Reconstruction Era: Key Policies, Amendments, and Civil Rights Challenges

Presidential Reconstruction

Plan to quickly readmit Southern states after the Civil War

Radical Republicans

Group in Congress who wanted strong protections for freedmen

Civil Rights Act of 1866

Gave African Americans citizenship and guaranteed equal protection under the law

Military Reconstruction Act of 1867

Divided the South into 5 military districts and required states to ratify the 14th Amendment

Impeachment of Andrew Johnson

Johnson was impeached for violating the Tenure of Office Act

Tenure of Office Act

Prevented the president from firing Cabinet members without Senate approval

Andrew Johnson

President during early Reconstruction, opposed Radical Republicans

Hiram Revels

First African American U.S. Senator

Robert Smalls

Former enslaved man; Civil War hero and congressman

Dred Scott

Enslaved man in Supreme Court case denying Black citizenship

Ulysses S. Grant

President who supported Reconstruction and civil rights

Rutherford B. Hayes

President elected after the Compromise of 1877

13th Amendment

Abolished slavery in the United States

14th Amendment

Granted citizenship to all people born in the U.S. and guaranteed equal protection under the law

15th Amendment

Gave African American men the right to vote

The Freedmen's Bureau

Helped formerly enslaved people with food, housing, education, and jobs

Black Codes

Laws passed in the South to restrict African Americans and limit their rights

Sharecropping

Farming system where farmers rented land in exchange for a share of crops

Scalawags

Southern whites who supported Reconstruction

Carpetbaggers

Northerners who moved South after the Civil War seeking opportunities

Ku Klux Klan (KKK)

White supremacist terrorist organization that used violence and intimidation

The Enforcement Acts

Laws passed to stop the KKK and protect African American voting rights

Election of 1876

Contested election between Rutherford B. Hayes and Samuel Tilden with no clear winner

Compromise of 1877

Hayes became president and federal troops were withdrawn from the South

Jim Crow Laws

Laws enforcing racial segregation in the South

Plessy v. Ferguson

Supreme Court case that upheld segregation and established 'separate but equal'

Disenfranchisement

Methods used to prevent African Americans from voting, such as poll taxes and literacy tests

Ida B. Wells

Journalist and civil rights activist who led anti-lynching campaigns

Booker T. Washington

African American leader who believed economic success would lead to equality

Lynching

Mob violence, usually against African Americans, used to intimidate and enforce white supremacy