Chicago-Kent Law Review Volume 70 Issue 3 Symposium on the Law of Freedom Part Article 6 II: Freedom: Beyond the United States April 1995 The Making of Federal Enforcement Laws, 1870-1872 - Freedom: Political X1 Wang Follow this and additional works at: https://scholarship.kentlaw.iit.edu/cklawreview Part of the Law Commons Recommended Citation X1 Wang, The Making of Federal Enforcement Laws, 1870-1872 - Freedom: Political, 70 Chi.-Kent L. Rev. 1013 (1995). Available at: https://scholarship.kentlaw.iit.edu/cklawreview/vol70/iss3/6 This Article is brought to you for free and open access by Scholarly Commons @ IIT Chicago-Kent College of Law. It has been accepted for inclusion in Chicago-Kent Law Review by an authorized editor of Scholarly Commons @ IIT Chicago-Kent College of Law. For more information, please contact
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[email protected]. THE MAKING OF FEDERAL ENFORCEMENT LAWS, 1870-1872* XI WANG** The Fifteenth Amendment represented the highest achievement of the Republican party's Reconstruction politics. By prohibiting the national and state governments from depriving citizens of the right to vote on the basis of race, color, and previous condition of servitude, the Amendment conferred suffrage on newly emancipated African- American men, thus constitutionalizing the principle and practice of black suffrage which was first established in early 1867. Black partici- pation in Reconstruction not only helped to consolidate the outcomes of the Civil War and congressional Reconstruction, but it also rede- fined the course of American democracy. In order to maintain the vitality and validity of the Fifteenth Amendment, the Republican party had to permanently and effectively implement that Amendment in the South, where anti-black suffrage forces mounted high.