TOTE CRISTINA-ANDREEA

XE

SOUTH SOCIETY AFTER THE CIVIL WAR

Three visions of Civil War memory appeared during Reconstruction:

the reconciliationist vision, rooted in coping with the death and devastation the war had brought
the white supremacist vision, which included racial segregation and the preservation of White
political and cultural domination in the South
the emancipationist vision, which sought full freedom, citizenship, male suffrage, and constitutional
equality for African Americans

SLAVE MARRIAGE
Before 1864, slave marriages had not been recognized legally; emancipation did not affect
them. When freed, many made official marriages. Before emancipation, slaves could not enter into
contracts, including the marriage contract. Not all free people formalized their unions. Some
continued to have common-law marriages or community-recognized relationships. The
acknowledgement of marriage by the state increased the state's recognition of freed people as legal
actors and eventually helped make the case for parental rights for freed people against the practice
of apprenticeship of Black children. These children were legally taken away from their families under
the guise of "providing them with guardianship and 'good' homes until they reached the age of
consent at twenty-one" under acts such as the Georgia 1866 Apprentice Act.[73] Such children were
generally used as sources of unpaid labor.

PUBLIC SCHOOL
Historian James D. Anderson argues that the freed slaves were the first Southerners "to
campaign for universal, state-supported public education". Blacks in the Republican coalition played
a critical role in establishing the principle in state constitutions for the first time during congressional
Reconstruction. Some slaves had learned to read from White playmates or colleagues before formal
education was allowed by law; African Americans started "native schools" before the end of the war;
Sabbath schools were another widespread means that freedmen developed to teach literacy. When
they gained suffrage, Black politicians took this commitment to public education to state
constitutional conventions.

The Republicans created a system of public schools, which were segregated by race
everywhere except New Orleans. Generally, elementary and a few secondary schools were built in
most cities, and occasionally in the countryside, but the South had few cities.

Although new industries did emerge in this era, the benefits of the New South did not accrue
to African Americans or poor whites. Although Grady dreamed of a new South of increasing
economic prosperity, his vision did not extend to civil rights for African Americans. "I declare,” said
Grady in an 1888 address, “that . . . the white race must dominate forever in the South.” In the New
South, landlords and factory owners prospered, but sharecropping and low-wage factory work kept
many across the region from escaping dire poverty.