Why did the south reject the 14th amendment?

1 Answer
Jan 10, 2017

The south rejected the 14th Amendment because it gave freed African Americans citizenship rights, civil rights, and other rights. (See Explanation:)

Explanation:

These are some of the provisions of the Fourteenth Amendment and why the South rejected them.

1)Established national citizenship for those who are either born or naturalized in the United States. The South was not really happy with this because they didn't want their ex-slaves to now be citizens and have the same rights as they did.

2)Prohibited any state from depriving a citizen of their civil rights or equal protection under the law. This is similar to point #1. This gave protection to African Americans against people trying to target them (which was some of the time southerners).

3)Reduced state representation in the House of Representatives by the percentage of adult African American citizens denied the right to vote. This made the South really angry because if they did deny African Americans vote (which they sometimes did), then their say in the House of Representatives would decrease.

(But they eventually found a way around this by placing literacy tests and requiring voters to pay a poll tax. They knew newly-liberated slaves were not literate nor did they have money to pay a tax.)

Hope this helps!