Freedom War

Freedom War was the name the slaves used for the Civil War.

Emancipation Proclamation

Abraham Lincoln signed the Proclamation on January 1, 1863. It decreed that all slaves in the eleven Rebel states were free. It was not until January of 1865 when the North was obviously winning that the Congress passed it as the Thirteenth Amendment. The Thirteenth Amendment freed the slaves everywhere instead of just the thirteen Rebel states. It took another year to fully ratify the amendment.

Black Codes

The Black Codes were introduced to stop all the old slave labor from leaving the plantations and becoming part of a wandering people or those who made up shanty towns in the cities. Some of the code was based on vagrancy laws of the Northern states. If the Black Codes were broken, the black person became part of some place that needed his labor. These Codes were...