discussion, response, extra

discussion:
Each of your posts must be a minimum of one paragraph in length and follow the stated guidelines. Creative and original thinking are always appreciated, as is going outside of the required reading to find information pertaining to your posts. The intent of the discussion board prompt/post exercise is to stimulate critical thinking and intellectual discourse. In other words, just relating what happened or what someone did is not enough to earn full credit. You must show cause and effect: because X happened, Y occurred, and because Y occurred, Z resulted. To successfully do this in only one paragraph, you must really analyze the prompt, then deconstruct it to find the essence of the question that must be answered. Choose your words carefully. Before you do anything, the first question you must ask is “Why did Professor Keller ask this question?” This week you are again required to use, and correctly cite, at least one outside source in your original response to a prompt. Remember to only use your own words!

1. Why did Lincoln wait for the northern victory at Antietam to announce the Emancipation Proclamation?

response :
After the war, some groups that belonged to the south began to agree with and work with other groups in the North. Unfortunately the North, being the one to win the war, had other people in the South that did not agree with the standards and laws that the North implicated. For example, in Created Equal we read, “Soon after the war’s end, southern white vigilantes launched a campaign of violence and intimidation against freed people who dared to resist the demands of white planters and other employers.” (Jones 375) This was a group called the Ku Klux Klan. The Ku Klux Klan was a group of veterans from the war that severely pushed white supremacy. We see this group giving us a direct example of how retaliation was taken from a southern group to a northern group. I believe groups like these were sour because they lost the war and lost their free labor. They took to violence because they were angry and they fed off each other in the group, thus greatly strengthening their violence and hatred. Basically we see a pattern of disagreements over the Blacks and slavery. For example, according to the Library of Congress, ‘By directly mentioning the role of the states, the 14th Amendment greatly expanded the protection of civil rights to all Americans and is cited in more litigation than any other amendment.” (http://www.loc.gov/rr/program/bib/ourdocs/14thamendment.html) The 14th Amendment guaranteed previous slaves rights and citizenship. After it was passed we see some officials disagree with it and go way out of their way to try and persuade the states to ratify the Amendment. Again in Created Equal we read, “Back in Washington, Johnson vetoed the Fourteenth Amendment, traveling around the country and urging the states not to ratify it.” (Jones 375) These are just a couple of examples of how the North did not with all of the hearts of the people in the South.

extra:
This semester we have journeyed through history from the pre-Columbian Era to 1877 and learned about all kinds of things both wonderful and horrifying. Each week you have had to think critically about what you have learned from a plethora of sources, and to express your thoughts succinctly. Not an easy task by any means, but one I believe you have enjoyed. One of my students in another class told me that the way I teach history is unorthodox and that’s why she has come to love something that she has hated since elementary school. I took that as the highest compliment she could have given me. So in honor of what you have accomplished in the past eight weeks, please tell me and the rest of your classmates about something you learned this semester that you found interesting, intriguing, surprising, or disturbing, and why. Your post should be a minimum of one paragraph in length. Create your own thread and put your topic in the subject line. This extra credit opportunity is worth 10 points!!!! I have a feeling we’ll all have fun with this.