The Success of the Elite White South

During the 12 year period aft(prenominal)ward the Civil warfare (1865-1877) four main(prenominal) groups of raft, s turn upherly Whites, Recently Freed dispiriteds, blue Democrats, and Northern Republicans, were each(prenominal) competing to rebuild the war destroy entropy to their advantage or ideals, sleek over it was the Southern Whites whose needs were most wellhead met.Because the freedmen were n forever wee-ween societal equality, development, course of instruction of economic success, or full battle in government operations the orchard stimulateers of the south were adapted to bring some conditions afterward the civil war which were non far from those of the prewar, with the gaberdineneds swearling the laws and the m onenessy and the filthys perform all of the labor needed to furnish an agrarian economy. After the Civil War m each Negroes though they would soon be entit take to n archaeozoic full, if not complete, social equality because of congr essional action such as the formation of the freed firearms bureau and the fling of the civil ripe(p)s act.However, they soon learned that the Southern dusters were not about to let this happen, and that blacks would be kept in the inferior postal service they had known for the hundreds of years that preceded the war. Soon after the war most Southern states wrote into the books intelligence operation laws pertaining to Negroes called the Black Codes. These laws, which were frequently identical to prewar laws save the record slave was replaced with the word freedman, limited close either conceivable right of the black man. They were denied the efficacy to congregate in groups, stay at certain motels or inns, and eat at umpteen restaurants.They were required to carry particular passes and apt(p) a curfew. Because the white South was so opposed to black equality, any law passed to grant Negroes rights were either or ignored, or were bypassed using certain loopholes. cop ulation could do almost nothing to chit these maltreatments from happening. In 1875 they did pass the Civil Rights Act, plainly poor people enforcement and a Supreme administration ruling 8 years subsequently led the bill practically shadowy to the blacks. All in all white resistance and government control led to almost no integration of blacks into white society.Lack of good education for blacks was another(prenominal) important factor that prevented them from achieving any place higher than servant after the war. Although blacks schools were rig up from primary to college, they were sparsely funded and almost completely segregated, leaving the blacks with either no education or a real poor one. Congress did make attempts at, and result in, creating state funded schools in the South, they accommodateed them to be segregated, which permitted the whites to control which race got what kind of education.Their prejudices of course pointed them in the direction of inferior educ ation for blacks. Black schools were almost always poorly funded and inadequately staffed. The teachers at these schools, usually Northern whites, were often condition such a noble social stigma that they were forced to conduct the South, and teaching there, completely. They were ostracized by the whites, and often defeat or tarred and feathered by the Ku Klux Klan. virtually states attempted to integrate state colleges, or create all black colleges, entirely when these ventures met with little success.In Arkansas, for example, the state college was state open to all races, just now entirely one black person registered and he was taught privately off campus. non tho did the prospect of segregation allow for poor black education, moreover it also caused their demoralization. or so a hundred years later when the Supreme Court finally command segregation unconstitutional, one of the strongest arguments was that separating the blacks from the whites caused a enceinte fe eling of self hatred and inferiority among the blacks.Had the blacks not faced these practical and mental barriers, they would have been far more(prenominal) probably to cont destination with white southerners in the bank line market. One of the most important things denied blacks during reconstructive memory was the means to make a backing either of subsistence farming or in jobs requiring sure-handed labor. Early on in the civil war there were rumors of a post-war consume redistri scarceion which would gives blacks the means to start farms of their own, but these rumors predicted a much greater cultivate over of land than was rattling seen.At first it seemed as if they might be true however. Upon capturing the sea islands south of Charleston, global Sherman gave the 485,000 acres to 40,000 black families to run. These blacks believed they had been given efficacious ownership of the land, and worked it profitably for over 4 years until the original white owners stepped in and demanded, and were granted, their old deeds back. Other plans were initiated to give poor blacks more land, but few of them me with success.In some states thousands of acres were acquired by dint of either purchase, taxation (States taxed land highly if one person owned more than a certain amount. This required many large land owners to give up some, but not all of their land. ), or confiscation, but when attempts were made to sell this land off at low prices, it was collapseed up mostly by speculators or people with close ties to the government looking for a summer home. Fewer than 40,000 acres were ever actually given to poor blacks.Not only were blacks kept out of subsistence farming, but they were also removed from almost all forms of skilled labor. The black codes imposed harsh restrictions on what jobs blacks could do, so that even if they did pick up a trade, either by means of schooling or from previous pick up on the plantation, they could not use it. The whites did allow them to enter the skilled workforce, but only through apprenticeships under white master which were almost no better than slaveholding. Apprentices were not allowed to leave their maters, and could be whipped if the masters deemed it necessary.With the end of efforts to get the black man his own land and the inability for him to enter the skilled work force the black man was destined to a life of obsequiousness to the whites. After reconstruction the only picking left to most of the blacks was a governing body of sharecropping which was practically identical to slaveholding. And just as demoralizing. All of these restrictions could easily have been bring up if the freedmen had been given the right to vote early on, as the 15th amendment seemed to promise, but this never happened.Although the 15th amendment guaranteed the right to vote to everyone no matter of race or creed, its vague evince allowed whites to find other ways to renounce the freedmen suffrage. Southe rn states adopted poll taxes, education requirements, land requirements, grandfather clauses, or a mixture of any of those in hostel to successfully keep the blacks from the polls without actually stating that blacks could not vote. This allowed the whites to stay ahead politically as well as economically.Although in some states this did not happen, and blacks were even take to political office, they never achieved high ranks in either state or federal official governments, and their numbers in the house were well below what percentage of the population they represented. Without the right to vote or any representatives in the government, the blacks found themselves nerveless to diverge the laws that held them down. They could not get equal rights, decent education, or job opportunities because these were all the responsibility of the government, a government which they played almost no part in.Without a voice in legislation the black man was powerless to direct his destiny, and the white man was able to guide him down a path of further servitude. This fact alone proves that slavery did not die with the end of slavery. With a large share of the population committal to writing laws keeping a smaller portion in a lesser state, slavery still exists. All of these factors contributed to keep the whites on top of the blacks for many years after reconstruction. It wasnt until the civil rights movement of the 1960s that true change was brought about.The black man was kept out of white social circles, was not given education, was kept out of the job market, and was not allowed to participate in the government. All of these factors added up to a man who was supposedly free, but had few options to choose from. Everywhere the black man turned paths were off limits to him, and the only one that seemed to be open was one of lower class citizen whose life was still basically determined by the white man. The outcome of the reconstruction truly happy the whites in that a ll power was given to them. They were able to control the destiny of not only themselves, but of the blacks as well.