African American Pros And Cons

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In 1856, a free black barber named James Rapier had four children who were freeborn and told to flee due the the increasingly repressive and dangerous nature that the South had been conforming to. One of his 4 sons chose Canada, where he would study Latin and Greek and said in a letter back to his father that he will “Endeavor to do my part in solving the problems [of African-Americans] in my native land” (P. 418, First Paragraph). The union victory finally gave James the opportunity to redeem his pledge where he had the first gathering of former slaves in the state. Even with this happening, the Alabama whites were finding it hard to accept the defeat and the black freedom. During the elections of 1868, while Rapier and other African American representatives pushed hard for the Republicans, the newly formed Ku-Klux-Klan got over 150 enraged …show more content…

Even though I didn’t touch on everything there is some things that I believe are still very important like the legalization of slave unions. Even though slaves didn’t have any rights and weren’t free, I believe that they still should have been seen as humans and not work horses and lack thereof. I believe is was a very pivotal move for the States to recognize the African American marriages. It’s good to be able to see that the blacks and whites were able to see a problem with the lack of recognized marriages within their unions. Another thing that I did not touch on, but is very important was getting rid of the Black Codes. Black Codes were honestly outrageous, even for the time period. Why would anybody want to restrict a certain group or culture to slave labor for low wages and debt, and deny them their rights that everybody should have? That is completely ridiculous. Luckily, the Civil Rights Act of 1866 was able to give the freedmen full legal equality, although they still didn’t have the rights to

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