ShmoopTube

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[ musical flourish ]

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And here's your Shmoop du jour, brought to you by Reconstruction,

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the nips and tucks needed to restore a nation to its former glory.

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All right, first up, the excerpt.

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[ mumbles ]

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[ mumbling continues ]

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[ further mumbling ] 1867.

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All right, and now the question:

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How did the Reconstruction Acts

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open up political opportunities for former slaves?

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And here are your potential answers.

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[ buzzing ] [ mumbling ]

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[ mumbling continues ] All right.

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Well, after Lincoln's assassination, a group of radical Republicans

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grabbed the reigns of Reconstruction,

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laying in place some pretty,

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well, radical ideas about how a country would rebuild itself.

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So let's see which answer best describes how the

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newly restored Union got its act together.

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Did the Reconstruction Acts open up

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political opportunities for former slaves

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A - by offering former slaves equal representation in Congress?

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Hmm.

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Well, the 13th Amendment - the one that abolished slavery -

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that's what gave former slaves equal representation in Congress,

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not the Reconstruction Acts.

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And while we're on the subject, the 15th Amendment

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granted slaves the right to vote, so that knocks out both A and D.

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Could the Reconstruction Acts have opened up

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political opportunities for former slaves

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B - by requiring states in the South

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to write new state constitutions?

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Well, the Reconstruction Acts did, in fact, require

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Southern states to write new state constitutions,

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but this had more of an indirect effect on the political options

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of former slaves. So it's not B, either.

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That means the Reconstruction Acts

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opened up political opportunities for former slaves

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C - by requiring Southern states

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to ratify the Fourteenth Amendment.

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That's right. A major requirement for rejoining the Union

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was that Southern states ratify the 14th Amendment,

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which gave citizenship, and thus political opportunities,

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to former slaves. So the answer is C.

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In general, Southern leaders weren't huge fans of the Reconstruction Acts,

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but when you lose a war, well, you don't really have much of a choice.

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[ fan blows ]

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