Reconstruction Assessment

Reconstruction

The period following the Civil War during which the United States implemented policies to rebuild and integrate the Southern states.

Freedmen’s Bureau

A federal agency established in 1865 to aid formerly enslaved people in their transition to freedom.

Radical Republicans

A faction of American politicians who sought to impose civil rights for former slaves and transform Southern society. They wanted a harsher Reconstruction plan than Johnson and Lincoln.

Andrew Johnson

Democrat from Tennessee, he became President of the United States after Lincoln’s assassination. He oversaw the early Reconstruction era and faced significant opposition from Congress, leading to his impeachment. .

Black Codes

Laws passed in Southern states to restrict the rights of newly freed African Americans. Codes intended to keep African Americans in a condition similar to slavery.

14th Amendment

An amendment granting citizenship to all persons born or naturalized in the United States and ensuring equal protection under the law. African Americans are now citizens.

15th Amendment

An amendment that banned states from denying African Americans the right to vote.

Military Reconstruction Act

A 1867 act passed by congressional Republicans that divided the South into military districts governed by Union generals.

Impeachment

The process by which Congress levels charges against a government official, leading to a trial and potential removal from office. Johnson was impeached but not removed.

Ulysses S. Grant

The 18th President of the United States and a former Union general during the Civil War. Won 1868 election and became president after Johnson.

Carpetbagger

A derogatory term for Northern whites who moved to the South after the Civil War for political and economic opportunities.

Scalawag

A term used to describe Southern whites who supported Reconstruction and the Republican Party.

Hiram Revels

The first African American to serve in the U.S. Senate, representing Mississippi.

Joseph Rainey

The first African American to serve in the U.S. House of Representatives, serving South Carolina.

White Supremacy

The belief that white people are superior to those of all other racial backgrounds like African Americans. Many Southerners feel this way.

Ku Klux Klan

A secret society formed in the South post-Civil War aimed at maintaining white supremacy through violence and intimidation of African Americans and Republicans.

Enforcement Acts

Laws enacted to protect African Americans' rights and to combat Klan violence in the South. It had 3 parts.

Compromise of 1877

An agreement that resolved the disputed 1876 presidential election and led to Hayes withdrawing federal troops from the South, essentially ending Reconstruction.

Sharecropping

An agricultural system in which landowners allowed tenants to farm the land in exchange for a share of the crops. This covered their rent as well as the cost of the seed, fertilizer, tools, and animals they needed.

Jim Crow Laws

State and local laws that enforced racial segregation in the Southern United States. Essentially replaced Black Codes.