Jim Crow and Reconstruction vocab

Radical Republicans

Part of the republican party during the Reconstruction era that advocated to secure civil rights for freed slaves.

Black codes

A series if restrictive laws enacted by Southern States immediately after the Civil War. They limit the freedom and rights of newly emancipated African Americans.

13th Amendment

Offically abolished slavery and involuntary servitude throughout the U.S.

14th Amendment

A post-civil reconstruction era amendment that granted citizenship to all people born or naturalized in the U.S, including formerly enslaved, and granted all citizens “equal protection under the law.”

15th Amendment

Prohibits denying the right to vote based on race, color, or previous condition of servitude.

Civil Rights Act of 1866

A federal law that declared all people born in the U.S. should be citizens regardless of race, essentially guaranteeing basic civil rights.

Freedmen’s Bureau

Established by congress after the civil war to assist newly freed slaves in the South by providing basic needs to them.

Thaddeus Stevens

A prominent radical Republican congressman during the Civil War and Reconstruction era, known for his staunch abolitionist views and strong advocacy for the rights of formerly enslaved people.

Charles Summers

A prominent abolitionist senator from Massachusetts who was known for his pierce anti-slavery rhetoric, most notably his speech “The Crime Against Kansas.”

Impeachment

The formal process where the house of Representatives brings against a gov. official, like the President.

Reconstruction Acts of 1867

A crucial piece of legislation passed by the U.S. congress that divided the former Confederate states into military districts enforced by the Union generals, and mandated that these states create a new Constitution guaranteeing voting rights for African Americans.

Carpetbaggers

A derogatory term used to describe Northerners who moved to the South after the Civil War.

Poll Tax

A fee that individuals were required to pay in order to vote.

Grandfather Clause

A legal provision enacted in the Southern States after the Civil War that allowed white men to vote if their grandfather had been eligible to vote before to Reconstruction era.

Scalawags

A derogatory term towards white Southerners who joined the Republican Party during the Reconstruction.

Amnesty Act of 1872

A federal law that granted amnesty to most farmer confederate soldiers essentially removing political disabilities imposed by the 14th Amendment, allowing them to vote

The “redeemers”

A group of White Southern Democrats who emerged during the Reconstruction era following the civil war, aiming to regain political control.

KKK

Originally a social club by Confederate veterans which grew into A Southern white underground resistance that acted with extreme violence and intimidation.

Civil Rights Act of 1875

A landmark piece of legislation that prohibited discrimination based on race, color, religion, sex or nationally.

The “New South”

A post-civil war movement by Southern leaders to transform the Southern economy from a predominantly agrarian society based on slave labor.

Compromise of 1877

An informal unwritten deal that settled the disputed 1876 U.S. Presidential election.

Plessy vs. Ferguson

A landmark supreme court case in 1896 that upheld the constitutionality of racial segregation laws, establishing the “separate but equal” doctrine, which essentiality legalized the Jim Crow laws.

Booker T. Washington

A prominent African American leader during the late 19th century who advocated for African Americans to focus on economic self-improvement through education and skilled labor.

WEB duBois

A prominent African American civil rights activist, scholar, and author who strongly advocated for immediate and full racial equality.

Civil Rights

Last law passed to try and save peoples rights — 1875

Who were the three men against Andrew Johnson?

Thaddeus Stevens, Ben Wade, and Charles Sumner