Civil War, Reconstruction, and Voting Rights

1. Civil War, Reconstruction, and Voting Rights

2. Lead up to the Civil War • Northern and Southern states split over the issue of slavery • Tensions increased over whether or not new states would allow slavery • Abraham Lincoln elected president in 1860 • In response to Lincoln’s election, Southern states seceded from the Union • The federal government said that was not allowed and war breaks out in 1861 Question: Should individual states have the right to leave the US for any reason?

3. The War • Prior to the war the South was mostly agricultural while the North was more heavily industrialized • The North was able to produce better equipment in larger quantities more quickly than the South • Lincoln issues The Emancipation Proclamation in 1863 • This declared that all slaves in the Confederacy were free • The war ends with a Northern victory in 1865 Question: Why do you think that The Emancipation Proclamation was issued?

4. Aftermath and Reconstruction • Amendments were made to the Constitution after the Civil War • Slavery was outlawed • Former slaves were granted citizenship • The right to vote was promised to all citizens regardless of race • The Federal government took control of the South • The government reorganized the politics and society of Southern states • The new constitutional amendments were enforced, allowing African Americans to vote and hold elected office throughout the South Question: What do you think happened after the policies of Reconstruction came to an end?

5. Consequences of the Civil War and Reconstruction • What decade witnessed the lowest rate of overall agricultural production in the South? Why? • What decade witnessed the highest rate of overall agricultural production in the South? Which two crops had the greatest surge in production? • What trend do you notice in agricultural production afterthe 1850’s? • What do you think happened to agricultural production between 1900 and 1930?

6. Voting Restrictions • Your group will be assigned one of the programs used in the post-Reconstruction South. Your task is to create a poster protesting policy. • Information about these programs can be found on Page 493 • Your poster must contain each of the following: • A title that includes that program you are protesting against • A definition of the program • A description of how it can be used to restrict the voting rights of African Americans • A drawing, cartoon, or symbol • Your ENTIRE group will automatically lose points if, at any point, ANYBODY in your group is not participating

7. Voting Restrictions • Advances made in voting and holding office by African Americans during Reconstruction where eliminated in the following years • Literacy tests • Some states passed laws that you had to be able to read and write in order to vote and required officials at polls to give literacy tests • Before the Civil War, it was illegal for a slave to be literate • African Americans were often given harder tests than whites • Poll tax • An annual tax that you had to pay in order to vote • Kept all poor people, regardless of race, form voting • Grandfather clause • Said that even if somebody could not pass the literacy test or pay the poll tax, they could vote if their father or grandfather had been allowed to vote • Allowed poor and illiterate whites to bypass the literacy test and poll tax