Failure Of Reconstruction Essay

“The very manner of their emancipation invited to the heads of freedmen the bitterest hostility of race and class.” (Douglas, 1881) Although historians differ on the success or failure of reconstruction, one cannot disagree that changes were made in areas of social, political, and economic structures of American society. Social, political, and economic segregation examples can be seen through United States documents. During reconstruction, political changes accompanied the abolition of slavery. One of the ways that political changes came about is through the addition of voting rights through the fourteenth and fifteenth amendment. The fourteenth amendment defines citizenship as “life, liberty, or property, without due process of law;.” (14th Amendment 1868) Although, voting rights came through

“With iron, coal, timber contiguous {adjoining} and easily obtained, the amount sent out is certain to increase as the labor becomes more skillful.” (Warner, 1887) The south transformed from an agrarian agriculture to business and more industry, through the process of reconstruction. The south is now considered the ‘New Industrial South’ as they were not only devoted to agriculture and politics, but buisness. The new wide awakened south was excited to explore and develop their own immense resources. Equally important, slaves went from the occupation of slaves to the occupation of tenant farmers. Although their job was important, they were still living on the same Barrow Family plantation. Additionally, white plantation owners found a way to keep freed black men as close to the occupation of slaves as possible by sharecropping. They used sharecropping as a way to hold them in debt, as well as having them pay rent and buy goods off of them. Freedmen were limited in their freedom in that they may have had there own house, church, or school, but they were still tied to work on