1. Reconstruction
6 KEY FACTS
L. M. Freer  FIT/SUNY  Fall 2012

2. #1
• The re-entry of Southern
states into the Union was
laborious and lengthy, and
happened on a case-by-
case basis.

3. #2
• Lincoln’s successor, Andrew
Johnson, was impeached by
Congress because he
became an obstacle to the
passage of civil rights
legislation.

4. #3
• Southern culture does make
some permanent changes after
the war, but the continued
lessened profitability of agriculture
in the region, as well as DC’s
drop-off in interest after 1868,
helps set the stage for a
conservative resurgence in
Southern local governments in
the 1870s.

5. #4
• The 1870s were a time not
only of increasingly
conservative politics but of
increasing racial
intimidation.

6. #5
• In the 1870s and 1880s,
restrictive new state
governments curtail social
services to the needy and
begin to restrict the rights of
African-Americans.

7. #6
• By the time the Supreme
Court rules on Plessy v.
Ferguson in 1896,
segregation has become an
institution—it’s already fully
woven into American laws
and culture.