Civil War
#8 Analyze the economic consequences of the Civil War with respect to any two of the following in the United States between 1865 and 1880. On April 9th, 1865, General Robert E. Lee, captain of the Confederate army surrendered to the Union, ending the Civil War. Though this was one of the most destructive wars in our nation's history, the repercussions the country felt economically, were drastic and contrasting. During the period known as reconstruction, which lasted from 1865-1877, the North will have a thriving economy where as the South's economy will be in shambles as a result of emancipation of the slaves. The end of slavery mainly affected southern agriculture and labor. Before the Civil War, two-thirds of the United States' exports were cotton and textile goods. The factories in the North would make textiles out of Southern cotton. A majority of Southern cotton was grown on plantations where slave lab
With the war officially ended in 1865, the slaves in the south were now free. The purpose of the Freedman's Bureau was to give food, clothing, health care, education, and find jobs for the blacks. To help the blacks, Oliver Howard founded the Freedman's Bureau. Once the slaves were emancipated, the southern system of labor was demolished, along with plantation economy. This helped the agriculture and labor situations in the south because the land was getting developed and people now had jobs. Slavery supplied the south with ample amount of free labor to take care of the plantations and keep the plantation economy booming. In conclusion, the Civil War had many direct consequences on agriculture and labor. As a result, the south's economy slowly but surely recovered. or was popularly used as a cheap way to pick and clean the cotton. Slavery was the backbone to the southern economy and without it, it would fall apart and it did after the war. This, along with the extensive damages the south faced after the civil war were why the south's economy went down the drain after the Civil War. The more common of the two was tenant farming, where a farm is rented out as opposed to sharecropping, where in return for living on the land, you give a percentage of your crops to the owner which usually add up to more than half your crops, leaving you little to sell. Frederick Douglass pointed out that the blacks "were not free" because now they were "slaves of society". This only lasted until 1872 because though its intentions were good, the Freedman's Bureau was over run with corruption.
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