Battle for Olustee

Greetings, this week we will continue exploring race relations and black labor during Florida's reconstruction period, the use of convict labor in southern states, and segregation.  The attitudes of Southerners would be a determining factor in a successful relationship between white men and freedmen (Day 2004, 3). Ultimately, the end of slavery caused numerous problems both for former confederates, as well as freedmen and abolitionists. Initially, the maintenance of status was of key importance to race relations in Florida: the dominant class did not want to relinquish control over resources, of which one was slavery (Ibid, 8).  In Florida, white businesses and landowners sought to maintain the pre-War status quo and were the dominant enactors of legislation. Dr. Christopher Day describes this as the "Holy Trinity" of race relations: political control, labor [and] property control, and violence (Ibid, 9).  The legalization of race relations may have been a result of fear-...

The goal of the Republican party after the Civil War was to ensure political stability and maintain Reconstruction laws in Southern states.  Florida was one of several formerly Confederate states to be occupied by Union forces well after the end of the Civil War. Southern White attitudes about Black Freedman were not positive. Wealthy and influential Democrats often sought to prevent Freedman from owning land or establishing themselves permanently.  Northern policy initially encouraged Unionism among the southern population. At the time, Republicans believed that reintegrating rebellious states into the Union would be easy. Union loyalists were installed in Florida to support sectional reintegration. Military rule was supposed to end July 4, 1868 but then-Governor Harrison Reed requested Union troops to stay fearing intense White resentment. The presidential election of 1876 marked the end of Reconstruction. Florida, Louisiana and South Carolina disputed the election between D...