Thirteenth Amendment to the Constitution, which outlawed slavery,
discrimination was so ingrained that a black person had a very
difficult time getting a job, finding a home, and supporting a family.
The Fifteenth Amendment to the Constitution gave black men
over 21 years of age the right to vote, but in many places in Illinois
local laws and fear kept black men from voting. The slaves were
free, but even in Illinois, the home of Abraham Lincoln, they did
not have equal rights with white citizens.
Problems for
Native American
people increased
after the Civil War
as pioneers moved
west and settled on
their homelands.
Much blood was
shed because white
settlers and the
United States
government failed
to honor the rights
of the native people
and uphold treaties.
By the end of the
1830s, the Miami,
Peoria, Kickapoo,
and other Illinois
tribes had relocated
farther north, south,
and west. As settlers
began moving west
after the war, they
again came into
conflict with
peoples of the Illini Confederation, eventually pushing many of
the native tribes into Oklahoma where the Peoria and Miami remain
today. The struggle between the native people, settlers, and the
federal army was violent and led to great injustices to the Indians.
Chicago, as well as the rest of Illinois, was a major supplier
of goods to the settlers moving west. The city had developed as a
major manufacturing and railroad center during the Civil War
because the Mississippi River had been closed to trade by the war.
discrimination
treating individual
people badly be-cause
of a decision
that all people in that
group have some
bad quality or char-acteristic
treaty, treaties an
legal agreement
between groups of
people or govern-ments
Illini Confederation
The Illini Confedera-tion
consisted of the
Cahokia,
Michigamea,
Kaskaskia, Peoria,
and Tamaroa tribes.
A confederation is
composed of groups
of people who share
a common culture,
language, or purpose
and work together for
the good of the
larger group.
Injustice, injustices
unfairness; injury
Delegation of Iowa’s, Sacs and
Foxes from Nebraska to Washington:
Tar-a-kee, Pe-ti-o-ki-ma, Lag-er-lash,
Too-hi, Date: 1866 Creator A.
Gardner. Courtesy Abraham Lincoln
Digitization Project, Northern Illinois
University,<http//Lincoln.lib.niu.edu>.
