From: Liz Horan
Date: 4/26/00
Time: 10:27:15 PM
Remote Name: 205.188.198.32
Liz Horan Week 14
The South lost the Civil War, but in the long-run won Reconstruction. Although initially the South was severely devastated, the accomplishments that would ensue proved worth the strife. The most important "win" was the abolition of slavery, for the black man anyway. Recovery could not begin until the South figured out a new labor method, and land as a topic of huge controversy. Many African Americans became involved in sharecropping or "took to the road" to find something better. Although they were poor and had literally nothing, they did have their freedom. Judging from what we have learned, slavery was a dreadful institution and poverty would definitely be the lesser of two evils. Resulting from their freedom also came segregation, which is one way Reconstruction failed the blacks. Their children and grandchildren would live to fight the ignorance of segregation to its death, but some could argue that it still lives. In politics, however, blacks fought for their rights. Although many whites were still enraged by black-white issues, the blacks held on to one thing: their freedom. Another way Reconstruction was won by the South is that it was the beginning of the end of ignorance. African Americans would be allowed to vote, hold public office, own land, and have many other rights that were denied. Even though the next 100 years would be marked by racial division and controversy, slavery was over for good, and African Americans would only continue to grow and succeed after the Reconstruction.