The Revolution Never Ended

The federal government abandoned Reconstruction in 1877, but Black people didn't give up on the moment's promise.

- Peniel E. Joseph

THE CIVIL WAR  produced two competing narratives, each an attempt to make sense of a conflict that had eradicated the pestilence of slavery.

Black Americans who believed in multiracial democracy extolled the emancipationist legacy of the war. These Reconstructionists envisioned a new America finally capable of safe guarding Black dignity and claims of citizenship. Black women and men created new civic, religious, political, educational, and economic institutions. They built thriving towns and districts, churches and schools. In so doing, they helped reimagine the purpose and promise of American democracy.

For a time after the war, Black Reconstructionists also shaped the American government. They found allies in the Republican Party, where white abolitionists hoped to honor freedpeople’s demands and to create a progressive country in which all workers earned wages. Republicans in Congress pushed through amendments abolishing slavery, granting citizenship, and giving Black men the ballot. Congress also created the Freedmen’s Bureau, which offered provisions, clothing, fuel, and medical assistance to the formerly enslaved, and negotiated contracts to protect their newly won rights. With backing from the Union army, millions of Black people in the South received education, performed paid labor, voted in presidential elections, and held some of the highest offices in the country—all for the first time. 

Black Reconstructionists told the country a new story about itself. These were people who believed in freedom beyond emancipation. They shared an expansive vision of a compassionate nation with a true democratic ethos.