D2.His.2.9-12: Analyzing Change and Continuity in a Historical Era

Overview

Lesson Procedure

70-85 minutes of class time across 5 phases.

1. Warm-Up10 minutes
2. Direct Instruction20-25 minutes
3. Guided Practice15-20 minutes
4. Independent Practice15-20 minutes
5. Closure10 minutes

1. Warm-Up10 minutes

   Warm-Up Prompt

   "A school replaces its old rule book with a new one, but the same staff enforce it and many old habits stay. Six years later, a historian asks: what really changed? List three kinds of evidence the historian should look at, other than the new rule book."

   Collect answers: what people did, who held power, how long the new rules lasted, how different groups felt. Introduce the four measures from the overview (depth, breadth, durability, perspective) and the idea of an era: a span of time that historians treat as a unit because a set of changes and conflicts defines it. Pose the lesson question: How much did the Reconstruction era change the South, and for whom?

2. Direct Instruction20-25 minutes

   Part 1: The matrix. Hand out a matrix with four rows (law, labor, education, politics) and three columns (evidence of change, evidence of continuity, analysis using the four measures). Explain that historians analyze an era by working across such a grid, not by listing events: a single event can sit in a "change" cell for one group and a "continuity" cell for another.

   Part 2: Read Source 1. Gloss "involuntary servitude" (forced labor), "jurisdiction" (legal authority), "abridge" (cut short) and "due process of law" (fair legal procedures). Model the first worked example.

   AMENDMENT XIII

   Passed by Congress January 31, 1865. Ratified December 6, 1865.

   [...]

   Section 1.

   Neither slavery nor involuntary servitude, except as a punishment for crime whereof the party shall have been duly convicted, shall exist within the United States, or any place subject to their jurisdiction.

   [...]

   AMENDMENT XIV

   Passed by Congress June 13, 1866. Ratified July 9, 1868.

   [...]

   Section 1.

   All persons born or naturalized in the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the United States and of the State wherein they reside. No State shall make or enforce any law which shall abridge the privileges or immunities of citizens of the United States; nor shall any State deprive any person of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law; nor deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws.

   [...]

   AMENDMENT XV

   Passed by Congress February 26, 1869. Ratified February 3, 1870.

   Section 1.

   The right of citizens of the United States to vote shall not be denied or abridged by the United States or by any State on account of race, color, or previous condition of servitude--

   [...]

   Part 3: Read Source 2. Carl Schurz was sent by President Johnson to report on five Southern states in 1865; the Senate printed his report. Gloss "freedman" (a person freed from slavery), "ordinance" (a local law), "barter" (trade goods without money) and "corroborate" (confirm). Model the second worked example, then the third with Source 6 (printed in Independent Practice) and the fourth with Source 4 (Guided Practice).

   1That the result of the free labor experiment made under circumstances so extremely unfavorable should at once be a perfect success, no reasonable person would expect. Nevertheless, a large majority of the southern men with whom I came into contact announced their opinions with so positive an assurance as to produce the impression that their minds were fully made up. In at least nineteen cases of twenty the reply I received to my inquiry about their views on the new system was uniformly this: "You cannot make the negro work, without physical compulsion." I heard this hundreds of times, heard it wherever I went, heard it in nearly the same words from so many different persons, that at last I came to the conclusion that this is the prevailing sentiment among the southern people. There are exceptions to this rule, but, as far as my information extends, far from enough to affect the rule. In the accompanying documents you will find an abundance of proof in support of this statement. There is hardly a paper relative to the negro question annexed to this report which does not, in some direct or indirect way, corroborate it.

   [...]

   2Clearer and more significant was the ordnance passed by the police board of the town of Opelousas, Louisiana. (Accompanying document No. 34.) It deserves careful perusal. Among a number of regulations applying exclusively to the negro, and depriving him of all liberty of locomotion, the following striking provisions are found:

   3Section 3. No negro or freedman shall be permitted to rent or keep a house within the limits of the town under any circumstances, and any one thus offending shall be ejected and compelled to find an employer or leave the town within twenty-four hours. The lessor or furnisher of the house leased or kept as above shall pay a fine of ten dollars for each offence.

   4Section 4. No negro or freedman shall reside within the limits of the town of Opelousas who is not in the regular service of some white person or former owner.

   5Section 8. No freedman shall sell, barter or exchange, any articles of merchandise or traffic within the limits of Opelousas without permission in writing from his employer, or the mayor, or president of the board.

   [...]

   6It is true, an "organization of free labor" upon this plan would not be exactly the re-establishment of slavery in its old form, but as for the practical working of the system with regard to the welfare of the freedman, the difference would only be for the worse. The negro is not only not permitted to be idle, but he is positively prohibited from working or carrying on a business for himself; he is compelled to be in the "regular service" of a white man, and if he has no employer he is compelled to find one. It requires only a simple understanding among the employers, and the negro is just as much bound to his employer "for better and for worse" as he was when slavery existed in the old form. [...]

   • Law: a deep change in form (Source 1)

     What did the Thirteenth Amendment change, and what question does its wording leave open?

     Result: Section 1 states: "Neither slavery nor involuntary servitude, except as a punishment for crime whereof the party shall have been duly convicted, shall exist within the United States." Depth: deep in law, since the Constitution now forbade slavery everywhere in the country. Analysis: the words "except as a punishment for crime" are an exception. Mark them as a question for later evidence; nothing in this lesson's sources shows how the exception was used.

   • Labor: change in form, continuity in substance (Source 2)

     How did the town of Opelousas try to control freedpeople's work after slavery ended?

     Result: Section 4 of the ordinance says "No negro or freedman shall reside within the limits of the town of Opelousas who is not in the regular service of some white person or former owner." Schurz judges that such a system "would not be exactly the re-establishment of slavery in its old form, but as for the practical working of the system with regard to the welfare of the freedman, the difference would only be for the worse." Analysis: the legal form changed (no one was owned), but the substance, control of Black workers' movement and labor, continued.

   • Education: a change that lasted (Source 6)

     What does Du Bois say South Carolina's 1868 constitution did for schooling, and did it last?

     Result: Du Bois writes that "eleven sections of the Tenth Article were devoted to the establishment of a complete public-school system," and that the state "lived twenty-seven years under it without essential change." Durability: high. Perspective: Du Bois, writing in 1910, lists "Free public schools" among the "three things which negro rule gave to the South," in his words. Students should note that this is his argument, built on his reading of the state constitutions.

   • Politics: a contested change (Sources 4 and 5)

     How did the Civil Rights bill of 1866 become law, and what does that show about the era?

     Result: Johnson told the Senate that the bill "contains provisions which I can not approve consistently with my sense of duty to the whole people and my obligations to the Constitution of the United States" (Source 4, paragraph 1). Source 5 reports that the bill "was passed over his veto." Analysis: the change in federal law came through open conflict between the President and Congress. Perspective: the veto shows that leaders at the top of the government disagreed about how far the change should go.

3. Guided Practice15-20 minutes

   Pairs read Source 3 (Schurz on education) and Source 4 (Johnson's veto) and add at least one entry to each matrix row from them. For each entry they write which measure (depth, breadth, durability or perspective) their analysis uses. Gloss "acquiesced" (accepted without protest), "federative system" (the division of power between the national government and the states) and "penal offence" (a crime).

   1It would seem that all those who sincerely desire to make the freedman a freeman in the true sense of the word, must also be in favor of so educating him as to make him clearly understand and appreciate the position he is to occupy in life, with all its rights and corresponding duties, and to impart to him all the knowledge necessary for enabling him to become an intelligent co-operator in the general movements of society. As popular education is the true ground upon which the efficiency and the successes of free-labor society grow, no man who rejects the former can be accounted a consistent friend of the latter. It is also evident that the education of the negro, to become general and effective after the full restoration of local government in the south, must be protected and promoted as an integral part of the educational systems of the States.

   2I made it a special point in most of the conversations I had with southern men to inquire into their views with regard to this subject. I found, indeed, some gentlemen of thought and liberal ideas who readily acknowledged the necessity of providing for the education of the colored people, and who declared themselves willing to co-operate to that end to the extent of their influence. Some planters thought of establishing schools on their estates, and others would have been glad to see measures taken to that effect by the people of the neighborhoods in which they lived. But whenever I asked the question whether it might be hoped that the legislatures of their States or their county authorities would make provisions for negro education, I never received an affirmative, and only in two or three instances feebly encouraging answers. At last I was forced to the conclusion that, aside from a small number of honorable exceptions, the popular prejudice is almost as bitterly set against the negro's having the advantage of education as it was when the negro was a slave. There may be an improvement in that respect, but it would prove only how universal the prejudice was in former days. Hundreds of times I heard the old assertion repeated, that "learning will spoil the [...] for work," and that "negro education will be the ruin of the south." Another most singular notion still holds a potent sway over the minds of the masses--it is, that the elevation of the blacks will be the degradation of the whites. [...]

   [...]

   3Education.--That the negroes should have come out of slavery as an ignorant class is not surprising when we consider that it was a penal offence to teach them while they were in slavery; but their eager desire to learn, and the alacrity and success with which they avail themselves of every facility offered to them in that respect, has become a matter of notoriety. The statistics of the Freedmen's Bureau show to what extent such facilities have been offered and what results have been attained. As far as my information goes, these results are most encouraging for the future.

   1I regret that the bill, which has passed both Houses of Congress, entitled "An act to protect all persons in the United States in their civil rights and furnish the means of their vindication," contains provisions which I can not approve consistently with my sense of duty to the whole people and my obligations to the Constitution of the United States. I am therefore constrained to return it to the Senate, the House in which it originated, with my objections to its becoming a law.

   [...]

   2[...] Four millions of them have just emerged from slavery into freedom. Can it be reasonably supposed that they possess the requisite qualifications to entitle them to all the privileges and immunities of citizens of the United States? [...]

   [...]

   3In all our history, in all our experience as a people living under Federal and State law, no such system as that contemplated by the details of this bill has ever before been proposed or adopted. They establish for the security of the colored race safeguards which go infinitely beyond any that the General Government has ever provided for the white race. In fact, the distinction of race and color is by the bill made to operate in favor of the colored and against the white race. They interfere with the municipal legislation of the States, with the relations existing exclusively between a State and its citizens, or between inhabitants of the same State--an absorption and assumption of power by the General Government which, if acquiesced in, must sap and destroy our federative system of limited powers and break down the barriers which preserve the rights of the States. It is another step, or rather stride, toward centralization and the concentration of all legislative powers in the National Government. The tendency of the bill must be to resuscitate the spirit of rebellion and to arrest the progress of those influences which are more closely drawing around the States the bonds of union and peace.

   4My lamented predecessor, in his proclamation of the 1st of January, 1863, ordered and declared that all persons held as slaves within certain States and parts of States therein designated were and thenceforward should be free; and further, that the executive government of the United States, including the military and naval authorities thereof, would recognize and maintain the freedom of such persons. This guaranty has been rendered especially obligatory and sacred by the amendment of the Constitution abolishing slavery throughout the United States. I therefore fully recognize the obligation to protect and defend that class of our people whenever and wherever it shall become necessary, and to the full extent compatible with the Constitution of the United States.

   5Entertaining these sentiments, it only remains for me to say that I will cheerfully cooperate with Congress in any measure that may be necessary for the protection of the civil rights of the freedmen, as well as those of all other classes of persons throughout the United States, by judicial process, under equal and impartial laws, in conformity with the provisions of the Federal Constitution.

   Teacher prompts: Schurz writes from the point of view of a Northern official who favored free labor and schooling; what does he notice that a Southern planter might not have reported? Johnson writes as a president defending his veto to the Senate; what does he accept as already changed, and what does he defend as unchanged? Keep the focus on what each source shows about the era, not on judging the writers as people.

4. Independent Practice15-20 minutes

   Students read Source 5, the editor's chronology of 1865-1866, and Source 6, Du Bois's article of 1910. They complete the matrix and add a fifth column, "Did it last?", using Diagram 1 and Source 6. Then they answer the quiz, which uses Sources 1-6.

   [...] From May 29 to July 13, 1865, proclaimed provisional governors for North Carolina, Mississippi, Georgia, Texas, Alabama, South Carolina, and Florida, whose duties were to reorganize the State governments. The State governments were reorganized, but the Republicans claimed that the laws passed were so stringent in reference to the negroes that it was a worse form of slavery than the old. The thirteenth amendment to the Constitution became a law December 18, 1865, with Mr. Johnson's concurrence. The first breach between the President and the party in power was the veto of the Freedmen's Bureau bill, in February, 1866, which was designed to protect the negroes. March 27 vetoed the civil-rights bill, but it was passed over his veto. In a message of June 22, 1866, opposed the joint resolution proposing the fourteenth amendment to the Constitution. In June, 1866, the Republicans in Congress brought forward their plan of reconstruction, called the "Congressional plan," in contradistinction to that of the President. The chief features of the Congressional plan were to give the negroes the right to vote, to protect them in this right, and to prevent Confederate leaders from voting. [...]

   1In the midst of all these difficulties the negro governments in the South accomplished much of positive good. We may recognize three things which negro rule gave to the South:

   21. Democratic government.

   32. Free public schools.

   43. New social legislation.

   5Two states will illustrate conditions of government in the South before and after negro rule. In South Carolina there was before the war a property qualification for office-holders, and, in part, for voters. The Constitution of 1868, on the other hand, was a modern democratic document starting (in marked contrast to the old constitutions) with a declaration that "We, the People", framed it, and preceded by a broad Declaration of Rights which did away with property qualifications and based representation directly on population instead of property. It especially took up new subjects of social legislation, declaring navigable rivers free public highways, instituting homestead exemptions, establishing boards of county commissioners, providing for a new penal code of laws, establishing universal manhood suffrage "without distinction of race or color", devoting six sections to charitable and penal institutions and six to corporations, providing separate property for married women, etc. Above all, eleven sections of the Tenth Article were devoted to the establishment of a complete public-school system.

   6So satisfactory was the constitution thus adopted by negro suffrage and by a convention composed of a majority of blacks that the state lived twenty-seven years under it without essential change and when the constitution was revised in 1895, the revision was practically nothing more than an amplification of the Constitution of 1868. No essential advance step of the former document was changed except the suffrage article.

   7In Mississippi the Constitution of 1868 was, as compared with that before the war, more democratic. It not only forbade distinctions on account of color but abolished all property qualifications for jury service, and property and educational qualifications for suffrage; it required less rigorous qualifications for office; it prohibited the lending of the credit of the state for private corporations—an abuse dating back as far as 1830. It increased the powers of the governor, raised the low state salaries, and increased the number of state officials. New ideas like the public-school system and the immigration bureau were introduced and in general the activity of the state greatly and necessarily enlarged. Finally, that was the only constitution ever submitted to popular approval at the polls. This constitution remained in force twenty-two years.

   [...]

   8A thorough study of the legislation accompanying these constitutions and its changes since would of course be necessary before a full picture of the situation could be given. This has not been done, but so far as my studies have gone I have been surprised at the comparatively small amount of change in law and government which the overthrow of negro rule brought about. There were sharp and often hurtful economies introduced marking the return of property to power, there was a sweeping change of officials, but the main body of Reconstruction legislation stood.

5. Closure10 minutes

   Exit ticket: Complete this sentence twice, once for change and once for continuity: "In the Reconstruction era, ___ changed (or continued) for ___, as shown by ___ (Source, paragraph), and the change was deep / shallow and lasting / short-lived because ___."

   Teacher note on the sources: The sources are quoted exactly. They use the words "negro," "freedman" and "colored," which were standard in their time; the lesson itself uses "freedpeople" and "Black Southerners." Source 3 omits a racial slur inside a quotation that Schurz reports hearing; the cut is marked [...]. Schurz also describes freedpeople in ways that reflect the prejudices of his own time, even as he argues for their education; discuss this openly. Source 1 dates the ratification of the Thirteenth Amendment to December 6, 1865, and Source 5 says it "became a law December 18, 1865"; Question 3 asks students how to handle the difference, and its answer explains both dates. Source 5 is a short editor's summary that sometimes runs two steps together; the answer to Question 12 gives the correction. Du Bois wrote in 1910 against the view, then common among historians, that the Reconstruction governments had been failures; his title answers that view. Present his article as one historian's argument from the documents: many later historians have supported its main points, and students should weigh it as an interpretation, not as settled fact. "Negro rule" was a phrase used by opponents of Reconstruction, and Du Bois takes it up to argue the opposite case. The Reconstruction governments were biracial: Black officeholders served with white Republicans, and they held a majority only in South Carolina's lower house. The lesson treats the political parties of the 1860s only as history.

Differentiation Strategies

Assessment Guidance

1. Question 1 of 20 · Multiple Choice

   Which amendment in Source 1 defines who is a citizen of the United States?

   AThe Thirteenth, in its ban on slavery BThe Fourteenth, in its first sentence CThe Fifteenth, in its voting clause DNone of them defines citizenship

2. Question 2 of 20 · Multiple Choice

   According to Source 1, about how long passed between Congress passing the Fourteenth Amendment and its ratification?

   AAbout six months BAbout one year CAbout four years DAbout two years

3. Question 3 of 20 · Multiple Choice

   Source 1 says the Thirteenth Amendment was "Ratified December 6, 1865," while Source 5 says it "became a law December 18, 1865." What is the best way to analyze the difference?

   AAsk whether the two dates mark different steps, and check other records BAccept Source 5, because it was printed closer to the events in time CAccept Source 1, because the National Archives never makes errors of any kind DTreat the difference as proof that neither of the two sources can be trusted

4. Question 4 of 20 · Multiple Choice

   Schurz says that "In at least nineteen cases of twenty" Southern men gave him the same answer (Source 2, paragraph 1). What percentage is that?

   A19 percent B90 percent C95 percent D99 percent

5. Question 5 of 20 · Multiple Choice

   Which of these is NOT a provision of the Opelousas ordinance as Schurz quotes it in Source 2?

   ANo freedman may rent or keep a house in the town BNo freedman may live in town unless in a white person's service CNo freedman may trade goods in town without written permission DNo freedman may attend a school inside the town limits

6. Question 6 of 20 · Multiple Choice

   According to Schurz in Source 3, paragraph 2, what answer did he get when he asked whether Southern legislatures or county authorities would provide for the education of freedpeople?

   AHe "never received an affirmative" BMost said they would vote for schools CThey said the army should pay for schools DThey said schools already existed for all

7. Question 7 of 20 · Multiple Choice

   According to Source 3, paragraph 3, why had freedpeople come out of slavery without schooling?

   ATheir former owners had sent them to work in the North BTeaching enslaved people had been a crime CThey had refused to attend plantation schools DSchools in the South had all closed during the war

8. Question 8 of 20 · Multiple Choice

   In Source 3, paragraph 1, how does Schurz connect education to the change from slavery to free labor?

   AHe says education would lead freedpeople to leave the South for the North BHe says free labor could succeed in the South without any public schools at all CHe says popular education is the ground on which free-labor society grows DHe says the planters on each estate should decide who receives an education

9. Question 9 of 20 · Multiple Choice

   In Source 4, paragraph 3, what does Johnson claim the Civil Rights bill would do?

   AMake race operate in favor of the colored race BReturn the Southern states to direct rule by the United States Army CAbolish the Freedmen's Bureau along with all of the schools it supported DEnd the Thirteenth Amendment's ban on slavery in the Southern states

10. Question 10 of 20 · Multiple Choice

    Which change does Johnson accept as settled in Source 4, paragraph 4?

    AVoting rights for all men regardless of race BFederal control over state courts and juries CCitizenship for all persons born in the United States DThe freedom of those once held as slaves

11. Question 11 of 20 · Multiple Choice

    In Source 4, paragraph 2, Johnson writes that "Four millions of them have just emerged from slavery into freedom" and asks whether they "possess the requisite qualifications." What kind of argument is this?

    AA claim that slavery should be restored in the Southern states BA claim that freedpeople were not yet ready for citizenship CA claim that the Constitution forbids Congress to make new citizens DA claim that Congress had already made the freedpeople citizens

12. Question 12 of 20 · Multiple Choice

    According to Source 5, what were the chief features of the "Congressional plan" of reconstruction in 1866?

    APardons for Confederate leaders and an end to the Freedmen's Bureau BProvisional governors chosen by the President to lead each Southern state CThe vote for freedmen, protected, and no vote for Confederate leaders DA return of all land in the South to the people who owned it before the war

13. Question 13 of 20 · Multiple Choice

    According to Source 5, what was "The first breach between the President and the party in power"?

    AHis proclamation of provisional governors in 1865 BHis concurrence in the Thirteenth Amendment CHis message opposing the Fourteenth Amendment DHis veto of the Freedmen's Bureau bill in 1866

14. Question 14 of 20 · Multiple Choice

    According to Du Bois in Source 6, paragraph 5, how did South Carolina's 1868 constitution change who could hold office and vote?

    AIt added a property test for voters BIt did away with property qualifications CIt limited voting to those who owned land DIt kept the rules from before the war

15. Question 15 of 20 · Multiple Choice

    Du Bois says that when South Carolina revised its constitution in 1895, "No essential advance step of the former document was changed except the suffrage article" (Source 6, paragraph 6). What does this show?

    AContinuity in most provisions, with a change in voting rules BA complete break with everything in the constitution of the Reconstruction years CNo change at all between 1868 and 1895 DA return to the constitution from before the war

16. Question 16 of 20 · Multiple Choice

    In Source 6, paragraph 8, what does Du Bois say surprised him?

    AHow completely the old laws of the slavery years came back into force BHow quickly the new public schools of the South were closed down CHow small the change in law and government was after the overthrow DHow few officials were replaced when power changed hands

17. Question 17 of 20 · Short Answer

    Compare what Schurz found about education in 1865 (Source 3) with what Du Bois describes in the 1868 state constitutions (Source 6). Analyze the change between them by depth and durability, and say whose actions the sources credit for it.

    Show model answer

18. Question 18 of 20 · Short Answer

    Using Source 4, identify one change that Johnson accepted and one continuity he defended. Then analyze how his position shaped the debate over the era, using Source 5.

    Show model answer

19. Question 19 of 20 · Short Answer

    Du Bois describes an "overthrow" of Reconstruction governments, yet says "the main body of Reconstruction legislation stood" (Source 6, paragraph 8). Was the end of Reconstruction a break or a continuity? Analyze, and name one kind of evidence Source 6 does not give that would help.

    Show model answer

20. Question 20 of 20 · Short Answer

    Was the Reconstruction era more an era of change or of continuity for freedpeople in the South? Answer using at least three sources written from at least two different perspectives.

    Show model answer

These standards connect to D2.His.2.9-12: prerequisites to review first, parallel standards at the same level, and next steps that build on it.

Standard text: National Council for the Social Studies (NCSS), The College, Career, and Civic Life (C3) Framework for Social Studies State Standards: Guidance for Enhancing the Rigor of K-12 Civics, Economics, Geography, and History (Silver Spring, MD: NCSS, 2013). NCSS was not involved in the production of this lesson and does not endorse it.