Some Successes of Civil War Era Reconstruction

When the Civil War ended in 1866 and the Thirteenth amendment was passed, the amendment abolishing slavery and giving African Americans the full rights of citizenship, the country began on its path towards correcting the damage done from years of slavery and oppression.

The Reconstruction largely succeeded in unifying the United States. By 1877 all of the former Confederate states had written new constitutions, and acknowledged the Thirteenth, Fourteenth, and Fifteenth amendments. These amendments gave African Americans the rights of full citizenship, equal protection under the law, right to vote, and the right to testify in a court of law as well as serve by sitting on a jury.

All of the former Confederate states had pledged their loyalty to the United States and its government and the states' rights versus federalism debate that had been going on since the country's inception was largely settled. The southern states began to accept the fact that they were going to lose in battle of power with the Unites States' central government. While the northern states maintained the upper hand in the government, they allowed the South to participate and in turn created a better balance of power than what had preceded during the Civil War.

The Republicans succeeded in carrying out their two main goals of rebuilding the Union and repairing the South through economic growth. They also created new economic wealth in the Northern states. This economic growth was key to the ability of the nation as a whole to move past the damage that had been done economically during the Civil War.

The Freedman's Bureau, which was established in 1865, and other organizations like it helped African American families gain access to better jobs, housing, and education. The Freedman's Bureau supervised all education and relief efforts towards freed slaves including, but not limited to the issuing of rations, clothes, and medicine. The states in the South also adopted the system of mandatory and tax payer supported system of education that was practiced in the North. Better access to education greatly benefited both African Americans and whites in the South.

While most would agree that very little was done overall to effectively solve the human rights and civil rights problems that had been present at the beginning of our nation, the steps that were taken and the laws that were passed, made a way for the problems to be better solved in the future.