I feel I should cut and paste Matthew's comments on the 3 Months essay because I agree with everything he wrote. Rather than cut and paste, though, I'll try to add.

Education to us, modern Americans, seem not only important but essential in our way of life. We must go to college to be able to obtain a job, etc. The South, however, did not have that need in the nineteenth century and we must remember this. A person lacking in "schooling" did not have the negative connation of today. In fact, one could argue the learning of book skills vs. practical skills (farming). Which one is important in an agricultural society? A Southerner didn't need the newspaper ("had never taken a newspaper in his life") or a public school when his family's true need was to tend the field for the day.

To continue with Matthew's thoughts on why Reconstuctionist Southerners hated the yankees, I would add to the reasons: raising the black status to at least a poor white status, northern military rule ("I shall not vote till you take away the military."), the loyalty to the state, the impact of casualties from yankees in the war, northerners taking land and economically competing in the south, and the "ideals" of the North to be industrialists, etc. All of these contributed to the hatred of yankees. The murders of Union men and sentiments of "No Yankee stops in this house!" all result from the dislike between northerner and southerner.

I, in accordance with Matt Heathman, feel that the "Three Months" essay was very informative and enjoyable. The sections concerning Southern distaste for education were perplexing. I really found myself subscribing to the old "We work the old-fashioned way; we don't need none of that education, fancy-pantsy stuff" notion of the South.

As far as the hatred shown towards"damned Yankess" by Southerners, I was not surprised at all. The CSA had just been defeated, meaning their entire cause--their entire effort--was a bust. Moreover, they had to go crawling back to the very government they had seceded from. Even MOREover, that old federal government would be able to dictate the rebuilding of Southern politics and civil society. BLACK MEN GET TO VOTE AND HAVE RIGHTS!?!?!?!? Who is going to pick the crops??? Nooooooo. See the reasons for resentment and spiteful hatred? They are blatantly obvious (and maybe not unreasonable).

Just one more thought...I like the way the writer seemed to suggest that white Southerners failed to see black rights as being merely equal to those of their own; they naturally assumed that blacks would somehow take over control of all society and dominate every aspect of life. However, blacks were simply gaining the very rights enjoyed by whites--the rights that had long been withheld from them. It isn't like they were getting some sort of special treatment...

Reconstruction may be just as interesting and exciting as the War. After all, how do you put something that is completely broken back together again--and how do you expect to make it respect and abide by the laws of the very entity that it saw as its "breaker"???

I agree Neal's discussion of education. I was pretty surprised to see how resistant they were to it. I suppose it had never really been a part of their lives and they continued to see their way of life continuing to slip out of their grip. Part of me wonders, however, if they refused it just because it was offered or suggested by the North.
I agree with Rusty's paragraph about what Southerners had to return to. It is a very suffocating thing to think about. They had given up their lives for a cause and now they had to return to what they had fought against and they were in a worse position actually. It is no surprise that Southerners didn't really accept blacks as equals. That is something that I've always taken for granted but one has to realize that the African Americans were still walking around the south and working with the whites. They were an-ever present reminder that the South was to be changed. It could not be forgotten.
The paper is pretty pro-northern, at least in that it tends to criticize the Southerners who were realizing how dependant they were on the blacks. Guelzo made that point the other night saying something like the whites were horrified to realize that they needed the blacks a lot more than they were needed by the blacks.
I am intrigued by his suggestion (in 3 months...) to "make haste slowly in the work of reconstruction."

Hi Guys. Sorry for posting late again...I have two papers due this week, and I haven't had much time for anything else. I'd like to start be disagreeing with Ryan that Johnson had everyone fooled. While he may have led them to believe their ideals were safe, I think it was they who didn't question him enough to secure his true agenda in reconstruction. It is also unbelievable that Lincoln would choose such a man to be his running mate. They must have talked about the subject in depth, and Johnson's plans of paying back the hated Southern Aristocracy must have been evident. He even went as far as to say "Damn the Negros." I agree with Megan that it is ridiculous to give power back to the Confederates and punishing them so little or not at all after a bloody war that lasted four years and took thousands of lives. Johnson pardoned Confederate officers instead of hanging them and allowed them to serve in state governments. It is hard to believe that state governments could fall into old Confederate hands so easily and that the surrender and reinstatement of governments could be allowed without full emancipation and rights to blacks.

  I always seem to enjoy articles written from an "outside looking in" standpoint, mainly because they seem to bring up ideas that are usually different from the preconceived norm. The Northerner in "Three Months Among the Reconstructionists" paints a picture of the South that, as he says in the article, only a Northerner that has experienced the South can convey or begin to understand. I can only imagine what Northerners thought of the South after reading this. I'm sure they already thought of the South as being backward and barbaric, but this probably sealed the deal.
  To add my two cents in on the education discussion, I would argue that the lack of interest in education probably derived from both the agricultural society that the South was a part of and straight out opposition to anything the North proposed. Like Neal said, the South was focused on farming and at this time, thought they had no need for "learning." In a way, this makes sense. The South had lost so much and it would have been impractical to send the children to school when they were greatly needed to work on the farms for their family's livelihood. The straight out opposition of the South towards the North reminds me of a parent with a teenage child. No matter what the parent says, the teenager automatically disagrees.
   I found the author's reason for why it's hard to build nationality in SC to be quite interesting. He see's it's "haughty state pride" as the main factor standing in the way. I found this interesting because I think this brand of state pride is still evident to this day. For example, the state flag is plastered all over the place, from license plates, to t-shirts, to keychains and I would venture to say that Texas would probably be another state where "haughty state pride" runs rampant. Don't get me wrong, I am by no means knocking the great stat of SC. I guess I found this interesting because I'm guilty of this too(I'll admit, I've purchased the items listed above) and had never really thought of it as getting in the way of nationalism.

Additional Resources
You may want to investigate the Freedmen and Southern Society Project website (http://www.inform.umd.edu/ARHU/Depts/History/Freedman/home.html), Documenting the American South (http://docsouth.unc.edu/) and the PBS "Africans in America" site (http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/aia/).

well, i forgot to post by this morning... but i'm here now!

along with kelly and some of the others, i really enjoyed reading a first person account of reconstruction times... however, i think janna raised an interesting question in class this morning when she asked who exactly the author was. i think it would be helpful to "consider the source" when reading such an account... was the writer from upper, middle or lower middle class? had he traveled in the south previously (as a standard to compare this visit to)? where in the north was he from? why was he traveling in the south? etc. etc. etc. it seems to me that these questions would shed some light on the context of these written perceptions of the south.

something struck me immediately upon reading this "3 months" article-- the author says that northerners could speak more liberally and freely with upper class southerners than middle or lower class southerners. if this observation is truly accurate, i think it speaks volumes about the idea of a "rich man's war, but a poor man's battle." certainly the poor and middle class citizens of the confederacy would be more hestitant to embrace a northerner in their territory, because the last four years of their lives had been dictated by warfare and bloodshed. some of the upper class southerners had paid for replacements or had supported the war financially, not with their own sweat and blood. they were likely more emotionally detached from the war than the middle class citizens who had embraced the role of confederate soldier. it is no wonder then that the author felt more freedom to speak with upper class southerners-- they typically had less emotional baggage from the war that might keep them from associating with northerners.

i was slighty confused at one point in the reading-- the author makes the case that until the southern caste system is broken, liberties and union cannot be truly appreciated or enjoyed. this implies that the north was without class divisions and social mobility was prominent. how accurate is this perception to the times? what did the north look like socially during the time of reconstruction-- how rigid were class divisions? just a few thoughts to make you guys think....
one other thing struck me-- he argues that reconstruction should embrace genuine loyalty coming from the south, not forced submission. but then he precedes to talk about all the ways changes should be forced on southern sociey (the break down of caste system, establishment of educational system, etc.)-- it seems to me that the authors ideas for reconstruction WITHOUT great RESISTANCE from the south are great in ideal form, but lofty in reality. while the changes mentioned did need to be addressed, the south also simply needed TIME to recover from the blow their pride had received, before redefining their socity and way of life.

The readings for today on the issue of the freedmen was extrememly interesting and gave many varied perspectives. The first document about the african american demands seemed very educated and to display a sense of insightfulness I would not have expected to be present in a recently freed slave from South Carolina. I think these articles portray the immense challenge of bringing an entire race of people out of shackles and to equality was much more comlex than anyone thought at the time. The system of sharecropping that emerged seems good but very much an appeasement to the black people and the rich planters who hired them. It seems like not much really changed, because the planters did not want it to and the freedmen didn't have any power to make it change. The essay on the black family gave insight into the plight of the black woman especially well. I found it interesting that when black women tried to act prim and proper by imitating white women they were shunned.
Another interesting point I found in the reading last night was the shortest document which was my favorite for other reasons besides it being really short. I thought it was interesting that the woman did so much work and when she tried to take her cotton to market she was too nervous or proud or fearful to ask anyone where the market was. These documents shed much light on the extreme poverty and sadness that gripped the african american community in the postbellum period.

Like Matthew, I thought the essay on black women was particularly interesting because of its look at them adopting the values of white women, or at least trying to. It is interesting to see the prejudice in the words of white people during this time, when they refer to white non-working women as proper, while referring to black non-working women as lazy.

Also, I enjoyed the article by King. Specifically I think he echoed some sentiments as the writer of "Three Month" when he said that the system of southern dependence on import would continue as long as there was "negro ignorance." Education was the cure in the south.

Lastly, I thought it interesting that freedmen wanted nothing that even resembled slave life to be a part of their life anymore. Such as the idea of being placed back into the quarters for a living space. Even if it was tough for them to find housing they still would rather work harder that be put into anything that resembled the old way.

tonight's reading was a look into reconstruction in the south and the effects it had on the people. it covered the plight of the african american community in a changing world. the reading basically said that although black people were technically free after the war was brought to an end, they were not any better off. "freedom ain't give us notin' but pickled hoss meat an' dirty crackers an' not half enough of dat." i think that black person was tryin to say she wasn't really enjoying her freedom. the role of black women in the postwar period is covered quite thoroughly in the reading. the way they tried to emulate white women by being lazy and "lady-like." this contributed, in the eyes of some historians, to decreased production in the south. the jones essay closed with an interesting description of black families. black households, containing both kin and community, were the opposite of the typical northern household in terms of making a living. in northern society, making a living and family life were distanced from each other. black people, on the other hand, tended to stay in large familiar communities while they were making a living.

These readings were on the rebuilding of an entire part of our nation, the South, and some of the necessary changes that came with it. The black community seemed to be impacted the most by such changes, on paper at least, because males were given the right to vote. I thought it was interesting that oin the South Carolina Demands piece the author was asking simply to, "Be governed by the same laws that control other men". But at the time this was a revolutionary stance and would take almost a hundred years to fully be realized. Also, like Nicholas I found the Curtis piece interesting because it depicts how blacks after emancipation were often times not any better off, in terms of economics, than they were before it. Now granted there is much more to the issue of slavery and freedom than economics, but it seems to me that for many slaves the emancipation proclamation gave them more troubles right away then it did solutions.
Also, King's descriptions of the decline of plantations after the war was interesting because it brought to light the labor issues that the Curtis piece had indirectly talked about. King definitely had the right idea when, at the end of his piece, he talked about how the only way he could forsee the South growing back into a power would be the education of the black men. He thinks this is integral to the reconstruction process because when the black man becomes educated he will also have, "Ambition, foresight, and a desire to acquire a competence lawfully and laboriously".
Reconstruction was a period of trying to bring the North and the South back together again and it strained the society of the time but was a necessary step in the progress of our nation.

i have to disagree with you guys when you say that the black women were "imitating" white women by being lazy and ladylike. I don't think they were trying to "be" like white women in as much as they were simply exercising their freedom to fulfill their domestic duties and put family first like white women had always done instead of the needs of planters first for example. It seems that you're buying into somewhat the same notion that the white had. Jones is saying that there was a double standard. The definition of work changed accordeing to race. The double standard affected the men as well, who were criticized if their wives stayed home, this indicating that she must have some dominance over him. Still, however, at no time did black women seem to sit back and simply "enjoy the sweets of emancipation." As Jones points out, womens' actions were very complicated. Just b/c some satyed at home, doesn't mean life was easy. And I enjoyed learning about the different reasons they did stay home. I hadn't though about thr fact that white employers would still abuse the freedwomen, and that any protest on the part of the husabnd could have serious repercussions. Keeping a woman out of the fields to avoid such situations must have been reason enough.So no, I don;t think lack of ambition, or lazines, or an effort to emulate white ladies had much at all to do with the freedwomens' actions. maybe this isn't what you meant, so sorry if i misinterpreted. But that's what is sounded like.

It was interesting to see how quickly it became apparant that freedom created new problems. Freedom is of course much better than slavery, but it also is far more complicated. Education is definatly the only solution to the matter. But making the education of black people a priority for the whites is a difficult task compared to getting them to make emancipation a priority. The plight of black men after the war demonstrates how whites were fighting to end an evil institution, not to protect a race of people.

Hey - just had an observation - Speaking as Robert Brown Elliot, i thought it was interesting that "I" was questioned only once during the debate today. Seeing as how I am the only black man in the room, one would think that my opinion on the subject of reconstruction and how it affects my people would be valuable information. The fact that Thaddeus, for example, who holds many of the same opinions as myself was questioned rather than me, is indicative of the fact that blacks are not being asked what they need. My opinion is seemingly not as important and does not hold as much authority as thadeus's. Why is that? If there is not even an ideology of COMPLETE equality in actions and in mind, at this high level, how can we expect is at the state level? Here I am, representing all people, and blacks in particular, and no one is asking me to give my argument. Unbelievable!

Just remember that it was Alexander Stephens who was doing much of the questioning of Thadeus Stevens. Stephens thinks that blacks are lazy, dumb, and pretty much worthless, so of course he would not degrade himself to talk to the likes of a black man.

I would just like to comment on how interesting and informative yesterday's debate was and it helped me clear up points of the Reconstruction period for my paper. I was a little shocked because I believed, as did my group, that Andrew Johnson would have recieved more heat and questions during the debate, since there were three or four radical republicans that were against democrats. The questions seemed to be spread out among the different people. In response to Ali, I take the side with MAtthew about the reason why not many questions were asked to Robert Elliot due to his race. Whites did not trust and believe in what blacks did or thought about many issues. Therefore, Robert Elliot is not questioned and the white politicians are beacause back then they were suppossed to be more intelligent and educated about the issues. The opinion of white politicans is taken more to heart than a black mans during that period.