The World Remade: Freedom, Reconstruction, and Counter Revolution
1866–1902

After the Civil War, Mississippi faced its next great challenge—creating a society not built on racial slavery. Voters approved the 1868 Constitution that formally ended slavery and affirmed Black voting rights, allowing the state to rejoin the Union in 1870. By 1890, White Democrats had regained political control and passed a new state constitution that disfranchised black Mississippians.

The end of slavery destroyed the established social, economic, and political order. Plantations, once worked by thousands of enslaved African Americans, now employed White, Black, and immigrant sharecroppers and tenants. These laborers produced millions of cotton bales, saturating the market and depleting nutrients from the land. Unfair practices often drove sharecroppers into debt. Educational and professional opportunities expanded for women and African Americans, but poverty and repression persisted. New immigrant groups arrived, but they faced persistent discrimination.