African American Civil Rights: The Reconstruction Era Byrd Center Teacher Institute Online Workshop Outline Presenter: Jody Brumage • jbrumage@shepherd.edu Length of Session: 50 Minutes Guiding Question: How are civil rights created and protected in the United States? Topic 1 How were civil rights for African Americans created?

Overview: The hard-fought progress made during and in the immediate aftermath of the Civil War elevated Black people in America from non-citizens to citizens entitled legally to the right to vote (for men). This critical transition was cemented in 1868 with the adoption of the 14th Amendment to the United States Constitution

1. Dred Scott v. Sandford, 1857 2. “Lincoln’s Last Warning” Cartoon, 1862 3. 14th Amendment to the United States Constitution, 1868

Topic 2 How were civil rights enforced?

Overview: Political supporters of African American Civil Rights advancements made in the years immediately after the Civil War desired to expand the reach of these new legal protections to impact all of the social and political facets of life Black people had previously been excluded from. The results of this push range from the 15th Amendment to the United States Constitution (guaranteeing male suffrage regardless of race, color, or history of servitude) to the more progressive ideas enshrined in the Sumner Civil Rights Bill of 1873.

4. Fifteenth Amendment Engraving, 1870 5. “U.S. Grant and the Colored People” Pamphlet by Frederick Douglass, 1872 6. Sumner Civil Rights Bill, 1873

Topic 3 What happens when civil rights are not defended?

Overview: Shifting political perspectives and growing aggression by Black Civil Rights proponents lead to an end of the Reconstruction Era in 1877 upon the election of President Rutherford B. Hayes. The advances made by African Americans in this decade, no longer enforced by U.S. military occupation or a majority mandate of the electorate began to erode as court decisions and Jim Crow laws limited the right to vote and eradicated Black representation in government.

7. Engraving of the Colfax Massacre, 1873 8. Colored Citizens' Petition for the Restoration of Voting Rights, 1867-69

Document 1: Dred Scott v. Sandford Decision (Excerpt from Chief Justice Roger B. Taney’s Decision) Transcribed by the National Archives and Records Administration [Full Version]

● 4. A free negro of the African race, whose ancestors were brought to this country and sold as slaves, is not a "citizen" within the meaning of the Constitution of the United States.

● 5. When the Constitution was adopted, they were not regarded in any of the States as members of the community which constituted the State, and were nut numbered among its "people or citizen." Consequently, the special rights and immunities guarantied to citizens do not apply to them. And not being "citizens” within the meaning of the Constitution, they are not entitled to sue in that character in a court of the United States, and the Circuit Court has not jurisdiction in such a suit.

● 6. The only two clauses in the Constitution which point to this race, treat them as persons whom it was morally lawful to deal in as articles of property and to hold as slaves.

● 7. Since the adoption of the Constitution of the United States, no state can by any subsequent law make a foreigner or any other description of persons citizens of the United States, nor entitle them to the rights and privileges secured to citizens by that instrument.

● 8. A State, by its laws passed since the adoption of the Constitution, may put a foreigner or any other description of persons upon a footing with its own citizens, as to all the rights and privileges enjoyed by them within its dominion, and by its laws. But that will not make him a citizen of the United States, nor entitle him to sue in its courts, nor to any of the privileges and immunities of a citizen in another State.

● 9. The change in public opinion and feeling in relation to the African race, which has taken place since the adoption of the Constitution, cannot change its construction and meaning, and it must be construct and administered now according to its true meaning and intention when it was formed and adopted.

● 10. The plaintiff having admitted, by his demurrer to the plea in abatement, that his ancestors were imported from Africa and sold as slaves, he is not a citizen of the Slate of Missouri according to the Constitution of the United States, and was not entitled to sue in that character in the Circuit Court.

● 11. This being the case, the judgment of the court below, in favor of the plaintiff of the plea in abatement, was erroneous.

Document 2: “Lincoln’s Last Warning” Cartoon by Frank Bellew, 1862

From the Musselman Library Special Collections at Gettysburg College [Source] Originally Published in Harper’s Weekly

Document 3: Fourteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution, 1868

Transcribed by the National Archives and Records Administration [Full Version] Amendment XIV

Section 1.

All persons born or naturalized in the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the United States and of the State wherein they reside. No State shall make or enforce any law which shall abridge the privileges or immunities of citizens of the United States; nor shall any State deprive any person of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law; nor deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws.

Section 2.

Representatives shall be apportioned among the several States according to their respective numbers, counting the whole number of persons in each State, excluding Indians not taxed. But when the right to vote at any election for the choice of electors for President and Vice-President of the United States, Representatives in Congress, the Executive and Judicial officers of a State, or the members of the Legislature thereof, is denied to any of the male inhabitants of such State, being twenty-one years of age,* and citizens of the United States, or in any way abridged, except for participation in rebellion, or other crime, the basis of representation therein shall be reduced in the proportion which the number of such male citizens shall bear to the whole number of male citizens twenty-one years of age in such State.

Section 3.

No person shall be a Senator or Representative in Congress, or elector of President and Vice-President, or hold any office, civil or military, under the United States, or under any State, who, having previously taken an oath, as a member of Congress, or as an officer of the United States, or as a member of any State legislature, or as an executive or judicial officer of any State, to support the Constitution of the United States, shall have engaged in insurrection or rebellion against the same, or given aid or comfort to the enemies thereof. But Congress may by a vote of two-thirds of each House, remove such disability.

Section 4.

The validity of the public debt of the United States, authorized by law, including debts incurred for payment of pensions and bounties for services in suppressing insurrection or rebellion, shall not be questioned. But neither the United States nor any State shall assume or pay any debt or obligation incurred in aid of insurrection or rebellion against the United States, or any claim for the loss or emancipation of any slave; but all such debts, obligations and claims shall be held illegal and void.

Section 5.

The Congress shall have the power to enforce, by appropriate legislation, the provisions of this article. Document 4: “The Fifteenth Amendment” Engraving by Thomas Kelly, 1870

The Library of Congress [Source]

Document 5: “U.S. Grant and the Colored People” Pamphlet by Frederick Douglass, 1872

Library of Congress [Source] [Transcript Available]

Document 6: Sumner Civil Rights Bill, 1873 National Archives and Records Administration [Source]

Document 7: Engraving of the Colfax Massacre by M. Morgan/G. Srong, 1873 The Historic New Orleans Collection [Source]

Originally Published in Frank Leslie’s Illustrated Newspaper

Document 8: Colored Citizens' Petition for the Restoration of Voting Rights, 1867-69 Tennessee Virtual Archive [Source]

Transcription: “To the Honorable, the General Assembly of the State of Tennessee. The undersigned colored citizens of Shelby County have seen with deep regret, and not without apprehension, the feeling of bitterness among the citizens of the state and they believe it results from the wholesale dis[en]franchisement of her citizens who have been accustomed to vote; and they therefore pray your Honorable body to call a convention at an early day, to so amend the constitution as to remove this cause of dissention, and to make the clerk of the county court, registrar, and require the sherriffs to hold the election.”