Reconstruction of the United States

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party (now the democratic party). There is a clear separation between the two. The Democratic party dominated the bottom right half of American states on a map and the top right was devoted to the Republican party. There was absolutely no interaction between the two sides and the gap was coherently clear. Then another election map produced in 2012 shows a slightly similar situation where the same two main parties dominate the map but are still likely separated. This time, the top right and top left was all Democratic states (used to be republican) and the middle states was all Republican (formerly democratic). The division has shifted slightly but is still apparent within the political side of the U.S. It is more than clear that Reconstruction did not successfully heal the political division within America. Another big gap between the North and the South was their political views on slavery. Both sides were positively sure their opinions were correct and at the time, refused to accept the others. A piece of propaganda materialized within the South in 1868 that depicted two voters from each side. An elegantly dressed voter from the South was portrayed eloquently and professionally yet a voter from the North was portrayed ridiculously and rudely. Another piece of voting propaganda emerged from the North but this time, they portrayed both sides eloquently and professionally. There was no apparent bias within the North but the South refused to politically forfeit quietly. They did not believe in compromise and thus, the division still remained.

The U.S. government has, in numerous occasions, allowed the Caucasian race to find themselves on a superior level than colored people even though slavery was diminished and equality was supposedly promoted. This behaviorism of the population was one reason that African Americans couldn’t properly be incorporated into American society. Another reason was that African Americans and people of color weren’t given equal wage, fair working conditions and weren’t given the same opportunities as white people. In an excerpt from a Senate report (senate report 693, forty sixth congress, second session) conducted in 1880, it states, “We made two or three hundred gallons of molasses and only got to keep what we could eat. We made about eight-hundred bushels of potatoes; we got to keep what we could eat. We split rails for three or four weeks and got not a cent for that” Not only were they paid unfairly, these unfair wages made it hard for African Americans to gain a steady income and find a stable life within American Society. A photo taken in 1873 depicts a “Help Wanted; Whites only” sign. This shows that African Americans had a limited amount of opportunities to incorporate themselves into society and make a decent living compared to white people. If they were not treated equally within society, how did the government expect for African Americans to be smoothly incorporated into it? A statistic given by the Department of Housing and Urban Development (2010) shows that these limited opportunities and restricted income led to the highest poverty and homelessness rates belonging to African Americans. Africans Americans weren’t treated equally socially and financially which led to difficulty arising when incorporating them into society.

Southern economy post-civil war was carried on the backs of slaves shoulders. When slavery was abolished, southern economy and infrastructure fell with it. It was up to the North and the Reconstruction era to rebuild both and return the South to its former glory without the use of slavery or slave labor. “In 1865 and 1866, new southern state legislatures passed restrictive “black codes” to control the labor and behavior of former slaves and other African Americans” (history.com). The government didn’t rely on slaves to do their labor but they did try to control their actions and where they worked. Although slavery was abolished, rich white Southern families found prisoner labor to be a loophole to work slavery under the law. These families leased convicts as a punishment and since they had no obligation to treat them right, they treated them worse than they ever could if these convicts were slaves. “Mines and plantations that used convict laborers commonly had secret graveyards containing prisoners who had been beaten and/or tortured to death” (DigitalHistory.com, Convict Leasing). These families used prison labor as a substitute for slave labor. “During Reconstruction, however, the conflict over labor resulted in the sharecropping system, in which black families would rent small plots of land in return for a portion of their crop, to be given to the landowner at the end of each year.” (history.com). Sharecropping was also another way to permit inhumane work habits under jurisdiction of law. The families that rented land were forced to sign contracts that controlled how much they worked and made from the land. These contracts limited the amount of crops these African American families were allowed to keep from their land, when and how long they were supposed to work and how much they made. Sharecropping bore a resemblance to slavery but instead, it had very little pay and less abuse.

One of the government’s promises to African Americans were to protect their civil rights and never allow them back into slavery. They did follow through on this by permitting a law banning slavery. “Neither slavery nor involuntary servitude except as punishment for crime whereof the party shall have been duly convicted, shall exist in the United States, or and place subject to their jurisdiction” It’s apparent that the government followed through on their promise of outlawing slavery for all people and proved to protect their civil rights. Well not all people, clearly. This law fabricated a loophole for slavery to transpire but within jurisdiction of court. In the section of that statement it says “ except as punishment for crime whereof the party shall have been duly convicted”. Although this law does not address African Americans specifically for the party being subjected to this punishment, there was a study from DigitalHistory.com (Convict Leasing) that stated, “Mines and plantations that used convict laborers commonly had secret graveyards containing prisoners who had been beaten and/or tortured to death”. Instead of using slaves as a source of revenue, southern families could now use prisoners and it was completely legal. They had no obligation to treat these prisoners appropriately since no government facilitator was appointed to oversee their well-being and they had nothing at stake. Even though there was no proof each prisoner picked for convict leasing was primarily African American, at least 25% of leased African American prisoners died (digitalhistory.com). The government allowed slavery to thrive underneath the jurisdiction