The lopping off of the African-American experience from the rest of American history is a big reason why most whites and Americans of all races are woefully ignorant and indifferent to their own past. For many Americans, and that includes many blacks, their knowledge of the historical contributions of blacks begins and ends with Martin Luther King and Malcolm X. They still don't know that African-Americans played a major part in shaping America's institutions.
Black inventors, explorers, scientists, architects and trade unionists helped construct the foundation of American industry. Black abolitionists, religious and civil rights leaders helped shape law, politics and religion in America. Black artists, writers and musicians gave America some of its most distinctive cultural art forms. The modern day civil rights movement not only broke down the legal barriers of segregation, it also opened the door of opportunity in government, business and at academic institutions for women, minorities.
In March 1867 Congress passed the Reconstruction Act which was strengthened by three supplemental acts later the same year and in 1868. The Reconstruction acts divided the former ten Confederate states into five military districts, each headed by a federal military commander. This created a federal military occupation of the former Confederate states. (Tennessee was exempt because it had ratified the 14th Amendment and was considered reconstructed.) Before applying for readmission to the Union, the Southern states were required to ratify the 14th Amendment and revise their constitutions to ensure that blacks had citizenship rights, including the right to vote (Jacobson, 1998).
1870 the states ratified the 15th Amendment. This amendment prohibited the denial of the right to vote based on race. Finally, Congress passed the Civil Rights Act of 1875, which forbade racial discrimination in “inns, public conveyances on land or water, theaters, and other places of amusement.................
