The post-civil war role of the federal government concerning race relations seemed solely to be the ensurance of the freedom of slaves. The government followed through with this action despite the large blow to the southern economy. To support slaves, the federal government passes three pro- African American Reconstruction amendments. The 13th abolished slavery, the 14th gave slaves the right to be citizens, and the 15th gave African Americans the right to vote. The government had completely changed since before the civil war and during the reconstruction, was very antislavery. However Southerners soon found ways to slide around these amendments. Slavery was abolished but soon after the sharecropping system was established providing African Americans with essentially the same future. Even after the 15th amendment was passed African Americans were still denied the right to vote by such state laws as poll taxes, literary tests, and grandfather clauses (only applying to blacks). The federal government simply chose to ignore these actions. This ignorance simply showed a limited amount of power.
In the post-Civil war era, the federal government’s role in westward expansion was greatly changed. Previous to the civil war, all issues of expansion became federal government issues. The Missouri compromise and later the Kansas and Nebraska compromise which both required federal government aid to help determine expansion based on slavery. After the abolition of slavery the western frontier was not so severely