There were many firsts during the period of Reconstruction after the Civil War. In 1863 the Emancipation Proclaimation freed the slaves and ushered in an era of black political power in the south. Unfortunately, white historians have focused mainly on whites after Reconstruction, ignoring the enormouss achievements of blacks. "These historians denigrated Reconstruction as a "mistake precisely because black Americans briefly attained some political power in the regions of their former bondage. This view was reproduced in popular form by the film The Birth of a Nation (1915) and the book on which it was based, The Clansman (1902 ) , both of which stigmatized African Americans and lauded white terrorist groups such as the Ku Klux Klan. The history of Reconstruction became a principal means by which whites, in both the South and the North, manipulated historical memories in order to reify a post-slavery racialism." Read more about Black Reconstruction.
In 1870 Hiram Revels became the first black Senator to serve in the Congress. "Revels' credentials arrived in the Senate on February 23, 1870, and were immediately blocked by a few members who had no desire to see a black man serve in Congress. Masking their racist views, they argued that Revels had not been a U.S. citizen for the nine years required of all senators." The obstructionist of that period did not have anything on the "birthers", "tea-baggers" or other racists assailing the Obama Presidency today. Senator Revels was joined by the first African-American member of the House of Representatives, Joseph Rainey of South Carolina.Blacks became politically active during Reconstruction. Many like Abraham Galloway, who founded the Equal Rights League, sought to claim their newly minted American citizenship. Their struggle for equality was met with "swift and violent" resistance. "First, in 1865 and 1866, the white South passed the "Black Codes, separate laws modeled in part on the antebellum laws restricting free blacks in both the North and South. These laws restricted basic contract and property rights for African Americans, imposed particularly severe criminal and vagrancy punishments, and otherwise established a legal basis for second-class citizenship." The establishment of the "Black Codes" caused the Republican Party (then the party of Lincoln--although that was changed with their opposition to the Civil Rights Act of 1964) to require that the Southern states give suffrage to blacks in order to be readmitted to the Union. The resulting black political power in Southern states was short-lived.
"All told, twenty-two African Americans served in Congress as a result of Reconstruction, and more than 600 African Americans served in state legislatures throughout the South, mostly from 1868 through 1877." These unprecedented gains ended when in a compromise following the contentious election of Rutherford B. Hayes, "Republicans agreed to remove all troops from the South. Blacks in the South were left without even minimal federal protection, and white Democrats were able to regain and secure full political power in the ensuing decade." The Hayes Compromise of 1876 costs blacks many of the gains they had made during Reconstruction and left them abandoned to the unbridled violence and racism of the Southern institutions.
Who should pay reparations for slavery?
Many who object to reparations for slavery say that their ancestors worked hard to get what they have, so why should they be held accountable for a crime that occurred so many years ago? What they fail to recognize is that they got a leg up and they are reaping the benefits of white privilege even if they don't know it. Their ancestors received land, loans and other privileges that were not made available to blacks. It's interesting to note that even President Obama benefited from white privilege. Obama is justifiably proud of his white grandfather. He has recounted how his grandfather got an FHA loan. To Obama, this obviously means that his grandfather Stanley Armour Dunham, pulled himself up by his bootstraps (with a little help from the government). However, an FHA loan, which was so vital for Mr. Dunham, was not available to most black people at the time. Here is part of Obama's statement:
"...my grandfather enlisted after Pearl Harbor and went on to march in Patton's Army... When my grandfather returned, he went to college on the GI Bill; bought his first home with a loan from the FHA; moved his family west, all the way to Hawaii, where he and my grandmother helped to raise me."
A study published in the July issue of Public Affairs Quarterly by two Oregon State University faculty members in 2008 concluded that "Black Americans Should Get Reparations for Housing Discrimination."
"Historic housing and lending discrimination against black Americans has created a significant discrepancy in their overall wealth " a gap that may take reparations to close, according to research published by two Oregon State University faculty members.
...The FHA made home ownership possible for many Americans by introducing low down-payment, long-term fixed-interest, self-amortizing loans. In 1938, the creation of the Federal National Mortgage Association ( "Fannie Mae ) provided a market for Federal Housing Authority (FHA) loans, increasing liquidity and further decreasing lender risk.
As Kaplan explains, black Americans were almost completely excluded from benefiting from these loans because the FHA assigned "risk rating to neighborhoods, based on various demographic factors, especially race. Mixed and predominantly black neighborhoods were rated as "riskier and were generally not eligible for FHA loans.
Valls said after World War II, the G.I. Bill led to a housing boom where returning soldiers bought new homes in the newly-formed suburbs. However, black veterans were largely excluded from the housing benefits of the G.I. Bill.
"The FHA manual at the time stated that ˜If a neighborhood is to retain stability, it is necessary that properties shall continue to be occupied by the same social and racial classes,'
Valls said. "So for a home to be insurable, a neighborhood had to be white and to stay white.
To ensure that stability, the FHA actively promoted the use of racial covenants " legal restrictions on who houses could be sold to " in order to protect against transitions to mixed neighborhoods.
According to Kaplan and Valls, by some estimates 80 percent of new suburban housing developments in the 1930s and '40s included such covenants. "So even if you wanted to sell your home to a person of color, you couldn't, noted Valls.
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