U.S. History Chapter 23 Flashcards

Amnesty Act of 1872

• Signed by President Ulysses S. Grant, it removed voting restrictions and disqualifications for most secessionists.
• Excluded approximately 500 Confederate military leaders.

Andrew Johnson and Impeachment

• Initiated a reconstruction plan, cancelled Civil War debts, and repealed secession acts.
• Impeached for violating the Tenure of Office Act by dismissing a federal official without Senate approval.

Black Codes

• Enacted in former Confederate states to restrict the rights and freedoms of African Americans.

Buffalo Soldiers

• African American soldiers who played a crucial role in displacing Native Americans during the Western Indian Wars.

Carpetbaggers

• Northerners who moved to the South after the Civil War in search of economic opportunities.

Civil Rights

• Constitutional rights ensuring equality and equal legal protection for all citizens.

Compromise of 1877

• Marked the end of the Reconstruction era and resulted in Rutherford B. Hayes becoming president.

Freedmen's Bureau

• Established to assist former slaves in education, job training, and various services during Reconstruction.

Grandfather Clause

• Laws that allowed white voters to bypass restrictions like literacy tests and poll taxes, effectively disenfranchising African Americans.

Jim Crow Laws

• Legislation that enforced racial segregation between blacks and whites.

John Wilkes Booth

• Infamous for assassinating President Abraham Lincoln.

Ku Klux Klan

• A secret organization established to eliminate African American political participation.

Military Reconstruction Act

• Divided the South into five military districts; aimed to establish loyal state governments.
• Included the Command of the Army Act and the Tenure of Office Act to limit presidential power.

Plessy vs. Ferguson

• Supreme Court case where the argument that segregation laws violated the Fourteenth Amendment's equal protection clause was rejected.

Poll Taxes

• Taxes charged as a prerequisite for voting, aimed at preventing African Americans from voting.

Radical Republicans

• Politicians advocating for severe penalties for Confederates and supporting laws that granted citizenship and voting rights to African Americans.

Reconstruction

• The post-Civil War period focused on rebuilding Southern states and reintegrating them into the Union, while abolishing slavery.

Sectionalism

• Loyalty or support for a specific region over the country as a whole.

Segregation

• The forced separation of racial groups in social and public settings.

Sharecropping

• An agricultural system where laborers worked on leased land in exchange for a share of the harvest.

13th, 14th, and 15th Amendments

• 13th Amendment: Abolished slavery.
• 14th Amendment: Defined African Americans as citizens.
• 15th Amendment: Granted African American men the right to vote.