Civil War, Reconstruction and Jim Crow Laws

Bill of Rights

The first ten amendments to the Constitution

Citizens

People who had the right to participate in government

Civil War (1861-1865)

deadliest war in American history; conflict between north (union) and south (confederacy); 11 southern slave states wanted to secede from Union

Civil War Amendments

13th, 14th, and 15th amendments

Secession

Formal withdrawal of states or regions from a nation

Confederate States of America

A republic formed in February of 1861 and composed of the eleven Southern states that seceded from the United States

Abraham Lincoln

16th president of the United States; helped preserve the United States by leading the defeat of the secessionist Confederacy; an outspoken opponent of the expansion of slavery.

Emancipation Proclamation

Proclamation issued by Lincoln, freeing all slaves in areas still at war with the Union.

13th Amendment (1865)

Abolishes and prohibits slavery

Reconstruction

the period after the Civil War in the United States when the southern states were reorganized and reintegrated into the Union

14th Amendment

Declares that all persons born in the U.S. are citizens and are guaranteed equal protection of the laws

15th Amendment (1870)

Prohibited voting restrictions based on race, color, or previous condition of servitude (slavery)

Due Process

fair treatment through the normal judicial system, especially as a citizen's entitlement.

undermine

to weaken

Black Codes

Southern laws designed to restrict the rights of the newly freed black slaves

Segregation

Separation of people based on racial, ethnic, or other differences

Jim Crow Laws

Laws designed to enforce segregation of blacks from whites

Voting Rights Act of 1965

a law designed to help end formal and informal barriers to African-American suffrage

Suffrage

the right to vote

Plessy v. Ferguson

a 1896 Supreme Court decision which legalized state ordered segregation so long as the facilities for blacks and whites were equal

Civil Rights Act of 1964

1964; banned discrimination in public accommodations, prohibited discrimination in any federally assisted program, outlawed discrimination in most employment; enlarged federal powers to protect voting rights and to speed school desegregation; this and the voting rights act helped to give African-Americans equality on paper, and more federally-protected power so that social equality was a more realistic goal

barrier

something that blocks the way; an obstacle

poll tax

A requirement that citizens pay a tax in order to register to vote

literacy test

A test administered as a precondition for voting, often used to prevent African Americans from exercising their right to vote.

Grandfather Clause

allowed people to vote if their father or grandfather had voted before Reconstruction

Equal Protection Clause

14th amendment clause that prohibits states from denying equal protection under the law, and has been used to combat discrimination

interracial

Between, among, or involving people of different races

anti-miscegenation laws

laws forbidding people of different races from marrying. Abolished by the US Supreme Court in 1967

Public Accommodation

a facility that provides entertainment, rooms, space, or seating for the use and benefit of the general public

Ku Klux Klan

A secret organization that used terrorist tactics in an attempt to restore white supremacy in the South after the Civil War.

19th Amendment

Gave women the right to vote

26th Amendment

Lowered the voting age from 21 to 18