2/12/12

This week in History we finished up learning about the Radical Republican plan for Reconstruction. To finish uup this section, we had an essay test. The prompt for this essay was based on whether the Radical Republican Reconstruction plan was successful or not. In my essay, I wrote about how it was unsuccessful. My first proof on how it was unsuccessful was that the Black Codes were created, which took away the social and political rights that were wanted for African Americans. This took them away by setting up strict curfews, labor contracts, vacancy laws,etc that could all result in a form of slavery for African Americans. Another point I had was that African Americans were not given the right to vote because a law was put in order only allowing people to vote if their grandfather could vote, meaning African Americans could not vote because their grandfathers were slaves and slaves were not allowed to vote. Lastly, African Americans were segregated from whites, meaning they were not socailly acceptable. I found the Radical Republican Plan for Reconstruction was a very interesting topic to learn about.

In English this week we got much farther in To Kill a Mockingbird. The book has started to become very interesting at this point because we are getting into the court scene. In Capther 17 we are introduced to Bob Ewell, who gives his testimony in court saying that Tom raped Mayella and that she was beaten and had a black eye. In chapter 18 we are introduced to Mayella Ewell who starts crying and making a fuss on the stand even though she is almost 20. In Chapter 19 Tom gives his side of the story which is given very honestly and he sounds like a polite, innocent young man. After reading the court scenes, I beleive that Tom is innocent and really that Mr Ewell just beat Mayella because she talked to Tom a lot.

A connection I made this week was that Mayella was treated like an African American under the Black codes. Her father did not want her out fraternizing with colored people, so he made sure she stayed in their dump of a home all the time, just like how African Americans under the black codes were given curfews. Mayella not being able to talk to Tom because he was a colored man was like how people were segregated under the Jim Crow laws.