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Ashleigh Floyd
Mr. Wall
Honors American Lit
3 February 2012
1870-1875: The End of Reconstruction
The last five years of the Reconstruction era in the United States was rough for the North
and the South. The South was going through radical changes while the North began
industrializing. The time period of 1870 to 1875 is significant to American history because it was
the end of Reconstruction in the South, the lasting implications of racism were beginning to
show, and the Industrial Revolution began to have an impact on the United States as a whole.
The last years of the harsh Reconstruction period were particularly bad for the South.
Carpet baggers and scalawags ran rampant. After President Lincoln’s death, his wish for a
“lenient” Reconstruction period was abandoned by Congress. The Confederacy owed seven
hundred twelve million in war debt. Thousands of dollars of havoc had been wreaked on homes
and fields. Many farmers, whose investments had been the slaves who worked their farms, were
now in debt and could not afford to hire hands. Many were destitute, but this was not enough to
assuage the fury of the Radical Republicans. The Radical Republicans that controlled Congress
wanted the South to be punished for the war. They were also afraid of losing their majority in
both Houses (Bartoletti). Congress viewed the defeated South as conquered territories. This
treatment included being occupied by the Union army. The army, Congress said, was there to
protect the rights of the freed African Americans (Violent Decades). At the same time, the South
had many more problems than just their freed slaves to contend with. During the Civil War,

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factories had been dismantled and the banks closed. Atlanta, Colombia, Richmond, and many
other cities along Sherman’s March to the Sea were in ruins (Wish).
In contrast, the North came through the Civil War relatively unharmed. This is because in
the South’s attempts to fight a defensive war, they invited most of the fighting into Dixie.
Therefore, the damages of the Civil War were far more great there than in the prospering North.
In 1873, the North’s economy fell into a depression. This lasted until 1877. The North also began
suffering from railroad riots (Wish). However, after the Civil War, the United States had rapid
economic growth. She also saw great political instability and violence that ran rampant (Violent
Decades).
Racism and slavery was an accepted “peculiar institution” for many reasons. Firstly, slave
labor was economically beneficial to farmers and plantation owners. Many a man made his
fortune off of the sweat of another man. Secondly, many white Southerners believed God created
African Americans to serve whites. They convinced themselves that racial equality was immoral
because it violated “God’s plan” for the African American population. Southerns were told that
once African Americans were freed, they’d rule over whites. This was the seed of the racism and
hate that the South saw after the Civil War (Bartoletti). This fear of loss in their supremacy over
African Americans frightened many Southerners, particularly the white trash and those who were
ruined in the Civil War. Southern Democrats, Conservatives, believed that equality according to
the 14th Amendment to the Constitution meant unsegregated education. Not allowing slaves to
have an education during the Antebellum period was a tactic used by slave owners to make
slaves inferior to whites. If freed slaves and their children were allowed to have an education,
that inferiority was no longer there. However, Radical Republicans and General Beauregard
welcomed integration in schools (Franklin).

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After the Civil War, many states in the South instituted laws to keep African Americans
“in their place”. Black Codes were basically the same as the Slave Codes. Later, these laws
became known as Jim Crow laws, the first of which were enacted in Tennessee in 1875, even
though the Civil Rights Act had already been passed (Taylor). These laws were in place to
disenfranchise African Americans and keep them inferior to their white counterparts.
One of the most despicable inventions of the Reconstruction era was the founding of
racial hate groups. While the Ku Klux Klan is the most infamous, they were not the only people
fueled by hatred. Other groups founded to establish white supremacy were the Knights of White
Camelia, Constitutional Union Guards. White Brotherhood, White League of Louisiana, and
(later) the ’76 Association. These groups used terroristic means to establish their
“supremacy” (Violent Decades). John Lester formed the Ku Klux Klan in 1866, using the Greek
word “kuklos”, meaning “circle” or “band”, for the name. Klansmen wore hoods and often did
their terrorizing in the dead of night. They beat, tortured, mutilated, and terrorized anyone who
stood against their beliefs. White teachers who dared to educate Negroes were often the targets
of these hooded cowards. William Luke was one such teacher that suffered for his actions. He
first was evicted from his hotel room in Patona, Arkansas for teaching racial equality. He was
lynched in 1870 by the Klansmen. Even though what they were doing was wrong and immoral,
white preachers would not openly condemn the KKK. In 1871 in Mississippi, KKK members
were tried and convicted in federal courts. Because of the mounting violence in South Carolina
that same year, President Grant suspended habeas corpus in nine counties and declared martial
law (Taylor). When on trial, many Klansmen said they were forced into joining the Klan.
Racial inequality was not just reserved for African Americans. The Chinese began
immigrating to the United States during the gold rush. In 1869, after the Transcontinental

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Railroad was complete, anti-Chinese sentiments reached their peak. They were welcome in the
US while the Transcontinental Railroad was being built for their knowledge of explosives. But
once they began competing with whites for jobs that were few and far between, they were not
welcome in the United States anymore. Another minority targeted was the Native Americans. In
1871, Congress stopped hiding behind treaties and legislation in regards to the Native
Americans. Natives were now viewed as wards of the State, and Congress passed legislation
(Indian Appropriation Act of 1871) stating that “no tribe shall be acknowledged or recognized as
an independent nation”. Many attempts were made to “civilize” them. This and the actions of
Congress led to constant warfare on the Plains before and after the Civil War (Violent Decades).
This violence happened partially because prospectors found Gold in the “Black Hills’ of South
Dakota in 1875. This land had been promised to the Sioux Indians “forever” by the federal
government. Violence also occurred because buffalo hunters on the Plains began moving West in
reaction to the expansion of both the railroads and the market for buffalo meat and hides. The
hunters, killing approximately three million buffalo a year, wiped out the Native Americans’ food
source. However, President Grant vetoed legislation protecting the buffalo in 1863 (“PBS”).
The violence with Native Americans grew with the Lakota Wars. In an effort to stop the
violence from spreading, the Senate met with Red Cloud and other chiefs. They offered these
chiefs six million to buy Black Hills, South Dakota. The chiefs refused to alter the 1868 treaty
that gave them rights to the land, the Fort Laramie Treaty. They told the Senate that they would
defend their land even if the federal government would not (“PBS”).
African Americans and other immigrants fared no better in the North. The North only
favored the abolition of slavery and emancipation because it stood in the way of squashing the
rebellion. To quell the rebellion, the Union used total warfare. This included freeing slaves, who

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often joined the Union army. It is important to remember that racism flowed freely in the North
and northerners were also prejudiced against African Americans (Bartoletti). Many Northerners,
now competing with African Americans and immigrants began viewing the reconstruction and
abolitionist movements to be mistakes. They did not agree with racial equality, in part because
they were afraid of the ever increasing land confiscation and appropriation (“An Outline”).
However, in 1875, the Civil Rights Act was passed by Congress. It stated that “no citizen can be
denied equal use of public facilities” (Campbell). This Act did not last long. It was found
unconstitutional by the Supreme Court and was the last effort made by Congress to protect civil
rights for half a century. Another racial precedent was in the ruling of White vs. Flood in
California, making segregation in schools legal.
Women began seeing reforms in this time period. In 1874, Massachusetts limited
women’s working days to ten hours on May 8th. This was the first reform of its kind. However,
in Minor vs. Happersett, the Supreme Court ruled that it was the job of each state to set suffrage
laws. This ruling also denied women the right to vote (Campbell).
Politics in this time period were fueled by shady business dealings, instability, and
corruption. This trend would last through the Industrial Revolution and Gilded Age in America.
There was cause to celebrate, though. The first Congress to have all states represented since 1860
was in session in 1870. John D. Rockefeller also founded his Standard Oil Company that same
year. Congress corruption and big business would soon be the mark of the Industrial Revolution.
In 1872, the Credit Mobilier scandal was uncovered by muckrakers. Muckrakers were reporters
who published the scandals of big business in newspapers to show the underbelly of the
Industrial Revolution. Credit Mobilier was a shady business dealing where the Union Pacific
railway contract for the building of the railway west of Nebraska was given to one company.

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Oakes Ames, the head of Credit Mobilier, gave shares of the Credit Mobilier of America
company to Congress members and Grant’s Vice Presidents after his company overcharged the
railroads for labor. He did this so that Congress would not open an investigation, and so
Congress members could become very rich very fast with the selling of the shares. In 1873,
Congress was at it again with their awesome wallet-fattening schemes. Congress voted
themselves a fifty percent salary raise increase that would be retroactive for two years. This was
completely unconstitutional, and was rescinded when the public found out about the pay raises
(Campbell). With the Industrial Revolution came the Financial Panic of 1873. This happened first
in Europe and became one of the biggest parts of Grant’s second presidency. The panic happened
after the Northern Pacific Railway’s backing company, the Jay Cooke Company, failed. The
economy took a hit soon after that. Credit became scarce, banks failed, factories closed, and the
New York Stock Exchange was out of commission for ten days. This led to thousands of people
losing their jobs, and caused the beginnings of the tensions between workers and bankers and
manufacturing bosses (“Panic of 1873”).
While the Industrial Revolution and the end of Reconstruction were bad, American
authors were on the rise. Romanticism lost popularity in America after the Civil War. This is
because many authors wanted to portray life as it was. This movement is still popular today. One
author, however, took realism to another level with his satire.
Mark Twain, born Samuel Langhorne Clemons, was born on November 30, 1835 in
Florida, Missouri. He moved to Hannibal, Missouri as a child. He loved the Mississippi River
and the surrounding woods as a kid. He served in the Confederate Army, rising to the position of
second lieutenant before leaving. Twain had many jobs other than writing. However, he became
known for his satiristic attacks on public figures. He worked as a printer’s apprentice and

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typesetter in Hannibal, Missouri from 1847 to 1850. In 1857, Twain wanted to go to South
America to make his fortune. However, he met Captain Horace Bixby and became his
apprentice. From 1857 to 1859, he was an apprentice riverboat pilot. After getting his Captain’s
license in 1859, he was a riverboat pilot for a year, where he got his inspiration for his novels.
But after the Union’s Anaconda Plan closed the Mississippi to business, Twain gave up his
riverboat captain job. He served in the Confederate Army until his brother got a government
position in the Nevada Territory for his work on President Lincoln’s election campaign. Then, he
became a secretary in Nevada from 1860-1862. This job was left for a miner’s life in 1862. His
panning job gave him inspiration for his book Roughing It. Twain enjoyed mocking gold panning
more than seeking his fortune through it.
Like so many others, Twain and his brother Orion were involved in speculation and bad
business deals. They were soon in debt. This led Twain to traveling in the Midwest and East
Coast for three years. While traveling, he published his travel observations in the newspapers his
brother owned.
He also had many writing related jobs. From 1862 to 1864, under the pen name Mark
Twain, he was a reported for the Territorial Enterprise. In 1864, he lived in San Francisco and
under his pen name wrote for the Sacramento Union. From 1866 to 1869 he wrote as Mark
Twain for the Daily Morning in San Francisco. Finally, under his pen name, Mark Twain was the
editor of Buffalo Express. In 1873, Twain published the book, The Gilded Age: A Tale of Today
with Charles Dudley Warner. Warner and he were satirizing the Industrial Revolution (Teuper).
This book is the reason that American History teachers use the term the “Gilded Age”.
The end of Reconstruction marked the end of one of the most devastating times in
American history. Rebuilding a nation and industrializing it at the same time took its toll on the

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people of America. Racism and the denial of civil rights was on the rise. Violence and corruption
ran rampant while political instability did nothing to help the situation. The good, however, came
in the form of literature. Samuel Clemons became one of the most recognizable men on the
Earth. Through him, audiences found humor and laughter in a time where life was cold and hard.
These five years are crucial to an understanding of America today because the struggles that
these people faced were only the beginnings of decades of turmoil.