8th Grade Unit 1 SS Vocabulary

Vocabulary terms and definitions from 8th Grade Unit 1 covering Reconstruction, constitutional amendments, key legislation, and post-Civil War American history terms.

Reconstruction

rebuilding of the South after the Civil War.

Segregation

practice or policy of segregating or discriminating against black people

Abolition

ended slavery in the United States

Jim Crow laws

separation of different racial groups

Black Codes

laws passed by Democrat-controlled Southern states with the intent and the effect of restricting African Americans' freedom, and of compelling them to work in a labor economy based on low wages or debt

13th amendment

this amendment ended slavery in the United States

14th amendment

an amendment to the Constitution that ensured that the freed slaves were officially U.S. citizens and were awarded the rights given to U.S. citizens by the Constitution

15th amendment

an amendment granting the right to vote to African American men

Plessy vs. Ferguson

major case in U.S. history that upheld state racial segregation laws for public facilities under the doctrine of "separate but equal"

Radical Republicans

an individual in favor of drastic and usually repressive measures against the southern states in the period following the Civil War. They led a vigorous campaign to secure rights for freed slaves.

Ku Klux Klan

white southern resistance who waged an underground campaign of intimidation and violence directed at white and black Republican leaders

Carpetbaggers

went to the South to see how much money he could make on the South’s suffering

Civil Rights Act of 1875

was a law that provided all citizens in their civil and legal rights

40 acres and a mule

a phrase echoed throughout the South in the aftermath of the Civil War, asserting the right of newly freed African Americans to redistributed land as compensation for unpaid labor during slavery

Freedman’s Bureau

agency set up to provide clothing, food, medical care and legal advice to poor blacks

Compromise of 1877

an agreement in Congress by which Rutherford B. Hayes was declared the US President following the election of 1876 in exchange for the Republicans withdrawing their troops from the Southern States

Homestead Act

this act encouraged Western migration by providing settlers 160 acres of public land. In exchange, settlers paid a small filing fee and were required to complete five years of continuous residence before receiving ownership of the land

Sharecroppers

needed help tending the cotton fields, a landowner was looking to hire someone to share the land with.

Impeachment

the only way of removing the president from office

Scalawags

the Republican Party in the South