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Established by Congress to help millions of former black slaves and poor whites in the South in the aftermath of the Civil War. The Freedmen’s Bureau provided food, housing and medical aid, established schools and offered legal assistance. It also attempted to settle former slaves on land confiscated or abandoned during the war. However, the bureau was prevented from fully carrying out its programs due to a shortage of funds and personnel, along with the politics of race and Reconstruction.
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Abolishes slavery in the United States.
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Southern states begin to create laws restricting the rights of the black population. Specifically creating harsh laws and sentences in order to justify the arrest of black men.
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A secret organization to intimidate African Americans and restore white rule is founded in Pulaski, Tennessee. It quickly becomes a terrorist organization intent on using violence and intimidation to try and control politics throughout the South.
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Awards citizenship to entire black population (remember: Dred Scott Case) and guarantees equal rights
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White civilians and police kill dozens of African Americans and destroy large swaths of churches, hospitals, and schoolhouses.
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Congress divides the former Confederacy into five military districts and requires elections in which African American men can vote.
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Founded by the Commissioner of the Freedmen's Bureau to foster the higher education of black Americans. Remains one of the strongest Historically Black Colleges and Universities (HBCU) to this day.
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US Senate fails, by one vote, to remove the president from office for abuse of office and attempts to disrupt the peaceful integration of the black populations in the south.
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Guarantees due process and equal protection under the law to all blacks in the country.
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The former Union general becomes the 18th president. He is far more progressive than Johnson, showing interest in supporting former slaves and suppressing the KKK.
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Tennessee is the first state to replace a bi-racial Republican state government with an all-white Democratic government, followed by Georgia, North Carolina, and Virginia in 1870. The Redeemers are Democratic Party affiliated, politically aggressive, states rightists, male white dominated alliance in the Southern U.S. (former Confederate States). They want to "redeem" the south from the stain of freedmen and northern influence.
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Authorized federal prosecutions, military intervention, and martial law to suppress terrorist activity.
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Hiram Revels of Mississippi elected to U. S. Senate as the first black senator.
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Extends the vote to all male citizens regardless of racer or previous condition of servitude.
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Five black members in the House of Representatives: Benjamin S. Turner of Alabama; Josiah T. Walls of Florida; and Robert Brown Elliot, Joseph H. Rainey and Robert Carlos DeLarge of South Carolina.
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Abruptly cut following decline in northern economy and motivation to continue pressuring the south.
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Debt and lost industry from the war finally catch up the US economy, starting a 6-year economic depression.
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For the first time since before the Civil War, Democrats control both houses of Congress.
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Supreme Court rules that the 14th Amendment does not extend voting rights to women. This ruling stays in place until 1920.
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Written "to protect all [black] citizens in their civil and legal rights", giving them equal treatment in public accommodations, public transportation, and to prohibit exclusion from jury service. These issues were ruled unconstitutional in 1883 and left alone until the Civil Rights acts of the 1950's and 60's.
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The election of Hampton, a leader in the Confederacy, confirms fears that the South is not committed to Reconstruction.
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Electoral Commission awards disputed electoral votes to the Republican candidate, who promises to remove federal troops stationed in the South, thus exposing the black population to violence, intimidation, and suppression by the resurgent white ruling class.
