Jim and Della both really love each other and sacrifice something that is very important to them (Della sacrifices her long hair and Jim sacrifices his golden watch) just so they could give each other a present for Christmas.
The purposes of the two passages are different. The first passage is biographical and contains quotes that reflect Grady's feelings about Reconstruction. The second passage is a personal essay which directly states the author's feelings about Reconstruction.
you can say something like a prominent leader came and said that there will be scholarships to students who are going through poverty and some of the rich pupils started bullying the ones who are on scholarship