The Reconstruction Era In Boyle's Ossian Sweet

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In conclusion, throughout Boyle’s book we get a glimpse of how the Reconstruction Era was a failure through the story of Ossian Sweet. Sweet worked diligently his entire life to get where he was, and he was on a path for quite a successful life. Unfortunately, the time period of the Reconstruction Era was catered towards white individuals and not people of color. Therefore, no matter how successful one is, the color of their skin will always cement them as the subordinate race, and we saw this with Ossian. Even though he won the case, his success didn’t matter anymore. The negative stigma towards him destroyed his life, and the only way he saw to escape it was to kill himself. No matter what people say, the Reconstruction Era was a failure.