EOTO2 Reax

Reconstruction, Two Ways: What Went Right and What Went Wrong

When two student groups tackled the Reconstruction era, one examined its successes and the other its failures. Watching from the audience, I came away with a fuller picture of a complicated period and a clear sense of which presentation helped me follow it best.

Group One: A Positive Outlook

The first group opened with the three Reconstruction Amendments. The 13th, passed in 1865, abolished slavery nationwide and freed about four million people. The 14th, in 1868, established birthright citizenship, equal protection, and due process, overturning the 1857 Dred Scott decision. The 15th, in 1870, barred states from denying votes based on race. Its effects included Black men serving in Congress, about 2,000 Black officeholders, and new public schools. The 15th Amendment was my biggest takeaway, since I had mostly focused on the 14th before.

The group also covered the first Black members of Congress. Hiram Revels, a minister and Union chaplain, became a U.S. senator from Mississippi in 1870. Joseph H. Rainey, born enslaved, became the first Black U.S. representative, elected directly by his constituents in South Carolina. Education was another theme: Howard, Fisk, Hampton, and Tuskegee were founded as education became a symbol of freedom. They also explained “40 acres and a mule,” which came from Sherman’s Special Field Order No. 15, a temporary wartime measure.

Group Two: Negative Effects

The second group turned to the era’s failures. They traced the Wilmington Massacre, in which a biracial government built by Black citizens and a fusion alliance of Republicans and Populists was overthrown in a political coup. They also examined the withdrawal of federal troops after the Compromise of 1877, which settled the disputed Hayes-Tilden election.

The group described Lincoln’s assassination as a major setback, since he had planned an approach for bringing Southern states back into the Union. Andrew Johnson’s conflicts with Congress then made Reconstruction harder. This was the part I learned the most from, because I hadn’t grasped how devastating that loss was.

Other topics included the Black Codes, first passed in Mississippi in November 1865 and adopted by nearly every Southern state by 1866. They granted some rights, like marrying and suing in court, but with conditions. The group also covered the rise of the KKK, which began in Tennessee as a social club for former Confederate soldiers before turning violent in 1868, and closed with voter suppression.

My Verdict

Both groups taught me something, but their delivery differed. Group One was organized, well paced, and clear, making it easy to take notes. Group Two summarized their information well on the slides, but their presentation ran long. Most presenters were quiet and hard to hear, and they seemed to rush to stay on time.

I preferred Group One because it was easier to follow and hear. Still, Group Two’s focus on setbacks gave me a fuller understanding of Reconstruction. Together, the presentations showed me an era of real progress and real loss.

AI DISCLOSURE: AI was used to create this blog post. I asked Claude AI to create a blog post in a journalistic style based on the notes and reactions I typed out in a google doc during the two presentations. I told Claude AI not to use any outside sources to create the blog post and to only use the notes that I made to create the blog post. I then copied the blog post Claude AI generated and pasted it into blogger.com. Lastly I rewrote any mistakes it made in the post and added pictures.

Plessy vs. Ferguson Trial

 

Separate but “Equal”: The Train Seat That Reshaped America

Homer Plessy bought a first-class ticket, boarded a train in New Orleans, and sat down. That’s it. That one small act ended up before the U.S. Supreme Court.

He wasn’t an ordinary passenger, though. Plessy was seven-eighths white and one-eighth of African descent, and he agreed to take part in a planned test case against Louisiana’s Separate Car Act. The law required equal but separate accommodations for white and non-white passengers, with a $25 fine or 20 days in jail for sitting in the wrong car. The group behind the challenge even hired a private detective to make sure Plessy was arrested for violating the Act. 

The Legal Case

Plessy’s lawyers argued that the law violated the Thirteenth and Fourteenth Amendments. The Court

ruled 7-1 against him in May 1896. Justice Henry Brown’s reasoning went like this: the Fourteenth Amendment guaranteed political equality, but it was never meant to force social equality or a mixing of the races. He also argued that if separation felt like a badge of inferiority, that was only because Black Americans chose to read it that way. 

The Precedents

Defenders of the law didn’t just make this up on the spot. Brown leaned on Roberts v. City of Boston, where the Massachusetts high court held that Boston could set up separate schools for Black children. Brown pointed out that the Congress that wrote the Fourteenth Amendment knew about that ruling and didn’t try to undo it. There was also a Supreme Court case from 1890 involving a Mississippi law that required railroads to provide equal but separate cars, and the Court accepted the state court’s reading that it covered only travel within the state. The argument boiled down to this: segregation wasn’t some Southern oddity, because even abolitionist Massachusetts had signed off on a version of it. 

The Religious Argument

Here’s the part that surprises people. Brown’s opinion was built on law and “reasonableness,” not scripture. But in the wider public debate, plenty of segregation’s defenders reached for the Bible. Their favorite passage was Acts 17:26, which says God made all nations “of one blood” and also set “the bounds of their habitation.” The pitch was that God Himself had drawn lines between peoples, and Babel proved it. Defenders also pointed to churches that already worshiped in separate congregations as proof that separation and faith could coexist.

Opponents had real answers. Abolitionist preachers had long read “one blood” as a statement about shared humanity, not about hierarchy. Others pointed to Galatians 3:28, which says there’s neither Jew nor Greek in Christ. And Black churches often formed as a response to exclusion, not simple preference.

The Lone Dissent

Justice John Marshall Harlan dissented, writing that the Constitution is color-blind and tolerates no classes among citizens. It was a lonely position in 1896, but it’s the one history vindicated. 

What Happened Next

Plessy stayed the law of the land until 1954, when Brown v. Board of Education overturned it. Nearly six decades of “separate but equal” proved that separate was almost never equal. Studying the arguments for segregation, religious ones included, isn’t about endorsing them. It’s about understanding how respectable-sounding reasoning once held up an unjust system.

AI DISCLOSURE: AI was used to create this blog post. I first asked Claude AI to research about the Plessy vs. Ferguson case. I then told it to find arguments for segregation at that time based on religion. Next I told it to create a blog post on it's findings. I then copied the blog and pasted it into blogger.com. Lastly I read over the blog in case I wanted to make any changes, added the sources that Claude gave me, and added pictures before publishing it. 

Town Hall Post

 

 Elizabeth Cady Stanton Speech

Good evening,

My name is Elizabeth Cady Stanton, and I stand before you today as a woman who has dedicated her life to the pursuit of liberty, justice, and equality for all people.

I was born in Johnstown, New York, in 1815. As a young woman, I witnessed laws that denied women basic rights. Women could not vote, had little control over their property, and were often treated as if their voices did not matter. These injustices inspired me to spend my life fighting for change.

In 1840, my husband and I attended the World Anti-Slavery Convention in London. There, I witnessed

another form of discrimination when women delegates were denied the right to participate simply because they were women. That experience strengthened my resolve to challenge inequality wherever it existed.

Eight years later, with Lucretia Mott and other courageous reformers, I helped organize the Seneca Falls Convention, the first women's rights convention in the United States. There, I wrote the Declaration of Sentiments, declaring that "all men and women are created equal" and demanding equal rights, including the right to vote.

But the struggle for women's rights was closely tied to another great cause of our time: the abolition of slavery. Many women who fought for equality were also active in the anti-slavery movement. We believed that no human being should be owned, controlled, or denied freedom because of race or gender. The fight against slavery taught us that injustice anywhere threatens justice everywhere.

Throughout my life, I worked alongside abolitionists and reformers who sought to end the cruel institution of slavery. After the Civil War, I continued advocating for equal rights and citizenship for all Americans. While our movement sometimes faced disagreements and challenges, our goal remained clear: a nation where freedom and opportunity belong to everyone, not just a privileged few.

Today, I ask you to remember that progress is never achieved by silence. It is achieved when ordinary people are willing to stand up for what is right. Whether confronting slavery in the past or inequality in any form today, we must have the courage to speak, act, and demand justice.

Let us continue the work of building a society where every person, regardless of race or sex, is treated with dignity, equality, and respect.

Thank you.

AI DISSCOLSURE: A.I was used to create this blog post. For this assignment I was told to use an A.I. tool to create a Town Hall speech on Elizabeth Cady Stanton. I told Claude A.I. to do research on Elizabeth Cady Stanton and create a speech for a Town Hall Meeting as her. I then took the speech and copied is into blogger.com.

Trial/EOTO Reax Post

Reflecting on Our Mock Trial: State v. Mann and the Machinery of Injustice

Last week, half of our class staged a mock trial revisiting State v. Mann, the 1829 North Carolina Supreme Court case that still stands as one of the starkest illustrations of how slavery corrupted the law itself. Part of our class argued for John Mann's innocence, and the other part argued for his guilt, and watching both sides build their cases gave me a new appreciation for how legal reasoning could be twisted to serve an unjust system.

For those unfamiliar with the case: in 1828, John Mann, a bankrupt sea captain in Edenton, North
Carolina, had rented an enslaved woman named Lydia from her owner, a minor named Elizabeth Jones. When Lydia committed a minor offense and tried to flee a whipping, Mann shot and severely wounded her. A local jury convicted him of assault and battery, reasoning that since he only hired Lydia rather than owned her, he had no right to inflict such violence. Mann appealed, and Justice Thomas Ruffin overturned the conviction, ruling that hirers and enslavers alike could not be criminally punished for assaulting the people they held in bondage.

What struck me most during our trial was how the "not guilty" side constructed a genuinely coherent argument—not because the underlying premise was just, but because it followed the internal logic of a slaveholding society with chilling consistency. Their argument echoed Ruffin's own reasoning: that slavery could only function if the enslaver's authority was total and unquestionable. As Ruffin himself wrote, "the power of the master must be absolute, to render the submission of the slave perfect." Hearing my classmates voice that logic aloud, even in the context of a debate exercise, was uncomfortable in a productive way. It forced me to sit with how ordinary legal language could be marshaled to defend something monstrous.

The "guilty" side, meanwhile, grounded their argument in ideas that feel almost self-evident to us now: that inflicting grievous bodily harm on another person, regardless of their legal status, should carry consequences. But what made their argument compelling wasn't just moral appeal—it was their use of the original jury's reasoning about the limits of a hirer's authority, showing that even within 1828's legal framework, a narrower and more humane ruling was possible. Ruffin's decision wasn't inevitable; it was a choice.

I left the trial with a clearer sense of why State v. Mann became such a rallying point for abolitionists. It
didn't just describe an act of violence—it codified a legal principle that stripped away any pretense of protection for enslaved people. Our class's reenactment didn't soften that reality; if anything, hearing the arguments spoken aloud, by people my own age, made the case feel less like a distant historical footnote and more like a warning about how easily law can be bent to rationalize cruelty when a system depends on it.

AI DISCLOSURE: AI was used to create this blog post. For the blog, I was assigned to take note on a mock trial of the State vs. Mann Supreme Court Case. I then took those notes and copied and pasted them into Claude AI and asked it to create a blog post from my notes and the history of the State vs. Mann case. I then took the blog it created and copied it into blogger.com. I read through the blog it created and fixed some of the information it wrote about. Lastly I added pictures to the blog post.

8 Values of Free Expression

What the Most Important Value is to Our Citizens Right Now?

We have 27 ratified Amendments in the U.S. constitution in total. Out of all of those Amendments, Freedom of Speech happens to be our very first one. I believe Freedom of Speech is our first amendment for a reason and because of its importance. It allows the American people to express themselves through the 8 values it holds. 

Going through each of the 8 values, I reflected on which one I think is the most significant right now in our society. 

Knowing all that I know about the violent acts our Government has made, I believe that the most essential

value we have right now is Value 5- Check on Governmental Power. This value states "As Watergate, Irangate, Clintongate and all the other ‘gates’ demonstrate, freedom of the press enables citizens to learn about abuses of power — and then do something about the abuse at the ballot box if they feel so moved. We, along with the press, are part of the check-and-balance system to restrain government power and abuse of power." 

This allows us to see all the uncivil ways our government has used their power, and go against the actions our government has made that many people believe are wrong. This makes this value essential to our society today because of the many illegal and terrible things the Government did and is currently doing.

After reading the AP News article titled “Trump administration caps how long international students can stay in the US” by journalist Annie Ma, I learned about how the Trump Administration recently “finalized a rule that will prevent international students from staying in the U.S. for more than four years” unless they are given permission to stay longer by the government. This means that the government has changed the rule our constitution already had, and did it in such a way for them to obtain more power by adding more restrictions to international students and by having to “ask permission” from the Government to stay longer.

This new rule the government has made is a huge problem for international students because it gives them significantly less flexibility than the past rule. This includes things such as when and how a student can go about changing their major or academic program. 

The new rule is also stricter on how long international students are allowed to be admitted in the U.S. for college. In the past, international students were allowed to stay “as long as it takes to complete the academic program, many of which are longer than four years by design.” This means that the restrictions on how long international students can stay in the states might make it harder for them to earn a masters degree or go to graduate school. Many school administrators are opposed to the new rule and have stated that the “action is unnecessary and duplicative.”

The Trump Administration also terminated many international students legal status in the states, revoking

the visas of “More than 1,200 international students at U.S. colleges, universities and university systems” according to the AP News article “International students stripped of legal status in the US are piling up wins in court” by the journalist Kate Brumback. Many students are now in fear of being deported by the Trump Administration. Many of the students’ visas were targeted by the State Department because of the student’s opinions and actions against the U.S. government, including protesting against the war in Gaza. This can be seen as illegal because international students are being punished for using their freedom of speech in ways the government does not like. This is also known as the “chilling effect” and it is unconstitutional.

This problem has undoubtedly made it harder for international students to earn their education for a future career. 

In my personal experience I have seen some of my friends struggle with this new rule. One of my friends who is an international college student from the Bahamas has talked to me about how she is scared to go home to her family on holiday breaks because she is unsure that she will be allowed back in the states to attend her college. Due to this, she has ultimately decided to stay in the U.S. without her family during the breaks. I find this very upsetting because my friend is just a college student like me and she unfortunately has to be alone in the U.S. without ever going home to her parents because she fears not being allowed to come back to school, and it’s all because of the new rule our government has shamelessly created.

This demonstrates how important our 5th value is now more than ever because the government’s new rule on international students is only one of the many ways the government has abused their power. The 5th value is one of the only ways the American people can take the power back and stop the government from using their power unconstitutionally. It allows the press to write to U.S. citizens about what the government has been doing so that people can then take what they found and vote against it and prevent it from happening further. 

Bible Team Challenge

The Bible Allows slavery

After reading an article titled The Bible is clear: God endorses slavery, by the publisher Michael Pahl I found that there are about seven passages in the bible that talk about how God accepts slavery.

Law of Moses

In the New Revised Standard version of the Old Testament, readers notice many quotes from the bible that show that God permits slavery. For example in Exodus 21:2-11 it reads “When you buy a male Hebrew slave, he shall serve six years”, showing that you are allowed to buy a person and use them for labor. 

Both the Old and the New Testament both describe how harshly slaves were treated including being beaten, but received little to no consequences for how they treated them.

The Israelites are Oppressed

In Exodus 1:1-22 It talks about how the Egyptians owned Israelite slaves to hold power over them, but later the Israelites left Egypt and had their own laws. 

While coming up with rules that are concerning slavery, in Leviticus 25:44-46 God talks about what the Israelites are allowed to do, saying, “As for the male and female slaves whom you may have, it is from the nations around you that you may acquire male and female slaves. You may also acquire them from among the aliens residing with you and from their families who are with you who have been born in your land; they may be your property. You may keep them as a possession for your children after you, for them to inherit as property. These you may treat as slaves, but as for your fellow Israelites, no one shall rule over the other with harshness.” 

This demonstrates that Israel was permitted by God to own foreign slaves, and that owning slaves was a sign of God’s blessing.

Religious Argumentation Against Slavery

In the Christian Bible, Exodus 21:16 states that “And he that stealeth a man, and selleth him, or if he be

found in his hand, he shall surely be put to death.”  This means that, in the views of the bible, whoever takes a person should be put to death, whether the victim is sold or kept by the thief.

This presents a clear outline against the slave trade, by condemning the taking of people and selling them into slavery (as property to somebody else).

Another source regarding abolition and religion going hand in hand is “The Black Hearts Of Men” by John Stauffer.  This text examines the lives of 4 radical abolitionists; two black, and two white.  Talking about the division of race and how these men overcame racial and social barriers to work toward the end of slavery and racial oppression, Stauffer writes that these men unite “…in order to usher in a kingdom of God on earth.”  This describes how these four religious men all believe in their union under Christ, adding to the idea that the bible believes in the equality among men, regardless of skin color or social status.

In the same way as the Christina Bible, the Islamic Quran also has verses about slavery and its religious stigma; Quran 24:33 and Philemon 1:16: “And those who seek a contract [for eventual emancipation] from among whom your right hands possess — then make a contract with them if you know there is within them goodness and give them from the wealth of Allah which He has given you”

This passage outlines the moral obligation to free a slave if they contract to do so, and you find them a (man) of good faith.  Though it does not directly oppose slavery it is evidence of the Islamic religion and the morals it promotes being empathetic towards slavery, releasing one's slaves, and also demotes the kidnapping of people for slavery. 

Conclusion and reflection:

After looking at the two opposite sides in which religion views slavery, we can clearly see that in the eyes of religion there is no objectively “correct answer” to slavery.  Religious texts show empathy to slaves and condemn poor treatment of slaves, but at the same time they never teach followers to not practice slavery. And in ways promote slavery.  This does make sense though; because religious texts are meant to be interpreted by the reader and are not written law, we will not be able to find a concise answer for or against slavery.

AI DISCLOSURE: I used Claude AI to help me find versus and sources so that I could research more on how the Bible talks about slavery. Claude AI did not help me or my partner write our blog. I also added the pictures and formatted the blog myself without the use of AI.

The Firing of Shots at Fort Sumter

  The Shots That Started a War: Fort Sumter, April 1861

CHARLESTON HARBOR, S.C. — It began before dawn.

At 4:30 a.m. on April 12, 1861, a single mortar shell arced over Charleston Harbor and burst above Fort Sumter. The Civil War had started.

The shell came from Confederate batteries ringing the harbor. Inside the fort, Union soldiers braced for what came next.

A Standoff Months in the Making

The crisis had been building since South Carolina seceded from the Union in December 1860.

By February, six more Southern states had followed. Together they formed the Confederate States of America.

Most federal military posts in the South were surrendered without a fight. Fort Sumter was different.

Major Robert Anderson, commanding a small garrison of about 85 men, refused to abandon the island fortress. He and his troops held their position, cut off and low on supplies, through the winter.

South Carolina's new Confederate government wanted the fort evacuated. President Abraham Lincoln, only weeks into his term, wanted it resupplied.

That collision of wills set the stage.

Lincoln's Calculated Move

Lincoln faced a dilemma. Send troops or weapons, and he risked triggering war. Do nothing, and the fort would eventually be starved into surrender.

He chose a middle path.

Lincoln notified South Carolina's governor that he intended to send food only — no arms, no reinforcements — to the starving garrison.

It was a political maneuver as much as a military one. If the Confederacy fired first, the blame for war would fall on them.

Confederate President Jefferson Davis and his commanders understood the stakes just as clearly.

The Bombardment Begins

Confederate General P.G.T. Beauregard, once a student of Anderson's at West Point, commanded the forces surrounding the fort.

On April 11, Beauregard demanded Sumter's surrender. Anderson refused, though he noted his men would soon be starved out regardless.

Confederate officials rowed out for one final answer overnight. When none satisfied them, they issued their orders.

At 4:30 a.m., the guns opened fire.

For 34 hours, Confederate batteries pounded the fort from multiple directions. Anderson's men returned fire, but they were badly outgunned and running low on ammunition.

Fires broke out inside the fort. Smoke filled the barracks. Supplies dwindled further.

Remarkably, no one was killed in the exchange of fire itself.

Surrender and Aftermath

By the afternoon of April 13, Anderson recognized the position was untenable. He agreed to surrender.

On April 14, Union forces evacuated the fort. As they fired a 100-gun salute to the American flag, an accidental explosion killed two soldiers — the first fatalities connected to the fight.

News of the attack spread quickly by telegraph across the country.

Lincoln responded on April 15 by calling for 75,000 volunteer troops to suppress what he termed an insurrection.

The call forced a reckoning in the states that had not yet seceded. Virginia, Arkansas, North Carolina and Tennessee soon joined the Confederacy rather than supply troops against fellow Southerners.

Why It Mattered

Fort Sumter settled nothing about slavery, states' rights, or the future of the Union. Militarily, it was a minor engagement.

Politically and symbolically, it was decisive.

The attack transformed a simmering political crisis into open warfare. It unified Northern public opinion behind the war effort and pushed the Upper South into the Confederate camp.

Four years of civil war followed. More than 600,000 Americans would die before it ended.

It all traced back to that first shell, fired in the dark over Charleston Harbor.

AI DISCLOSURE: AI was used in creating this blog post. I was assignmed to find out about the firing of shots at Fort Sumter. I used Claude AI to find research on the firing of shots at Fort Sumter and create a blog from what it found. I then copy and pasted what Claude gave me into the blog post. I then edited the text and added pictures to the blog.