal government the power to prosecute crimes against freed people in federal rather than state courts.

Question 3

Who were the Redeemers?

Answer 3

Redeemers: White Democrats who tried to undo Reconstruction to limit the rights of African Americans and bring back “home rule” – white supremacy

Question 4

What was the effect of the 1876 Presidential Election?

Answer 4

• There were disputed votes between Rutherford B. Hayes (Republican) and Samuel Tilden (Democrat) in three states
• Compromise of 1877: Hayes won by agreeing to pull out all federal troops from the South sent to protect African Americans, setting patronage for southern politicians, and letting the South decide on the enforcement of new Amendments. In return, Southern Democrats agreed to accept the legitimacy of Hayes’ election.
• 1877: Official end to Reconstruction after the removal of federal troops and military zones

Question 5

What were Jim Crow laws?

Answer 5

Jim Crow Laws:
- White southerners reasserted their dominance by enforcing racial segregation
- They denied African Americans basic social, economic, and civil rights
- There were poll taxes, literacy tests, and grandfather clauses (restricted voting to those whose grandfathers voted before 1867)

Question 6

How did the Slaughterhouse Cases (1873) strip away civil rights stated in the 14th Amendment?

Answer 6

The Slaughterhouse Cases (1873):

• The state of Louisiana granted monopoly of the New Orleans slaughtering business to one corporation
• Other slaughtering businesses claimed the monopoly deprived them of property without due process
• The Supreme Court’s claim of the 14th Amendment: A citizen’s privileges and immunities are only limited to those written in the Constitution and don’t include rights given by states
• This decreased protections given to African Americans under the 14th Amendment as it only banned states from depriving blacks of equal rights and didn’t guarantee that all citizens would receive equal economic privileges by the state

Question 7

How did the Civil Rights Cases of 1883 affect the interpretation of the 13th and 14th Amendments?

Answer 7

Civil Rights Cases of 1883:

• Five cases that revolved around the 1875 Civil Rights Act which granted all people access to transportation facilities, hotels, theaters, and places of public amusement regardless of race, color, or previous condition of servitude.
• The Supreme Court held that the 13th and 14th Amendments didn’t empower Congress to outlaw racial discrimination by private individuals.
• This led to an increase in public segregation and Jim Crow laws, as private businesses were further empowered to discriminate against racial groups