<span>Black codes were restrictive laws designed to limit the freedom of African Americans and ensure their availability as a cheap labor force after slavery was abolished during the Civil War. Though the Union victory had given some 4 million slaves their freedom, the question of freed blacks’ status in the postwar South was still very much unresolved. Under black codes, many states required blacks to sign yearly labor contracts; if they refused, they risked being arrested, fined and forced into unpaid labor. Outrage over black codes helped undermine support for President Andrew Johnson and the Republican Party.</span>
There are all kinds of stories of hostilities between early American colonists and the Native people who were already there. However, these hostilities did not occur with every European group who came. The French are a notable exception to this, and in fact, enjoyed excellent relations with the Natives almost from the very beginning.
Why were the French different? The main reason is that they did not try to change the Natives. They also did not compete with the Natives for land. When the French first came to the Americas in the 1530s and 1540s to engage in seasonal fur trading, they immediately established strong trading ties with the local Natives they found there. The Natives already dealt extensively in furs.
The Reign of Terror came to an end, because the man who had started the Reign of Terror (Robespierre) was executed. The Reign of Terror also came to an end, because nuns had been executed because they did not want to give up their monastic vows and they were very calm during the execution, so this shifted the mood in Paris, probably making the general population realize that the mass executions were futile.
Brazil
Colombia
Cuba
Argentina
Boliva
Chile
Costa Rica
Mexico
Panama
Haiti
Peru
South Sakhalin (prewar-1945)
