Gonna jump into the conversation. The one thing i have to say is i think you can tell its urgently important to bring as many schoolkids as possible to come see the incredible exhibit. [ applause ] that is why am thrilled that last week the superintendent of the School District of philadelphia sat with me and announced that the School District and the Constitution Center are launching up program to bring tens of thousands of School Districts to the Constitution Center every year. Wow. [ applause ] they are calling it the Constitutional Ambassadors Program and they go seek support and the great kids are going to start to come see the civil war exhibit and see the Constitution Center and connect classrooms around the country using the virtual constitutional exchanges for our long conversations moderated by a judge or a master teacher. Wow, that is great. Its an amazing project that im so excited to share with you. It needs no introduction. He is author of the best selling book stony the road reconstruction White Supremacy and the rise of jim crow which is a companion to the pathbreaking series run on pbs. The book is superb and tells the story in more vivid detail and more powerful images that ive seen before of how the promise of reconstruction that we signed the gallery was brutally thwarted by the south and the heroic efforts of africanamerican intellectuals and others to try to resurrect that promise. We will jump right into the conversation but before we start we will see a from the series, let us watch it now. Most of us know that our country fought a civil war in the 1860s. Less is and what happened afterwards, the chaotic, exhilarating and ultimately devastating period known as reconstruction. Did you ever study reconstruction in school . A paragraph or two, we never really studied it. I didnt learn anything about reconstruction. Reconstruction was her shining moment. The second founding of our country. Overnight people who had defined as property take leadership positions in the south. This is an incredibly heady moment. But those black folks had no idea of the if they were heading towards. Reconstruction produced a violent backlash, racist backlash. I want us to tell the truth about our history, not to punish america, i want to liberate us but we can get the duration if we dont acknowledge what we dont. Do you believe that we are still undergoing the process of reconstruction . It never ended. Were still trying to go to terms to the end of slavery in this country. This is a chapter of our history thats been misrepresented and misunderstood. Its time what that we acknowledge the true story and complete the work of reconstructing america. [ applause ] thank you. I want to correct one thing that you said, you said that every school child in philadelphia could see this exhibition, every school child in america should see this exhibition. Absolutely. I learned things that id never seen the different drafts of the three reconstruction amendments and thank you to members of the board and all the people who support this marvelous center for making this education possible. We have never really dealt with the issues raised by reconstruction. Thank you so much for the and i learned so much from that interaction. Ill ask you what you learned but also what you want americans to know about the reconstruction amendments themselves. The 13th, 14th and 15th amendments. The 13th amendment abolished slavery and most people know it now because of the documentary if they didnt know it before. We will raise that the emancipation proclamation abolish slavery but of course it didnt. May be half 1 million formally enslaved people were able to get behind union lines and gain their freedom before the end of the civil war. But, the institution of slavery was only abolished by the ratification of the 13th amendment. The 14th as you said so eloquently, the equal protection clause and citizenship, do you ever wonder where birthright citizenship came from . Charles sumner and the colleagues from china try to figure out what is the status of the people whove been property for a quarter of a millennium . And, they came up with birthright citizenship which was brilliant, actually. Then, finally, is 1868 and then finally the ratification of the 15th amendment which, effectively gave black men the right to vote so that race cannot be used to prevent or prohibit any american from voting. , was very curious about the 15th amendment is that black people in the south who had been formally enslaved and freed in the 10 of the 11 Confederate States, got the right to vote three years before. This is a surprise to me, when i started doing research for what became our theories. It was a surprise for most of you that, if you were a former slave who had been free in the south, it was one of four reconstruction amendments that gave blackman the right to vote. That was what we call the first freedom summer of 1867 when the 80. 5 of all eligible black men in 10 of the 11 Confederate States registered to vote. But heres the kicker. You know how we demonize the south as opposed to the north and we have a fantasy that there was no racism in the north, if you were free you to send from three sets of free negroes as they wouldve called themselves the two sets were free by the outbreak of the American Revolution. The third set but they were free in 1823. They live 30 miles from where i was born. I have a tremendous amount of stability in my family. Now in West Virginia but it was in virginia at that time. My greatgrandfather john redman, fought in the American Revolution and because of him he was a free [ null ] and because of him my brother remember the sons of the American Revolution, go figure. [ laughter ] [ applause ] not exactly a predominately black organization, you know what im talking about x [ laughter ] so, all this in mind, West Virginia becomes a state and joins the union in the middle of the civil war. It becomes a state on june 20, 1863. My free [ null ] ancestors had cousins just across the border around winchester virginia. These cousins who have been enslaved but the right to vote three years before my free ancestors got the right to vote because of the north the white men could only vote in the five New England States in the state of new york if you satisfied a 250 property requirement. Isnt that amazing. That is so shocking but it is true. So even when West Virginia became a state they refused to give black men in West Virginia , were only talking about a handful of people, but they refuse to give them the right to vote. It was the for reconstruction acts that really laid the groundwork for citizenship and for the right to vote. Now i first studied reconstruction i didnt study at all in high school in piedmont, West Virginia. But i studied it at yale. My sophomore year i took a two semester survey course, introduction to afroAmerican History that we were afro americans at that time and caught the professor, William Mcfeely went on to get a Pulitzer Prize for his biography of ulysses s grant, he had us read w eb to voice his book, black reconstruction published in 1935. It was radical because it challenged the Dunning School at Columbia University and they were part and parcel of the mythology of reconstruction being a dismal failure and an embarrassment to the history of america and democracy. He took on the school and the chief consultant to our series its so ironic hes the leading reconstruction historian at Columbia University. Its almost as if hes about to publish his 10th book on reconstruction on the 13th, 14th and 15th amendments that will be out in december. Its a personal mission for him to refute the terribly racist claims made by the Dunning School, his own predecessors in the history of the department at columbia to set the record straight. So, mcfeely had us read the book black reconstruction and then a book by Rayford Logan. Most of you havent heard of Rayford Logan but Rayford Logan was the third or fourth black man to get a phd in history from harvard. At one time he was engaged to leticia gates, who happens to be my great aunt so im very biased about Rayford Logan. He wrote a book about the betrayal of the [ null ]. Its about the period immediately following reconstruction. Logans book begins in 1877 and that is the period of the rollback to reconstruction. But it takes a while to roll it back because blackman had an enormous amount of power, black people were the majority and almost in the majority, florida, alabama and georgia. So, there were 16 blackman elected to congress between 1870 and 1877 including two United States senators. The speaker of the house, secretary of state, he has all the reconstruction congressman on as well and systematically, stepbystep the redemption of the former confederates the south indeed rose again and they disenfranchise the blackman and they did it in such a clever way. Is started with the mississippi plan, there were state constitutions with then unfolded over the next 16 years in each of the former Confederate States. Thats when they establish poll taxes, literacy tests, comprehension tests that only allow professor could possibly understand. Do you want to know how dramatically affected the state constitutional conventions were . Louisiana, in 1898, before the constitutional convention, and had 130,000 black men registered to vote. The new constitution was ratified in 1898 and by 1904, the number of 130,000 black men registered to vote had been reduced to 1342. There were 2000 black men and elected to office during the reconstruction period. The last reconstruction congressman, George Henry White bids farewell to congress in 1901. There wouldnt be another black man elected to congress when Oscar Depriest of chicago was elected to congress, how is he elected to congress . Because all the black people to part in the great migration from mississippi to chicago and other Southern States north and because of the 15th amendment they had the right to vote. They vote northerner in to congress. So for my introduction and reconstruction its culture minute to a rollback. But the first two hours are about reconstruction and the great heights that black people believe just out of slavery in this great moment when lincolns desire for a new birth in the First Experience with interracial democracy. This was greeted by the rise of White Supremacy. The ku klux klan was invented december 18 65. There were eight massacres a major between 1866 and 1876 the starting in memphis. Starting in hamburg but this was not an untroubled period. The ku klux klan hearings and its come to a truth and reconciliation, the grants sent troops to suppress the ku klux klan and all these people had been victimized by the . Because it been trying to vote. Women were raped, black men were lynched, they were beaten, threatened and bribed or they were offered a i keep them from voting because they had so much power. I think that the manifestation and expression of all that power not only scared the daylights out of the south as you might expect but i dont think the north was ready for all that white power either. But the north was complicit as of the rollback of reconstruction. Certainly you can see signs of 1872, 1873 is called the panic now, the panic of 1873 until the Great Depression starting in 1929 it was called the Great Depression and they look around saying do we really need to protect these slaves, are they free and can they stand on their own feet, how you can enslave people for a quarter of a millennium. 250 years expect them to stand on their own 2 feet after a mere 12 years but that is exactly what happened. The president ial election of 1876 was deadlocked in 1877 the compromise to one of the agreements of the compromise was federal troops for the few remaining federal troops protecting black peoples right to vote would be withdrawn and black people would be on their own. The Supreme Court was complicit as. 1876, the decision and scholars argue about when reconstruction was over but black people basically had a funeral and a big church in washington 1883, right after the Supreme Court said that the Civil Rights Act of 1875 which established a quality, social equality, black people could write in streetcars and stay in hotels etc. The sip dream corps says that was unconstitutional richard t greener, the first black graduate all gathered in the church and the church was packed just like this. And how could the country do this and how could they do in the way that theyve done. The boy said famously if you want to think about the rise and fall of black freedom the slave went free for the brief moment in the sun and then moved back toward slavery again. That is a history of the rise in the fall of reconstruction. [ applause ] thank you for the incredibly moving recount of the rise and fall of reconstruction. And to think another funeral is held for reconstruction after the civil rights decision is stunning. You have a picture in the book of the first colored senators and representatives in new york and then what is so incredible about what you just said but the right to vote is the most important of the group because africanamericans were a majority in so many states and why the evisceration of the right to vote was the core of redemption tell us more about how the racist redemption base backlash eviscerated the right to vote for the Supreme Court decisions terrace, violence and discriminatory laws like whole taxes and literacy taxes. Sure. Could you hold up the lithograph from 1872. I dont know if you can see it. And during the depression the federal writers project they sent writers to interview former slaves. They wouldve been very young by the end of the civil war and still live in the 1930s. They found the grease covered and stated copies of 1812 lithograph. Theres jesus and Martin Luther king and others jesus, Martin Luther king and barack obama. They have the lithograph. I had to study the history of that lithograph. But we tend to forget and one was english. Robert Brown Elliott was born free in liverpool and theres so much excitement about reconstruction that elliott shows up in boston born free in liverpool, educated that hes part of the british navy, shows up in boston heres a bit of the opportunity in South Carolina goes to South Carolina, richard her making it been moved by the church from new york to revitalize mother emmanuel you know because that is where the nine martyrs but richard a harvey kane a great entrepreneur starts a black newspaper and hires elliott to work for him. Then, elliott runs for the state legislature and then for congress. When richard graduates from harvard in 1870, endless opportunities to go to new york, boston but he goes to charleston, South Carolina because that is where the action was. We cant imagine that today. We cant imagine how much promise, energy and optimism to think about it, think about what that was like if you had been enslaved up to 1865 endless horizons and then within 12 years, all gone. I was born in 1950, i often think and im sure you do too, what it wouldve been like to be black with the same capacities that we have now. You wouldnt have gone to oxford. I wouldve gone to cambridge. I wouldve gone to yale, where were you at undergraduate . Lincoln. Is historically black university, lincoln university. Right on, my brother. Of course you were. We would not of had those opportunities. And i have to imagine the heartbreak, when douglas goes to lincoln hall and makes a separate speech about the betrayal of the [ null ]. You ask, why would they do this well, what remains the leading export, cotton. Someone had to pick the cotton. You are moving from an economy where labor was free and performed by slaves and it needed to be replaced to maximize profits the form of neoslavery, sharecropping. Vagrancy laws. So three or four black men on the street could be arrested and put on the chain gang. Thats where they all come from the images of chain gangs. 300 3700 black men are lynched in the main dublin name of many accused of raping white women. As booker t. Washington pointed out, no one was accused of raping a white woman during the civil war in the south when the masters were away and the male slaves were black on the plantation. A white supremacist rhetorical superstructure. One of the most fascinating things and particularly when i was writing the book was that this was the time of americas first social media war. It was a battle between conflicted images of black people as thieves, liars, the resonated sambo art we call it. And this book is full of every chapter followed by a visual essay comprised of the horrible images which we have all seen called memorabilia now. But black skin, thick red lips, wide eyes with black pupils and wild hair. These were black men stealing chickens. Black people eating watermelon. Black people, male and female in every exaggerated and humiliated form which you can represent hundreds and hundreds of thousands of these images are produced at the fall of reconstruction a