Reconstruction was the period of repair after the civil war. It was to repair the North and South, politically, socially, and economically. It was to rejoin the South back into the union, because it had succeeded during the civil war. President Lincoln wanted to let the South come back to the union and make them pay for it, however the radical republicans wanted to make the South pay for succeeding in the first place and causing the union all the problems. During this period of time many people suffered from the great amount of property damage done to such things as farms, factories, railroads and several other things that citizens depended on to keep their economy strong. Some of these economic hardships included destruction of the credit system. Reconstruction was a dark era of total failure in the government’s attempts to create a truly democratic society. When the black slaves were freed under the Emancipation Proclamation, Congress passed three new amendments. Despite the importance of the Emancipation Proclamation, it did not obliterate the bonds of slavery in the United States. That task was accomplished by the Thirteenth Amendment to the Constitution. This amendment was recommended in 1864 by Lincoln, passed by the Congress in early 1865, and approved by three-quarters of the states by December 1865, and thereafter abolished slavery throughout the country (Burns 1). It was necessary to abolish slavery because the Emancipation Proclamation only freed slaves in the confederate states and was a wartime document, which may have been invalid after the war ended. Through this amendment “The shackles which had so long bound the slave and his ancestors, fell from him, and he stood forth a free man, entitled to all the rights and privileges of free persons of color. He can no longer be bought and sold; husband and wife, parent and child, can no longer be separated by the will of the master.” according to a resident of Tennessee in 1865" (Williamson 654). Even though slavery was abolished it still allowed the use of inmate labor “Neither slavery nor involuntary servitude, except