The Civil Rights Act of 1866
This is the full text of the Civil Rights Act of 1866, which made freedpeople citizens.
![Historical newspaper with headline reading “civil rights bill.”](/sites/default/files/styles/dynamic_stack_296_1x/public/2022-06/image063.jpg?h=e111bd9d&itok=Y2bjiHOh)
Congress Debates the Fourteenth Amendment
Quotations from the 1866 congressional debate over the Fourteenth Amendment help students clarify what the amendment says and its significance.
![Photo of page 1 of the 14th amendment of the US Constitution](/sites/default/files/styles/dynamic_stack_296_1x/public/2022-07/Civil_Rights_1868_14th_Amendment_of_the_United_States_Constitution_%20FH21203.jpg?h=4359e9ca&itok=4j99BHvV)
Conquered (en español)
In Spanish, in an 1865 journal entry, Southerner Kate Stone mourns the Confederacy’s defeat.
![Ruins of a building and carriages.](/sites/default/files/styles/dynamic_stack_296_1x/public/2022-06/Charleston_sc_1865.jpg?h=02857a37&itok=Qup7m3tC)
A Day of Triumph
In an 1865 diary entry, Northerner Caroline Barrett White celebrates the Union’s victory and the end of the Civil War.
![People kiss and greet each other.](/sites/default/files/styles/dynamic_stack_296_1x/public/2022-06/master-pnp-ppmsca-21000-21005u.jpg?h=09123122&itok=vt-DNgbW)
A Day of Triumph (en español)
In an 1865 diary entry, Northerner Caroline Barrett White celebrates the Union’s victory and the end of the Civil War. This reading is in Spanish.
![People kiss and greet each other.](/sites/default/files/styles/dynamic_stack_296_1x/public/2022-06/master-pnp-ppmsca-21000-21005u.jpg?h=09123122&itok=vt-DNgbW)
Election Day in Clinton, Mississippi (1875)
Eugene Welborne describes the attacks and intimidations on Black voters on Election Day in 1875.
![People voting.](/sites/default/files/styles/dynamic_stack_296_1x/public/2022-06/FreedmenVotingInNewOrleans1867.jpeg?h=4bc92e92&itok=w2ULaH3x)
Election Day in Clinton, Mississippi (1875) (en español)
In Spanish, Eugene Welborne describes the attacks and intimidations on Black voters on Election Day in 1875.
![People voting.](/sites/default/files/styles/dynamic_stack_296_1x/public/2022-06/FreedmenVotingInNewOrleans1867.jpeg?h=4bc92e92&itok=w2ULaH3x)
Election Violence in Mississippi (1875)
Robert Gleeds, an African American candidate for sheriff in Lowndes County, Mississippi, describes the violence that occurred on the eve of the 1875 election.
![Cartoon showing violence and dead bodies at polling place with two men shaking hands.](/sites/default/files/styles/dynamic_stack_296_1x/public/2022-06/figure_178_Nast_vs_Greeley.png?h=a44ae31d&itok=5rVecj0T)
Election Violence in Mississippi (en español)
In Spanish, Robert Gleeds, an African American candidate for sheriff in Lowndes County, Mississippi, describes the violence that occurred on the eve of the 1875 election.
![Cartoon showing violence and dead bodies at polling place with two men shaking hands.](/sites/default/files/styles/dynamic_stack_296_1x/public/2022-06/figure_178_Nast_vs_Greeley.png?h=a44ae31d&itok=5rVecj0T)
The First South Carolina Legislature
This image shows 63 members of South Carolina’s 1868 state legislature, the first state legislature with a Black majority.
![African American and Radical Republican members of the South Carolina Legislature in the 1870s.](/sites/default/files/styles/dynamic_stack_296_1x/public/2022-06/REC_03_First_South.jpg?h=e4d64d67&itok=cL1yI8GT)