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Period: to
Assimilation
Natives had to adopt christianity, private property, European values by being forced into reservations (where white settlers came in with food to « help » the natives but refused giving them US citizenship). Kids were forced into Christian schools, go to churches, cut long hairs, forbid to pray their own gods or speak their native tongue. They were starved and tortured until they gave up for the white way and went into reservations. -
Fugitive Slave Act
The Congress made north people catch run away slaves in their free states to bring them back to their masters even if they were against slavery. -
Parution of Uncle Tom's cabin
Became most sold book (after the Bible) in North US
It was about runaway slaves (uncle Tom) who end up being catch again, tortured and eventually killed. It played a great part into people believing slavery was wrong. -
Dred Scott v. Sanford's Supreme Court Decision
Dred Scott v. Sanford was a slave that was taken by his master in a free state for business before taking him back to the Slave State. He argued that since he had set foot into a free state he was therefore free but the Supreme Court disagree and he remained a slave. The north and anti slavery was indignated with it and it confirmed the power of the Republican Party which was a newly antislavery party created in 1854. -
* Federal Government *
Before civil war, States had more power than the government itself
Nowadays (contrary):
Legislative branch (US capitol) - Congress (House of Representatives and Senate) and then State Legislature and then city council
Executive branch (White House) - president and vice president and then Governor
Judicial branch (Supreme Court) - Federal (all of the States) and then State courts -
Free and Slave states
Blue States are free states - Red are slaves states - Brown are not conquered yet but bought from other countries (only inhabited by native americans) -
* White Supremacy *
used to talk about "white superiority over the rest (blacks and native Americans)" and justify the 4 to 4.5 millions of slaves
white supremacy slowed down during civil war and Reconstruction but it started again around the mid-1870s -
Confederate States of America
Abraham Lincoln, first Republican president, didn't want slavery to expand further so the 11 southern states seceded from US to create the Confederacy -
* Reality on Natives Americans *
There were a lot of tribes, some fought between one another unlike what whites thought (lived form agriculture, livestock rising, hunting, fishing, gathering and training, sometimes raiding) Buffalo (+salmons) was their main source of hunts but was threatened by white who massively hunted them just for fun, take the land or their leather. Only a few hundreds remained on the millions in plains. It resulted in the decline of the native population (from several millions to only 250k by 1900). -
Abraham Lincoln's election
16th US president and first Republican
Was against slavery and for the Union -
* Reality of Western US *
2/3 of US is concerned when talking about western US (everything west of Mississippi river in red) and the image of western movies in Hollywood (cowboy valleys, ghost towns, deserted places with guns fighting and the white hero or sheriff) only concerned the south around Texas. Landscapes were rocky mountains and plains in middle west, forest woodlands in north west, the Great Plains further east (blue circle), plantations of corn or giant fields in the eastern part of west Mississippi. -
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Civil War
Clash between South (slavery was good for sugar canes or cotton fields and slaves were thought by their masters hard work and other things since they were wild people) and North (morally wrong) caused the civil war.
Border States (slave states next to free states) didn't want to leave US so Lincoln tried to rally them by putting slavery matters after Union. He made runaway slaves prisonners of war but quickly revised his idea to use them as soldiers and to deplete the South economy -
Homestead Act
If settlers had lived in a territory for five years they earn the right to call it their own (of course most of the territories belonged to Indians who were there for millines). Only saw the great plains and the rest of the territories as unexploited ressources (mining, wood work or farming) so they took the most fertile leaving the poorest to natives. -
Lincoln's Gettysburg Address
most famous words of US history made to commemorate the battle and open the cemetery next to the battlefield for fallen soldiers.
His words are next to his statue in the Lincoln memorial in Washington -
End of Civil War and results
North was industrialized (armed) whereas South was composed of agricultural States so they only won a few battles at the beginning but after the battle of Gettysburg in 1863 the north kept winning battles. The March to the Sea was the South's surrender and saw a temporary collapse of White Supremacy and reinforced the federal government. -
End of Slavery
13th amendment - only prisonners (convicted for crime) remained slaves -
Andrew Johnson's Black Codes
Lincoln was murdered on April 1865 and his successor, Johnson, was conservative and stated that Black people didn’t have the right to vote or to be in debates against the white -
Ku Klux Klan
Led by former Confederate officer Nathan Bedford Forrest, they were "white vigilante" that shot, beat up (often to death) former slaves without being considered as criminals -
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Reconstruction
Designate the period following Civil war, end of Confederacy, slavery in the South and their return in the Union but also presence of a lot of terrorism and violence against Black people and a lot of fleeing toward rural places to avoid riots and intimidation
It ended when the North troops were withdrawn from the South -
14th amendement
if you’re born on US soil you are an American citizen (even black newborn) and anyone should be equal and under US laws
Because of the black code in the South, republicans sent military occupation to make sure new revolution would not blow up -
15th amendment
anyone could vote (except women) and therefore be governors, senators... - first time talking about biracial democracy (equal for black and white) but Africans Americans remained on the land they worked before for a low wage (no right to earn property), went from slaves to free poor farmers -
Rise of ranching
Ranching (taking care of cattle) is the origin story of cowboys (rough work most in the time in the sun, poorly paid and had to travel a lot by horse) -
Rise of railroads industries
Transcontinental railroad (from west to east coast) and all Chicago's line (most main lines passed or started in Chicago) made railroads going from 900 miles in 1850 to over 100k miles in 1900 -
Reconstruction fatigue
financial panic and troubles caused by the government which focussed itself on the North or on racial issues -
Little Big Horn
Last major victory for natives (they only had small victories except maybe this one) -
Lost Cause
It was followed by the Lost Cause that was used by the South to justify the civil war (the cause of the Confederate States during Civil War was just heroic and not centered on slavery) Nowadays it's still a common belief for many in the South. South lost the war but won the peace. -
Compromise
Because of Reconstruction fatigue and raise of violences, republicans made a compromise with the South to withdraw their troops making southern Black abandoned (number of Black elected in the south dropped because they couldn't vote anymore because of all the violence). It marked the White Supremacy return as well as the end of biracial democracy in the South (even did literacy test so that only literate could vote but slaves never learned how to read or write). Starts separation of Segregation. -
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Racial Segregation
Begin after the compromise, reflect all the racism and discrimination especially in the South (Black kept away from certain job, places...or only had specified places for Blacks which were worst than White facilities) and is confirmed by the creation of Jim Crow in theatre (played by white painted faces black) which stated that black and white were separated but equal (Union allowed segregation because of that reason) -
Dawes Act or General Allotment Act
Natives got back some of their former land by paying in order to separate tribes and sense of community and encourages individual ownership because it was lands for individual families (capitalism °3°). It helped settlers to control them. It met a lot of resistance especially from Lakota who are responsible for the Ghost Dance (to speak with the spirits through trances). -
Wounded Knee Massacre and end of Natives Resistance
Violent repression of Ghost Dance and ended Indian military resistance in the Plains.
Nowadays, the image of a tragic but yet honorable fight for the whites is still present even if it was clearly mass murder of natives (couldn’t even fight back because they either were starved or had to faced more powerful weapons or diseases and didn’t have any rights which made every crime immediately sentenced to death). The cultural genocide and the genocide itself are sadly underestimated.