Long-Term Effects Of Reconstruction

Improved Essays
Reconstruction generally refers to the period in the United States history following the Civil War in which the federal government set the conditions that would allow the rebellious Southern States back into the Union. Although the military conflict had come to an end, Reconstruction was it’s different kind of war. The struggle was mostly waged by radical northerners who wanted to punish the South and southerners who clinged to preserve their way of life. Slavery, in practical terms, died with the ending of the Civil War. The thirteenth amendment abolished slavery in all states and territories. The fourteenth amendment and fifteenth amendment also came after the civil war during Reconstruction. Washington was born a slave in Virginia to Jane, an enslaved African-American woman and he claims that he doesn’t know where he was born or his father’s name and …show more content…
Blacks in the South were greatly concerned about land ownership, education and self help. Washington encouraged African-Americans to stay in the South while Ida B. Wells urged them to head North escaping all the unfairness. He also felt that if African-Americans were more concerned with the wealth of Whites then they would eventually be granted their constitutional rights. He basically advertised a “go slow” approach to avoid a harsh white backlash. The effect was that many youths in the South had to accept sacrifices of potential political power, civil rights and higher education. Washington valued the “industrial” education because he believed it provided the critical skills available for the majority of the jobs available to African-Americans. For the long term, he believed that "blacks would eventually gain full participation in society by showing themselves to be responsible, reliable American

Related Documents

  • Improved Essays

    What those people failed to consider was by Washington pushing the idea of skilled work it allowed blacks to be incorporated into society with a skilled job. Skills such as carpentry, welding, fabrication and agriculture provided blacks with a higher paying job that would allow them to work their way out of poverty. After Washington was freed from slavery at age 9, he went on to receive a diploma from Hampton University. Here he impressed the founder and he became the organizer and principal of the newly established African American trade school, Tuskegee Normal and Industrial Institute. This is where Washington incorporated his ideas and beliefs that skilled labor would help bring African Americans out of poverty and give them equality among whites.…

    • 1058 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Decent Essays

    In Booker T Washington Speech - Atlanta Compromise he was talking to the President and Gentlemen of the Board of Directors and Citizens. Mr. Washington is talking to the President, Board of Directors and citizens because he wants to repair the economic and social relationship between the whites and blacks. He gave his speech because he wanted encourage blacks to make to try becoming mechanics, agriculture and more. He wanted to encourage them to do stuff that did not seem like the normal labor jobs that whites were used to blacks working.…

    • 240 Words
    • 1 Pages
    Decent Essays
  • Improved Essays

    Washington considered himself to be a bridge between the races. He believed that to first improve African Americans and their position in society, they must be diligent through education, industrial training/work, and business ownership/investment. When this has been achieved, Washington believed, equal rights would follow. Washington’s upbringings were a great factor in how his decisions were made. Being born, enslaved, gave him a first person idea of what African Americans are going through.…

    • 814 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    In Washington's era, as a slave or a freeman education was a way to escape. It was considered a luxury or the golden egg. Through education you could be successful. You could have self worth and you could respect not only yourself but the job that you had done. Washington's ideas promoted hard work, trial and tribulation, get up and dust yourself off.…

    • 607 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    He advised blacks to remain in the South, accept segregation, and avoid politics. It sounds as if self-help and education were most important to Washington. Again, he encouraged blacks to build up their character, and also founded Tuskegee Institute in Alabama and modeled it after Hampton, which shows how important black education was to him. W.E.B. DuBois grew up in Massachusetts. He did not experience slavery, as his ancestors were free blacks.…

    • 1047 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    Up From Slavery Summary

    • 1262 Words
    • 5 Pages

    Dubois and Booker T. Washington had a shared objective, which was the advancement of the African Americans. Even so, they had differing opinions on the best way to do it, and the opinions still intrigue scholars in the present day. According to the article, Washington believed that vocational training would win the respect of the white people in the country, through a demonstration that the black community was committed to hard work. To the contrary, Dubois advocated confronting the segregationist. He advocated for an educational system that would focus on the arts and sciences, similar to that afforded to the white students.…

    • 1262 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    That’s easy to say when he didn’t have to work as a child and always had the privilege and support to go school. Education was the improved accomplishment that would be the key for African Americans and poor whites to better their lives and make themselves socially acceptable. During reconstruction “many African Americans were attracted to the vision of progress and…

    • 784 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Decent Essays

    White people were surprised, but also made them accept this idea. Black people on the other hand were very concerned but Washington told them that if this school turns out into the industrial school that he wants to, everyone would be able to escape debt and live a normal life. This way, Washington was accepting social and political inequality for blacks while training them how to build economic self-determination in the industrial arts. From his small industrial school, he managed to create a political network of schools, newspapers, and the National Negro Business League. Washington further publicized himself and his program by publishing his autobiography.…

    • 320 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Decent Essays
  • Improved Essays

    Washington is one of the first people in African-American history that took a public stand to speak to individuals about African-American rights. He sought industrial education and economic growth for his fellow people that were treated inferior; shunned when attempting to “rebel”; and silenced when making cry. Washington was the first African-American educator, as well as an advisor to presidents of the U.S. His experience as being born a slave, led him to do great things after he became a free man during Emancipation. His goal was to convince African-Americans to work to earn their civil rights, rather than demanding them.…

    • 1986 Words
    • 8 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Superior Essays

    Washington’s strategies were more of a long goal plan, he wanted African Americans to focus on doing hard work, such as farming and industrial work, “No race that has anything to contribute to the markets of the world is long in any degree ostracized ( 1.6). ” He was strict on that idea, hence why he said ostracized. If black people worked diligently, then white people eventually would start to accept and respect black people and if people began to discriminate them, Washington said to be silent and to continue doing their work, which was more important. However, Washington was for education, even though many people did not know that, including dubious. Washington would fund public schools.…

    • 1099 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Superior Essays
  • Improved Essays

    Washington from his base at the Tuskegee Institute founded the National Negro Business League where he sought to further African American business opportunities. As the vile affects of Jim Crow took hold in the South and a surge of lynching’s occurred Washington laid out what he believed was the path forward for African Americans in a speech known as the “Atlanta compromise.” In his speech, Washington espoused the belief that progress for African Americans would come through education and entrepreneurship, rather than demanding social equality. “The wisest among my race understand that the agitation of questions of social equality is the extremist folly, and that progress in the enjoyment of all the privileges that will come to us must be the result of severe and constant struggle rather than of artificial forcing. ” Washington’s acceptance of Jim Crow and his subsequent urging of African Americans to simply accept the severe oppressions and day-to-day struggles of life in racist America served as the point of contention between he and Du…

    • 564 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    W.E.B Du Bois believed that Mr. Washington 's approach for the black community is profoundly asinine on a black man adjustment and submission. As W.E.B Du Bois addresses in his letter “Of Mr. Booker T. Washington and Others” that Mr. Washington ideas does not age for economic development and more specifically sets the black race accepting inferiority. W.E.B Du Bois states “Mr. Washington distinctly asks that black people give up to concentrate all their energies on industrial education, the accumulation of wealth and the conciliation of South”. These things were widely impossible because blacks had no rights to defend themselves from suffrage, self respect was neither given to a race that was inferior and was looked down upon and most importantly the cultural training within whites would only let the white race become more powerful than it already is. There was no way the North and South can find similarities and work together, Mr Washington ideas overall will cause a disaster to the children, the black and the…

    • 1040 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    Washington’s philosophy, though not the one carried out in the end, was one of the most revolutionary and well-conceived plans for racial equality America has ever come upon. Many African American people at the time were jobless and poor, but being hired by white businessmen. Washington’s plan created businesses run by African Americans where African Americans could find work, and under his schooling, they could find an education. Washington stated himself that, “The wisest among my race understand that the agitation of questions of social equality is the extremist folly, and that progress in the enjoyment of all privileges that will come to us must be the result of severe and constant struggle rather than of artificial forcing” (Atlanta Exposition Address. Pg. 948).…

    • 1268 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    Washington used his exposure to Southern upbringing to navigate the murky waters of the concerns among black and white people alike, whether it be the poor black man or the wealthy white industrialist. Washington’s concern for white interests was thus required in order to establish white support and a means of economic development for black people, which would then aid to future advancement down the…

    • 1020 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Great Essays

    Up From Slavery Analysis

    • 1675 Words
    • 7 Pages

    Washington’s emphasis on an industrial education for social advancement was showcased through The Tuskegee Institute, his primary school for vocation and industrial training. He firmly believed an industrial background and education “would both nurture individual self-confidence and transform blacks into people of property” (2-3). Washington pressed for an industrial education above all else, primarily because he believed that learning skills, crafts, and proper hygiene would benefit freedmen more than any classical education would, as an industrial education was practical, useful, and applicable in day-to-day society. It showed students “how to lift labour up from mere drudgery and toil,” how to see labor as a blessing and relief rather than as a burden and hardship (108-109). The Tuskegee Institute, to Washington, was his way of showcasing and emphasizing the…

    • 1675 Words
    • 7 Pages
    Great Essays