End of Reconstruction Notes
Reconstruction ended with the Compromise of 1877
o Compromise of 1877
○ Rutherford B. Hayes elected president by Congress
○ Southerners agreed to give him the presidency
o Rights that African Americans had gained were lost through “Jim Crow” laws
● “Jim Crow” Laws
○ Laws that made discrimination against freedmen legal
○ Were characterized by unequal opportunities in
■ Housing
■ Work
■ Education
■ Government
○ Voter discrimination
■ Poll Tax: taxes imposed on voters
○ Literacy Test: tests requiring voters to read and write.
● Segregation
○ Segregation: separation of people by race
○ Directed primarily at African Americans in the South; however, other groups were
segregated
○ Native Americans were not considered citizens until 1924
● Plessy vs. Ferguson
○ Supreme Court Case 1896
○ Established that “separate but equal” treatment was constitutional
■ Made segregation legal
● Sharecropping
○ A farming system where white planters rented individual pieces of land to freedmen in
return for a large portion of crops
○ Limited freedmen’s economic freedom
● Secret Societies – Ku Klux Klan (KKK)
○ Members wore robes and masks
○ Pretended to be ghosts of Confederate soldiers returned from the dead for revenge
against the enemies of the South.
Response to “Jim Crow” Laws
African Americans differed in their responses to discrimination and “Jim Crow” Laws.
Booker T. Washington
● Famous educator (no formal education
himself)
● Believed equality could be achieved
through vocational education; accepted
segregation as a temporary situation
●
●
●
●
W.E.B. DuBois
African American to earn a Ph. D from
Harvard
Rejected Booker T. Washington’s
message
Believed in full political, social, and Civil
rights for African Americans
Founded NAACP
1st