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 The end of slavery marked not liberation, but the beginning of new forms of oppression for Black Americans. After Lincoln's assassination at Ford's Theatre by John Wilkes Booth, a Confederate sympathizer enraged by the president's support for Black rights, the nation lost its greatest advocate for racial equality. Under President Johnson, Black Codes immediately began restricting the freedoms of formerly enslaved people, demonstrating that Lincoln's death would impact generations to come.

Reconstruction era

Sharecropping emerged as slavery under another name, trapping Black families in perpetual debt. Landowners divided plantations and offered Black families land in exchange for half their crops plus housing. However, sharecroppers had to purchase their own equipment, creating insurmountable debt to white plantation owners. Combined with poll taxes that stripped voting rights, sharecropping maintained white supremacy by keeping Black people tied to the same plantations where they had been enslaved.

Despite these obstacles, Black political participation briefly flourished during Reconstruction. The 15th Amendment guaranteed voting rights regardless of race, leading to skyrocketing Black voter registration. More than 2,000 Black Americans held office, including 16 congressmen. However, Jim Crow laws and literacy tests effectively ended this progress, virtually eliminating Black officeholders.

Reconstruction era

Against this backdrop of oppression emerged leaders like Booker T. Washington, himself born into slavery. Teaching himself to read and working as a janitor to fund his education, Washington founded an educational institution and became an adviser to Presidents Roosevelt and Taft, the first Black leader invited to dine at the White House.

The Great Migration (1916-1970) represented Black America's response to Southern oppression. Six million African Americans fled northward and westward, escaping forced segregation and violence. Though they faced housing discrimination and segregated neighborhoods in cities, most never returned South, choosing factory work and urban life over the plantation system that had enslaved their ancestors.

AI disclosure: After taking notes on the videos my peers made. I used Claude AI to smooth the text and format it in a readable way. I then added photos, links, and captions.

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 The assassination of President Abraham Lincoln at Ford's Theatre in April 1865 marked a tragic turning point for the nation. Shot by John Wilkes Booth, a famous actor upset about the South's defeat. Booth's familiarity with the theater allowed him to execute his plan, and ultimately eight people were put on trial, with four being hung. 

Abraham Lincoln giving a speech

Lincoln's death removed a potentially moderating voice during the tumultuous Reconstruction era that followed, leaving freed African Americans vulnerable to systematic efforts to strip away their newfound freedom.

Despite the ratification of the 14th Amendment, which granted citizenship and equal protection under the law, Southern states moved quickly to reimpose control over Black populations through Black Codes. 

These laws were designed to keep African Americans under as much control as possible by severely limiting their freedom and controlling their labor. Black people could not travel freely without permits and were required to maintain employment at all times. Although they technically could vote, numerous barriers were erected to prevent them from exercising this right. These codes represented the South's determination to maintain a social order that resembled slavery in all but name.

Carpetbagger

The Reconstruction period also saw the arrival of carpetbaggers, Northerners who moved South carrying cheap bags made from carpet material. While they helped rebuild the region and passed civil rights legislation, Southerners viewed them with deep suspicion and hostility. This resentment contributed to the formation of terrorist organizations like the Ku Klux Klan, which sought to maintain white control in the South and resist Reconstruction efforts.

 The KKK targeted Black citizens and their supporters, creating an atmosphere of terror that effectively undermined the progress of Reconstruction.

Lynching became one of the most horrific tools for terrorizing Black communities and enforcing white supremacy. These extrajudicial killings occurred without trials, legal representation, or due process, functioning as pure terrorism to maintain racial hierarchy and enforce Jim Crow laws. 

Most lynchings went undocumented, and offenders were rarely prosecuted. The violence proved devastatingly effective, Black voter registration plummeted due to intimidation, and property was frequently stolen from victims' families.

Anti-miscegenation laws represented another mechanism for preserving white supremacy by banning interracial marriage. Adopted by thirty out of forty-eight states, over sixty percent of the country, these laws carried harsh punishments including banishment from the state, fines, or forced separation of couples. Although the Supreme Court struck down these laws in Loving v. Virginia, their legacy lingered for generations.

Reconstruction era

The Reconstruction era ultimately revealed the limits of legal change without social transformation. Despite constitutional amendments and federal intervention, white Southerners successfully used violence, intimidation, and discriminatory laws to reassert control and deny Black Americans the full freedom they had been promised.

AI disclosure: After taking notes on the EOTO presentation my peers made. I used Claude AI to smooth the text and format it in a readable way. I then added photos, links, and captions.

Reconstruction era video

 The Reconstruction period following the Civil War represented one of the most transformative yet turbulent times in American history. This era, spanning the years after the 1860s conflict, was marked by both unprecedented hope for racial equality and devastating violence that would leave lasting scars on the nation.

President Lincoln taking to freedmen

After President Lincoln freed the slaves, many believed America had reached its happy ending and would only improve from that point forward. The reality proved far more complicated. African Americans celebrated their newfound freedom and immediately began searching for family members torn apart by slavery, taking to the roads and placing advertisements in newspapers to reunite with loved ones. When given the opportunity, Black men enlisted in the Union Army to fight against the Confederacy, demonstrating their commitment to freedom and democracy.

The summer of 1865 brought critical questions about citizenship and rights. After Lincoln's assassination, Andrew Johnson, a Southern Democrat who harbored no friendship toward Black Americans, assumed the presidency. Though he despised wealthy Southern planters, Johnson ultimately helped white Southerners maintain control over former slaves. The Freedmen's Bureau, established to ensure fair treatment and property rights for freed people, remained severely underfunded. Johnson issued pardons to former Confederates and forced the Bureau to return confiscated land to white owners, devastating Black families who had begun building new lives.

Southern states quickly enacted Black Codes, oppressive laws designed to maintain conditions barely distinguishable from slavery. Black adults had to sign yearly labor contracts, could be arrested for unemployment, and saw their children taken under false claims of parental unfitness. The Ku Klux Klan emerged during this period, terrorizing successful Black families and burning churches and schools.

The Ku Klux Klan violence

However, Congress fought back. In April 1866, lawmakers passed the Civil Rights Bill over Johnson's veto and later reorganized the South through the Fourteenth Amendment, which redefined citizenship rights. Northern Republicans registered Black men to vote, and freed people eagerly participated in politics, with some even serving in state legislatures and Congress.

Freedmen registering to vote

The three years following the Civil War represented the most hopeful and violent period in American history. This legacy of both promise and brutality would haunt African Americans for generations, as they continued fighting for basic rights a full century after emancipation.

AI disclosure: After taking notes while watching a reconstruction era video. I used Claude AI to smooth the text and format it in a readable way. I then added photos, and captions.

Plessy v. Ferguson

 The 1896 Supreme Court decision in Plessy v. Ferguson is one of the most controversial rulings in American legal history. When the Court upheld Louisiana's Separate Car Act and established the "separate but equal" doctrine, it basically gave legal permission for racial segregation across the South. What makes this decision even more frustrating is that it completely ignored strong religious arguments against segregation that were based on fundamental biblical principles. Understanding how religion opposed segregation during this period reveals the massive gap between America's claimed Christian values and the actual reality of its legal system.

The case of Plessy v. Ferguson

At the core of Christian theology is the belief that all humans are created in God's image, known as imago Dei. This concept comes from Genesis, where it says God created mankind in his own image. 

This wasn't just some minor detail, it was a foundational teaching that gave every single person inherent dignity and worth, no matter what they looked like or where they came from. Segregation laws directly contradicted this by treating Black citizens as fundamentally different and inferior to white citizens. If everyone truly bears God's image equally, then there's no theological justification for separating people by race or treating them differently under the law.

Racial segregation on trains

The New Testament provided even stronger arguments against racial division. The Apostle Paul wrote in Galatians that "there is neither Jew nor Greek, slave nor free, male nor female, for you are all one in Christ Jesus." This was a revolutionary statement for its time, basically saying that all the social categories and hierarchies humans create don't matter in God's eyes. 

Jesus himself constantly broke social rules by associating with Samaritans, tax collectors, and others considered outcasts. His entire ministry was about tearing down barriers between people, not building them up. So when you think about it, segregation was the exact opposite of what Jesus taught and demonstrated through his actions.

The Golden Rule is another religious principle that makes segregation impossible to justify. "Do unto others as you would have them do unto you" requires people to honestly consider how they'd feel if the roles were reversed. Would white Americans have been okay with being forced into separate, worse facilities? Would they accept their children being treated as inferior? Obviously not. This simple moral test exposes how deeply unjust segregation was.

Racial segregation at water fountains

It's also worth noting that religious communities had already been fighting racial injustice for decades. Quakers were instrumental in the Underground Railroad and abolitionist movement because their religious beliefs about human equality made them see slavery and discrimination as morally wrong. They put their lives on the line because they believed God's law was more important than unjust human laws.

 This tradition of faith-based activism against racism was alive and well during the Plessy era, even if the Supreme Court chose to ignore it.

The Plessy v. Ferguson decision showed how far America had strayed from its stated religious values. In a nation that claimed to be built on Christian principles, the highest court in the land upheld a system that violated basic biblical teachings about human equality, unity, and love. This contradiction between religious ideals and legal reality would eventually help spark the Civil Rights Movement, proving that these religious arguments against segregation had real power and lasting significance.

AI disclosure: I used Claude AI to write an essay on the case of Plessy v. Ferguson, arguing in favor of Plessy using religion to challenge segregation.  I then added photos, links, and captions.

Gone With the Wind

 I watched "Gone With the Wind" in class expecting it to be another long and boring history movie. However there is so much to digest in this movie. This movie really pays attention to detail, and there was always something interesting going on.

The house is held together by Mammy who is played by Hattie McDaniel. We see her trying to get Scarlett, who is played by Vivien Leigh to get back in the house as she is running off. Mammy has a very important role in the house which I didn't expect. She keeps the kids in line and makes sure the parents are always taken care of. It seems as though she knows them better than they know themselves. This movie seems to completely leave out the brutality of slavery. They seem to care for Mammy, which we know isn’t realistic for this time period in the South.

Mammy and Scarlett

Scarlett is very immature in the beginning of the movie, Mammy is always trying to keep her under control, but Scarlett listens to no one.

Scarlett, who is in love with Ashley Wikes, has no shame telling him she loves him even though he is going to marry his cousin Melanie Hamilton. She is judged by all the other girls at the engagement party. They are jealous of her beauty as all the men come flocking to her. Yet she only wants Ashley. She seems very different from the other girls in the beginning of the movie. However the one girl who is nice to her is Melanie, whom she dislikes as she is marrying Ashley.

Scarlett, Melanie and Ashley

When Scarlett confesses her love for Ashley and he shoots her down, she catches the attention of Rhett Butler, however she isn’t interested in him. Rhett seems to be the talk of the town, many people judge him for his past.

Rhett Butler and Scarlett

This movie takes place during the civil war. When the first shots were fired and all the men ran off to war they were excited. Excited to fight for what they believed in, for slavery. This is almost a juxtaposition as they seem to be very kind to Mammy, as they fight to keep her for her free labor.

As the war continues on we see Scarlett step up and mature a lot which I didn’t expect. She worked as a nurse during the war. She even helped Melanie deliver her and Ashley's baby, putting her jealousy aside and helping Melanie. She really grew up during this time. 

Rhett helps Melanie, her baby, and Scarlett escape back home. Halfway through their journey Rhett abandons them, and it is up to Scarlett to get them back home as Melanie just gave birth. 

When they get home Scarlett realizes the city was destroyed, all that was left were her slaves, her father who went insane, and her mother who just died. It was up to Scarlett to keep everyone alive. We really see her mature throughout the movie.

Ultimately this movie is very complex, and fails to show the brutality of slavery in the south at this time.