This 1899 photograph of students at the Hampton Institute in Virginia was taken by Frances Benjamin Johnston. It is from Artstor.org.
1.) Why did Reconstruction fail? Who was president and why was he a failure in regards to Reconstruction? Should the Southern leadership have been punished? Refer to the “Disenfranchisement” section of your lessons in week two.
2.) It is surprising to see that so many black office holders existed in the South, just as Reconstruction was starting to fail. In what states did they hold office? But, then the situation changed and they were no longer in office. How were African Americans disenfranchised? What states had the worst voting rights laws? How did these states get away with doing this?
3.) Plessy v. Ferguson is one of the most famous Supreme Court cases in U.S. history. What happened in the case and what precedent did it set? Your chapters have an entire section on the legal system. Find your chapters under “lessons”. Be sure to incorporate that information in your answer (so expand on more than just the Plessy decision).
4.) The Buffalo Soldiers as a group had mixed feelings about participating in the Spanish American War. Who were the Buffalo Soldiers who fought in this war? What were the controversies about?
If you pick this question, start by referencing your lessons/text and here: https://www.nps.gov/prsf/learn/historyculture/buffalo-soldiers-and-the-spanish-american-war.htm
Please read:
Students,
I know how tempting it is to use a generic internet source (like Blackpast or History.com) but don’t. Use the textbook, articles from the library at APUS, or other scholarly sources written by historians. I will take off points for poor sources. You are not required to cite in the discussions but you ARE required in the essays.
1) These kinds of sources aren’t scholarly
2) They do not have the context that our book has, missing this context will hurt your knowledge of the material. They are sometimes inaccurate, too.
So, what happens is – your knowledge is watered down and you don’t get all of the context and details that I want you to get. So, don’t use it! Make sure to read the actual textbook, or sources from our wonderful APUS library. You can use Google Scholar if you how. Only use sources written by historians (sources with credit to authors), and that are preferably peer reviewed. If you want me to post more sources, I can. You may use the Library of Congress or National Parks website, but anything else should have an author and be a scholarly source. I do expect everyone to read the textbook/lessons each week and your posts should reflect that.
Also, I post during the week in response to you all. I offer additional sources to read in some of those posts, as well. I also ask further questions and guide the discussion, so read my posts, please. You are responsible for using Word or another software to edit for spelling, grammar, and punctuation before you post.
You are required to cite in the essays, but not the regular discussion forums.
More: do not critique the answers of your classmates, please. You can ask questions to clarify or offer another perspective based on something that you read, or just add more information, but avoid traditional critiques.
In reply posts, to make them substantive, feel free to do a bit of extra research online or in the library, if that helps you to find things to write. Use the text, as your base, of course. Watch your writing errors, try using Word to edit, as I noted above.
