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Crash Course 22 - Reconstruction

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hi I'm John Green this is Crash Course u.s. history and his hit me up dangerous crash course so when you say don't aim at a person that includes myself roller coaster only goes up from here my friends epic failure of reconstruction right stupid reconstruction always ruining everything so after the Civil War ended the United States had to reintegrate vote they formerly slave population play formerly rebellious population back into the country which is a challenge that we might have met except Abraham Lincoln was assassinated and we were left with Andrew I am the third worst president ever Johnson I'm sorry but you don't get to be in the show anymore and Reconciliation never had a right to secede in the first place so because he was himself a southerner who had he was also a racist turn black should have any role in reconstruction between 1865 and 1867 the so-called. Of presidential reconstruction Allstate conventions to establish New all-white governments and in their 100% whiteness and depression and former slaves those new government's look suspiciously like the old can current government stated replace and what was changing for the former slaves will in some ways a lot like Fisk and Howard University's were established as well as many primary and secondary schools thanks and what did the Freedmen's Bureau which only lasted until 1870 but had the power to divide up confiscated and abandoned Confederate land for former slaves is land ownership with the key to freedom and many felt like they've been Promised Land by the Union Army like General Sherman's field order 15 promise to distribute land in 40-acre plots to for slave but that didn't happen either through the Freedmen's Bureau or anywhere else instead President Johnson ordered all land return to its former owners so the South remained largely agricultural the same people owning the same land and in the end we ended up with sharecropping let's go to the South light housing to the sharecroppers no thought bubble not quite that nice very ago also tools and seed and then the sharecroppers received get this a share of crop usually between a third and a half with the price for that Harvest often said by the landowner free blacks got to control their work and plantation owners got a steady Workforce. easily leave because they had little opportunity to save money and make the big Capital investments in like land or tools by the late 1860's poor white farmers were sharecropping as how in fact by the Great Depression most sharecroppers were white and we'll share cropping certainly wasn't slavery in did result in a quasi serfdom that tied workers tool and they own more less the opposite of Jefferson's ideal of the small independent farmers South so they took the lead in reconstruction after 1867 Republican wanted to see the powers of the national government what was Thaddeus Tommy Lee Jones Stephens who wanted to take away land from the southern Planters and give it to the former slave rank-and-file Republicans were Radical enough to pass the Civil Rights bill Define persons born in the United States as Citizens and establish Nationwide equality before the law regardless of race African Americans amounted to discrimination against white people which so infuriated Republicans that Congress did something it had never done before in all of American History they over row presidential veto with a two-thirds majority in the Civil Rights Act became law to Amendment guarantees equal protection and extends the rights in the Bill of Rights to all the states sort of had almost no Democratic support but it also didn't need any because there were almost no Democrats in it's on account of how Congress refuse to seat the representatives from the New all-white governments that Johnson supported and that's how we got the 14th Amendment arguably the most important in the whole Khan to ship  the rules here are simple I guess the author the mystery document in try not to get shocked Manitou we got today Section 1 be ordained by the police jury of the Parish of St Landry that no negro shall be allowed to pass within limits of said Parish without special permit in waiting from his employer section for every negro is required to be in the regular service of some white person or former owner who shall be held responsible for the conduct of negro section 6 no negro shall be permitted to preach exhorter otherwise declaim to congregations of colored people without a special permission in writing from the pic of the police jury please stand I wonder if the president of the police jury was white I actually know this one it is a black code which was basically legal codes when they just replace the word slave the word negro unwilling white governments were to ensure the rights of new free citizens I would celebrate not getting shocked but now I am depressed again over Johnson's veto Congress passed the Reconstruction Act which divided the South into 5 military districts and required each state to create a new government one that included for creation of black men who had to ratify the 14th Amendment if they wanted to get back into the Union radical reconstruction had begun people in the USS Jefferson Davis in Twin instead the 1868 election was won by Republican and former Union General Ulysses S Grant play was small enough that Republicans were like man we would sure win more elections of black people could vote which is something you here in public and say all the time these days so professional Republicans push through the 15th Amendment which give me the States from denying men the right to vote based on race but not based on gender or literacy or whether your grandfather could vote ended up with a lot of leeway when it came to find the franchise to African-Americans which of course they did so who can vote and who is and isn't a citizen of a state and establishing equality under the even local walls and this is a really big deal in American history because the national government became rather than a threat to individual liberty the custodian of freedom I'm as radical republican Charles Sumner put it integrate streetcars by voting in elections and by holding off again Americans were Republicans at the time then because they can vote and where a large part of the population the Republican Party came to how many politics in the South just like today except totally different know something mythology about the age of radical reconstruction is exemplified by Gone With the Wind which of course tells the story of Northern Republican Clinton corruption by Southern Republicans seeking Northern Carpetbaggers seen here as well as Southern turncoat scalawags dominated politics and all of the African-American elected leaders they're corrupt or puppets or both yeah well like the rest of Gone With the Wind that's a bit of an oversimplification they were about 2,000 African Americans who held office during Reconstruction and the majority of them we're not corrupt and amazingly named Pinckney BS pin from 1872 to 1873 play in Louisiana is America's first black governor and went on to be a senator and a member of the House of Representatives by the way America second African-American Governor Douglas Wilder of Virginia was elected in 1989 American office holders was a huge step forward in terms of ensuring the rights of African-Americans because it meant that there would be black Jeremy's unless discrimination state and local governments when it came to providing basic services in the end Republican governments failed in the South there were important Achievement System that while segregated time to educate both black and white chill I'm gone through one of the most remarkable changes in our relations to each other that has been known perhaps in the history of the world that's a little hyperbolic but we are America after all it's for the corruption was widespread but it wasn't the north to I mean we're talking about governments and that's not why reconstruction really ended send it because one things like schools and Road repair cost money which meant taxes which made Republican governments very unpopular because Americans hate taxes and to white Southerners could not accept African Americans exercising basic civil rights holding office or vote and for many the best way to return things to the way they were before reconstruction was through violence 1867 much of the violence directed toward African-Americans in the South was politically motivated the Ku Klux Klan was founded in 1866 play quickly became a terrorist organization targeting Republicans both black and white beating and murdering men and women in order to intimidate them and keep them from voting worst act of violence was Wendy massacre at Colfax Louisiana where hundreds of former slaves were murdered between intimidation and emerging discriminatory voting laws you were black men voted which allowed White Democrats to take control of state governments in the South and return white Democratic Congressional delegations to Washington these white Southern politicians called themselves redeemers because they claim to redeemed the south from northern Republican corruption and black roof would have fallen back into Democratic and eventually but the process was aided by Northern Republicans interest in reconstruction 1873 the stomach to fight for the rights of black people in the south to being hard with expensive to buy 1876 the supporters of reconstruction were in full Retreat and the Democrats were resurgent especially in the South and this setup one most contentious elections in American history Democrats and NYU Law School graduate Samuel the Republicans chose College alumnus Rutherford B Hayes one man who's going to crash course writers while school and another who'd gone to my college can you know if it been based on facial hair is election should be there would have been no controversy but sadly we have an electoral college here in the United States and in 1876 they were disputed electoral votes in South Carolina Louisiana and of course Florida situations there is a constitutional provision that says Congress should decide the winner but Congress shockingly proved unable to accomplish show me a pointer 215 man electoral commission a super committee if you will and they were eight Republicans on that committee and seven Democrats so you will never guess who won Canyon colleges Rutherford B Hayes Lords & Ladies received control of the South to the Democrats and to stop meddling in southern Affairs and also to build a transcontinental railroad through Texas to bargain of 1877 because trains are so good at naming things and it basically killed Reconstruction without any more federal troops in southern states and weed control them Southern legislatures firmly in the hands of white Democrats the states were free to back to restricting the freedom of black people which they did legislators passed Jim Crow laws that limited African Americans access to public accommodations and legal protection States passed laws that took away black people's right to vote in Social and economic Mobility among African-Americans in the South declined precipitously however for a brief moment the United States was more democratic than ever been before and an entire segment of the population that had no impact on politics before was now allowed to participate and for the freedmen who lived through it that was a me a mental change and it would echo down to the civil rights movement in the 1950s and 1960s sometimes called the second reconstruction end this episode on a downer as we are want to do here crash course u.s. history because I want to point out a lesser-known legacy of reconstruction the Reconstruction amendments and laws that were passed granted former slaves political freedom and rights especially the vote and is credit what you give them what they really wanted and needed plots of land that would make them economically independent would have required confiscation and that violation of property rights was to watch for all but the most radical republican and that question of what it really means to be free in a system of free market capitalism has proven very complicated indeed I'll see you next crash cars produced and directed by Stan Miller our script supervisor is Mary the danco the associate producer is Danica Johnson the show was written by my high school history teacher role Meyer and myself and our Graphics team is thought every week There's a new captain for the Liberties you can suggest those in comments where you can also ask questions about today's video that will be answered by our team with historians thank you for watching crash course don't forget to subscribe in his stay in my hometown don't forget to be awesome

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Crash Course 22 - Reconstruction

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