Summary
Highlights
The video introduces the 'New South' concept (1877-1898) as a period after the Civil War. Henry Grady, editor of The Atlanta Constitution, coined the phrase, advocating for economic diversity, industrial growth, and laissez-faire capitalism to 'North-ify' the South.
Southern cities and industrial centers grew, with southern states surpassing New England in textile manufacturing. Population and railroad growth matched or exceeded other regions. However, this industrialization was isolated, with much of the South remaining agricultural, heavily reliant on sharecropping, which often resembled a new form of slavery.
After the Compromise of 1877, federal troops withdrew from the South, leading to widespread racial segregation. The 1896 Supreme Court case Plessy v. Ferguson upheld 'separate but equal' facilities, legalizing racial segregation through Jim Crow Laws that separated all facets of society. These facilities were often far from equal.
Black people lost their gains from Reconstruction, being forbidden from juries or public office. Lynching became common, with over a thousand black people violently lynched in the 1890s as a form of vigilante justice outside the law.
Significant resistance emerged. Ida B. Wells, a black newspaper editor, fought against lynching and Jim Crow Laws despite threats. Henry Turner founded the International Migration Society to help Black Americans migrate to Africa. Booker T. Washington advocated for economic self-sufficiency rather than direct political struggle, a controversial approach given the systemic disadvantages.