Teaching
Reconstruction
I have a
feeling some of my students are about to get a rude awakening. We will be
launching the second half of the US History survey course this fall for
students at my campus. I am not sure when the last time the course was offered
at this particular campus. We see a huge number of students take the first
survey course, but very few take the second one. I am hoping that after a few
rotations with the flipped classroom we will see some changes in this, but time
will tell. 
I am going
to launch the course with a double lesson plan on Reconstruction. This is
available for coverage in the first survey course, but judging by conversations
with my fellow instructors few of us actually cover it in depth. Time is always
an issue with teaching the survey courses and invariably there is always a
weather cancellation or something else that swipes one to two class dates away.
That leaves Reconstruction with less time for analysis and it needs a deep
analysis. Most instructors don’t cover the period for assessment purposes and
that pretty much eliminates any chance students will pay attention to the
lesson if there is even one held.
So with
that in mind, I decided to include Reconstruction. So much of our history goes
through Reconstruction. In fact, the national arguments over the meaning of the
confederate battle flag and memorials are tied directly to this period. It is
also the sesquicentennial of the period and in my opinion is the least known
period of American history. Actually, the entire period from the end of the
Civil War to WWI is probably a vacant mental picture for most Americans. Most
will not know anything from this period or even that the Gilded Age took place in
it. Judging by the people who think that racism only recently became a problem
in this country, I’d say the period needs to be brought up in depth.
This is the
period that the lost cause people are able to take advantage of people’s
ignorance and twist information to support their myths. Many are adherents of
the Dunning School which postulates that Reconstruction was a failure because
it violated republicanism by taking the right to vote or hold office from
southern whites. This is part of the foundation of white supremacy in America. I
tend to agree with Eric Foner that Reconstruction did not fail so much as it
was left uncompleted, partially dismantled, and left for almost a century
before the nation picked up the principles and completed it as part of the
Civil Rights Era.
To be fair,
modern historians have several competing interpretations of it, but I will be
following Eric Foner’s view. I took all three of his classes via EdX and was
quite impressed with his work. I also read through his book on the subject
which merely convinced me even more that he was on the right track. I think it
is somehow appropriate that Foner has helped revolutionize the interpretation
on Reconstruction since he teaches at Columbia which is where Dunning developed
his views a century ago.
I love what
Foner says about the enforcement of the Constitution in the Civil Rights Era.
He says no constitutional changes were needed in the Civil Rights Era other
than the poll tax. Government just needed to enforce the existing laws which
had been made in the Reconstruction period. Now this ties in with his views
with Reconstruction as the Second American Revolution. A revolution is about
changing the existing structure in a fundamental and radical way.
Reconstruction was about changing the structure of America as to include black
Americans as equal members. It met with great resistance in the South where
white supremacy united the various classes of whites and generated the lost
cause myth development as a reaction to this revolution.
It did not
fail so much as sputter to an end because the federal government chose not to
enforce the laws it had created to enact that revolution. Only when better men
came along did the reins of Reconstruction get picked up again and this time
borne to completion. Unfortunately, there are plenty of lesser men and women
with us today that would like to roll back the gains made in this revolution
and restore white supremacy. Hopefully, my class will be one that helps my
students develop an interpretation of the period that reflects the Foner views.
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