Ulysses Grant fought in many bloody historic battles but could not stand the sight of blood. Ulysses Grant was the 18th president of the United States and he made our country a strong powerful nation. He was a commanding general and he led the Union army to victory in the American civil war. He helped revolutionize America and gain rights for blacks by helping to create the 15th amendment. Our country thought that he really helped end all the inequality in our country and make a stronger nation. Ulysses Grant helped the passage of the 15th amendment which led to African American voting rights, everyone being more equal, slaves gathering and electing leaders to represent them, and African American freedom. Ulysses Grant helped African Americans …show more content…
gain protection to voting rights. America did not give some races like blacks a chance to vote or have an opinion in elections of presidents or many other government ideas. According to Brian Frosh the Voting Right Act created and prevented governments from creating any voting laws against races (Frosh). So now that this vote was created the governments could not prevent any races from having a say or a vote in any of the elections. The blacks felt very left out and felt it was unfair with all the racial injustice in America. According to Brian Frosh “Today is a triumph for freedom as a huge as any victory that has ever been won on any battlefield. Yet to seize the meaning of this day, we must recall darker times… This Act flows from a clear and simple wrong. Its only purpose is to right that wrong. Millions of Americans are denied the right to vote. This law will ensure them the right to vote” (Frosh). So the blacks had gained power at least it felt like they gained power because now they could vote just like the whites in America and their opinion will be recognized. Even in the states that would allow blacks to vote, blacks still had to take literacy tests and other types of tests and pass in order for them to vote. According to the article “Voting Rights Act” the act put an end to literacy tests and similar devices being used against blacks in the south (Frosh). So now the blacks had a free rain into voting and their opinion could be counted anywhere in America without passing any tests. Ulysses Grant assisted the passing of the 15th amendment which helped give protection to African American voting rights. The passing of the 15th amendment aided by Ulysses Grant created more equality among races in America. The races started to gain the same rights as white or black. According to John Buescher no state can deny anyone of their rights of life, liberty, and property (Buescher). Now it was not just whites who had those 3 main rights the blacks gained those rights as well and they became a more equal society with whites. The whites did not only have those 3 rights now but they also could now vote and be apart of the voting process. According to John Buescher any citizen could now vote no matter what race. So the blacks gained another right to gain equality and move towards the whites in power (Buescher). The nation was turning into an equal nation with the same amount of power as the whites. According to the article “Equality in African-American Politics” “While the Declaration of Independence proclaimed equality, the Constitution did not, and it was not until after the Civil War and the adoption of the Fifteenth Amendment that the Constitution was amended to formally commit the nation to equality” (Equality in African-American Politics). In other words the nation was shifting from a white dominance society to an equal society where the whites were not as dominant anymore and the blacks gained rights. The 15th amendment helped gain equality in power, politics, and identification between the whites and blacks. The 15th amendment helped the African American slaves gather their own leaders to represent them.
The south started to allow blacks to be elected into government and allow them to elect their own leaders. According to the video “The Failure of Reconstruction”, the southern states started to elect blacks for governor and many other positions in the government and gave blacks more freedom (Failure of Reconstruction). Now the blacks could become governors and that opened the door for their opinion and their choices on their representatives in the office. Blacks should deserve the right to be elected and have a say in decisions for their country. According to the article “Equality in African American Politics”, “In African-American politics blacks should be entitled to certain opportunities such as representation in Congress or access to employment as a group rather than as individuals.” In other words blacks should be treated exactly like whites and now they have been given the right to be represented in the government office. The South started to give more rights to blacks and more freedom. According to the video “The Failure of Reconstruction”, the struggle between North and South shifted from the battlefield to the political ground. As a result the South started to change their government and give the rights blacks deserve to be represented and accounted for in political government. The blacks had a choice on who would represent them and a lot more freedom than they originally
had. The passing of the 15th amendment was the beginning of African American freedom. It lead to the freedom of voting and their opinion being recognized. According to the book Constitutional Amendments, “The Act focused on 7 southern states (Alabama, Georgia, Louisiana, Mississippi, North Carolina, South Carolina, and Virginia) and outlawed restrictive voting requirements that denied the right of a U. S. citizen to vote because of race, color, or membership (Pendergast et al 313). Therefore the blacks now had and freedom to vote and have a say in government decisions. Many organizations tried to help form more freedom for blacks by creating protests. According to article “Voting Rights Struggle”, “The National Association for the Advancement of Colored People, various black individuals, and other civil rights organizations continued to work through the political and judicial systems to overturn the legal obstacles, and some progress was made including the outlawing of grandfather clauses (1915) and the white primary (1944)” (Voting Rights Struggle). As a result they created an association that created two clauses that helped change the laws and give more freedom to blacks. The blacks gained lots of rights and freedom after the 15th amendment. According to the article “Voting Rights Struggle”, the blacks gained the right of freedom of speech, freedom of press, and freedom of assembly (Voting Rights Struggle). The blacks gained the right to say whatever they want and speak their minds in their country as freedom granted it to them. All in all the blacks gained lots of freedom and became a noticed race in America. Works Cited Buescher, John. "Voting Rights and the 14th Amendment." Teaching History. Roy-Rosenzweig Center, n.d. Web. 22 Sept. 2015. "Equality in African-American Politics." African-American History Online. Facts on File, 2014. Web. 5 Oct. 2015. Frosh, Brian E. "Voting Rights Act." Maryland Office of the Attorney General Civil Rights Division, 6 Aug. 2015. Web. 21 Sep. 2015. Pendergast Tom, Sara Pendergast, John Sousanis. Constitutional Amendments. Detroit: Thomas L. Romig. 2001. Print. The Failure of Reconstruction. History. A+E Networks, n.d. Web. 28 Sept. 2015. "Voting Rights Struggle." African-American History Online [Facts On File News Services]. Facts on File, 2000. Web. 28 Sept. 2015.
“Those who do not learn history are doomed to repeat it.” George Santayana stated what happens if we do not learn from our past. After the Civil War the United States wanted to build itself back up. The nation was in rubble because half of the country was fighting the other. That left it in a sad and fallen state. The issue of slavery was a long debated topic. They thought they could get over this and start anew. Reconstruction means the actions or process of rebuilding what has been damaged or destroyed. Did the North or the South kill Reconstruction? That issue is still up for debate. In my opinion, the South killed Reconstruction and stopped it dead in its tracks. The South did not respect the African American’s right to vote and would terrorize
Groups of people soon received new rights. Congress passed the Civil Rights Act. It gave black Americans full citizenship and guaranteed them equal treatment. Also, it passed the Fourteenth Amendment to make sure that the Supreme Court couldn’t declare the Civil Rights Act unconstitutional. The amendment made blacks citizens of the United States and the states in which they lived. Also, states were forbidden to deprive blacks of life, liberty, or property without due process. Additionally, blacks could not be discriminated by the law. If a state would deprive blacks of their rights as citizens, it’s number of congressional representatives would be reduced. The Civil Rights Act as well as the Fourteenth Amendment affected both the North and the South.
The radical reconstruction tried to bring the south to submission while protecting blacks. This brought forward the 14th amendment which stated that all citizens born or naturalized in the U.S. are citizens of the United States. Then came along the 15th amendment was passed that stated that black m...
The Great Compromise gave equal representation in the government for all states meaning that the South has gain back the power they had lost after, the Civil War. The Great Compromise was used to bridge the gap between the South and the North and to restore the South back to it’s former “glory”. Although, this compromise was suppose to benefit the country as a whole it oppressed the newly granted rights the African American population has acquired. After, the Great Compromise the African Americans were being discriminated against and attacked because of their former role in society. The white population majority of them being in the South did not accept the African Americans as equals and citizens of the same country.With the whites back in control of the government many of these Southern states started to segregate the public and private institutions claiming that they do not want to be around an inferior race.Which, lead to hate groups forming against the African Americans came around such as the Ku Klux Klan that struck terror in African Americans. The result of these actions taken against African Americans caused them to limit the use of their rights as citizens; the power to
The second phase of the Civil War was a victory for the south, for their political ideas of former slave owners stayed far after the war. The south was dependent on slave labor and with the slave population now free they had to forcibly change tactics to control this population. Southern whites used legal, political, and violent means to whip the black population into submission. Laws like the black codes were in the south to restrict the black population from becoming a strong community. Common practices like sharecropping crippled the black community’s only field in which they had experience in. Violence from southern whites increased the fear stricken society and crippled their potential for any civil liberties.
First off there was the Ku Klux Klan better known as the KKK. This was a group of people who wore robes and masks. They pretended to be the ghosts of confederate soldiers. These people were scared of changes and the rising rights of African Americans. This was also in the north not just the south. Poverty was a big thing after reconstruction. It was a problem before reconstruction but it got bigger after. Poverty was a global issue in the south where a lot of white southerners had lost their land. This caused them to be trapped in a little poverty cycle. African Americans had little job
“Although political violence continued in the South…the tide of public opinion in the North began to turn against Reconstruction policies.” Some may think this meant the North was killing Reconstruction but the North can’t help the South if they’re going to keep rebelling and trying to take over. They can’t help people who don’t want to be helped. “In the fall of 1873, even the staunchly [firmly] pro-Grant and pro-freedman Boston Evening Transcript ran a letter…arguing that “the blacks, as a people, are unfitted for the proper exercise of political duties.” In the North’s defense, this was kind of true, since most blacks were uneducated and the Black Codes prevented them from many rights which were needed as politicians. Like the right of assembly. My thesis is correct. Though the North did have some actions that may have impacted Reconstruction in a negative way, most of them were for a reason and made sense.
The governments established under Congressional Reconstruction made notable and lasting achievements. One positive outcome that resulted was the Civil Rights Act of 1866, which extended citizenship to African Americans and listed certain rights of all citizens such as the right to own property, bring lawsuits, and testify in court. Another major outcome was the Fifteenth Amendment, which prohibited the states from denying the right to vote because of a person’s race or because a person had been a slave. This finally granted African Americans the right to vote and marked an important change in the history of our country. A negative outcome resulted politically from congressional Reconstruction. Many of the federal laws concerning reconstruction led to the strengthening of the federal government at the expense of the states. These new laws often placed significant restrictions on state actions on the ground that the rights of national citizenship took precedence over the powers of state governments leading to an increase in sectional bitterness, an intensification of the racial issue, and the development of one-party politics in the South. Stemming from this “infringement” of states’ rights and intensified by the election of 1868 was another negative outcome. Fierce activities were stirred up by groups such as the KKK- violence became prominent, and terrorists and mobs attacked many people- mostly Republicans and blacks.
During the time of reconstruction, the 13th amendment abolished slavery. As the Nation was attempting to pick up their broken pieces and mend the brokenness of the states, former slaves were getting the opportunity to start their new, free lives. This however, created tension between the Northerners and the Southerners once again. The Southerners hated the fact that their slaves were being freed and did not belong to them anymore. The plantations were suffering without the slaves laboring and the owners were running out of solutions. This created tension between the Southern planation owners and the now freed African Americans. There were many laws throughout the North and the South that were made purposely to discriminate the African Americans.
... This came in the form of segregation, the denial of land and jobs to blacks, as well as poll taxes and literacy tests to prevent blacks from voting. In the end, Reconstruction held such promise for a truly equal south, but the actions taken by President Johnson and the eventual lack of northern support left the fledgling Reconstruction governments to fend for themselves in a sea of hostile extremists and angered southerners. This failure is the direct cause of the race issues such as segregation and profiling, which still arise even today in the 21st century.
Reconstruction was intended to give African-Americans the chance for a new and better life. Many of them stayed with their old masters after being freed, while others left in search of opportunity through education as well as land ownership. However this was not exactly an easy task. There were many things standing in their way, chiefly white supremacists and the laws and restrictions they placed upon African-Americans. Beginning with the 'black codes' established by President Johnson's reconstruction plan, blacks were required to have a curfew as well as carry identification. Labor contracts established under Johnson's Reconstruction even bound the 'freedmen' to their respective plantations. A few years later, another set of laws known as the 'Jim Crow' laws directly undermined the status of blacks by placing unfair restrictions on everything from voting rights all the way to the segregation of water fountains. Besides these restrictions, the blacks had to deal with the Democratic Party whose northern wing even denounced racial equality. As a result of democratic hostility and the Republican Party's support of Black suffrage, freedmen greatly supported the Republican Party.
Even though Blacks were granted independence, laws were set up to limit this accomplishment. Jim Crow Laws, enforced in 1877 in the south, were still being imposed during the 1930s and throughout. These laws created segregation between the two races and created a barrier for the Blacks. For example, even though African Americans were allowed to vote, southern states created a literary test exclusively for them that was quite difficult to pass, since most Blacks were uneducated. However, if they passed the reading test, they were threatened death. Also, they had to pay a special tax to vote, which many African Americans could not afford. This obstacle caused Blacks to not have a voice in the USA’s political decisions. Furthermore, they were left with the worst jobs in town and had the poorest schools because of segregation (The Change in Attitudes…). In the southern states, compared to White schooling education, the Blacks received one-third of school funding. The White people dominated the states and local government with their decisions and made sure that the Blacks were weak. They weren’t being treated in hospitals because the doctors refused to do treatment on them. Also, because of the laws and segregation, people claim that there was a ‘visible colored line’ in publi...
One of the greatest Civil War commanders, but Ulysses S. grant didn’t start out as a hero in the Civil War. He started out like any man, a child. He ended the same way all men do too. As a Civil War hero, his life was interesting before, during, and after the line of duty.
After the Civil War was over and the Reconstruction-era began, changes were made such as the 13th amendment in 1865, which forbid slavery in the United States. Even though slavery was now prohibited, freed blacks were now left alone to struggle finding simple things like a roof to live in and a job to work for. Meanwhile, President Abraham Lincoln wanted to give the south humane conditions for them to be accepted back into the union and also wanted to give African Americans and former soldiers the right to vote, but that wasn’t very successful when put into the hands of Congress. Soon after Lincoln was killed in 1865, President Andrew Johnson came into presidency and changed the conditions giving African Americans a harder time adapting to their new lives as freedmen. Furthermore, the south became very violent against the blacks and came up with black codes, which put freed blacks as closely as possible back into a slave state. These black codes prohibited interracial marriages, the ownership of guns or liquor, congregation in large groups and had curfews for these freedmen. Furthermore, these black codes forced the freedmen to sign annual work contracts that were offensive and offered only in the agricultural f...
Tragically, however, very few of these goals were achieved. It seems as if every time the African Americans manage to move one step closer to reaching true equality among the Southern whites, whether it be in a social, political, or economic fashion, the whites always react by committing violent acts against them. Initially, the Southern whites (in fear of black supremacy in Southern politics) fought to preserve the white supremacy Southern politics had always functioned by. This “ushered most African Americans to the margins of the southern political world” (Brinkley, 369). Secondly, African Americans struggled to survive once they were set free; they had nowhere to live and nothing to eat. Because of such reasons, most former slaves decided to remain living on their plantations as tenants, paying their tenancy by working the crop fields. Sadly, even this failed for the African Americans due to the birth of the crop-lien system. Lastly, the Southern whites counteracted the effects of the fourteenth and fifteenth amendments by establishing the Jim Crow laws, which aided them with upholding, if not increasing, the steady level of segregation in the South. Ultimately, out of the very few accomplishments made by the African American population during and following the Era of Reconstruction, there existed one achievement significant enough to change the course of American history: the fourteenth and fifteenth amendments. As a result of these amendments, “would one day serve as the basis for a “Second Reconstruction” that would renew the drive to bring freedom to all Americans” (Brinkley,