The Reconstruction Amendments and their Relevance to Economic and Social Issues Faced by the United States from the 19th Century Onwards

This thesis examines a period in the history of the United States between 1865 and 1877 known as Reconstruction. It develops around the major pieces of legislation that were enacted over the course of its duration, and which incorporated for the first time into the American Constitution civil rights related to the country's black population of (in the examined period already former) slaves. The Reconstruction Amendments, as Amendments Thirteen, Fourteen, and Fifteen to the U.S. Constitution came to be known, had several functions: one of them was to define the status of freed blacks in the post-war country, and they were also to serve as a means of restoring political and economic stability in the South devastated by the Civil War. The first part of the thesis looks at the so-called Presidential Reconstruction, which lasted until 1866 and was characterised by rather 'mild' provisions in the South on the part of the U.S. government. Lack of national intervention on the level of individual states, insufficient financial funds and President Johnson's sympathy toward the class of white Southern planters prevented a more radical development in the post-war South. Although Presidential Reconstruction saw some considerable achievements, such as the setting up of schools, health facilities and churches to..