EOTO

Brief Overview of The Freedmen's Bureau

In the Reconstruction Era, the Freedmen's Bureau was beneficial for the time being. 

It was also known as the Bureau of Refugees. It was a U.S. government agency from 1865 to 1872. The Bureau was placed under the authority of the War Department and the majority of its original employees were soldiers from the Civil War. 

It was established on March 3rd, 1865 by Congress to help millions of former black slaves and poor whites in the South as a result of the Civil War. 

With the Freedmen's Bureau came food, housing, medical aid, established schools, and offered legal assistance.

The Freedmen's Bureau was organized into districts covering the 11 former rebel states, the border states of Kentucky, Maryland, and West Virginia, and Washington, D.C. Each district was headed by an assistant commissioner. 

While the Bureau was active, it was underfunded and understaffed. With only 900 agents at its peak, some were corrupt or incompetent and others were brave and hardworking people who made important contributions. 

With the Bureau, millions of people were fed, hospitals were built and provided medical aid, negotiated labor contracts for ex-slaves, and settled labor disputes. It also helped former slaves legalize marriages and locate lost relatives, and assisted black veterans. 

In addition to that, it was instrumental in building thousands of schools for blacks and helped to found colleges. 

Lastly, with not much success, the bureau tried to promote land redistribution. The Bureau was dismantled in 1872 by congress, as a result of white southerners pressuring them.

 

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

State V. Mann

Image
 The State V. Mann's case was about an individual named John Mann, who had hired Lydia, who was a slave of Elizabeth Jones. After he had chastised her, she ran off. Mann ended up shooting Lydia and wounded her, however, she was still alive after the attack.  The state of North Carolina ended up charging Mann with assault.  The trial judge charged the Jury, that if they believed the punishment inflicted by Mann was cruel and uncalled for, that in the law the Defendant was guilty, as he only had a special property in the slave. The jury convicted the Defendant, and Mann appealed the conviction.   My group and I looked at all aspects of this case. This included religion, ethics, emotions, history, law, and economics.  My viewpoints however were solely based on the religious aspect of this case.  Religion does not support slavery by any means. In fact, It has been opposed on religious grounds. Throughout most religions slavery was accepted as an institutio...
Read more

Plessy V. Ferguson

Image
 In the Plessy V. Ferguson case,  Louisiana has a law adopted in 1892 requiring all private railroad companies to have separate accommodations for black and white passengers. Homer Plessy, who is 1/8ths black, got a first-class ticket. Apparently doing this broke the law. He ended up suing under the 14th amendment. There were two sides to this case. It was the state (Ferguson) against Homer Plessy. According to Homer Plessy's side, it e stablished the constitutionality of racial segregation. Plessy should not have been required to give up his right or access his train car. The Constitution should be colorblind so they don’t have to view color as a reason for treating other people differently.  Plessy had every right to not move because his rights were violated. The equal protection clause was violated and P lessy did nothing wrong. On the state's side (Ferguson), s ince slavery ended the state has tried to include blacks into society without violence, fear, or hate....
Read more