Blog #71 – Reconstruction – Success or Failure?
I don’t like to give you just a two-pronged choice, because logically, there are more than two choices to choose from. So, what I’d like you to do is weigh the article we looked at in class on Monday (“The New View of Reconstruction“) and the section at the end of Ch. 22 (How Radical was Reconstruction?), and the notes we’ve done and the video (Aftershock), and make your own decisions about Reconstruction’s success or failure.
In the old school or William Dunning interpretation, Reconstruction was a miserable failure that blundered in giving freedmen their rights (which they weren’t ready for), but Andrew Johnson and the Klan were portrayed as the heroes of the era because they tried to ease the country back 
together painlessly (Johnson) and pushed for restoration of home rule (Klan). Reconstruction governments were filled with scalawags and carpetbaggers who corrupted the states and raised taxes.
Under some of the new interpretations, especially the Progressive and Neo-Progressive / New Left ones in the 20th Century, the Dunning interpretation is flipped on its head. Andrew Johnson was a racist who stood in the way of the idealist Radical Republicans who wanted to give freedmen their full and equal rights. The Klan was not the protector of the South but a haphazard terrorist organization that kept blacks from voting and intimated both whites and blacks in the South. And the Southern state governments, Republican by nature, may or may not have helped out the freedmen. One thing is certain: the governments, from the local and state all the way up to the federal level (think Credit Mobilier) was corrupt. Moral standards were low during this time period and many people (as we’ll see in one of our next units) are in it to make a quick million or two.
Things to think about when looking at the positives of Reconstruction:
1. Slavery was abolished after the war with the 13th Amendment. The next two amendments laid the ground work for equal protection under the law and the right to vote.
2. As mentioned by Foner, nowhere else in the world were former slaves so quickly included in the discussions of the country’s politics and the direction it was headed.
Things to think about when looking at the negatives of Reconstruction.
1. The Klan intimidated, killed, and punished blacks and whites.
2. The Southern state governments were undoubtedly corrupt with carpetbaggers and scalawags in charge. They may also have not been very helpful to their constituents.
3. Very little good land was distributed to the freedmen, leaving them stuck in tenant farming.
Your task: explain whether or not you think Reconstruction was a success, failure, or a combination of both. Use evidence from the notes, articles, and video that we’ve seen.
Due Wednesday, January 14th by class. Minimum of 300 words.
Reconstruction was both a success and a failure in my opinion. Reconstructions two main goals were to give the freedmen their rights and reunite the union; it sort of did both of those. The 14th and 15th amendment initially were very good and for a short time created equality, but that was not for long. As we learned in our portrait the 14th amendment wasn’t interpreted the way it was supposed to be interpreted again until the 1960s! Although reconstruction eventually gave freedmen their rights terrorist organizations came out of it like the KKK. The KKK not only intimidated African American voters so there basically wasn’t political equality, they also physically abused and murdered freedmen. In the movie, aftershock, we watched as the KKK whipped a freedwomen and both of her daughters in the night, because she had spoken out about wanting to be able to vote. Also, codes were passed in the south basically returning the freedmen and women back to slavery. Most people were forced to work on tenant farms, and they were perpetually in debt so it was almost just slavery. Obviously reconstruction was pretty much a failure, but without it I think the country would’ve been much worse. Without reconstruction the “reconstruction amendments” probably wouldn’t have passed, and who knows how long it would’ve took to have equal citizenship for all and allow all men to vote. Although it took awhile I think the 14th and 15th amendments are very important amendments, especially the 14th. Even today the 14th amendment has been almost expanded for equality for all regardless of race, religion, sexual orientation, and I believe it’s going to continue to be expanded until their truly is equality for all. So although at the time reconstruction was basically a huge failure, it did have some lasting success.
I think reconstruction was a failure. I think this because of the failure of integration of freedmen into society, and the failure to evolve the southern economics. I think that there was a failure to integrate freedmen into society because of the various clans and groups that sprung up after blacks were given the right to vote. The groups, such as the KKK, kept the freedmen out of the voting booths, taking away their rights as citizens. These groups also viscously murdered freedmen, and did not give freedmen equal protection under the law. If the freed blacks were successfully integrated into society, they would have had equal protection under the law, and would not have to be afraid for their lives everyday. This failure to protect the freed black was so bad that even today there is a massive issue with the killing and unequal protection under the law of blacks, one example being the Eric Garner case, were an innocent black man was strangled to death by police; police who did not get any legal punishment.
I think that there was a failure to evolve the southern economics. I think this because freedmen and poor whites whose land had been destroyed were not given enough land to farm and produce food on. This lack of land for the freedmen and poor whites lead to widespread poverty, and the rise of tenant farming, a practice almost equivalent to slavery. If the government gave out more land for less of a price, then more people would have been able to earn money, and subsequently spent it, boosting the southern economy. With a more stimulated economy, the south could have become more industrialized, evolving its economy past just farming and cotton production. The effects of this lack of southern economics can be seen in the rise of the coal mine in the south, and the terrible working conditions and pay that came with it. This lack of the development of the southern economy can also be seen today in poverty throughout the south, especially in where the slave belt used to be. The effects of the failure of reconstruction were harsh politically, economically, and socially, and these effects are still seen today.
I believe the pre-construction Cara was a failure in some characteristics but also his success benefit in others. The reconstruction benefited many slaves, He’s free men were no longer a train and tortured animals owned by White southern masters. So main benefit was the fact that all slippery was ballast in every state. The blacks were able to get new clothes, find their own religion, own their own independent land, find their lost relatives and family members, and most of all be educated.education was the most important independent characteristics that the White hadso when the blacks were able to get this, they felt as if they were equal to whites. Another thing that the black one with the political power of the white man which meant they wanted to run the country living in, But as you know the first black president should not be elected until 2008, but black people still fought and still believe that they needed this freedom back then. A couple results from the war the wreath structure very negative towards the freemen especially blacks. One major negative aspect was creation of the Ku Klux Klan which violated the law and they killed many black people. This Ku Klux Klan was made up of white people white people that hated black people and I thought that the black people were taking the power from the white people instead of just attic power to each race equally.The black Freedmen although worked as slaves and now they didn’t have to, they are now running in terror because they feel as if they are being hunted like your animals. Although some organizations felt that blacks had the same equal eights as the whites. These type of organizations helped blacks by giving them protection from the whites and the Klu Klux Klan. I believe the reconstruction era was both a success but the war also had some failures as a result.
The Reconstruction era was many things. A success, no. A failure, not quite. But this time period in our history did bring a step in the right direction when it came to the social and economic situation of slavery and racism that many African Americans where subject to. But, with every two steps forward the country took one giant leap backwards. Reconstruction can be considered successful in two ways, the passing for the fourteenth and fifteenth amendments. The fourteenth amendment had to be signed by the southern states to regain access back into the union. This amendment states that all persons born on American soil are free men and slavery is abolished. It goes on to give the newly freed slaves the basic human rights of life liberty and the pursuit of happiness. The fifteenth amendment that was passed gives all men, white or color, the right to vote and run for office. Now with both of these amendments seen as improvements to the country and a step in the right direction, reconstruction wasn’t that way as a whole, as a matter of fact I believe that reconstruction did more harm than it did help. With the passing of both amendments, there was an extreme rise in violence. Organized terrorist groups, such as the KKK rose up and attacked African American to scare them away from the polls and to keep the social norm from before the civil war. During this time we also very many freedmen being given crappy land so they aren’t given a chance to farm and make money so they were seen as lazy people who lived off of the early for of social security, well the white man was stuck working. In the eyes of the white, the tables had turned and they didn’t like it. Social order was completely switch from what it had been from the civil war, and the Reconstruction era was not all that successful when it came to fixing things.
The period of Reconstruction was the time between civil war and civil rights. By some it’s seen as the time in American history where African Americans truly gain their freedom from the white supremacy. Others view the Reconstruction era as a total waste of American time and lives. I believe that, yes Reconstruction brought changes to the country that we still see in effect today, but it also came to a point where it seemed as though the country was stepping back instead. Reconstruction may have “abolished” slavery and made us the quickest country to have our slaves bounce back, but no amount of good done can overcome the tragedy that became KKK. The death and horror that so many freedmen and radical republicans were subject to are inexcusable. The abolishment of slavery was not real. Some were kept enslaved and others were sharecroppers, but that might have even been worse. Some of them may have rather still been slaves. The land that they were given was terrible and they were better off without it. The rockiness and old dead dirt made in not farmable. The government became corrupt and the new amendments basically meant nothing. They lost all of their troops in the south. They made the deal in the corrupt bargain that took them out and they lost control. People argue that it worked because of abolishing slavery and the 14th and 15th amendments and If reconstruction worked then the civil war would have been the last fight we fought. Many people say that this continued on and the civil war was not over when the civil war was over. Johnson just let all the work go to waste by giving the southerners back all of the land that they lost just by admitting that they were back in the union. Everything left for the freedmen were not good to use for farming and they all failed. Slavery was technically over but it lived on and people were still cruel and others were still in pain. Over all reconstruction was a failure.
The US reconstruction was both a success and a failure. It was a success that it did not completely destroy the union while giving more rights to the freedmen. It was horribly ineffective in the south. The Freedmen that tried to vote were intimidated away from the voting polls and the freedmen were forced to work as sharecroppers that were almost identical to their former position as slaves. Not to mention their lack of justice in almost every legal confrontation at the time that still has it’s lingering effects on today’s court cases. In addition to this, the state governments began to form that openly supported organizations such as the Ku Klux Klan. Many state officials in those states were open supporters or members of the Klan. One instance of this was in Louisiana when a mob of both disgruntled students and police officers went to a legislative meeting that focused on expanding freedmen’s rights; the mob then proceeded to murder and maim dozens of both Legislatures and Retired black Union soldiers. Reconstruction in the United States was completely different than reconstruction from slavery in other countries. In England, their reconstruction was much less violent as they did not attempt to fully integrate their freedmen into their politics. This would have been a better route for the United States as it would incite less violence and hatred from the more unsavory people of the south. Had the United states had been as gradual as the process implemented in England, Reconstruction may not have been such a tremendous failure that resulted in increased bigotry. Although the fourteenth and fifteenth were soon to follow afterward, the approach we took was littered with violence and fraught with the hypocritical resistance of the racist President as well as a bureau that was also horribly ineffective due to southern resistance.
The idea of reconstruction was to accomplish two things; reunite the very broken Union and give rights to the freedmen. The first goal was partially a success because of the many rights received with the 14th and 15th amendments. Leaving the freedmen thrust into political power. Though they had basic experience in politics, most State governments in the South allowed freedmen to govern their states. they did this because any Southerners involved with the Confederacy were stripped of voting rights and political power because they now became very biased, aggressive and racist- they became so much of these things that it would make it nearly impossible to govern fairly. However this progress didn’t last as President Johnson pardoned most of the former confederates so they began to return to political power, because former Southerners completed resisted the new government with Jim Crow laws. Soon after, terrorist organizations such as the Ku Klux Klan were formed to take away any of the rights given to freedman and promote white supremacy. This was made worse by the federal government because they took no control over the situation and avoided it like nothing happened. Leaving all enforcement of the new amendments and the rights of blacks in the hands of Southern state governments who made no moves to enforce any laws protecting blacks. In the reuniting of the Union, it started out oppositely. Congress did their best to take away political power from all former confederates and impose other punishments onto the States and many times forced them to pay off their own debt. However President Johnson began to hand out pardons to all ex confederates. The white Southerners used groups like the KKK to restore the social balance they had before the war. This lead us to fall back into a similar tense equilibrium the two divide halves of the country had before the war. All in all, reconstruction neither failed nor succeeded in some of their bigger ideas for reconstruction.
Reconstruction had many ups and downs. In my opinion the time period was a complete failure.
Nothing came out all the work that was put in. Johnson didn’t help the country in anyway. People fought for the abolishment of slavery everywhere. After all that slavery wasn’t at the same state it was before and technically it was abolished. But overall blacks still were forced to work and sometimes they would work and at the end the farm owners wouldn’t pay them. This was called share cropping. Blacks also had to have jobs and if they didn’t they would get arrested and then farmers would come by and make the blacks work on their farms. So what came out of this time period that really made a huge impact on the country? Life didn’t go back to normal, but there wasn’t a huge change in power or a huge shift in people’s ideas on equality. The klan also rose up after the war. The KKK became a huge terror factor for blacks. They would wear white hoods and ride on horseback wreaking havoc on the blacks and their lives and their families. They would do terrible things. They would kill innocent people. They would lynch blacks and they would celebrate while doing it. They became a fear factor. Finally the freedmen bureau. This was supposed to help the blacks to get on their feet and start a life. For blacks money was respect and land was money. So they needed the bureau to get free land that was left from post civil war. Nothing came good from post civil war reconstruction. Everything they worked for and all the money that was lost and everything that was expected for this time period. It all was bad and it is hard to look back and be happy about that time period.
I believe that reconstruction was an overall failure in the south. I think this because is we look at how it rattled the population there was more negative attitude and unwillingness then there was acceptance and actual reconstruction. First off, I believe that the republicans might have given to much control to freed slaves at once, flooding the population who were (for the most part) uneducated, setting the south up for failure. Also the southerners who were previously the owners and masters of the black population now had to adjust accordingly to the new amendments and was extremely hard for them, culturally and financially. Up to the emancipation of blacks the south, previous slave owners had a relatively stable financial income and so when their main or only source of income was legally and permanently cutoff it is understandable to know why they were so angry at the government and more excess able the blacks in the south. I say excess able because during reconstruction infuriated pro ex confederates terrorized the black population practically driving them back into the right less position that they were previously in that they just fought a bloody war for. But most southerners recognized the danger of committing this terrorism so they expressed their position on black rights in a much more “lawful” manner. What I’m talking about the sharecropping in the south on farms. Previously slave operated farms now were being un-operated but the blacks who were tied to the land by slavery were now tied to the land by sharecropping. Sharecropping was the act of giving someone to farm your land and in return the renter gets a percent of the grow. But with the use of credit as a form of payment and crippling interest due to shops that accepted the credit, the blacks now became debt ridden and in almost the same predicament that they were in previously when they were slaves. Overall the reconstruction was a failure but I see no better way of it working out no matter who’s plan was enacted. The people of the south and especially slave-owners, had a deep rooted racism against blacks and it take many, many years for that mentality of another human-being being less than yourself.
In my opinion, Reconstruction definitely was a combination of successes and failures. The concept of Reconstruction presented by the Scalawags and Carpetbaggers looked quite great. These people wanted the freedmen to be able to have equal rights and citizenship as white people. These people made efforts to do so, but not enough to achieve what they wanted. During Reconstruction, blacks were indeed given rights in the 14th amendment. The problem with this, though, was that these rights were not being enforced whatsoever. Confederates were outraged that blacks now had rights that rivaled and were even somewhat greater than theirs. The thought of black people in government was utterly frightening to most of them. The Confederates made efforts to prevent the blacks from reaping the benefits of their rights. One thing these people did was implement a system of sharecropping. This was a system where white landowners had black people work the fields in return for a share of the crops produced. Having blacks play this part in sharecropping was not a ton different from slavery. Blacks believed they needed land to truly be free, and the Freedmen’s Bureau had promised to do so but ultimately never came through. Another thing the Confederates did was prevent blacks from voting. They did this by committing violent acts in groups at black individuals to scare them off from coming close to the voter’s box. In the end, Reconstruction provided rights for blacks that were essential for them to be somewhat regular citizens, but these rights were not protected and blacks were not even close to equal. They would be segregated and would suffer from political and judicial injustices for years to come. Ku Klux Klan members could kill blacks at their will in large numbers and get away with it all every time without any implications. After reviewing Reconstruction, the failures greatly outweigh the successes, and it’s quite sad.
I think reconstruction was both a success and a failure. It was successful because freed black people in the south were given citizenship int he 14th amendment and the right to vote in the 15th amendment. This is huge is the reconstruction era. People that used to be considered property, and were beaten and treated inhumane, now have as much political rights as the people who used to own it. Although this sounds very good, there was way more negative to reconstruction than good. Blacks now had citizenship and the right to vote. Racism was running ramped through out the south at this time. Most white people were not happy that these “less than humans” had rights in America. To stop these freed slaves from voting, racist southerners created the Ku Klux Klan, a group of people who terrorized and intimidated blacks. They would try to intimidate blacks at the polls, so they would be to scared to vote and share their opinion. the KKK also injured and killed a large amount of blacks, just for being black. The KKK would stay off and on at large, for almost 100 years. Also, because the government did not do much to help the freedmen get land, they were stuck in sharecropping situations. Sharecropping was a terrible situation were blacks would rent land and tools from the white men that owned large plantations. The black people could never make any money because their landlords would charge them so much. This was a bad time for black people, but it was better then where they started
In my opinion, reconstruction was nothing more than a failure. The period of time where reconstruction took place was after the Civil War and Civil rights. The biggest goals of reconstruction were to reunite the country to a whole as well as give freedmen rights. Freedmen who tried to exercise their rights, like voting, were often scared away by whites. Societies formed, like the KKK, which started as a fraternal organization targeting freedmen and intimidating them, but turned much more violent in the following decades. Many state governments openly supported these organizations, and many state officials were members of the Klan. Although Andrew Johnson’s reconstruction plan worked at first, Confederates eventually worked their way into the government and were elected to the United States Congress. Also, very little of the land that was promised to the freedmen was ever actually given to them, and the land that was, did not provide good farming for the freedmen. There were several promising times during Reconstruction when progress was made for freed African Americans. The first was time that any progress was made was the passing of the13th, 14th, and 15th Amendments guaranteeing African Americans certain civil liberties. The rise of white supremacy groups, in combination with the Black Codes, began to intimidate freed slaves and push back their civil liberties. Another reason that the Reconstruction was a failure in my opinion was because the Southern economy did not evolve. The lack of available land for the freedman and poor whites lead to widespread poverty, this in hand, lead to tenant farming, which could be compared slavery. Everything left for the freedmen were not good to use for farming and they all failed. Slavery was technically over but it lived on and people were still cruel and others were still in pain. Over all reconstruction was a failure.
Reconstruction in my opinion was a failure. Even though the fourteenth and fifteenth amendments were passed, the freedmen were still reduced to a form of economic, social, and political oppression. The Southern Democrats passed laws that allowed the blacks to be suppressed. The blacks were not allowed to vote unless their grandparents were able to read, which they could not. Also, during votes, many ex-Confederates tried to keep blacks away from the voting booths. In addition, the Ku Klux Klan was formed. The Klan was able to become a full-fledged terrorist organization that almost completely suppressed the freedmen. They wore hooded masks to keep their identities secret, and to prey on freedmen superstitions. Although the Tennessee governor and multiple Northern carpetbaggers attempted to stop the Klan, it became a huge part in ending Reconstruction. The Klan, although officially “ended” when a clash of federal troops and the Klan became imminent, it became an invisible empire. The blacks were reduced to sharecropping, which was essentially slavery. The freedmen were forced to rent out land and all of the farming essentials from the former slave owners. Every season the freedmen gave 2/3 of their yield. Then they were able to sell the rest of the crop. Unfortunately, all of the tools and seed were priced so highly that every year the sharecroppers fell further into debt. Many freedmen tried to reconnect with their families, but faced many challenges because the Southerners were not eager to help their former slaves and the slaves were often given new names when they changed owners. Also, President Johnson was sympathetic to the former Confederates and much of the land promised to the freedmen was actually given back to the former slave owners. The Radical Republicans were able to pass laws that should have ensured black rights but the Democrats found ways to sidestep the laws. When the Radical Republicans fell out of power, so did Reconstruction, completing the failure.
I refuse to call any system that results in vigilante groups murdering innocents a success. I refuse to call any system that results in the systematic discrimination and terrorism of a minority group a success. Reconstruction was a failure. If Lincoln had been in charge during reconstruction, maybe we’d have had some better things happening, but no, instead we have Johnson. Johnson, a white supremacist who refused to send military troops to an area of tense racial conflict, instead turning a blind eye to the massacre of blacks and sympathizers with the cause of equal rights. Johnson did nothing about how the land given to freedmen was of significantly poor quality, and how the majority of the Southern state governments were headed by men ready to get a quick buck. Sure, the thirteenth through fifteenth amendments were great in theory, but they did nothing to quell the terrorism that the Ku Klux Klan caused. Instead of, I don’t know, a police force, these murderers were instead taken care of by militias led by citizens like Daniel “Boss” Upham. And yes, it released all the slaves at once, but how could that be considered a success when the majority of them were stuck in tenant farming, poor, and still without simple rights like voting. Oh yeah, they totally said they were able to vote, but take a look at the opening scenes of, or the whole movie of Selma. Voting rights? I don’t think so. The whole thing is a mess, honestly, that I don’t even know how I could possibly begin to argue it, so I’m just going over every topic. Remember that Arkansas was put under martial law? Remember how the southern governments didn’t do anything for freedmen? You remember how some plantation owners didn’t even release their slaves? Reconstruction didn’t so much reconstruct as it did fill out a treaty and say that now people could stop shooting each other. Only problem is, they didn’t stop.
I believe that Reconstruction was both a success and a failure. The success part come from the fact that the freedmen were now somewhat integrated into everyday society. At the same time most were denied basic rights and were still the social status of slaves. The Klan also was a big factor in the success/failure of Reconstruction. Because the freedmen were so quickly given rights and the defeated confederates were so quickly outcast, this gave rise to the Klan. The Ex-Confederates that were now considered below Freedmen, were outraged and began in time to attack these freed slaves and all African-Americans. Perhaps the fact the Andrew Johnson seemed to gloss over the Klan’s activity for the most part made Reconstruction a longer and more tedious process for America. The development of Black codes in the South while seeming bad at first may have in my opinion helped shape the South and get it back into shape. I say this because the North was trying to flip the switch from enslavement to free men overnight. The South’s backlash tried to establish a new normal and get the South into the mindset that change is coming and it all starts now. While many people take sides on the success/failure of Reconstruction I believe that it cant simply be a yes or no answer much like the issue of slavery was not an easy question to answer. The issue of race is never an easy topic to bring up even today, which is sad because I believe that Reconstruction wasn’t a race issue but it was rather an issue of change coming to quickly for the South’s liking. This is one of those situations that we have to look back on and see how we can prevent this from ever happening again in history.
The period immediately following the American Civil War, known as “Reconstruction”, is a very controversial and thoroughly-studied topic, even today, and debates still rage as to whether it was a success or a failure. And that argument can continue all day, as the answer is very difficult to ascertain, mostly because the definitions of “success” and “failure” are not particularly clean-cut in this regards. Did Reconstruction really accomplish the things that those who engineered it set out to accomplish? On the whole, not really. Even the 14th and 15th Amendments, which were supposed to level the playing field, both socially and politically, for African-Americans were generally unsuccessful (the fact that the 15th Amendment had to be passed is evidence of that, as it essentially restates and reinforces portions of the 14th). However, Reconstruction did set the stage for later generations to work with many years down the line. Could the Civil Rights Movement of the 1960s have taken place had the events of Reconstruction not occurred? While that is an admittedly rather large “what if?”, it does add validity to Reconstruction. Yes, Mississippi may not have ratified the 13th Amendment until 1995. But the fact that that amendment, and its successors, even exist is a testament to the political and social reform that occurred directly after the bloodiest war in American history. And while it did take a century for the dream that the Reconstructionists had to be fully realized, or more realized than it was by the end of the 19th century, it could have taken much longer, and I argue that it would have had the events of Reconstruction not occurred. So while Reconstruction may not have actually accomplished all that it was meant to within the time it was supposed to, and while the Ku Klux Klan may have come about as a direct response to it, and while the governments that arose in the South because of it may have been incredibly corrupt and ineffectual, it did lay the groundwork that America would need to truly fulfill the words that Thomas Jefferson had immortalized in the Declaration of Independence a century prior.
I believe that Reconstruction in the south failed. However to address my point I must point out what I understood to be the two main goals of reconstruction; to secure the rights and freedoms of the recently freed blacks, and to bring an end to the Confederate rebellion. Reconstruction immediately began a downhill fall when Presidents Lincoln and Johnson let the Confederate leaders walk off with a pardon, allowing most of them to rejoin southern politics. To let it sink in, Alexander Stephens, the former “vice-president” of the Confederacy, was allowed to rejoin congress in 1873, and even become governor of Georgia in 1882. This allowed anti-black sentiment to flourish in the south, as one of the Confederacy’s main goals was to maintain the oppression of blacks in the form of slavery. This goal was still fresh in the minds of the ex-Confederate citizens, as they quickly changed the method of oppression to the “maintaining of white supremacy”. This directly interfered with Reconstruction’s first goal, the securing of the rights of the freedmen in the south. By passing state legislation such as the Black Codes, black people were forced into a system very similar to slavery, called shareholding. Shareholding was a system backed by debts and the vagrancy law. This law forced Black-Americans to work, because if they were without job for more than a week, they would be sent to jail, where farm-owners could “hire” them out to work on their lands against their will. Of course, many acts were passed that attempted to stop such practices, such as the many Civil Rights Acts and the 13th and 14th amendments. However, it was hard to enforce them in the South, as the military had limited usability and the police were either white supremacists or under the thumbs of the white supremacists. Therefore, as Reconstruction failed both of its intended goals, I believe it failed.
You can look at reconstruction as both a success and a failure, depending upon your viewpoint. If you view reconstruction as a time where the South was welcomed back into the United States and the union was restored, then it could be considered a success. If you view reconstruction as a just the act of returning to southern states, but not truly following through on the promise of making freedmen truly free, then it is a failure. I tend to fall on the latter side of the argument, because there were often scenarios where the newly freedmen were not able to be protected with the same rights as white people. When the compromise of 1877 was reached, and military intervention was removed from the South, they were free to pass any laws suppressing black people that they liked. That is where the infamous Jim Crow laws come into play. Even before this, sharecropping was a thinly veiled way to reinstall the slavery mindset in the South, by forcing the freedmen working on the white man’s land to be in perpetual debt. That prevented the former slaves from even having a chance of climbing up the socioeconomic ladder. There were still good things that came out of reconstruction. The Freeman’s Bureau, a group within the government designed to help blacks and poor whites, helped blacks vote without discrimination, create their own jobs that did not rely upon sharecropping, and even get involved in the politics. They also provided basic things, like food, clothing, and shelter. The overwhelming majority in the South determined to keep the blacks on the bottom of the social order out weighed the Freeman’s Bureau, however. In theory, reconstruction could have worked beautifully. But many people in the South did not want to change what had been established as their economy since the country was born. Reconstruction was poorly executed, which in my mind, results in it being a failure.
I personally don’t think Reconstruction is a pass/fail situation. I would give reconstruction a C-, passing, but barely. I would do this because it did do some things that were very influential and are still important today. For example the 14th and 15th amendment are still used as defenses in court today and are key in discussing complex issues such as immigration and national debt. But other than these two things, Reconstruction was a series of good ideas that no one followed through with. The plan to give Freedmen 40 acres of land and a mule? That sounds awesome except for the fact that most Freedmen either never received the land in question or the land they did received was not good for farming, this lead to a majority of Freedmen going into sharecropping, or how I think of it, slavery with a different name. So instead of being property, Freedmen were kept in a cycle of debt that was nearly impossible to get out of. In addition to this, there were still some difficulties in Representation. Yes, during Reconstruction, Freedmen were put into government but after Reconstruction it wouldn’t happen again for decades. Not to mention that some of the right’s promised in the fourteenth amendment, the right to vote mainly was halted by militia groups, like the KKK, who intimidated or assaulted Republicans and Freedmen to the point of preventing them from voting. Why does this deserve a C-? Because Reconstruction did accomplish good things. But it inadvertently left us with some bad things too. Not to say that attempt weren’t made. Many people did try and work for economic, political and social equality. So Reconstruction passes, barely and pitifully and I would probably talk to its parent’s about getting it some tutoring because its grades are slipping, but it still passes.
I believe the reconstruction can be looked at as a failure, although it did have some success. The problem is, the failures of the reconstruction out weigh the success tremendously. The only success of this period was the 14th and 15th amendment, which helped the newly freed african americans establish their equal rights. But even after these were passed, they still went entitled to most of their rights in places in the south. An example of this is every man’s right to vote. Many people disagreed that blacks should have this right and out of this rose violent groups such as the KKK. These Klans would go around carrying out disturbing acts threatening men not to register to vote. Many of these Klan members were involved with the southern state governments so the blacks had no protection from them. So, can we even call these amendments a success? Can something that lead to so much violence and even death have any light shed on it at all? Another thing that was promised to the freedmen was new land. This was a good thing right? Except for the fact that this new land was usually swampy and not suitable for their intended source of income, farming. Sometimes, these men were granted with land that used to belong to confederates, but when the confederates re-joined the union, the land was given back to them leaving the african americans in the dust. This lead many of them to go back and work for their old masters where they were treated even worse than they were before they were free as a punishment for leaving. Again, the landowners could get away with this cruelty because there was so much corruption in the government. Corruption was also in the north in many businesses. An example of this was Credit Mobilier. In this scandal, companies that sold railroad parts were buying the metals for cheap and selling them to the railroad companies at a high price. The transcontinental railroad was spending thousands of taxpayers money on these parts and so the country was getting ripped off by the companies that sold the parts. These companies got away with this for so long because some people in the federal government held stocks in the company and kept it on the hush hush. The reconstruction was an overall failure because even it’s small success lead to more failure.