Review Of The Source 'Successes, Challenges, And Outcomes Of Reconstruction'

Reader Response The text I selected tells me many things of the successes, failures, challenges, and outcomes of Reconstruction, however, to even begin to understand or comprehend how it does this, one must first know what this source is about. This source is an excerpt from a sermon in New Orleans, that was delivered to the people of the First Presbyterian Church on December 29th, in, ‘the year of our Lord,’ 1860. The sermon was carried out by a man named Benjamin Morgan Palmer, who, based upon the site I viewed this source, was a doctor. I can infer from that information that he was an educated man and, ‘wise,’ man, so to speak, for being both educated and the leader of a church, in New Orleans. This excerpt is a very short excerpt from
Underneath this list of things lies the fact that a success of Reconstruction was a sort of union of ideas and perspectives in both the North and South, considering how, based upon my prior knowledge of Reconstruction, there was segregation in both the North and the South. Using this knowledge, I can infer that, even in it’s most basic state, many Northerners and Southerners would agree to more or less of this excerpt for Dr. Benjamin’s sermon. The reason being is due to the fact that this concept is widely by a majority of whites, some of whom truly thought this was the best for the black race. The section of the text that says, “By nature the most affectionate and loyal of all races beneath the sun, they are also the most helpless; and no calamity can befall them greater than the loss of that protection they enjoy under this patriarchal system,” only justifies and proves that what I am stating is true. However, though the majority of the white race believed this concept, they were still oblivious to the fact that blacks were extremely mistreated and fall short of this dream due to the barrier between the races. I generally feel nothing about this fact, however, further contemplation on the subject, I realize that I feel sympathetic for both the white and black race, the whites for some of
In fact, some of the cruel things that whites inflicted on blacks were caused by the blacks. In the text, Benjamin states that, “With the fairest portion of the earth in their [the blacks’] possession and with the advantage of a long discipline as cultivators of the soil, their constitutional indolence has converted the most beautiful islands of the sea into a howling waste,” Benjamin displays a hint of fear that some whites were having about the blacks, about how the blacks could ruin a number of different things by just being lazy and not utilizing their discipline in farming, though to an exaggerated angle. Dr. Palmer truly believes that blacks should best utilize their skills in farming, hence the title of the source, “The Black Race is Fit for Servitude.” The whites were afraid, in a way, of the blacks, because they feared for change, and the change from blacks being slaves to blacks being citizens was unbearable in their eyes, blacks being equal to whites even more so. This is the reason why many people, like Dr. Benjamin Morgan