It is difficult to find fault with this outstanding, four-part PBS series on the complex topic of Reconstruction in the post-Civil War years.
The strength of the program is in the insightful commentary of the scholars. Their words took the viewer into the world of the 1860s and '70s when the Reconstruction period attempted the dual objectives of returning the defeated Southern states to the Union and the landmark passing of the 13th, 14th, and 15th Amendments that assigned Constitutional civil rights to the freed slaves.
The program traced the developments from the tragic end of Reconstruction and the long period in the late-nineteenth century that was a devastating setback to the post-Civil War efforts. It was multiple abhorrent rulings of the United States Supreme Court, such as the reversal of the Civil Rights Act of 1875 in the 1883 court ruling and Plessy v. Fergusson in 1896, that sealed the doom of Reconstruction.
If there was any shortcoming to the series, it was the implication that the United States continues to be a deeply racist society. There are moments in the program that suggest that nothing has changed since the mid-nineteenth century. This approach marginalizes the heroic stand taken by the Republic Congress in the late 1860s that overturned Andrew Johnson's initial and unsatisfactory approach to Reconstruction.
There is no doubt that the slavery issue was the most pressing issue of the nineteenth century in America. And there has been no nation in human history that has been as successful as this nation in developing a tolerant society unlike any other on the planet. Along the way, there have been disgraceful moments and often slow progress. Of course, more work always likes ahead. But the story of ending slavery, then instituting a set of legal rights is one of the most positive attributes of the history of the United States of America.
The strength of the program is in the insightful commentary of the scholars. Their words took the viewer into the world of the 1860s and '70s when the Reconstruction period attempted the dual objectives of returning the defeated Southern states to the Union and the landmark passing of the 13th, 14th, and 15th Amendments that assigned Constitutional civil rights to the freed slaves.
The program traced the developments from the tragic end of Reconstruction and the long period in the late-nineteenth century that was a devastating setback to the post-Civil War efforts. It was multiple abhorrent rulings of the United States Supreme Court, such as the reversal of the Civil Rights Act of 1875 in the 1883 court ruling and Plessy v. Fergusson in 1896, that sealed the doom of Reconstruction.
If there was any shortcoming to the series, it was the implication that the United States continues to be a deeply racist society. There are moments in the program that suggest that nothing has changed since the mid-nineteenth century. This approach marginalizes the heroic stand taken by the Republic Congress in the late 1860s that overturned Andrew Johnson's initial and unsatisfactory approach to Reconstruction.
There is no doubt that the slavery issue was the most pressing issue of the nineteenth century in America. And there has been no nation in human history that has been as successful as this nation in developing a tolerant society unlike any other on the planet. Along the way, there have been disgraceful moments and often slow progress. Of course, more work always likes ahead. But the story of ending slavery, then instituting a set of legal rights is one of the most positive attributes of the history of the United States of America.